The good news about former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani crawling out of his makeshift 9/11 shrine to write a New York Post article about current Mayor Bill de Blasio’s handling of the city’s homelessness problem is that Giuliani never mentioned 9/11.
I’m sure of that. I read the article twice. Plus, I skimmed the article once.
The dastardly part about Giuliani’s latest missive is that — well, he has the nerve to talk!
In fairness, it’s hard to argue with the former mayor when he recommends that team de Blasio take an aggressive approach to the homeless problem inclusive of intervention; assessment of financial, housing and social needs; as well as coordination of the appropriate responses by city agencies.
In abstract terms, Giuliani’s recommendation is generic, but reasonable.
And then, Giuliani said these words about the approach which made my reading eyes shift to park:
This approach is not hypothetical. As mayor, I utilized it and was able to successfully remove the vast majority of homeless from the streets, providing humane and effective solutions for many of their problems.
Well, I would like for Giuliani to explain how eliminating support to community service programs — a primary line of defense in fighting homelessness — will reduce the number of homeless people.
How does arresting homeless people reduce homelessness?
Oh, yeah. You’re no longer homeless after that — you’re now a felon! With a jail record!
So, the cycle in Giuliani’s NYC went like this: underfund the shelters, thus making them dangerous and unattractive options to homeless people; arrest homeless people who fear for their safety and refuse to stay in those shelters; and then screw-up homeless people’s chances of employment by giving them jail records.
No job means no income, and no income increases your risk of being homeless, which means you’ll likely get arrested again…
I normally like to crunch my own numbers but time constraints led me to the Coalition for the Homeless’ website, where their graph — produced from NYC government data — shows the homeless shelter population increasing under the two mayoral administrations before De Blasio’s.
And yes, that population grew during the Giuliani years.
After thinking about this for a moment, I would rather hear Giuliani talk about 9/11…
song currently stuck in my head: “well you needn’t (live at montreux)” – gonzalo rubalcaba
mentalunrest.com 