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It's a dumping ground for the rest of Canada including the GTA ... we should deport the homeless back to the cities where they're from.

The cities surrounding the Toronto harass the homeless into leaving their city as to get them to move to Toronto.

It's time for Toronto to return the favour and kick the homeless out of the city.

It hurts our economy - including tourism.

one of the main reasons why many homeless go to big urban centers is because of the lack of resources in smaller cities.

It's freaking out of hand, much worse than London -- way freaking worse.

^I would'nt go that far.

It is getting a bit much though and there is little excuse for it. People can always find work, it just isn't going to be good paying or pleasent work.

Just back form London -- 3 or 4 times bigger than Toronto- so, on a 'per capita' basis, Toronto has FAR MORE homeless -- even from a flat out looking around (OK, I was not just in the west end, where, no doubt, the cops keep 'em moving. )

Homelessness in Toronto is truly, and most tragically, 'world class.' OK, not Mexico or Brazil bad -- but freaking bad.
I have an answer "tag and release' inject with anti- flu, anti hepatitis, and if needed, anti psychotic drugs. Push them into social services. And if they just want to stay on the streets, let them.-- more later.

^I'm sure that the homelessness situation is not as bad as you think. All the homeless people live in a very small area in and around downtown and are more noticable than say homeless in London.

It is also as I have said, most homeless people have no excuse for being so. It is a choice.

most homeless people have no excuse for being so.

Really? Never knew that.

What are the other choices?

Insane asylum?
Jail?
Potter's Field?
Igloo?

Without downplaying homelessness, because I do believe it is a social crisis in our society, especially in large urban centres, but to say Toronto is "overrun" is a bit much. Every large city in the world has this problem, it's not a Toronto phenomenon.

In Toronto, however, compared to some of the more southern American cities, the homeless have an added problem: the winter.

Homelessness is a sad phenomena, no doubt...I have much sympathy. The majority of the time the people have no choice because they are mentally ill to a cetain degree. Until our society starts treating those with mental illness more humanely, this sort of thing will remain a large problem. However, there are some homeless people who are not mentally ill, but I'm sure each has a story, and I'm sure if it is causing them to live the life they are living, the story is likely a good one.

But, face it people, until someone develops a new system of social organization and competetion, in a gross oversimplificatoin it is the nature of capitalism that some succeed, and some fail.

However, in Canada, we have a pretty good social support network that can stop homeless people from slipping through the cracks. I mean, when someone makes more money on welfare than someone working minimum wage, one could argue that homelessness has little excuse other than mental handicap.

It's a dumping ground for the rest of Canada including the GTA ... we should deport the homeless back to the cities where they're from.

The cities surrounding the Toronto harass the homeless into leaving their city as to get them to move to Toronto.

It's time for Toronto to return the favour and kick the homeless out of the city.

It hurts our economy - including tourism.

I find this last statement so amusing (not to mention this statement in the context of your tag signature paraphrasing Mill) because everyone from Marx to Friedman agrees that our economic system requires unemployment. Full employment is systemically impossible to sustain; our economy would collapse via inflation, accumulative stasis and even greater unemployment ("stagflation"). Back when economists were still social scientists and not mathematicians, they understood the social effects of the "reserve army of the unemployed" and the yet-to-be coined "natural rate of unemployment", and that's why social safety nets were put in place. So, when a safety net is hacked away, people who find themselves unemployed and who would otherwise have received financial and social aid to help them through their period of unemployment, don't, or find it severely limited. If one has worked with homeless people or bothered to do some simple homework on the issue - and anyone who resorts to sweeping stock comments like "they're lazy" or "don't want to work", much less the reprehensible and idiotic "deport them" hasn't - one would know that a disturbing number of homeless people had jobs, often for decades, and that the 90's recession, which devoured our industrial sector, coupled with irresponsible cuts to social services, and guided by the regulative logic of the marketplace, put these people out on the streets. But I guess they smell bad, live under bridges and don't look like underwear models, so f--- them.

Of course, not all homeless people have had economic stability in their life. There's the well-cited and sizable segment that suffers from mental illnesses (those "crazies" who should be locked up), there's a much higher proportion of homeless women - often having escaped abusive relationships - than a cursory observation walking down Yonge would allow one to believe (why don't they just go home and take their slaps like good women do), and many young men and women from economically depressed regions in Canada, never encountered on Queen bearing signs asking for dope contributions, who are clearly frightened and ashamed by their predicament, (let them be homeless in Newfoundland - send them all home in boxcars!). None of these people have experienced financial security and/or independence in life, but by no fault of their own. However, a great many have had stability and lived regular lives, and when you take into account that unemployment is inevitable and that the social safety net that protects those who are unemployed has been slashed to pieces, it becomes increasingly arbitrary as to who ends up homeless, at least if you aren't lucky enough to have financially supportive family and friends. But I guess that's a "choice" too.

^ bullseye

most homeless people have no excuse for being so.

Really? Never knew that.

What are the other choices?

Insane asylum?
Jail?
Potter's Field?
Igloo?

Getting a job, no matter how shitty it is would help matters. The sad truth is that a person can make tonnes more panhandling than swinging a mop in a Mac Donald's.

With Canada's social system and good economy, there is no reason for a mentally fit individual to go without work.

Housing is a different issue but even then one could rent a room or live in a hostal for a month for $300 dollars.

There are alternatives for mentally fit homeless people, what they lack is motivation.







By the way, I agree with Alex. Unemployment is a fact of life.

Well, begging for money on the street was not so long ago...unthinkable....something they do in Biafra or something. Now...it's perfectly acceptable, not to mention lucrative. So now, everybody's doing it...mostly just perfectly healthy, normal, employable kids.

We need to instill some more pride in people so they look at begging on the street for money for what it is...unacceptable and unecessary.

And maybe people should stop forking over so much cash...when it stops being an easy way to make money, people won't do it.






KGB

Begging on the streets is not the same thing as homelessness (though they often come together). If you can make more money begging than at a fast food job then you can probably find a place to live. But can you make more money begging?

Remember the woman begging at the corner of Yonge and Bloor a few years back whose son used to drive her to "work" every morning?

^In Downtown Toronto some of these panhandlers make like $1000 a week. I only make like $600 before taxes.

There was an interesting series of articles a year or two ago in the Globe that was about life as a homeless person. The writer actually lived on the street for about a week or so. I'm sure some of you may have read it. I recall that around christmas time, panhandlers in good spots can make anywhere from 100-200$ a day and they will literally fight over a spot if they have to. If everyone stopped giving them money they wouldn't be so visible.

^ as someone already noted, a professional panhandler and a homeless person need not be at all the same thing.

I know this much: when I'm out late and see a homeless person sleeping in a cold winter's night, I know that the current situation is absolutely unacceptable.

Well, since no-one actually has to sleep outdoors, they are doing it by choice. So why is it people choose to sleep outside? I would imagine there are many reasons and stories behind that. But sufice to say, it's a lot different living the "homeless" lifestyle in Toronto than it is in some 3rd world city. I mean, if you're going to choose a city to be homeless in...Toronto's a pretty good choice.

And yes, I realize there is a difference between "homeless" and panhandlers....don't know why I gravitated to that topic.






KGB

Getting a job, no matter how shitty it is would help matters. The sad truth is that a person can make tonnes more panhandling than swinging a mop in a Mac Donald's.

With Canada's social system and good economy, there is no reason for a mentally fit individual to go without work.

Housing is a different issue but even then one could rent a room or live in a hostal for a month for $300 dollars.

There are alternatives for mentally fit homeless people, what they lack is motivation.







By the way, I agree with Alex. Unemployment is a fact of life.


I would have to agree to a certain extent. There are almost always jobs around if people want them.

We have to get on with it- start dealing.
I think there is a lot to be said for 'tag and release' -- and then, let the homeless -pr beggars (buggers?) do as they please. Remember r-- one of the key elements for a John Stewart Mills ?) thereby -- do anything the hell you want: your freedom to swing your arms ends at the tip of my nose, you want to walk off a cliff to your certain death -- fine PROVIDED YOU ARE SANE!!!!
Ah! - there's the rub! You can choose to live on the streets--- Provided you are sane! So--- let's get these homeless, identify them (tag them) , inoculate them against hepatitis, which is to my understanding rampant amongst people on the street and in shelters, make sure there shots are up to date, flu shot, etc., and, if needed-- Anti psychotic medication. If you are sane, you need to get you anti flu and anti hepatitis shots, so that you are less likely to get sick in a shelter. These people should be striped down, hosed down, have there closes sent through the laundry, etc., and- PRESTO - homelessness becomes less of a problem.

by the way, - ever notice how homeless increases dramatically in the summer-- until it gets cold, and then, gee- Mom and dad not letting me smoke pot in the house is not so oppressive.

"Well, since no-one actually has to sleep outdoors, they are doing it by choice. So why is it people choose to sleep outside? I would imagine there are many reasons and stories behind that." Shelters are often that in name only--understaffed, overcrowded, etc.

"But sufice to say, it's a lot different living the "homeless" lifestyle in Toronto (or New York--F) than it is in some 3rd world city." Yes--it's even more disgraceful.

"We have to get on with it- start dealing."

Oh yea...listen to the Brampton arm-chair social critic. You wouldn't know the first thing about "dealing" with it.





"These people should be striped down, hosed down, have there closes sent through the laundry, etc., and- PRESTO - homelessness becomes less of a problem."


I can't begin to describe how you disgust me.








"Yes--it's even more disgraceful."

Yes...as in the way many have embraced it as a lifestyle choice, compared to the people in 3rd world cities who really don't have the same choices.






KGB

"Yes--it's even more disgraceful."

Yes...as in the way many have embraced it as a lifestyle choice, compared to the people in 3rd world cities who really don't have the same choices.

KGB

While there's bound to be people who 'choose' to be homeless, there are two points this neglects:

1) Some people don't choose this-they don't have a mental capacity to keep, let's say, their welfare checks and make rational decisions with them.

2) One thing that tends to be forgotten is the fact that homelesness tends to be a slow psychological descent into madness itself.

"These people should be striped down, hosed down, have there closes sent through the laundry, etc., and- PRESTO - homelessness becomes less of a problem."

...
I can't begin to describe how you disgust me.
...
KGB
What? You want the piss- panted to stay that way, rather than giving them a good washing and cleaning their clothes? I can't begin to describe how you disgust me.

What? You want the piss- panted to stay that way, rather than giving them a good washing and cleaning their clothes? I can't begin to describe how you disgust me.

I find the synonyms you use for homeless people disgusting.

I feel bad for the mentally ill, but it is ridiculous. There are so many young able bodied people on the streets , and many pestering me for my money.

CLEAN toilets like I did to get by when I was layed off. I cut neighbours fucking lawns, and cleaned there homes, ran errands. Anything was better than begging.

i can not go to my bank, tim hortons, esso whatever without the same fucking people bugging me. There is this one guy who ran at me at the Beer Store looking like he was going to cry saying he was starving. I gave him a freeking toonie. I have now seen him do the same thing 5 -6 times and I want to give him a good punch in the head. he wrecked any good intentions I ever had.

Like i said, get the ill under care. MAKE them come in, but the rest should take some responsibility and DO something about their situation.

Ok, that feels better

^ thats nothing, once at dundas squrare, some kid wanted change, i said i dont have any, i was drinking a bottle of coke, he took that!

Who says the piss -panted are mentally ill? They need to get a shower and clean clothes, a hair cut, get injections, etc. and see a doctor and dentist, etc., but, hey, that does not make them mentally ill ( They MAY be mentally ill, but they ARE piss panted!- which is Fcking sick- flat out sick, so, well, let's GIVE THEM A SHOWER AND CLEAN THEIR CLOTHES! Of course, if you guys want to invite them over to your homes and - oh, I don't know, spend an hour sniffing their socks, well, go ahead.)
I find the piss - panted offensive.
I find the piss - panted a nuisance.
The city of Toronto ought to be ashamed!
And I am not ashamed to say something must be done about the piss - panted- 'cause it's freaking sick.

Well, while we're at it, can I put in a request to have all people found wearing their sweaters draped over their backs...executed on the spot?

They really bug me.






KGB

AreBe man you got to give this shit a rest about homeless people. I don't think anyone likes having them around but really, you are going a bit far eh.

Are Be = IGNORED

Why don't we, instead of ignoring the homeless, deal with them?

Not only does he degrade the homeless...he insults the huge amount of people who devote their time, money and carreers to helping them by pretending it doesn't exist.

You just become a bigger loser every time you post. Could it possibly get any worse???






KGB

Yeah--he could lose his home.

I mean, you think he's bad now, wait until he's accosting you at the corner of Crack and Whore at 3 in the blink with his insane social theories.

Even worse, he's one of those people who really don't give a shit...but pretend they do to use it as a politcal football.






KGB

Without downplaying homelessness, because I do believe it is a social crisis in our society, especially in large urban centres, but to say Toronto is "overrun" is a bit much. Every large city in the world has this problem, it's not a Toronto phenomenon.

In Toronto, however, compared to some of the more southern American cities, the homeless have an added problem: the winter.

Homelessness is a sad phenomena, no doubt...I have much sympathy. The majority of the time the people have no choice because they are mentally ill to a cetain degree. Until our society starts treating those with mental illness more humanely, this sort of thing will remain a large problem. However, there are some homeless people who are not mentally ill, but I'm sure each has a story, and I'm sure if it is causing them to live the life they are living, the story is likely a good one.

But, face it people, until someone develops a new system of social organization and competetion, in a gross oversimplificatoin it is the nature of capitalism that some succeed, and some fail.

However, in Canada, we have a pretty good social support network that can stop homeless people from slipping through the cracks. I mean, when someone makes more money on welfare than someone working minimum wage, one could argue that homelessness has little excuse other than mental handicap.


I have been to cities all around the world and I have never seen the amount of homelessnes that Toronto has. Toronto truely is in a class of it's own when it comes to people living on the streets. For that we are World class.

I have met people from all around the world who comment on how they can't believe the amount of homelessness there is. They're astounded.
I think even Lonely Planet gives warnings about the amount of homeless - and I haven't seen that warning for any other first world country.

The Mike Harris policies of poverty for all is coming home to roost.

It's sad we have to use the Safe Streets Act in a desperate attempt to take the homelessness situation out of the public eye.

I have been to cities all around the world and I have never seen the amount of homelessnes that Toronto has. Toronto truely is in a class of it's own when it comes to people living on the streets. For that we are World class.

I have met people from all around the world who comment on how they can't believe the amount of homelessness there is. They're astounded.
I think even Lonely Planet gives warnings about the amount of homeless - and I haven't seen that warning for any other first world country.
....
It's out of hand--Too bad we refuse to examine answers -- such as my proposed 'tag and release' - I think similar to what was done in New York.

One of the key problems is that many of the 1/3rd of the homeless who are mentally ill refuse to take medication-- that's why they may need to be injected with their medicine.

I guess it is offensive to suggest that those who can't or won't take care of their hygiene should have assistance with it. So be it:Most homeless people are OK- it's the piss-panted that we need to look at.

Homeless Christmas wish--- funny!
http://www2.b3ta.com/merrychristmas/
So, was that funny and offensive enough- or what?
http://www2.b3ta.com/merrychristmas
[link] http://www2.b3ta.com/merrychristmas /[link]

^ :blahblah: :blahblah: :blahblah:

905 people can't be in 416 because they're poor
We need screwball European ideas: no more subways let everything be LRT or a service utlizing GO tracks in the middle of nowhere
Homeless need to be tagged like dogs

:wallbash: :hammer: :bash:

Seriously, I think you're a robot.

Well, tag the homeless like dogs? Perhaps like bears with a tracking divice? No, but ID them so that we know whe they are, make sure they know where the shelters are, feed them, give them medicine -- absolutely,

it's the piss-panted that we need to look at.

I'm going to start a charitable organization for the piss-panted.







the real question is: are people piss-panted by choice, or is it thrust upon them?




Sometimes piss-panted people even have jobs.. the working piss-panted. Even someone you know might be piss-panted...

Piss-pantedness is getting out of hand in Toronto!

Well, tag the homeless like dogs? Perhaps like bears with a tracking divice? No, but ID them so that we know whe they are, make sure they know where the shelters are, feed them, give them medicine -- absolutely,


You are begining to sound like our mutual friend Paul Martin with comments like that.

the real question is: are people piss-panted by choice, or is it thrust upon them?


Good question.

I'm going to start a charitable organization for the piss-panted.







the real question is: are people piss-panted by choice, or is it thrust upon them?




Sometimes piss-panted people even have jobs.. the working piss-panted. Even someone you know might be piss-panted...

Piss-pantedness is getting out of hand in Toronto!

You got it, bro. Where do I sign up?

I think I just pissed my pants.






KGB

So, when are you coming over?

We need to start handing put free diapers to these poor people. Stupid poor people/

I was in Toronto today (after getting back from Rochester) and I actually walked downtown at around 5:30 A.M. to 7:30 A.M for almost two hours. I couldn't help but notice some of the homeless sleeping on the street. I don't think they really want to hurt you, they're down on their luck, and want to know if you could spare some change, although you should still watch yourself around them.

I think jesuschrysler should take notes on this, I walked downtown Toronto for 2 hours early this morning before I got back home, there is lots to see and it is a unique, walked by all the monuments and attractions pretty much, and I never got hurt or approached by anyone, I really don't know what his problem is.

Come to Ottawa, I'll show you homeless people sleeping on the streets within sight of Parliament. Then go to the suburbs, and you won't see any homeless people there.

It's not just Toronto.

Dec. 21, 2004. 01:00 AM
Getting Larry inside, for one night
Rough sleepers resist shelter even during bitter cold

Outreach workers are practised in art of sweet-talking

ANDREW MILLS
STAFF REPORTER

Just before midnight, the street help van stopped at York and Wellington Sts. as the temperature halted its plunge at minus 24C. Outreach worker Trish stuck her head out the window and yelled to a pile of sleeping bags and blankets on the corner.

"Do you want to go inside tonight?"

In the worst kind of nostril-freeze-together, finger-numbing, back-shivering cold Toronto has seen this season, a swift and somewhat muffled "No thanks" came from the body lying under the sleeping bags.

"One male. Refused services," Trish neatly printed in the logbook on her lap, shaking her head.

That same "No" came from all but two of the 15 or so street people the van tried to help Sunday night. They're called rough sleepers: a portion of the thousands of street people in Toronto who never sleep inside, even on nights like Sunday. With a death rate some five times higher than most living on the street, rough sleepers may be the most vulnerable people in the city.

The city's 4,000 or so shelter spaces grow to accommodate everyone looking for shelter when the temperature dips below minus 15C and the city declares an extreme cold-weather alert, as it did both last night and on Sunday. Even so, some just flat-out refuse.

Either they have serious mental health issues or have just adapted to a life on the streets, said Bob Duff, executive director of the shelter at the Church of St. Simon-the-Apostle on Bloor St. E., who once lived on the streets himself. "It's, `I set my own hours. I have a concept of where I'm going to go. I know that and I don't have to have someone at a shelter dictating to me,'" he said.

The strict rules at each shelter — no smoking, lights-off time, no booze or drugs, short showers, no women — scare many rough sleepers away.

And for a brown-eyed native woman know only as Trish, whose layered coats made her frame burly, trying to get rough sleepers to come indoors is her daily chore when it's cold, riding in the van from 7:30 p.m. to 1 a.m., five days a week.

"I feel like they're adapting to being out there," she said. "Like when you've been in prison for a very long time, you get institutionalized. It's like being institutionalized, but to being out there."

Larry is one of Trish's regulars and at about 8:30, the van pulled into his alley, beside a fire station near Yonge St. and Eglinton Ave. "Larry, what's the chances of you going in tonight?" she said, standing over the short, ginger-haired man in his early 50s. He sat on the pavement, wrapped in sleeping bags and a dirty, khaki-coloured coat.

In the four years he's lived around here, Larry said, he's never gone in and he certainly wasn't going last night.

"Come on Larry, work with us," Trish said. "Someone will drive you right back here tomorrow."

The exchange went on for five minutes, with a pleading Trish jumping up and down, fighting the cold. Larry simply sat on the ground without gloves, looking positively warm.

There's no evidence rough sleepers like Larry adapt to the cold physiologically, said Stephen Hwang of the Centre for Research on Inner City Health at St. Michael's Hospital. "It's more mental than anything. They've learned how to survive in winter before and they just keep using that knowledge."

So all rough sleepers depend on for survival are tricks like finding a dry and sheltered spot, and layering sleeping bags. "Not surprisingly, their risk of death is extremely high," Hwang said.

There are no statistics for Toronto's rough sleepers, but in Boston, researchers at the Health Care for the Homeless Program followed 127 rough sleepers for four years. At the end of that period, 20 per cent had died and 12 per cent were in hospital.

Though getting them off the streets sometimes seems impossible, there is an occasional breakthrough that, on very cold nights, may save their lives.

Larry's came just before 9, when he suddenly looked up, nodded and said, "Have you got a garbage bag?"

Something — Trish still isn't sure what — snapped and Larry rolled up his sleeping bags, packed away his shopping carts and came inside for the night. He got into the van and, as he declared he was hot, he started to get cold feet.

"How many people are going to be in the shelter? I know you people are doing a good job but ..."

At Bathurst and St. Clair, just inside the native men's residence, a sign read Cold Alert Today! and Larry turned to Trish. "Why don't you drive me back to where I was?" he said, leaning his head against the doorjamb. "I think I got one bus ticket. I can go."

"Oh no Larry. We're so close," she begged, nearing tears. "I want you to stay inside for the night because it's freezing Larry."

"There's no place to lie down in here," he said, getting confused. "Where is it? Where is it? Where is it?"

"Can you get the bed happening ASAP?" Trish told the guys in the office, with life-and-death urgency in her voice. "Listen. He's on the verge of walking out."

He never did. They got him upstairs, made up a bed in the smoking room and Larry had a warm night.

"I almost cried. I'm so happy he's in here," said Trish, getting back in the van. "Oh, I sweet-talked him all right."

But for dozens of others, no amount of sweet-talking would get them off the street.

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Dec. 21, 2004. 01:00 AM
Getting Larry inside, for one night
Rough sleepers resist shelter even during bitter cold

Outreach workers are practised in art of sweet-talking

ANDREW MILLS
STAFF REPORTER

Just before midnight, the street help van stopped at York and Wellington Sts. as the temperature halted its plunge at minus 24C. Outreach worker Trish stuck her head out the window and yelled to a pile of sleeping bags and blankets on the corner.

"Do you want to go inside tonight?"

In the worst kind of nostril-freeze-together, finger-numbing, back-shivering cold Toronto has seen this season, a swift and somewhat muffled "No thanks" came from the body lying under the sleeping bags.

"One male. Refused services," Trish neatly printed in the logbook on her lap, shaking her head.

That same "No" came from all but two of the 15 or so street people the van tried to help Sunday night. They're called rough sleepers: a portion of the thousands of street people in Toronto who never sleep inside, even on nights like Sunday. With a death rate some five times higher than most living on the street, rough sleepers may be the most vulnerable people in the city.

The city's 4,000 or so shelter spaces grow to accommodate everyone looking for shelter when the temperature dips below minus 15C and the city declares an extreme cold-weather alert, as it did both last night and on Sunday. Even so, some just flat-out refuse.

Either they have serious mental health issues or have just adapted to a life on the streets, said Bob Duff, executive director of the shelter at the Church of St. Simon-the-Apostle on Bloor St. E., who once lived on the streets himself. "It's, `I set my own hours. I have a concept of where I'm going to go. I know that and I don't have to have someone at a shelter dictating to me,'" he said.

The strict rules at each shelter — no smoking, lights-off time, no booze or drugs, short showers, no women — scare many rough sleepers away.

And for a brown-eyed native woman know only as Trish, whose layered coats made her frame burly, trying to get rough sleepers to come indoors is her daily chore when it's cold, riding in the van from 7:30 p.m. to 1 a.m., five days a week.

"I feel like they're adapting to being out there," she said. "Like when you've been in prison for a very long time, you get institutionalized. It's like being institutionalized, but to being out there."

Larry is one of Trish's regulars and at about 8:30, the van pulled into his alley, beside a fire station near Yonge St. and Eglinton Ave. "Larry, what's the chances of you going in tonight?" she said, standing over the short, ginger-haired man in his early 50s. He sat on the pavement, wrapped in sleeping bags and a dirty, khaki-coloured coat.

In the four years he's lived around here, Larry said, he's never gone in and he certainly wasn't going last night.

"Come on Larry, work with us," Trish said. "Someone will drive you right back here tomorrow."

The exchange went on for five minutes, with a pleading Trish jumping up and down, fighting the cold. Larry simply sat on the ground without gloves, looking positively warm.

There's no evidence rough sleepers like Larry adapt to the cold physiologically, said Stephen Hwang of the Centre for Research on Inner City Health at St. Michael's Hospital. "It's more mental than anything. They've learned how to survive in winter before and they just keep using that knowledge."

So all rough sleepers depend on for survival are tricks like finding a dry and sheltered spot, and layering sleeping bags. "Not surprisingly, their risk of death is extremely high," Hwang said.

There are no statistics for Toronto's rough sleepers, but in Boston, researchers at the Health Care for the Homeless Program followed 127 rough sleepers for four years. At the end of that period, 20 per cent had died and 12 per cent were in hospital.

Though getting them off the streets sometimes seems impossible, there is an occasional breakthrough that, on very cold nights, may save their lives.

Larry's came just before 9, when he suddenly looked up, nodded and said, "Have you got a garbage bag?"

Something — Trish still isn't sure what — snapped and Larry rolled up his sleeping bags, packed away his shopping carts and came inside for the night. He got into the van and, as he declared he was hot, he started to get cold feet.

"How many people are going to be in the shelter? I know you people are doing a good job but ..."

At Bathurst and St. Clair, just inside the native men's residence, a sign read Cold Alert Today! and Larry turned to Trish. "Why don't you drive me back to where I was?" he said, leaning his head against the doorjamb. "I think I got one bus ticket. I can go."

"Oh no Larry. We're so close," she begged, nearing tears. "I want you to stay inside for the night because it's freezing Larry."

"There's no place to lie down in here," he said, getting confused. "Where is it? Where is it? Where is it?"

"Can you get the bed happening ASAP?" Trish told the guys in the office, with life-and-death urgency in her voice. "Listen. He's on the verge of walking out."

He never did. They got him upstairs, made up a bed in the smoking room and Larry had a warm night.

"I almost cried. I'm so happy he's in here," said Trish, getting back in the van. "Oh, I sweet-talked him all right."

But for dozens of others, no amount of sweet-talking would get them off the street.

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So true

I'm going to start a charitable organization for the piss-panted.

the real question is: are people piss-panted by choice, or is it thrust upon them?

Sometimes piss-panted people even have jobs.. the working piss-panted. Even someone you know might be piss-panted...

Piss-pantedness is getting out of hand in Toronto!

Maybe we just have to train the piss-panted to poop in painted portable potties. :jk:

Toronto would benefit from enforcable laws that prohibit people from living in the streets. More shelters should exist and it should be made law that anyone who is homeless must use them. Its difficult to see people especially in light of the bad weather we've just been hit with, living on the streets...I can't begin to imagine what they must be going through. Unfortunately, we can't always be sympathetic...there are some individuals who I absolutely will not pitty, teens who rebel and say they have it soo bad at home etc...Not to say thats always the case. You just run a fine line though between compassion and anger with this issue.

"Toronto would benefit from enforcable laws that prohibit people from living in the streets. More shelters should exist and it should be made law that anyone who is homeless must use them."


Well, there's a slight problem with your suggestion...because we live in a free country, there is very little you can actually force a person to do.






KGB

^ I disagree. That's what laws are for. We only live in a free country to a certain extent...there are tons of laws prohibiting us from doing certain things, yet we all claim that "we live in a free country". A country can only be so free.

Yes, but the laws must fall within our rights. You simply can't force a person to sleep where they don't want to. And there is no law that says how much time you can spend in public.

Do you see where I'm getting at? Things are far more complicated than making up your own rules on the internet.






KGB

Yes, but the laws must fall within our rights. You simply can't force a person to sleep where they don't want to. And there is no law that says how much time you can spend in public.

Do you see where I'm getting at? Things are far more complicated than making up your own rules on the internet.






KGB


If such a law did exist it would probably achieve the elimination of people sleeping in the streets by some safety, obstruction, etc. law they were breaking rather than flat out saying they were no longer allowed to sleep on the street.

Exactly!
There are 'catch all' laws -- loitering, nuisance, etc., that can be used to help provide the homeless with the services they require.

As I have previously indicated, provided they are sane (or made sane through injections), and don't pester people, then they should be allowed to choose to sleep on the streets if they feel fit to do so. But, they need to be 'tagged', assessed, and ID'd before they are 'released'.

[QUOTE=KGB]Yes, but the laws must fall within our rights. You simply can't force a person to sleep where they don't want to. And there is no law that says how much time you can spend in public.

Do you see where I'm getting at? Things are far more complicated than making up your own rules on the internet.

KGB Quote

fine...keep them there on the streets as the visual pollution they are....they'll be like Toronto's version of lawn ornaments. Its a sticky situation and I guess b/c of such considerations its no wonder nothing has really been done to resolve this with the city.

of course you can legislate no sleeping on the street. Depending on how you look at it, we are a free country, but with rules. That is what makes us a free country and a civilized country also.

Doing nothing will get us more of the same. Pumping more money into shelters etc is not the answer. Some just won't go. Some do not have the capacity to make these choices.

Be your Brothers keeper if you will. Take charge and get these people off the streets and into care facilities etc.

"If such a law did exist it would probably achieve the elimination of people sleeping in the streets by some safety, obstruction, etc. law they were breaking rather than flat out saying they were no longer allowed to sleep on the street."


Sorry, but these so-called "catch-all" laws are already legally challenged as useless as it is. Works for private property sometimes (and not always)...never work for public property. Forget these imaginary laws...can't happen....get with the real world.






"provided they are sane (or made sane through injections) "

Hows your treatment going anyway?








"fine...keep them there on the streets as the visual pollution they are....they'll be like Toronto's version of lawn ornaments."


You're taking the wrong attitude about it....I don't like it any more than you do....all I'm saying is these overly simplified and incredibly unrealistic "ideas" people have about changing the situation just isn't going to work....why waste time on them?






"its no wonder nothing has really been done to resolve this with the city."


There is a huge amount of effort put towards this situation...both public and private. The fact that this still exists as a problem is not because a lack of money, manpower, ideas or people and agencies genuinely wanting to help...it's that it is a very tough problem...one that may never be resolved....only handled as best as possible.

And it seems that most people's motivation is selfish...you want what's good for you...not for them. I mean...what's your problem...are you embarrassed by them...do they bother you??? So what...who says everybody has to conform to your lifestyle?








"of course you can legislate no sleeping on the street."


Really...you think so. Ok genius...I want your proposed law spelled out...and remember, it's a law, so you better be damned specific about it. It's not as easy as you think.







"Doing nothing will get us more of the same."


Nobody is doing nothing about it. Just because your immaginary impossible to make laws aren't around, doesn't mean people are doing "nothing" about it. I think the people that devote themselves to it might be insulted by armchair critics like you.







"Some do not have the capacity to make these choices."

Well, technically, very few, if any people who are in that position are actually on the street...if you are indeed that mentally handicapped, you are not alowed out of a facility for people in that position. I think people simply don't understand at what point your rights can be taken away from you for being mentally impaired. There's no law against being stupid...if there was, a lot of the people on this forum would be typing from a padded room.






"Be your Brothers keeper if you will. Take charge and get these people off the streets and into care facilities etc."


This is just another meaningless sentence...it means nothing...it says nothing.

So let's just stop saying things as inane as "do something about it". I find people who make those kind of statements far more annoying than the panhandlers who bug me for change.






KGB

KGB, I am not a genius. I just have opinions and ideas. And I elect smart officials to makes laws and give good guidance.

I think you have good insight into many Toronto things. But since you are just being rude I would rather just stick to buildings etc.

I have enough aggravation in my life

Well, I'm not trying to be rude...just trying to point out that sometimes when we are frustrated about things, we tend to pretend there is a simple solution to very complicated problems. I was just trying to show how these simple solutions a wrought with pitfalls that will make them impractical when you actually look at them.






KGB

But since you are just being rude

It just seems that way http://www.wordforge.net/forum/images/smilies/marathon.gif

Well, I'm not trying to be rude...just trying to point out that sometimes when we are frustrated about things, we tend to pretend there is a simple solution to very complicated problems. I was just trying to show how these simple solutions a wrought with pitfalls that will make them impractical when you actually look at them.

KGB
Take, for example, buidling more housing so that those who choose to sleep on the streets will have more shelter to turn down.

I bet Are Be would be the first guy to fight any low-income housing in HIS neighbourhood. LOL!!






KGB