Left Behind: Homeless Crisis in San Francisco

yeah I always want to come back and now that my kids are grown and they don't need me like they you know or do your kids know that but yeah it's the homelessness examine steals out of control I would say majority of people that are homeless are not homeless they're mentally ill slash dragons this is a question you need to be asking why do the police let it go on right in front of them is it because of that bill that they passed you had made everything a misdemeanor even heroin simple possession of meth and heroin are misdemeanors now so it's not worth the cops time the Supreme Court gave a ruling that the overcrowding in the California prisons was cruel and unusual punishment and they threatened to cut off the Fed dollar if they didn't do something about it so that's why they're not arresting everybody anymore they can't put them all in prison because they got a Supreme Court ruling against him they call it cruel and unusual and punishment how crowded the prisons were the whole goal of Prop 47 had had multiple aspects to it her goal was to be more helpful to society helpful to the homeless issue helpful to the police departments and the court system but as we saw that's a total failure at this point connection between those who are homeless and drug abusers it has a direct correlation in a sense these who are homeless and in possession of drugs are not going to be prosecuted and taken out of a homeless realm and thrown into jail as long as what they possess is less than nine hundred and fifty dollars due the intention was to help of course but what it really wound up doing is it made San Francisco more attractive for those who are both homeless and those who are drug addicts to move here we're now finding that homelessness is increasing drug addiction is increasing and the number of people here the numbers are increasing as well [Music] you okay she-she-she Hamblin every day the Wyndham [Music] is that over the years before homelessness was the crisis that we're having now is that San Francisco is always looked at as being a fun musical free or welcoming of people from all over the world but now as we see that the city has very much changed at what point do the locals here just say we've had enough other cities stick them on buses and send them here and now this is like a homeless camp what happens is they're building too many condominiums and keeping the people out high cost of living which also pushes out affordable housing initiatives which also pushes out homeless shelters because those are like the first thing to go quality of life laws have to be enforced urinating on the street defecating sleeping shooting heroin on the street should be illegal while some locals are clearly frustrated with the homeless crisis others seem to be either desensitized or completely heartbroken I mean I see it every day where I work in Berkeley there's a semi-permanent camp right on the block where they'll get cleared out every few weeks back it's something that's around that I see every day I mean it's hard to get the logic on it yeah some of the economic indicators say in general we're doing better and yet just to walk down the street clearly that's not the case for a lot of folks just right now where we are walking from City Hall if I walk one block that way I moved from seeing professionals to seeing ten people in a row actively sleeping either intense warchest crashed out on the sidewalk in the juxtaposition of Union Square and like elite economic shops on one in government well from the other end it just doesn't seem famil the way that the reality is how do I engage with fellow members of my city without feeling like I'm looking at them to see what they are it does appear to be going it's a complex system issue one perspective is just the economic structure of capitalism by now is increasing the division between the wealthy and the poor we see they here in San Francisco one of the wealthiest cities in America so there's a few different schools of thought but one of them specifically goes back to the early 1960s that was when the last Republican mayor's administration finished up and voted in a Democratic mayor which has been the situation all the way till today and so before this in 1964 so we've had a whole string of Republican conservative mayor ships then after that when the Democrats were voted in we had the poverty homeless everything as you see and that has never changed unless there's a fundamental change in getting more conservative more centrist candidates elected to office elected to the mayorship elected to the City Council or Board of Supervisors there's not going to be a change and the latest change the local government has come up with is an interesting one to say the least [Music] the latest homeless count in San Francisco reached over 8,000 people and they say about 35% of unsheltered homeless citizens live in vehicles while the number can't be precise there's a good chance as far beyond 30 [Music] I'm intrigued by some of the experiments with guaranteed income you know sometimes I wonder how much both private and government money is spent on paying people to come up with solutions and provide services and intakes and referrals if somebody actually had a meaningful amount of money that wasn't the kind of money that let's me imagine getting through the next few days what if somebody had ten thousand dollars and could imagine making a deposit and could imagine setting up with some long-term health care clearly the mediating of services can't be the only thing [Music] they allowing day that reach to get richer and never stop them just if they don't stop the rangecontrol that they beat they let the land or to increase their rent as much they can they'll continue to do that and one day are gonna be in the streets do I don't think there is one answer because I don't think it's one problem a portion of the homeless community which are people that are working and around the area that just can't afford to live someplace the answer to that isn't the same answer as the people who have been failed by our mental health system there's a lot of work to be done in a lot of places [Music] [Laughter] policies that the government is enforcing and promoting is the problem with homelessness the more you give homeless people to try and help them the byproduct of that is more homeless people and more people trying to take advantage of this and probably more businesses that are nonprofit trying to help popping up and their whole intention is to keep more people in this cycle because they're getting money for you at some point this people have to realize you just can't be only nice and only try and help but you should but there has to be consequences [Music]

Channel: Fox News

Views: 445,835

Rating: 4.8182335 out of 5

Keywords: Fox News Channel, Fox News, News, us, homeless, homelessness, left behind, homeless crisis, san francisco, san fran homelessness, san francisco homelessness, california, california homeless, california homeless crisis, web exclusive, us homeless, us homeless crisis, us homelessness, san francisco homeless, homeless people, homelessness in america, homelessness in california, homelessness in san francisco, homelessness in america 2019, california homeless camps

Id: j9z0FNGKng4

Length: 9min 47sec (587 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 20 2019