Editorial: Mission needs rescuing

Tuesday, March 22, 2005 | 8:59 a.m.

Free evening meals are no longer being served to homeless and low-income people at the Las Vegas Rescue Mission. The meals, which had been served seven nights a week at the mission's dining room on West Bonanza Road, are thought to be the main reason that a homeless camp of about 100 men, women and children sprang up on nearby Wilson Avenue. The camp is causing health problems as its residents are forced to use the area's streets as a bathroom.

In November the city of Las Vegas and the Rescue Mission agreed to work together to clean the streets. But in January the city stopped this service and the mission, facing the task alone, ended its effort in February. For five days in January the city tried to find housing for the camp residents but met with little success. Afterward, the Nevada Transportation Department swept through the area, dispersing the homeless people and cleaning the streets. But the homeless came back.

Now the mission, reluctantly, has ended its meals program in hopes the camp will break apart. But this is not the answer. Hundreds of people who are not part of the camp depend on those meals. We hope that someday the city of Las Vegas will realize that homeless people are not going to simply disappear. A proper system of shelters and services would alleviate most of the health problems. In the meantime, at the very least, the city should cover the cost -- approximately $10,000 a year -- for some portable bathrooms near the mission.