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StumbleLas Vegas shortchanged in federal funding for homeless
People line up by the fence of the Las Vegas Rescue Mission at Bonanza Road and D Street on Aug. 16.
Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2010 | 2 a.m.
A homeless man takes a nap on Foremaster Lane last summer. Homelessness is a factor in the redevelopment of downtown Las Vegas.
Outdated formulas
Last year, the U.S. Housing and Urban Development Department distributed $1.677 billion nationally to fund programs through the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act. Two formulas are applied to determine community need. Factors that determine aid per homeless person include age of housing stock and population growth lag, neither of which relates to root causes of homelessness, according to the United Way of Greater Los Angeles.Another option
HUD is to decide whether to revise the formulas by next year. Communities and agencies in Las Vegas and across the country are mobilizing to urge the federal agency to act. The United Way of Greater Los Angeles, citing a review of existing research and data, says the three key variables highly correlated to increased rates of homelessness are poverty, lack of affordable housing and overcrowding. The United Way is urging that HUD adopt one formula to distribute funding to all U.S. metropolitan areas. It recommends the new formula take into account, for example, the number of each area’s people who live below the federal poverty line, the lack of affordable housing for people living in poverty and the number of overcrowded housing units.Sun archives
- Couple looks to future after leaving desert homeless camp (7-25-2010)
- As economy sinks, demand for social services soars (7-25-2010)
- Battered women of recession (7-19-2010)
- Las Vegas jobless rate soars to 14.5 percent (7-19-2010)
- The faces of the recession in Las Vegas (12-28-2009)
- Count finds 17 percent increase in homeless population (4-9-2009)
- LV City Council addresses homeless issues (3-18-2009)
- Volunteers seek out valley's homeless for census (1-29-2009)
- Volunteers turn out to help homeless (12-21-2008)
Homeless numbers in greater Las Vegas have topped 13,000, with the recession leaving people jobless, then pushing parents and children out of their homes and onto the street.
It’s happening all around the country, but the human toll here could be compounded because federal formulas lead to uneven homeless funding, giving cities such as Pittsburgh more than $10,000 to serve each homeless person while the Las Vegas area receives about $500 per individual.
Southern Nevada has 2 percent of the country’s homeless, but gets just 0.4 percent of $1.7 billion in funding from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Funding over the years has fluctuated, providing $5.8 million in 2005, $7 million in 2007 and $6.8 million in 2009.
The huge difference between Las Vegas and other areas recently came up before the Southern Nevada Regional Planning Coalition’s Committee on Homelessness.
Michele Fuller-Hallauer, the group’s coordinator of Continuum of Care, the name for federal programs targeting homelessness, asked the committee to urge HUD to change the funding scheme that leaves the Las Vegas area “the least amount of money per homeless person.”
If funding were evenly distributed to the 640,000 homeless throughout the country, Fuller-Hallauer said, it would increase from about $500 to $2,600 each in the Las Vegas region. Getting five times as much money would boost the coalition’s ability to prevent homelessness, in part by providing housing and rental assistance, she said — even though she doubts a big increase would happen quickly.
“But if we had more money, we could fund more homeless services and get folks off the streets,” Fuller-Hallauer said, adding that the coalition’s 10-year plan focuses on prevention and rapid rehousing. “It would give us more money toward assisting with their rent in transition,” she said.
Because services and shelters are located nearby, the homeless loll up and down the streets of downtown Las Vegas — or get arrested and, without question, make business owners and some of their customers uncomfortable.
For years, the city has tried to redevelop parts of downtown, attempting to draw business to an area that has little foot traffic. While pockets of rejuvenation spring up, Richard Worthington, president of the Molasky Group of Companies and also president of the Downtown Las Vegas Alliance, said, “We as a community are going to have to address homelessness as it affects the perception of personal security.”
Homelessness and loitering are two of the biggest issues facing members of the Alliance, a group working to create a “sustainable urban core.”
“It sets the tone for the area that may end up reducing investment,” Worthington added.
This area’s low federal aid to fight homelessness stems from one of two funding formulas developed in the 1980s. To get HUD homeless grants, communities were evaluated by Formula A, which considers population, poverty and overcrowded housing. Formula B considers population, poverty and housing built before 1940s — assuming older housing means more homeless.
Las Vegas was considered under the first formula.
In 2009, Congress approved the HEARTH Act (Homeless Emergency and Rapid Transition to Housing), opening the door to reconsider HUD’s funding formula. Next year, HUD is expected to decide whether to change it.
Kenny Young, North Las Vegas’ acting city manager who chaired the homeless coalition’s latest meeting, said several communities and agencies, including the United Way, are working together to urge HUD to modify the formulas.
“Right now, money is going to communities where there really isn’t that much of a homeless population,” he said.
Almost all the agencies and communities represented on the Committee on Homelessness signed a letter to HUD. Only Metro Police declined to sign. Deputy Chief Gary Schofield, Metro’s representative on the committee, abstained.
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I drive by these homeless on the way to work. It is amazing to see just how many of them are smoking cigerettes. How do they afford them?
It doesn't matter how much money is spent on homeless people or programs, most will remain homeless.
Most homeless shelters have 3 rules, no drinking, no drugs, no fighting. Most of these people CHOOSE to live on the streets rather than live by these 3 simple rules.
So would should I have to pay for their lifestyle decisions with my taxes?
@LasVegas2009 homeless people just bum cigarettes off of smokers. My brother was a smoker and he used to give cigarettes to homeless people all the time. If you have a dollar in your hand and a homeless person asks you if you have some spare change you will probably just hand them the dollar you have in your hand. It's only a dollar, right? It's only one cigarette..it's the same thing.
And @Noindex with Las Vegas being the foreclosure capital of the world I am sure not all of the people currently homeless are "lifers" at being homeless. Why should Pittsburgh get $10,000 per homeless person and Las Vegas only get $500. I know they don't have nice weather there but the discrepancy is too much. The funding needs to be configured better.
Now, when driving by a homeless encampment, or an area of town like Las Vegas Blvd. near the Salvation Army, where it looks like a fairly well organized OUTDOOR PSYCH WARD, what would prompt one to muse, as lasvegas2009 does;
"It is amazing to see just how many of them are smoking cigerettes. How do they afford them?"...
My first thought is "Good God...LOOK AT HOW MANY OF THEM THERE ARE!" & "HOW DO YOU SURVIVE outside in the 110 degree HEAT?"
Obviously, Las Vegas's ECONOMY has born a whole new breed of "homeless people".
There are people from every persuasion and socio-economic background out there now...
It is, at best, a tragic commentary on society that there is SO MUCH MONEY, FOOD & SHELTER in the same city that mocks, shuns, and belittles it's homeless population.
HEY OSCAR... I thought all these "panhandlers" went home to SUMMERLIN at night... WHAT GIVES???
OF COURSE, Las Vegas is UNIQUE in some of it's homeless population;
"Sin City" pops out new homeless folks EVERY DAY in MANY WAYS by virtue of it's many "opportunities" to "blow your wad"...
A LOT of HOMELESS VETS here...that's a damned sad commentary
on society; IMO...UNCONSCIONABLE...shameful...sinful...lacking in human decency...
MANY MANY MANY MANY psychologically unstable, dangerous to themselves AND OTHERS amongst the Las Vegas Homeless Contingent...
SHAME.
I personally do not believe this is about reducing or eliminating the homeless. I believe this is just another attempt by local officials to grab more federal tax money for their programs.
Ask yourself this questions, do all these homeless programs really want homelessness eliminated? If so that would mean they would be unemployed and the gravy train would end.
Instead, it's in their interest to make the problem seem horrific in order to secure more funds.
This is not about serving the homeless, it's about increasing the funding, period.
@gmag39 is totally correct. Thinking someone likes to stand in 100+ degree heat while passerbys in cars sneer at them or throw things at them, is not something someone readily volunteers for, I used to edit a newspaper in Phoneix that was sold by the homeless. The cops told us it started to give them a sense of pride back. They would pool their money from the sales of the paper and get apartments. Some would get haircuts and just start to feel better about themselves and create a course of action. We started doing dental clinics - it's amazing how dental work and haircuts equaled a 100% self-esteem turnaround. Lots were vets - some were families who had exhausted every possible resource to stay off the streets. Most Americans are two paychecks away from homelessness - two paychecks. And how often have any of us been helped by a friend or family members in tough times or had something to pawn just when we really had to? The country is rife with mental illness but we're big with throwing them in jails. And we're the U.S. for crying out loud.
I worry that some readers are confusing the chronic homeless with the recent homeless, victims of the economy who have either lost their jobs and/or their homes, and are now in need of some help.
It would seem more constructive if comments were focused on that part of the population, who are not gaming the system, versus focusing on the chronic homeless, who are easy targets of criticism and who generally resist assistance but who still, don't you think, deserve some bit of human compassion?
Just sayin'.
Check them all for warrants!
Who is filling in the government required paperwork for Nevada, Clark County, Las Vegas and CCSD? We seem to have people doing these chores that are either uneducated in Grant Writing or our state and Municipal Governments don't bother going after the money that our local news continues to report we are missing out on. If Nevada is "A Day Late And A Dollar Short" for Food Stamp Funding, Homeless Support, Race To The Top Funds, Renewable Energy Credits, Government Foreclosure Money and Southern Nevada consistently loses out to the North in Per Capita State Funding, then heads need to roll and competent Civil Servants need to replace the incompetent.
This is the result of high house prices, high house prices are very bad for an economy they give you an illusion of wealth, yet can destroy a life over night, when prices come down to affordable levels then the economy will start to recover.
All of the Las Vegas programs to get the homeless off the streets require the person to be sober. It is nearly impossible to get sober (or drug free) while living on the streets. The only program that actually works is called Housing First; provide housing, then work on other problems. We could save $50,000 a year per homeless person if we provided housing with case management. Savings come in reduced costs for emergency medical care and law enforcement, including jails and prisons. But taxpayers object to having non-sober housing, even if they have to pay more to keep a drunk or drugged person on the streets. It's time to take a more dollars and cents viewpoint and less of a moralizing one.
This 17 year old senior has started a project to help the homeless. Search, "Where There Are No Lights." Amazing when you know the real facts and not the "reported" facts about the homeless. I do applaude the Sun for stating 13,000 people and not 3,000 as some reports have shown just to make Vegas look not as bad.
This senior is trying to show that the homeless are not just drunks on a corner. They are people who have lost their homes, jobs, identity, and aren't there because they want to be. The comments that some make here are why they get no help. The could happen to any of us. Here is the link to his site or look it up on YouTube.
http://www.facebook.com/CourVO?v=wall&am...
There has been a surge in recently homeless. Most are white Americans who are not street wise or system wise.
There is a increase in "dust bowl" migrants who have a small amount of money, who are going from one town to another looking for work..living in their vehicles.
Whether it is true or not..I meet people who are homeless, dirty and hungry who state that the government agencies do not give aid to whites, only minorities...and especially white men...White men do not apply for aid..because they do not qualify..and they claim to have been refused aid..
That belief is widespread. I believe it. I don't qualify..and if I were out on the street, I would not know how or to whom to apply..nor would I consider going to any State agency..Whites, especially men, rely on family and Church..
But these are a new breed of homeless..The unemployed who didn' t qualify for unemployment and do not qualify for any other program..
I ask homeless whites..why don't you apply for..government aid..and they will reply "That is for minorities"
Thanks Harry!!! Keep up the good work. 6 more years! 6 More Years!. Yes we can, Change we can believe in, Yeah!!
This article is about the homeless situation which has been aggravated by the dire economic situation in the country, much less in Nevada. This article is about a lack of federal funding, in comparison to other areas.
Elsewhere I have read where some people are supporting Harry Reid because of the supposed clout he has and what it brings to Nevada ???
The dire economic situation in this country goes right back to the three leaders of the government and their agenda, Harry Reid being one of them.
Harry Reid has not shown any of that supposed "clout" in deterring an unemployment rate from hitting 14+%. Harry Reid has not shown any of that supposed "clout" in rectifying this homeless funding situation either.
The country's problem is Nevada's problem and that problem is named Harry Reid. We in the rest of the country realize this, but are powerless to do anything about it. Only you in Nevada can fix one of the country's biggest problems, which in turn is going to be the beginning of fixing many of your own.
I feel sorry for these families that have lost everything. The city needs to do more. Even if it means buying some trailers on a piece of land, for a temporary solution. The economy is in the toilet, while the cost of everything is sky rocketing. Shoot, my power bill was 350 this month. Maybe, the electric company crooks, should donate a little/lot of what their stealing from customers, towards these homeless families.
VegasExile
These white homeless have not been bought by entitlements..The ones I have talked to lately have been men who were working construction.
Obamaville... is an interstate migrant camp..until the car breaks down and the last few dollars runs out..
There are going to be more..walking around..this years..
I honestly believe if you GAVE housing to most chronic homeless people, they would still CHOOSE to live on the street. And that's fine, that's their decision and I have no problem with that. I do have a problem paying for worthless programs that have very low success rates. How about some compassion for those of us being taxed to death ourselves.
Because of the way funding works, these agencies have an incentive to increase their own homeless numbers. I don't doubt the numbers are actually going up, I just question how effectively our tax dollars are really being spent.
So last years $800 billion stimuli goes to fund states overblown budgets. $400 billion omnibus, more social spending. Twenty six, fifty two... now we've got the 99ers (2 years UE benefits)club. Record 40 million on food stamps and growing, need more money. The states decide they must cut their own workforce and nazi Pelosi rushes in with $26 billion state aid to keep the public union employee/voters paychecks coming. Hope and change?
Regarding LVS staff comment on "chronic" homeless. You need only listen to #2 man to your idol Obama, Joe Biden, "those 8 million lost jobs aren't coming back"...period.
Look you like capitalism here you go some one wins some one looses ....17 years ago i was was homeless strung out...i got clean went to college ...now i'm a director of a large Non Profit....but thats becuase i decied to play the game....the game of climb over the back of my fellow man to get ahead.........its the game we are all stuck in want more..... what are you willing to do to get it....homeless are so preoccupied with drug or mental health issues.. they cant play....and the rest that are recent are the loosers in this big game...
Xtra Sarcasm Hello!!!
noindex
The typical story..and I hear it every day:
The man is working construction, the wife is working at the local retail.
No construction..no retail..These people do not qualify for benefits..No unemployment or it has run out..The illegals have created that economy and whites compete at the same wages and benefits..
The couple or man see the end of rent/mortgage and scrape together enough for a small travel trailer and pack up, going to mom's or to a friends or where they heard there is work..
When they get there..no work..and mom or the friends scrape up some traveling money so the couple or man can go on to the next..opportunity..
That was last years saga..and there were many people I saw like that..
This Year
Somewhere..the car breaks down or they run out of money...and there aren't any programs that these poeple qualify for or that they know how to apply for or that they will apply for..
It is a absolute, irrefutable fact in the minds of white americans that all those government programs from small business loans to food stamps.. is only for minorities..And they don't apply or don't know how to apply..and don't want to take charity ..not these new homeless, in any event..
VegasExile
Hello...I was agreeing with you...The new homeless are not bought by entitlements and they and their families vote..
Bye Bye Democrats!
Don't give them a penny. They will move on somewhere else. done.
Mr. Gorman, a very liberal response. I would expect nothing less from the Las Vegas Sun. Keep supporting the "everyone is a victim" mentality. I think the Hollies wrote a song.. " He's Not Heavy, He's my Brother", well, let me tell you, he's getting heavy, and my back is breaking..
During the Depression, the WPA offered a job opportunity and a place to live while you worked. I observed on a visit to Sydney, Australia the city streets were very clean in the morning because if you were receiving a public assistance check, you were required to work between one and five in the morning picking up trash and sweeping the streets. Surely there is a public policy strategy that could mimic these examples or become a hybrid which would aid the homeless and jobless problems. Our political leadership has proven woefully deficient in solving these problems, preferring to dole out money to various constituencies rather than risk their political careers on tough votes.
So many homeless people are mentally ill all over the country. In Los Angeles other citys drive them downtown to skid row to get rid of their homeless! A lot of people have no idea that every homeless person is not a bum. I know bums with jobs!
Those small business loans..
I met a man and his wife the other day. They were traveling to relatives..Both had been out of work for a long time..They found one job working for an East Indian immigrant who (according to the Americans) qualified for low interest government loan and special tax breaks..and had bought a motel. The Americans worked at the motel for a room and $7 a day..The East Indians said that he was doing them a favor because an illegal would work for just the room..while mamacita collected welfare. The couple saved the $7..and quit when the East Indian returned from a week in Vegas..
The Americans were traveling to their family ..and had saved enough out of that $7 a day..after food and expenses to pay for gas to get there..
The question is;
Do those Americans who were running the motel qualify for the small business loan to buy the motel?
If not, why not?
they can opnly drink booze on the street and not get harrassed. Please they get free entertainment each week thurs-sun at the fremont street stages!
Homelessness spiked sharply after Ronald Reagan took office and cut social welfare programs. You could look it up.
let the homeless go to california where they will be embraced and treated to welfare. ebt cards, wic, food stamps, section 8, free child care, housing programs, etc...
i hear san francisco and long beach give out the most. tell a homeless person today! same with illegal aliens!
I wonder why everyday I see so many people standing around in the Home Depot parking lot looking for work while countless others waste time holding a sign begging for money at street corners. I want to say - put down the sign and go look for work at Home Depot! Or could it be that the work is too hard for them and it is easier and lazier to stand around beg? Or how about getting paid to hold an advertisement sign for Cricket Wireless or Computer Repair? Heck, we all hate them, but hand out smut on the strip! Do something instead of standing around and weaving in and out of traffic at red lights.
No, until we get the homeless to stop begging for money for booze, cigs, or drugs and get people to stop giving money and only give money to established charities, food banks and shelters - this problem is not going to go away or shrink.
Las Vegas is probably the single worst place to be if you have ANY kind of addiction (gambling, booze, women, sex)....on and on.
You see it everyday. Marginal types locating here with some type of problem. It never gets better for them. My only advice is that if you are drawn to Vegas for its vices...you are probably in trouble. Stay where you are. There's only one way to stay in this city....and that's with money.
@scootermom5:
Thanks for providing the link to that awesome blog, that has been composed by Mr. Justin Major, who definitely does the right thing.
Way to go, kid!
May I recite the link you gave US:
http://nolightsdocumentary.blogspot.com/...
The homeless don't bother me -- I respect their decision to deviate from the norm as well as their will to survive upon the raw basics -- I oppose all social financial assistance funding their decisions.
: {
Hmmm. Another failure by our almighty Harry Reid. We don't get the funding for education, we don't get the funding for foreclosures, he's shifting the funding on the maglev to his buddy Rogich and now this. He's the best.
Sorry, xtra, the way small business loans work (or don't work), the borrower must be "credit-worthy." That means (1) they have collateral, and (2) they have enough income to pay back the loan. Homeless people don't have either. Come to think of it, since house prices are most peoples' main asset, most small businesspeople in this economy are just struggling not to join the homeless on the streets. That is why banks won't lend. That is why small business has stopped being a jobs engine for our economy.
Why don't they drug test these loafers before they hand out this free money. I also see them drinking alcohol and have to wonder where they get all the money to afford those beers and bottles of alcohol. I have to wonder just how much money it takes to stay high all the time? Lots and lots of these people refuse to get off the drugs and alcohol those same problems that brought them to the homelessness. Shelters are there they just need to comply and do what they are suppose to do to stay.
Sorry Lericgoodman
So ..the East Indian immigrant who qualifies for a low/no interest federal loan and no taxes for 5 years ..had collateral and an income...? The guy arrived a few years ago with the shirt on his back, a wife and children?
I know what the people who are homeless tell me..
And some have told me that the farms won't hire Americans for field work...
I found out that was true..
That is either a very persistant wide spread myth..about legal immigrants qualifying for minority wealth redistribution programs that most Americans don't qualify for..or it is true..
I have heard that same thing from people in motel business, trucking, restaurants..many small businesses
I find that most persistant and wide spread rumors are true..
LasVegas 2009
There is a new army out there of ..homeless..or travel trailer Americans
The state parks in Tennessee were obamavilles. There are obamaviless near Reno, there are obamavilles outside Sacrament and in Colorado
Look it up..most of the people are like the okies in the 30's..they have a car, or a travel trailer or a..tent..
their bushvilles though !!!!!!!!!!
It's an indication of our level of literacy in this city and state when so many of the posters fail to see the point of this story and/or provide the typical knee-jerk thoughtless talking point that all these folks are all freeloaders and that somehow social programs are the reason there's a problem to begin with.
It's much easier to gripe about your tax dollars, but meanwhile these same folks don't gripe about all the subsidized funding by the Fed to entire corporations and industry or for the $100 screwdriver.
Unfortunately many people decided to borrow much more than they could afford and the banks and Wall Street made a killing off of the average person's debt.
That's not the Democrats' nor dare I say the Republicans' fault.
We Americans are a wasteful and overspending lot. We're simply reaping what we sow.
Hope you enjoy those 24" rims on your Escalade without a roof over your head with your mailroom job.
cinderelladream: The housed people are not asking for a handout! I could careless what people do with their lives but when you start looking for a handout from me you better start doing things right and live the way I say or no money!
cinderelladream, could you please name the shelter which misused your donation and when this incident happened? I regularly donate to two women's shelters and would like to know.
I've tried to help out "friends of friends" who are in deep need but I cannot figure out some things. One guy was employed part time but refused to even buy a few groceries when I let him stay in a spare room rent free. He insisted on restaurant food.... I sent him packing.
I guess my conclusion from various incidents is that they refuse to plan ahead. They live as well as they can today. I on the other hand, often go without, eat cheaper food, conserve utilities--maybe because I probably don't qualify for energy assistance and food stamps.
Just like people on welfare and food stamps, make them pass a drug test before they recieve a nickle in any kind of aid. I have to pass a drug test where i'm employed , so should they ....
lots of people talking about the homeless like they know what they are talking about; NOT!
I know I'm a mere mortal and not blessed with the Homelessness insight posessed by Michele Fuller-Hallauer. My puny understanding of the issue leads me to believe that making more money available to the homeless in Las Vegas will attract more homeless people. Of course, what do I know.
It's abject cruel capitalism for the poor and TARP bailouts for the rich. The way you righties talk - Why don't you just break out the zyklon-B or whatever ?
@lericgoodman:
Thanks for providing detailed information about retrieving loans.
Good to read a serious non-agenda post, here.
@Harley: How can you decide, when you have no other choice available?
Poor decisioning with no other choice to choose, I mean...
Imagine to wake up one morning with everything gone ...for whatever reason:
the small business, the house, the extendable loans, your savings ...poof, all gone in one night.
How about your clever decisioning right then?
@gbigs:
Your comment is embarrassing. You should be ashamed. You're trying to make yourself feel better by looking down on the homeless and to play the politics card on the homeless issue. This could happen to everyone.
Why don't you just stick some fresh banana where the sun never shines and have some fun with yourself.
Ok, dipstick, here's my story from about 12 years ago:
When I was in search of some Calvary Chapel Service in a new town after having finished my Master degree at University, it happened accidentially, that I took part in some missionary service on Sunday's eve which aimed to reach out for homeless folks. I was so focused on the preacher, who did an awesome job, and made so many people publish their prayers (btw, me, too), that I did only realize, where all the folks around me came from (the streets around the church), when we all were offered some sausages and some potatoe salad et al for free afterwards. So I sat together with all the homeless, knowing I just had my rented home and I was thrieving at my 1st job, but they did not know what I knew, I mean...
They were just usual people, like you and me, just without a home and without a job, they were clean and very poor. One older woman even was trying to hit on me, when we were talking, you know, just like that Harold & Maud stuff, although I declined due to a distant relationship I used to have at that point of time.
@cinderelladream: Right said, exactly what I was about to say:
Another time when I used to be a student and gave five bucks to a homeless, I wanted to know, what he'd do with my donation. So, I watched him buying: a big wheat bread, some cheese and some little bottle of red wine ...I mean: he bought exactly that kind of a French meal, like me, myself, I would have bought it. Then he luckily ate and drank it, to ease his hunger with a thankful look in his eyes.
If I had a company or were a business owner, I'd offer jobs to the non-addictive homeless, and there are many of them:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0454921/
If only Nevada's had a senator who was
Majority leader, things would surely improve! The absolute absence of common sense among bureaucrats is disgraceful. If the formula is that disparate, it should not take 30 years and an act of Congress to change it. No private company could survive this
level of incompetence and mental paralysis. I literally shutter every time the federal government grabs more control over the economy or anything else.
Thanks to the sycophantic actions of Harry
Reid we have lost control of our health care, finance, energy, credit, mortgages
and national debt. Subjecting our private
lives to the control of robotic bureaucrats
is unforgivable. Angle might be crazy but she doesn't have the power to harm us further like Reid does. He's allowed NV
to crumble as he did Obarf's bidding. He
must not be sent back to D.C. or we will
have no chance of surviving the current anti-business agenda.
Harry Reid's clout could have been better use for things like this... getting Nevada a fair share... just a fair share and what is due Nevadans. But Harry does not really care about Nevadans.
It would be interesting to know if Senator Reid's office and staff are organized to protect and represent the interests of their constituents.
Or would general malaise, the fabulous DC party circuit, and or the herculean efforts saving City Center, detract from securing rightful funding for our state's derelicts.
Like you really care about the poor when you use the pejorative term derelicts. Will these people have anymore help with the Republicans ?
With the 500 they get here,buy them a plane ticket to Pittsburg,then they can collect the other 9,500 there.Not so hot there either.Solves both problems.They might even like it there.
Our community looks bad when we "just run people off".
"Now the thing that I call livin' is just bein' satisfied with knowin' I got no one left to blame" --
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Hooker;500 will getya a 1st class champange flight to a really nice town with a way lower unemployment rate,with some bucks to spare.Then their giving out 10 grand in bennies.I know what u mean,but what's not to like,not exactly being run out of town.I call it common sense,go where the dough is.Cures the homeless problem here,get's them 20 times the help,gets them out of the 110* heat,oh ya those winters.Oh ya etc... they wouldn't have the oppertunity to gamble away those bennies.Harley:Carefree Highway ,Gordon Lightfoot,right
Where is the State Gov't in this? Did they do the paperwork right? and the Local gov't as well. And remember we have 2 senators, where is Ensign? Many homeless don't want to be homeless. I know. I was one of them. Homelessness is not a choice. It is hell. And yes, it is better to stay on the streets than a shelter. They stink, get robbed, and noisy. I was more frighten in a shelter than the streets. Some homeless need mental health care. Some need physical care. Others like me needed steady shelter and a job. We need a system that can help sort this out and do it. But; this is Las Vegas and it does not care. There are cities that do more. Thanks to a church, I pulled out. I own my home now. I am fine. There are only so much a church can do. When the laws were pulled to put the homeless and mental patients on the streets, that's a problem, but it is better than the wharehouses.
So we blame them and run them off - Much lower unemployment rate where---B.S.
Hey Ralston!
Where's your article on Reid not being able to secure the funding for this or education which we didn't get a couple of weeks ago?
You're right on top of it as always right? Especially when it comes to the Reids...
Unfortunately the "homeless" industry in the U.S. is thriving, with billions in tax and donation dollars being paid out to these shelters. The largest portion goes to "executive" salary and compensation.
A local rescue mission in my town has a "director" being paid over $150k a year and a fundraising director making over twice that. They are forever on TV and sending mailers asking for your "$25 donation" and saying how many "meals" it provides. Well, the first 18,000 "$25 donations" just goes straight to their pockets so they can be seen eating their meals at all of the finest places in town. No thank you.
As one writer posted, the high salary isn't enough for some of them, they have to skim the donations for the "good stuff" to keep for themselves. What a racket. That director should be fired.
Those of us who work for a living, and suffer through layoffs, salary cuts, etc. are tired of the "system" taking and taking when there's nothing left to take from us.
We feed sandwiches, snacks, water and whatever else we can find to the homeless on the streets four times a week at the dinner hour. We have been doing this for many years. We get no government funding. We had a couple of significant donors who have stopped sending us contributions due to the economy. We would deeply appreciate your help. We are Homeless Helpers. Homelesshelpersnv.com
Yet...oddly enough there is an animal shelter right next to Shade Tree. An animal shelter that provides cool a/c, food, water & shelter to animals as homeless PEOPLE sleep outside around it. I wonder how much it cost to build and maintain that shelter? Couldn't that $$$ have gone to establish homeless programs for those who really do not want to be homeless and are willing to comply with such rules of the programs? Surely not all homeless choose to be so. I find it absolutely ridiculous that this animal shelter sits among tent cities of homeless of which most don't even have access to a shower once a week. Where are our priorities people?!!
hey silcon crap their jobs there-----not !!
@leftiebob:
Thanks for providing the link, guess you meant:
http://www.homelesshelpersnv.org/