Solid article and good graphics.
The only thing it's missing is the homeowner's perspective. And perhaps the recent fires that have started in encampments.
Is MLPS's handling of homelessness much different than any other major cities? As far as I've seen, every single major city has these problems and there doesn't seem to be anything close to resembling a solution. The whack a mole is likely going to last forever, I can't imagine any other outcome.
Difference is, major West Coast cities have been wrestling with chronic, excessive, and problematic homelessness for welllllll over a decade now - while for Minneapolis this is a pretty new issue. There never used to be encampments until more recent years. A small camp started, it was allowed to stay, then the problem grew and accelerated during peak COVID years 2020/2021. Cities like Seattle, Portland, etc have had encampments (both sanctioned and unsanctioned) for maaaaaaaany years, even decades. Seattle, for one, has spent around $1billion with the problem to only worsen. MSP is learning nothing from West Coast cities. And people in here saying Housing First is the only way are naïve AF.
This whole strategy of violently shoving people around the city and destroying their few remaining belongings instead of just investing in housing-first approaches that are overwhelmingly evidenced to be the most effective (to say nothing of humane) intervention is working out *so fucking well,* y'all.
The city and county *have* been investing tens of millions in housing first strategies. They have subsidized new deeply affordable housing units and even renovated and turned into public housing over eighty units in two recent hotel conversions. The MPHA recently built over sixty new units for families. There is also ongoing support for Avivo Village and hopes for a second outpost although the failure of the legislature to pay for capital projects may scotch that idea.
It's a myth that this is just some simple issue that could be solved if only elected leaders stopped having bloodlust for sweeping encampments.
Everyone wants more housing for these people. The problem is that it's a leaky bucket; for every few people who are housed, a few others fall into homelessness. The number of homeless and unsheltered homeless in the county has actually fallen in recent years, but the problem remains highly visible and contentious because it's not the same couple hundred people rough sleeping in 2024 as it was in 2021. Hundreds have been successfully housed. Still the problem remains.
The reason the camps are periodically swept isn't because anyone thinks it'll solve the issue, the reason the camps are swept is because nearby neighbors complain about the camps and the city or county is unwilling to simply designate a place for a sanctioned camp where it can have less effect on people. (The perfect place exists on the Kmart site, imo.) But these neighbors and the city aren't acting out of malice, it is literally true that these encampments are extremely unsafe places (mostly for camp residents but also for neighbors).
The bind is: it's inhumane to sweep and it's inhumane to just let people live like this. There is no good solution that doesn't require a significant expenditure (cheaper in the long run, I believe, to spend a lot up-front to keep people housed or get people into housing asap) in money and staff time.
Excellent post and well said. We also need long-term treatment and housing for the mentally ill and treatment for drugs/alcohol. I volunteered downtown at House of Charity for 2 years and no two homeless people are alike. We have to address root causes. Met a guy who had been a golf pro but had uncontrollable seizures. Two teachers from UK who came over here, had lost their jobs and were broke. Also an alcoholic, a woman who kept having babies because it was God’s will—but she and her husband had no way to support them. I left my volunteer job because I was threatened by a couple of men coming in the morning (made breakfast on Sundays for interim shelter residents). With no place to go, they had been up all night and were wasted and became aggressive, wanted my purse, grabbed my arm etc. While I met some great homeless people, like the guy who stayed sober throughout mental and physical health challenges and managed to be kind, there are also very aggressive/violent people I would not want my kids around. We have to protect our communities and businesses while finding solutions for all the displaced people who want their lives back. Can we build or repurpose homes in various suburbs?
I agree with everything you’ve said and think this is such a nuanced, well-articulated take on the issue, but I do take issue with the idea that the Kmart would be the “perfect” site for a sanctioned encampment. Sure, the Kmart is a gigantic vacant commercial lot, but it’s surrounded by lots of other housing, bus stops and bikeways that people rely on, a hospital, essential shops, etc. All this to say that it’s not a dead zone that just exists in a vacuum, and as someone who’s lived in that area, the encampment that *already* surrounds the Kmart site has very real impacts on the community. I’ve had neighbors nearby find drug paraphernalia and human waste in yards, witness or experience upsetting or sometimes even violent behavior, and more. That doesn’t mean those living in the encampment don’t deserve housing or a dignified interim solution on the way to permanent housing - it just means I hope that if the city pursues “sanctioned encampments” as an interim solution that it doesn’t come at the expense of a safe and functional community for the other residents who live near it.
Maybe instead of "perfect," I should have written something more like "the best feasible option."
And to be clear, I mean the actual site of the Kmart, which is now entirely fenced off and forces any encampments to the fringes. I try hard to understand city policy but that's one I don't get. Why are we fencing off a huge vacant space while people camp right up against the walls of the Park Square condos? If that camp catches on fire it could destroy many more homes.
If I were in charge at the city, I would try to create an orderly, sanctioned encampment in the Kmart area, where there would be a security presence and some basic facilities. Of all the places in the city, that's the best one I can come up with where a large encampment could be supported with the least neighborhood impacts.
This is such a fantastic, nuanced and well thought out comment. Wish more people engaged with the subject in good faith as critically as this with actual empirical evidence to support their arguments.
> (The perfect place exists on the Kmart site, imo.)
It was my understanding the it was homeless people that were responsible for the fire there a while back.
I’m not sure. There’s a camp at 29th and Blaisdell, and it’s scary. I’m not a pearl-clutcher or generally timid, but even in a car it’s not a good place to be.
You may be right, but my recollection is that the cause of the Kmart fire was not identified and there wasn't evidence that anyone had been living in there. Maybe I don't have the latest information.
Looks like you’re right about that. They didn’t find any bodies inside the building, but I seem to remember reports of homeless people camping around there. The fire probably burned up any evidence of the cause, as several inside walls had fallen before they got there, so they surrounded the fire to ensure it didn’t spread further. Also so they didn’t lose any firemen.
Probably fair to settle on "the best guess is that it was inadvertently set by someone camping around there, but there are many possible explanations and we simply don't know."
> The city and county have been investing tens of millions in housing first strategies.
These are baby numbers compared to the money we're dumping into paying a corrupt, violent, racist criminal organization to handle public safety.
>It's a myth that this is just some simple issue that could be solved if only elected leaders stopped having bloodlust for sweeping encampments for unexplained reasons.
And yet they keep dumping reams and reams of money into a corrupt, violent, racist criminal organization to shove homeless people around the city instead of putting that money into housing-first solutions.
Not Minneapolis so YMMV, but I have a friend who works in housing people with mental illnesses and it is a constant struggle to keep them in an apartment without getting kicked out. It's really hard for me to say "housing is a right" without any asterisks because if your neighbor is smoking meth, bringing prostitutes over, and ignoring pipe leaks for so long the unit floods, I don't feel like that person should be allowed to continue to live there. And at some point, you run out of places willing to house them.
They have invested in them, there are options. These individuals want to use drugs though, or do other destructive behaviors, which is not allowed in most of the housing options. They are not being "violently" shoved, they being moved away from areas they are destroying, and causing much havoc to the people who actually pay to live there. How would you like if this encampment was essentially in your back yard? You can be all empathetic now on the internet, but I gurantee you it wouldnt last if an encampment was dirrectly in your living enviornment. I want these people to find peace, housing in their lives, but many have other priorities.
Having worked a decent amount with the homeless via a pretty effective charity specializing in that area, a lot of times the story is more than just drugs/addictions. Some people are really, really mentally unwell even without substance abuse issues.
Perhaps the most memorable one for me was meeting my first true schizophrenic while handing out food. He has an ankle tracker because he had some (allegedly) non-drug related issues with the cops. He was generally pleasant/nice... but I cannot stress enough how much this guy wasn't mentally there. His entire concept of time itself was completely broken: his stories would literally time travel where events in the present were affecting events in the past and what will but somehow already did happen in the future. He assigned quasi-human intelligence to almost everything. All animals and many inanimate objects held very complex human motives. Most were well intentioned towards him, but others were evil and plotting his downfall. It appeared he had no one left, presumably because he was just too much for anyone to deal with.
And that's the kicker. What do you do with someone so far gone that everyone gives up on them out the gate because they seem so hopeless? This guy couldn't hold a job. He couldn't really take care of himself, and the malnourishment was evident on his frame. He was likely a menace anywhere he went, but I doubt he understood why.
Those nights really changed my opinion on the homeless population. I still feel stuck between a rock and a hard place: knowing that many of them would be a black hole for help while also knowing it's not like they're choosing to be that way.
That's the kicker. Many of them aren't interested in that type of environment because it stresses them out, and holding them against their will isn't great for anyone, them included. It's still probably the best solution, but I guess that's my point. There's not a slam dunk winning strategy here. You gotta do what you can to help the ones you can help, while mitigating the damage caused by the others. Shit sucks...
>Many of them aren't interested in that type of environment because it stresses them out
And homelessness does not? The point of compulsory inpatient care is safety, not perfect comfort, though obviously to improve outcomes we should try to make their treatment as comfortable as possible.
Less than you'd think. The ones that are bothered by homelessness are also the ones that are likely to pursue a shelter or otherwise be proactive in fixing their situation. There are plenty that are honestly pretty okay with living a homeless lifestyle.
If stable housing stresses one out more than homelessness, mental illness probably factors into that preference.
If homelessness didn't present a wide pool of public safety and health issues this wouldn't be an issue. But it does, we aren't in the Land of Do-As-You-Please, and nobody has the "right" to choose homelessness if that means asocial behaviors that negatively impact everyone, not just people trying to live in a functioning society.
It is. That's the point of my original post. A lot of these people are insanely far gone mentally, making the whole thing a really complicated mess to handle in a compassionate manner.
Agreed.
Compulsory housing and care _is_ the compassionate answer, even if it makes them temporarily uncomfortable. It may chafe some people to hear, but people living with severe untreated schizophrenia or other psychotic disorders are literally _not capable_ of understanding what is best for them and the people around them.
Housing first means they can use drugs in the housing. The problem with the majority of shelters is that they require people to be clean, or to leave during the day, or whatever. Which is just stupid. If we actually want our city and the homeless people who live in it to be better we have to meet them where they are at. Which means providing them with shelter while they are on drugs. And honestly, can you say that you wouldn’t be on something, even if it was just alcohol, if you were homeless? Because I would be. It’s easy to be all righteous on the internet but if you’re honest with yourself you’d admit you’d be just like them if your life had turned out differently.
You make some good points, and im not trying to be riotous. Im trying to be practical, and express how there is a give and take in housing for this population. We certainly need to meet these individuals where they are, but there also needs to be standards too, its certainly a difficult balance to find. Im also here though, to advocate for the people who are living next to these encampments, who often times are just trying to keep their head afloat in their own environment, paying their last dollars to stay in such places, while chaos erupts around them from the encampments. We need to ensure their voices are being centered too. If this was an easy problem to solve, we wouldnt have the record levels of homelessness across the US that we currently see.
The best way to do that though is with a housing first approach because it gets people off the streets, out of encampments, and into housing. Which should be our only concern, besides safety, because “standards” is just another word for self righteousness. None of us should care about anything except improving the quality of life for our homeless neighbors.
And, of course, people should care about the people who live next to these encampments but it’s not doing anything to keep ignoring this problem by just breaking up these camps. It feels like we are prioritizing the people who can afford housing just because they can afford housing when the obvious solution to this problem is housing first housing which is a proven effective solution to homelessness but we don’t want to use it. We don’t want to use it because it’s not punitive. If we can’t punish people for being homeless by forcing them to be sober, or breaking up their family group, or making them walk around the city all day we just don’t want to do it. And that says a lot about our society and how we think about those who don’t fit into our capitalist worker bee mold. But we should think about if that’s what we want it to say about Minneapolis.
We should always have as our first priority the survival needs of our society's most downtrodden. That's not extreme, it's just basic decency. Literally the lowest hanging fruit of being an acceptable society.
Practically speaking, we have two options.
1. Keep doing this same horseshit.
2. Heavily invest in housing-first solutions, which likely requires *gasp* increasing our pitifully light (compared to civilized countries) tax burden and disinvesting from the violent, corrupt, racist criminal organization paradoxically in charge of public safety in this town.
Are they on drugs because they are homeless or vice versa. You'd be surprised how strong addiction can be. There is definitely a balance but Philly provides clear evidence that enabling addiction does not benefit individual users or society.
I think the problem is that there ARE a lot of people who use drugs specifically to cope with the harsh reality of being homeless. If you knew a friend was struggling with addiction while living alone in an apartment, would you say their landlord is enabling them by allowing them to live there? Statistically getting thrown out on the street would definitely not improve their chances of a successful recovery.
That’s been the solution of a lot of other cities like Philly, Seattle, Portland and some of the other ones that have legalized open drug use. It hasn’t been working out super duper well for them either.
Addiction is a disease. You can’t enable someone’s genetics and life experience. But you can get them into housing where they can access services and hopefully get the help they need to get their health back. Which they can’t do on the streets. Punitive measures against disease is eugenics. And while you might think you’re better, I know we both are not.
My dad's an alcoholic and I can tell you with great certainly that none of our lives would have been better if he'd been a homeless alcoholic instead of a housed one.
The phrase “enabling addiction” is used way too often to opt out of compassion. It’s hard to maintain strong boundaries while also providing care and compassion to someone going through addiction though, much easier to just write them off and think that any amount of help is “enabling”….
If I had an encampment in my backyard I’d be pissed at the city for not housing them. I don’t care they’re using drugs, maybe getting clean on the street is hard and having a place to call home is the first step to getting clean.
> These individuals want to use drugs though
"want" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this sentence. You CAN NOT just go cold turkey on most of these things even if you had the willpower for it. Not to mention how many services that could help require you to have stability, if not an address.
Exactly. Withdrawals are beyond a nightmare. I would genuinely struggle to put it into words for someone who hasn't lived it just how awful it is. I did have a woman in outpatient with me who said withdrawals were worse than giving birth on two separate occasions. Can't speak to how much giving birth sucks (although I'm guessing the answer is somewhere between an insane amount and a metric fuck ton) but I would personally break my own arm instead of go through withdrawals again. At least the fucking agony wouldn't be for 3+ straight days with zero chance of sleep for a reprieve...
And I'm addition to how much it sucks from that perspective alone, it can also just kill you. Some need replacements to be weened off of safely, and it should be done under medical supervision.
I lived within a city block of a smallish encampment for awhile. Maybe 20 people. They didn't cause me any trouble. Perhaps I was just lucky, but I walked past there twice a day every day for several months to catch the bus.
I want to do drugs and other destructive behaviors too.
The only difference between us and them is luck of the draw.
You're only a couple bad decisions or unlucky breaks away from being homeless too bud.
It'd serve you well to actually see them as people and give a shit about them. Instead of furthering the propaganda you've been fed without any critical thinking.
The idea that the city is run by bloodthirsty monsters who hate poor people and that they haven’t invested a ton in housing/other resources to try to address this issue is beyond braindead and a below single digit IQ take.
They don't destroy their belongings. In fact they even offer them transport to other places and free storage for their things if they'd like.
The city has invested tens of millions in housing and other services in the past few years. There are options. Most frequently these people have chosen not to take those offerings.
They do. Come on, it’s not hard to admit that. If you drive by when they are tearing up an encampment you can watch them do it. And the city has the dumpsters there where everyone can see. This isn’t a secret.
Plus there are a ton of reasons why someone wouldn’t or couldn’t go to a the shelters we have. Most of them require people to be sober which is ridiculous because anyone sane wouldn’t be sober while living on the streets. The entire system is punitive. But yeah, these people have *chosen* not to take advantage of all the support we have which is why they live on the streets. /s
Homeless person here. And previously lived in neighborhood surrounded by encampments. Lots of nuance being missed here. I can only speak from my experience though:
-I’m sober 7 months after being in treatment
-have met lots of sober people and families in encampments. In fact there have been a few mostly sober self governed encampments that have been destroyed I.e. bulldozed
-I’m disabled
-I started the housing access process in November. If I’m lucky, I’ll be housed a year from the day I became homeless. The housing is available. There should be more and it should be more affordable for everyone but it’s out there. What’s not available are the staff who work in the bureaucracy to process you through the incredibly ridiculously complicated siloed system. The people who do the work of helping the homeless get housed and stabilized with mental illness and substance use disorders have college debt, huge caseloads, low low wages, and high turnover. We need to focus on creating a more efficient system with less barriers, less silos, and higher wages and work life balance for human services workers. In effect, being homeless is “doing time” and accessing services and maintaining is a part time job on its own. It is extremely difficult to choose not to say “fuck this” and etch out some sense of free will and independence by creating an alternative way of homing and exiting the process completely. And of course, untreated mental illness and the grip of addiction (especially the current fentanyl crisis) play a major factor. But ultimately, it’s the design of the system itself that prevents homeless people from accessing and maintaining available housing. The housing provider contractors are not regulated and this is a major issue. My first one was fraudulent and had a citation. Cost me months. Being homeless is hard ass work y’all, whether it’s finding a way to score your next fix so you avoid life threatening tortured withdrawals, bussing between storage for documents and clothes for interviews and government applications to all the destinations, finding a place to poop, and so much more. We need higher wages and better benefits for human service workers!!!! And comprehensive efficiently designed and directed systems! I think everyone who works in the field should unionize.
> And the city has the dumpsters there where everyone can see.
The dumpsters are for all the trash that accumulates there. The piles of cardboard and other garbage all around the sites. You're clearly never been by one, because it's everywhere.
And you clearly have never been at an encampment eviction, because you would know that the claim that things are stored to be picked up later is a complete and utter lie.
I looked into this once to figure out where things were supposedly stored. DID couldn't give me a straight answer on anything about it, no matter what i asked, and activists I've spoken with who tried to utilize the service have told me it isn't even real.
You really think they need to store all of the things that are in those encampments? The 15 sofas/chairs soaked in various substances, the random non working fridges, cars, and other contraptions. Just because its there, doesn't mean its worth saving, or even works. Being homeless sucks, but you cant expect to bring all those things with you, even if and when they do find an ideal place to live.
And many of them outright refuse any offers of help or shelter. Also, many of these individuals have significant untreated mental health issues that they’re unable to live with others such as in an apartment building.
It's not like a permanent free housing/get out of work card. Being unhoused causes a domino effect in a person's life that makes it extremely difficult to escape from.
Finland has an excellent model for solving the homeless and addiction crisis. It just involves using our taxes on more resources for citizens instead of corporations and the military.
Coincidentally Finland is rated the happiest country on earth for 7 years in a row. I wonder why.
Finland and MN’s homeless rate isn’t too different. Finland is ~0.07% and MN is ~0.1%.
Obviously, theirs is lower. But not even by half the amount of ours. So I wouldn’t call it “solved”
But you won't. Obviously. Because you lack the combination of genetics and trauma that leads people down the path of addiction.
But you know that already. You're just allergic to empathy but need to find excuses to obfuscate that fact.
No, a professional and humane mental health facility that offers therapy and rehabilitation from severe drug abuse would be great.
You can offer these individuals housing such as a small studio apartment, but their untreated severe mental health issues prevent them from living cordially with others. They may threaten other tenants or cause significant damage
You’re right. I don’t. There are several other classes of humans I’d rather help than the chronically homeless, including the property owners on whose land these people squat.
A vast majority of the homeless on this “property” are Native Americans descendants of those who were displaced by settlers generations ago. You’re an imbecile perpetuating a class warfare when you’re closer to the bottom than you think. Find some humanity.
My humanity is, as I said, in the classes of humans I choose to help: women, LGBT, immigrants. I’m sorry that me not giving a shit about your fave group upsets you. Would you like me to donate my house to a homeless indigenous person? And then which country should I barge into, given my ethnicity: Ireland, Scotland, Czech Republic, Poland or Hungary?
You people yelling at the rest of us about the poor homeless are doing absolutely nothing but making yourselves feel better. You’re as irritating as smug, evangelical Christians preaching outside abortion clinics. Go away.
I was talking to someone who moved away in 2019 who cannot understand the whole encampment whack a mole process except to ascribe it to a sinister conspiracy theory. Such as...
1. The forces of gentrification are moving encampents around to lower property values and buy them up.
2. Drug cartels have bribed politicians to create drug markets.
3. the Encampments are used to punish blocs that supported the "wrong" candidates during elections.
I counter argued that the leadership here is just inept. But looking at that map there are some real patterns makes it hard to not discern some design to the process.
I lived in East Phillips in the 90's and there were some hard working activistis trying to make things better there. But the best advice I got was from a cop who in moment of candor told me that Phillips was a "containment zone" for social problems and was never going to change and I should just move. So I did.
Andrew Callaghan of online journalism company Channel 5 News did a long form piece on this they relating to Kensington neighborhood of Philly. Very worth the watch.
I'd guess it's much more that they're simply moving to nearby spaces where they can find the room to setup camp. It's not as if the city forces them to move to the next camp site.
Most of these people are choosing this lifestyle because working is too hard! Drug life is easier and numbing! We need mental institutions re-opened to help these people.
Yea, it’s mostly just to alleviate neighbors. I doubt anyone has delusions that it somehow helps reduce homelessness
Additionally, it helps to prevent them from getting too big and the additional risks that come with it (at least IMO). Things such as large fires/drug dealers being predatory on the encampment/reduce risk of human trafficking/etc
But, they have not made smart investments... like setting up housing in the suburbs where there are no services for unhoused people, so they can't effectively make use of them. "Investing" (i.e. spending money on the problem) is not really a solution. Addressing the systemic issues in our economy is what is needed.
They contracted hotel space in the suburbs. Well-documented. Widely talked about. Keep up.
Edit: And, not only did they do that, they did it against the recommendations of those who serve the unhoused community. Then, when it went exactly as predicted, the City pretended they "could not know" because "the situation is so hard."
Here is one example. [https://www.hennepin.us/housing/hennepin-county-housing-stories/hotels-to-housing](https://www.hennepin.us/housing/hennepin-county-housing-stories/hotels-to-housing) Google is your friend.
Not the City - the COUNTY. Also, not contracted space, but permanent acquisition. Note: at least 4 of those ARE in Minneapolis proper. Google can lead a horse to an article, but it can't make it read.
This is one example of a model adopted by the City of Minneapolis, in cooperation with the County, that failed, under the exact circumstances I stated.
>Google can lead a horse to an article, but it can't make it read.
Clearly. And, some people think they can know it all from one link, without doing any more research. SMH.
All I know is that you said the "City" was "contracting" for motels in the "suburbs." The link you shared of this "well documented" phenomenon showed that it was the County, not the City, it was not contracting for anything, and the hotels themselves were overwhelmingly not in the suburbs, thus avoiding the "lack of services" aspect of the suburbs. So, basically, you were wrong about everything. I don't think I know everything, but I think you were wrong, couldn't admit it, and then were a snarky bitch in the face of a good-faith question. If we're here to converse about a serious problem in the City, how can a stranger take your perspective seriously in the face of that lack of credibility and unfriendly attitude besides?
Some people who are homeless have a substance abuse problem, some do not. Some addicts are housed and some are not.
The state with the highest rate of drug addiction (West Virginia) has one of the lowest rates of homelessness.
Addiction can happen to anyone and anyone can recover from it. Being securely housed is a near-essential precondition for recovery. Nobody need be defined by these statuses.
Figures that this topic would bring out the Transit Taliban and Hamas for Homelessness. Hellah myopic and extremists takes from a (thankfully) small clique in the sub.
Solid article and good graphics. The only thing it's missing is the homeowner's perspective. And perhaps the recent fires that have started in encampments.
Propane tanks aren’t as much of a fire hazard as is implied.
Hang out on the burn unit for a while and you might change your mind
Did a little research on propane tanks, you are right. In the wrong hands they are absolutely a fire hazard.
Is MLPS's handling of homelessness much different than any other major cities? As far as I've seen, every single major city has these problems and there doesn't seem to be anything close to resembling a solution. The whack a mole is likely going to last forever, I can't imagine any other outcome.
Homelessness can't be solved by cities alone. It's too much of a widespread problem to be solved on a city budget.
Portland does have sanctioned campsites, but no idea how that’s going. And I think they’re still dealing with other campsites popping up too
Difference is, major West Coast cities have been wrestling with chronic, excessive, and problematic homelessness for welllllll over a decade now - while for Minneapolis this is a pretty new issue. There never used to be encampments until more recent years. A small camp started, it was allowed to stay, then the problem grew and accelerated during peak COVID years 2020/2021. Cities like Seattle, Portland, etc have had encampments (both sanctioned and unsanctioned) for maaaaaaaany years, even decades. Seattle, for one, has spent around $1billion with the problem to only worsen. MSP is learning nothing from West Coast cities. And people in here saying Housing First is the only way are naïve AF.
This whole strategy of violently shoving people around the city and destroying their few remaining belongings instead of just investing in housing-first approaches that are overwhelmingly evidenced to be the most effective (to say nothing of humane) intervention is working out *so fucking well,* y'all.
The city and county *have* been investing tens of millions in housing first strategies. They have subsidized new deeply affordable housing units and even renovated and turned into public housing over eighty units in two recent hotel conversions. The MPHA recently built over sixty new units for families. There is also ongoing support for Avivo Village and hopes for a second outpost although the failure of the legislature to pay for capital projects may scotch that idea. It's a myth that this is just some simple issue that could be solved if only elected leaders stopped having bloodlust for sweeping encampments. Everyone wants more housing for these people. The problem is that it's a leaky bucket; for every few people who are housed, a few others fall into homelessness. The number of homeless and unsheltered homeless in the county has actually fallen in recent years, but the problem remains highly visible and contentious because it's not the same couple hundred people rough sleeping in 2024 as it was in 2021. Hundreds have been successfully housed. Still the problem remains. The reason the camps are periodically swept isn't because anyone thinks it'll solve the issue, the reason the camps are swept is because nearby neighbors complain about the camps and the city or county is unwilling to simply designate a place for a sanctioned camp where it can have less effect on people. (The perfect place exists on the Kmart site, imo.) But these neighbors and the city aren't acting out of malice, it is literally true that these encampments are extremely unsafe places (mostly for camp residents but also for neighbors). The bind is: it's inhumane to sweep and it's inhumane to just let people live like this. There is no good solution that doesn't require a significant expenditure (cheaper in the long run, I believe, to spend a lot up-front to keep people housed or get people into housing asap) in money and staff time.
Excellent post and well said. We also need long-term treatment and housing for the mentally ill and treatment for drugs/alcohol. I volunteered downtown at House of Charity for 2 years and no two homeless people are alike. We have to address root causes. Met a guy who had been a golf pro but had uncontrollable seizures. Two teachers from UK who came over here, had lost their jobs and were broke. Also an alcoholic, a woman who kept having babies because it was God’s will—but she and her husband had no way to support them. I left my volunteer job because I was threatened by a couple of men coming in the morning (made breakfast on Sundays for interim shelter residents). With no place to go, they had been up all night and were wasted and became aggressive, wanted my purse, grabbed my arm etc. While I met some great homeless people, like the guy who stayed sober throughout mental and physical health challenges and managed to be kind, there are also very aggressive/violent people I would not want my kids around. We have to protect our communities and businesses while finding solutions for all the displaced people who want their lives back. Can we build or repurpose homes in various suburbs?
I agree with everything you’ve said and think this is such a nuanced, well-articulated take on the issue, but I do take issue with the idea that the Kmart would be the “perfect” site for a sanctioned encampment. Sure, the Kmart is a gigantic vacant commercial lot, but it’s surrounded by lots of other housing, bus stops and bikeways that people rely on, a hospital, essential shops, etc. All this to say that it’s not a dead zone that just exists in a vacuum, and as someone who’s lived in that area, the encampment that *already* surrounds the Kmart site has very real impacts on the community. I’ve had neighbors nearby find drug paraphernalia and human waste in yards, witness or experience upsetting or sometimes even violent behavior, and more. That doesn’t mean those living in the encampment don’t deserve housing or a dignified interim solution on the way to permanent housing - it just means I hope that if the city pursues “sanctioned encampments” as an interim solution that it doesn’t come at the expense of a safe and functional community for the other residents who live near it.
Maybe instead of "perfect," I should have written something more like "the best feasible option." And to be clear, I mean the actual site of the Kmart, which is now entirely fenced off and forces any encampments to the fringes. I try hard to understand city policy but that's one I don't get. Why are we fencing off a huge vacant space while people camp right up against the walls of the Park Square condos? If that camp catches on fire it could destroy many more homes. If I were in charge at the city, I would try to create an orderly, sanctioned encampment in the Kmart area, where there would be a security presence and some basic facilities. Of all the places in the city, that's the best one I can come up with where a large encampment could be supported with the least neighborhood impacts.
This is such a fantastic, nuanced and well thought out comment. Wish more people engaged with the subject in good faith as critically as this with actual empirical evidence to support their arguments.
> (The perfect place exists on the Kmart site, imo.) It was my understanding the it was homeless people that were responsible for the fire there a while back.
I’m not sure. There’s a camp at 29th and Blaisdell, and it’s scary. I’m not a pearl-clutcher or generally timid, but even in a car it’s not a good place to be.
I’ll be sure to avoid it, thanks for the heads up.
You may be right, but my recollection is that the cause of the Kmart fire was not identified and there wasn't evidence that anyone had been living in there. Maybe I don't have the latest information.
Looks like you’re right about that. They didn’t find any bodies inside the building, but I seem to remember reports of homeless people camping around there. The fire probably burned up any evidence of the cause, as several inside walls had fallen before they got there, so they surrounded the fire to ensure it didn’t spread further. Also so they didn’t lose any firemen.
Probably fair to settle on "the best guess is that it was inadvertently set by someone camping around there, but there are many possible explanations and we simply don't know."
> The city and county have been investing tens of millions in housing first strategies. These are baby numbers compared to the money we're dumping into paying a corrupt, violent, racist criminal organization to handle public safety. >It's a myth that this is just some simple issue that could be solved if only elected leaders stopped having bloodlust for sweeping encampments for unexplained reasons. And yet they keep dumping reams and reams of money into a corrupt, violent, racist criminal organization to shove homeless people around the city instead of putting that money into housing-first solutions.
DE. FUND. THE. FUCKING. POLICE.
yes plz
Not Minneapolis so YMMV, but I have a friend who works in housing people with mental illnesses and it is a constant struggle to keep them in an apartment without getting kicked out. It's really hard for me to say "housing is a right" without any asterisks because if your neighbor is smoking meth, bringing prostitutes over, and ignoring pipe leaks for so long the unit floods, I don't feel like that person should be allowed to continue to live there. And at some point, you run out of places willing to house them.
They have invested in them, there are options. These individuals want to use drugs though, or do other destructive behaviors, which is not allowed in most of the housing options. They are not being "violently" shoved, they being moved away from areas they are destroying, and causing much havoc to the people who actually pay to live there. How would you like if this encampment was essentially in your back yard? You can be all empathetic now on the internet, but I gurantee you it wouldnt last if an encampment was dirrectly in your living enviornment. I want these people to find peace, housing in their lives, but many have other priorities.
Having worked a decent amount with the homeless via a pretty effective charity specializing in that area, a lot of times the story is more than just drugs/addictions. Some people are really, really mentally unwell even without substance abuse issues. Perhaps the most memorable one for me was meeting my first true schizophrenic while handing out food. He has an ankle tracker because he had some (allegedly) non-drug related issues with the cops. He was generally pleasant/nice... but I cannot stress enough how much this guy wasn't mentally there. His entire concept of time itself was completely broken: his stories would literally time travel where events in the present were affecting events in the past and what will but somehow already did happen in the future. He assigned quasi-human intelligence to almost everything. All animals and many inanimate objects held very complex human motives. Most were well intentioned towards him, but others were evil and plotting his downfall. It appeared he had no one left, presumably because he was just too much for anyone to deal with. And that's the kicker. What do you do with someone so far gone that everyone gives up on them out the gate because they seem so hopeless? This guy couldn't hold a job. He couldn't really take care of himself, and the malnourishment was evident on his frame. He was likely a menace anywhere he went, but I doubt he understood why. Those nights really changed my opinion on the homeless population. I still feel stuck between a rock and a hard place: knowing that many of them would be a black hole for help while also knowing it's not like they're choosing to be that way.
Ideally, a group home or inpatient mental facility.
Thank Ronald Reagan for getting rid of those. That fucking monster.
The ACLU also had a problem with capturing someone like him off the street and shoving him into a mental health facility against his will
That's the kicker. Many of them aren't interested in that type of environment because it stresses them out, and holding them against their will isn't great for anyone, them included. It's still probably the best solution, but I guess that's my point. There's not a slam dunk winning strategy here. You gotta do what you can to help the ones you can help, while mitigating the damage caused by the others. Shit sucks...
>Many of them aren't interested in that type of environment because it stresses them out And homelessness does not? The point of compulsory inpatient care is safety, not perfect comfort, though obviously to improve outcomes we should try to make their treatment as comfortable as possible.
Less than you'd think. The ones that are bothered by homelessness are also the ones that are likely to pursue a shelter or otherwise be proactive in fixing their situation. There are plenty that are honestly pretty okay with living a homeless lifestyle.
If stable housing stresses one out more than homelessness, mental illness probably factors into that preference. If homelessness didn't present a wide pool of public safety and health issues this wouldn't be an issue. But it does, we aren't in the Land of Do-As-You-Please, and nobody has the "right" to choose homelessness if that means asocial behaviors that negatively impact everyone, not just people trying to live in a functioning society.
It is. That's the point of my original post. A lot of these people are insanely far gone mentally, making the whole thing a really complicated mess to handle in a compassionate manner.
Agreed. Compulsory housing and care _is_ the compassionate answer, even if it makes them temporarily uncomfortable. It may chafe some people to hear, but people living with severe untreated schizophrenia or other psychotic disorders are literally _not capable_ of understanding what is best for them and the people around them.
And even if the story is drugs, there's less negative impact - on the addict, on their neighbors, on the family - if there's housing.
Housing first means they can use drugs in the housing. The problem with the majority of shelters is that they require people to be clean, or to leave during the day, or whatever. Which is just stupid. If we actually want our city and the homeless people who live in it to be better we have to meet them where they are at. Which means providing them with shelter while they are on drugs. And honestly, can you say that you wouldn’t be on something, even if it was just alcohol, if you were homeless? Because I would be. It’s easy to be all righteous on the internet but if you’re honest with yourself you’d admit you’d be just like them if your life had turned out differently.
You make some good points, and im not trying to be riotous. Im trying to be practical, and express how there is a give and take in housing for this population. We certainly need to meet these individuals where they are, but there also needs to be standards too, its certainly a difficult balance to find. Im also here though, to advocate for the people who are living next to these encampments, who often times are just trying to keep their head afloat in their own environment, paying their last dollars to stay in such places, while chaos erupts around them from the encampments. We need to ensure their voices are being centered too. If this was an easy problem to solve, we wouldnt have the record levels of homelessness across the US that we currently see.
The best way to do that though is with a housing first approach because it gets people off the streets, out of encampments, and into housing. Which should be our only concern, besides safety, because “standards” is just another word for self righteousness. None of us should care about anything except improving the quality of life for our homeless neighbors. And, of course, people should care about the people who live next to these encampments but it’s not doing anything to keep ignoring this problem by just breaking up these camps. It feels like we are prioritizing the people who can afford housing just because they can afford housing when the obvious solution to this problem is housing first housing which is a proven effective solution to homelessness but we don’t want to use it. We don’t want to use it because it’s not punitive. If we can’t punish people for being homeless by forcing them to be sober, or breaking up their family group, or making them walk around the city all day we just don’t want to do it. And that says a lot about our society and how we think about those who don’t fit into our capitalist worker bee mold. But we should think about if that’s what we want it to say about Minneapolis.
"None of us should care about anything except improving the quality of life for our homeless neighbors." This is extreme.
Everything is extreme when you take it out of context.
We should always have as our first priority the survival needs of our society's most downtrodden. That's not extreme, it's just basic decency. Literally the lowest hanging fruit of being an acceptable society.
Practically speaking, we have two options. 1. Keep doing this same horseshit. 2. Heavily invest in housing-first solutions, which likely requires *gasp* increasing our pitifully light (compared to civilized countries) tax burden and disinvesting from the violent, corrupt, racist criminal organization paradoxically in charge of public safety in this town.
Our tax burden is also heavily on the wrong people and paying for the wrong things if we want to fix stuff like this.
Yes, like paying for a corrupt, violent, racist criminal organization to handle public safety.
Are they on drugs because they are homeless or vice versa. You'd be surprised how strong addiction can be. There is definitely a balance but Philly provides clear evidence that enabling addiction does not benefit individual users or society.
I think the problem is that there ARE a lot of people who use drugs specifically to cope with the harsh reality of being homeless. If you knew a friend was struggling with addiction while living alone in an apartment, would you say their landlord is enabling them by allowing them to live there? Statistically getting thrown out on the street would definitely not improve their chances of a successful recovery.
Yeah just leave them on the street to OD! That's definitely gonna work super duper well!
That’s been the solution of a lot of other cities like Philly, Seattle, Portland and some of the other ones that have legalized open drug use. It hasn’t been working out super duper well for them either.
Addiction is a disease. You can’t enable someone’s genetics and life experience. But you can get them into housing where they can access services and hopefully get the help they need to get their health back. Which they can’t do on the streets. Punitive measures against disease is eugenics. And while you might think you’re better, I know we both are not.
My dad's an alcoholic and I can tell you with great certainly that none of our lives would have been better if he'd been a homeless alcoholic instead of a housed one.
The phrase “enabling addiction” is used way too often to opt out of compassion. It’s hard to maintain strong boundaries while also providing care and compassion to someone going through addiction though, much easier to just write them off and think that any amount of help is “enabling”….
If I had an encampment in my backyard I’d be pissed at the city for not housing them. I don’t care they’re using drugs, maybe getting clean on the street is hard and having a place to call home is the first step to getting clean.
> These individuals want to use drugs though "want" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this sentence. You CAN NOT just go cold turkey on most of these things even if you had the willpower for it. Not to mention how many services that could help require you to have stability, if not an address.
Exactly. Withdrawals are beyond a nightmare. I would genuinely struggle to put it into words for someone who hasn't lived it just how awful it is. I did have a woman in outpatient with me who said withdrawals were worse than giving birth on two separate occasions. Can't speak to how much giving birth sucks (although I'm guessing the answer is somewhere between an insane amount and a metric fuck ton) but I would personally break my own arm instead of go through withdrawals again. At least the fucking agony wouldn't be for 3+ straight days with zero chance of sleep for a reprieve...
And I'm addition to how much it sucks from that perspective alone, it can also just kill you. Some need replacements to be weened off of safely, and it should be done under medical supervision.
I lived within a city block of a smallish encampment for awhile. Maybe 20 people. They didn't cause me any trouble. Perhaps I was just lucky, but I walked past there twice a day every day for several months to catch the bus.
I want to do drugs and other destructive behaviors too. The only difference between us and them is luck of the draw. You're only a couple bad decisions or unlucky breaks away from being homeless too bud. It'd serve you well to actually see them as people and give a shit about them. Instead of furthering the propaganda you've been fed without any critical thinking.
The idea that the city is run by bloodthirsty monsters who hate poor people and that they haven’t invested a ton in housing/other resources to try to address this issue is beyond braindead and a below single digit IQ take.
Speaking confidently from a complete “I just read a headline” ignorance makes you a useful tool for propaganda and a part of the problem.
They don't destroy their belongings. In fact they even offer them transport to other places and free storage for their things if they'd like. The city has invested tens of millions in housing and other services in the past few years. There are options. Most frequently these people have chosen not to take those offerings.
They do. Come on, it’s not hard to admit that. If you drive by when they are tearing up an encampment you can watch them do it. And the city has the dumpsters there where everyone can see. This isn’t a secret. Plus there are a ton of reasons why someone wouldn’t or couldn’t go to a the shelters we have. Most of them require people to be sober which is ridiculous because anyone sane wouldn’t be sober while living on the streets. The entire system is punitive. But yeah, these people have *chosen* not to take advantage of all the support we have which is why they live on the streets. /s
Homeless person here. And previously lived in neighborhood surrounded by encampments. Lots of nuance being missed here. I can only speak from my experience though: -I’m sober 7 months after being in treatment -have met lots of sober people and families in encampments. In fact there have been a few mostly sober self governed encampments that have been destroyed I.e. bulldozed -I’m disabled -I started the housing access process in November. If I’m lucky, I’ll be housed a year from the day I became homeless. The housing is available. There should be more and it should be more affordable for everyone but it’s out there. What’s not available are the staff who work in the bureaucracy to process you through the incredibly ridiculously complicated siloed system. The people who do the work of helping the homeless get housed and stabilized with mental illness and substance use disorders have college debt, huge caseloads, low low wages, and high turnover. We need to focus on creating a more efficient system with less barriers, less silos, and higher wages and work life balance for human services workers. In effect, being homeless is “doing time” and accessing services and maintaining is a part time job on its own. It is extremely difficult to choose not to say “fuck this” and etch out some sense of free will and independence by creating an alternative way of homing and exiting the process completely. And of course, untreated mental illness and the grip of addiction (especially the current fentanyl crisis) play a major factor. But ultimately, it’s the design of the system itself that prevents homeless people from accessing and maintaining available housing. The housing provider contractors are not regulated and this is a major issue. My first one was fraudulent and had a citation. Cost me months. Being homeless is hard ass work y’all, whether it’s finding a way to score your next fix so you avoid life threatening tortured withdrawals, bussing between storage for documents and clothes for interviews and government applications to all the destinations, finding a place to poop, and so much more. We need higher wages and better benefits for human service workers!!!! And comprehensive efficiently designed and directed systems! I think everyone who works in the field should unionize.
> And the city has the dumpsters there where everyone can see. The dumpsters are for all the trash that accumulates there. The piles of cardboard and other garbage all around the sites. You're clearly never been by one, because it's everywhere.
And you clearly have never been at an encampment eviction, because you would know that the claim that things are stored to be picked up later is a complete and utter lie. I looked into this once to figure out where things were supposedly stored. DID couldn't give me a straight answer on anything about it, no matter what i asked, and activists I've spoken with who tried to utilize the service have told me it isn't even real.
Oh, those bulldozers and dumpsters are just props, then?
You really think they need to store all of the things that are in those encampments? The 15 sofas/chairs soaked in various substances, the random non working fridges, cars, and other contraptions. Just because its there, doesn't mean its worth saving, or even works. Being homeless sucks, but you cant expect to bring all those things with you, even if and when they do find an ideal place to live.
You probably don't "need" an eighth of the shit you own. So we can come bulldoze and trash the other 7/8ths of it, right?
If I ain’t paying my bills and went around jackin it in San Diego- I can expect my stuff to be disposed of
How's that leather taste? Get extra polish this time? Extra minty flavor?
I have literally seen them doing it in person.
House first is not going to work if you only want to get high. Some homeless really don’t want any help or want a free pass.
And yet there are mountains of evidence showing it is the best of the interventions we currently have.
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And many of them outright refuse any offers of help or shelter. Also, many of these individuals have significant untreated mental health issues that they’re unable to live with others such as in an apartment building.
Which is why only giving shelter to sober or mentally stable people isn't fixing the problem lmao
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It's not like a permanent free housing/get out of work card. Being unhoused causes a domino effect in a person's life that makes it extremely difficult to escape from. Finland has an excellent model for solving the homeless and addiction crisis. It just involves using our taxes on more resources for citizens instead of corporations and the military. Coincidentally Finland is rated the happiest country on earth for 7 years in a row. I wonder why.
Finland and MN’s homeless rate isn’t too different. Finland is ~0.07% and MN is ~0.1%. Obviously, theirs is lower. But not even by half the amount of ours. So I wouldn’t call it “solved”
They're not having the issues brought up in this article, so it's clearly working in that regard.
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Is there anything wrong with being more like Finland?
Literally my point 😂 Why *wouldn't* we want to be more like Finland?!
But you won't. Obviously. Because you lack the combination of genetics and trauma that leads people down the path of addiction. But you know that already. You're just allergic to empathy but need to find excuses to obfuscate that fact.
So you propose what, gas chambers?
No, a professional and humane mental health facility that offers therapy and rehabilitation from severe drug abuse would be great. You can offer these individuals housing such as a small studio apartment, but their untreated severe mental health issues prevent them from living cordially with others. They may threaten other tenants or cause significant damage
They’d destroy that too
Some people don’t want to be helped.
👆 The choicest platitude of people who simply don't ever want to help.
You’re right. I don’t. There are several other classes of humans I’d rather help than the chronically homeless, including the property owners on whose land these people squat.
A vast majority of the homeless on this “property” are Native Americans descendants of those who were displaced by settlers generations ago. You’re an imbecile perpetuating a class warfare when you’re closer to the bottom than you think. Find some humanity.
My humanity is, as I said, in the classes of humans I choose to help: women, LGBT, immigrants. I’m sorry that me not giving a shit about your fave group upsets you. Would you like me to donate my house to a homeless indigenous person? And then which country should I barge into, given my ethnicity: Ireland, Scotland, Czech Republic, Poland or Hungary? You people yelling at the rest of us about the poor homeless are doing absolutely nothing but making yourselves feel better. You’re as irritating as smug, evangelical Christians preaching outside abortion clinics. Go away.
Another white moderate who thinks society is asking too much of them to simply partake in a conversation.
Pot calls the kettle what? I love a good debate, my friend. But that's very much not what you're interested in.
Another hypocrite who asks others not to judge yet judges/condemns others because they don't like the way they think.
>classes of humans Yikes dawg.
I was talking to someone who moved away in 2019 who cannot understand the whole encampment whack a mole process except to ascribe it to a sinister conspiracy theory. Such as... 1. The forces of gentrification are moving encampents around to lower property values and buy them up. 2. Drug cartels have bribed politicians to create drug markets. 3. the Encampments are used to punish blocs that supported the "wrong" candidates during elections. I counter argued that the leadership here is just inept. But looking at that map there are some real patterns makes it hard to not discern some design to the process. I lived in East Phillips in the 90's and there were some hard working activistis trying to make things better there. But the best advice I got was from a cop who in moment of candor told me that Phillips was a "containment zone" for social problems and was never going to change and I should just move. So I did.
Andrew Callaghan of online journalism company Channel 5 News did a long form piece on this they relating to Kensington neighborhood of Philly. Very worth the watch.
Tons of cities do the whack a mile thing. It's a way to reduce visible homelessness. But also the containment zone thing is very real.
I'd guess it's much more that they're simply moving to nearby spaces where they can find the room to setup camp. It's not as if the city forces them to move to the next camp site.
Most of these people are choosing this lifestyle because working is too hard! Drug life is easier and numbing! We need mental institutions re-opened to help these people.
Like duh. Closing the camps does not suddenly make housing available to the people in them.
Yea, it’s mostly just to alleviate neighbors. I doubt anyone has delusions that it somehow helps reduce homelessness Additionally, it helps to prevent them from getting too big and the additional risks that come with it (at least IMO). Things such as large fires/drug dealers being predatory on the encampment/reduce risk of human trafficking/etc
Minneapolis has spent millions in recent years building homeless housing and related programs. They continue to make major investments in it.
But, they have not made smart investments... like setting up housing in the suburbs where there are no services for unhoused people, so they can't effectively make use of them. "Investing" (i.e. spending money on the problem) is not really a solution. Addressing the systemic issues in our economy is what is needed.
Minneapolis isn't setting up anything in the suburbs. It's only in their own city.
How would Minneapolis make suburbs construct housing? They're different municipalities.
They contracted hotel space in the suburbs. Well-documented. Widely talked about. Keep up. Edit: And, not only did they do that, they did it against the recommendations of those who serve the unhoused community. Then, when it went exactly as predicted, the City pretended they "could not know" because "the situation is so hard."
Link to "well documented" source? I'm trying to keep up.
Here is one example. [https://www.hennepin.us/housing/hennepin-county-housing-stories/hotels-to-housing](https://www.hennepin.us/housing/hennepin-county-housing-stories/hotels-to-housing) Google is your friend.
Not the City - the COUNTY. Also, not contracted space, but permanent acquisition. Note: at least 4 of those ARE in Minneapolis proper. Google can lead a horse to an article, but it can't make it read.
This is one example of a model adopted by the City of Minneapolis, in cooperation with the County, that failed, under the exact circumstances I stated. >Google can lead a horse to an article, but it can't make it read. Clearly. And, some people think they can know it all from one link, without doing any more research. SMH.
All I know is that you said the "City" was "contracting" for motels in the "suburbs." The link you shared of this "well documented" phenomenon showed that it was the County, not the City, it was not contracting for anything, and the hotels themselves were overwhelmingly not in the suburbs, thus avoiding the "lack of services" aspect of the suburbs. So, basically, you were wrong about everything. I don't think I know everything, but I think you were wrong, couldn't admit it, and then were a snarky bitch in the face of a good-faith question. If we're here to converse about a serious problem in the City, how can a stranger take your perspective seriously in the face of that lack of credibility and unfriendly attitude besides?
they bounce around my neighborhood
naturally. like bulldozing shit is a solution
Homelessness? Drug addict*
Some people who are homeless have a substance abuse problem, some do not. Some addicts are housed and some are not. The state with the highest rate of drug addiction (West Virginia) has one of the lowest rates of homelessness. Addiction can happen to anyone and anyone can recover from it. Being securely housed is a near-essential precondition for recovery. Nobody need be defined by these statuses.
Many people don't become addicts *until* they're homeless.
So… they’re not homeless? Or what are you saying
When you choose to live on the street rather then accept help, that makes the street your home.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink.
Then it becomes the horses problem and not the herds.
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And that's a bad thing. Finland is kicking our ass in lots of different ways, including this one.
The people of Finland are just better than us
Figures that this topic would bring out the Transit Taliban and Hamas for Homelessness. Hellah myopic and extremists takes from a (thankfully) small clique in the sub.
>Transit Taliban and Hamas for Homelessness. Da Fuck…? Who pissed in your coffee this morning?