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Representative Rashida Tlaib of Michigan has proposed a Congressional resolution to grant “unhoused” people significant rights to use public spaces, such as parks, public buildings, public restrooms, and public transportation facilities.
Rep. Tlaib’s proposed resolution would not be binding on the federal government, nor does she address who will be forced (at gunpoint) to pay for this "right," but the thinking behind it is worth considering.
As proposed, the resolution would declare that the unhoused (i.e., homeless) individuals have an inherent, inalienable right to uninhibited access to public parks, transportation, facilities, sidewalks, buildings, restrooms and other spaces. Essentially, the right to take over any public space for their own use.
That sounds to some like an invitation to the homeless to functionally take over any public space for the personal use of the unhoused individual. Possibly to the exclusion of the general public.
So the question arises: Why were/are those public spaces created, built, and maintained? And what does it mean for the future of those and similar public spaces if a small group of people (the “unhoused”) is allowed to take over any public space they choose to occupy?
This was an issue even more than forty years ago when I was a young lawyer who frequently visited the county courthouse and adjacent county law library. The homeless even then had begun to occupy the plaza next to the courthouse (especially the benches surrounding the plaza fountains), the county law library, and the restrooms in both spaces. Their aggressive behavior and their offensive odors drove away the office workers who used the plaza as a place to have a peaceful break or in which to eat lunch, lawyers and other citizens who used the law library to research the law, and visitors to the courthouse and law library who sought to use the restrooms in both facilities.
Voters and taxpayers at the time grew frustrated and began to ask why the county was allowing a small number of homeless people to interfere with the ability of the general public to enjoy these public spaces. Taxpayers were questioning whether to agree to fund future public spaces if they were to be functionally excluded from using them.
Rep. Tlaib’s proposal appears to formalize the same problem - to allow a small number of homeless people to take for themselves spaces that were designed, built, and maintained for the use of a large number of people. Will the public continue to support designing, building, and maintaining public parks, transportation facilities, sidewalks, (public) buildings, (public) restrooms and other (public) spaces if doing so is for the exclusive enjoyment of people who contributed nothing?
Discussion (10)
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There is no reasoning with our civilization wreckers . They intend to wreck us .
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The State of Washington passed a law this year making it impossible for any local jurisdiction to apply zoning rules so as to exclude homeless camps from any place in their town. Essentially, making it possible for homeless to camp anywhere they please with localities unable to move them. My neighborhood already has a street-end near a supermarket where homeless park their RVs (they buy cheap RVs and use them as shelter). In Seattle, entire streets are parked full of stationary RVs, whose residents leave trash, used needles, and tarps everywhere. Stores everywhere are closing, due to unlimited shoplifting losses, and vacant buildings don't remain vacant long-squatters move in quickly, and sometimes burn them down due to indoor cooking fires.
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One of the things I hear from my acquaintances who are very focused on the "poor and downtrodden" (including the "homeless" or "unhoused," and in the last few yers the illegal immigrants) is that in their focus on the "poor and downtrodden" they fail to even see or consider the people who are negatively affected by their efforts to "help" the "poor and downtrodden."
When the "unhoused" take over an area, it is not usually an area in which the "rich" people who support programs for the "homeless" and "migrants." Instead, the "unhoused" usually take over an area otherwise occupied by by economically poor people who have few if any other options.
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Every person of the left failed to mature, but Tlaib is particularly stunted. I remember when this happened. (Tlaib wanted Biden to take better care of Palestinian Arabs.) The NPR article treats her charitably - the account I read at the time had a picture of her making fists and stamping her wittle foot. Couldn't find that picture now.
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Coincidence that I read the OP and on the same day Rashida Tlaib leaves a voice mail (recorded) on my phone. The message invited me to a "know your rights" workshop. She indicated that this info would be valuable in the event that I happened to encounter federal agents including ICE agents.
So she introduces legislation and she prioritizes constituent service.
On a side note I found the tone of her voice on the call surprisingly friendly but I was not moved that she addressed me as neighbor.
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