Homeless people living rough on city streets and in city parks interfere with intended uses of those spaces by nearby residents, shopkeepers, shoppers, walkers and drivers. This is much worse in mild-climate states, especially those with humane intentions toward the homeless.
City, county and state governments have a right and a duty to enable normal use of these areas. So far efforts to limit unauthorized camping or squatting have failed.
Jailing people for drug trafficking, overdosing, petty theft or trespassing doesn’t relieve street abuse significantly. There isn’t enough jail capacity. Likewise for rehab services. Needed is a new way of housing and caring for people unable to compete for normal housing.
I wonder whether a variety of last-chance resort colonies would be appreciated and effective. Last-chance resorts would be analogous to the hundreds of prisons now located in rural communities where prison is the main industry.
Some resorts could be placed in existing towns. Others might be placed in abandoned mining towns rebuilt for the purpose. Resorts would be for people who were repeatedly arrested and who failed three attempts at rehabilitation. Last-chance resorts would have to be walled for the community’s safety. But they would be equipped for and devoted to recreation and entertainment.
Some resorts would be for sober guests, who can’t compete for various reasons. They might accommodate couples or families. Separate resorts would be for substance abusers who would get enough after-dinner drugs of choice for happy evenings. Monthly socials with opposite-gender last-chance resort colonies might be arranged. Guests who choose and succeed with sobriety could move to half-way houses in hopes of advancing to self sufficiency.
These ideas are meant to be ethical, in that they should diminish unjust and unnecessary suffering. How might they be made more so?
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