Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News Editorials & Other Articles General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search
 

Sophia4

(3,515 posts)
3. Thanks for posting this video. It's really important that we all watch it and think about
Mon Jul 9, 2018, 12:33 PM
Jul 2018

it. Poverty in America should be our number one issue here on DU.

In Los Angeles, something like 55,000 people are homeless per night.

On any given day, as many as 20 people take to the City Hall lawn, across the street from LAPD headquarters. They're there to "escape the madness" in downtown streets, a 53-year-old homeless man named Lazarus said last week. At night, they fan out to doorways or deserted plazas to wait for daybreak.

The growth of a homeless day camp at the halls of civic power speaks to the breadth of Los Angeles' burgeoning homelessness problem.

The number of those living in the streets and shelters of the city of L.A. and most of the county surged 75% — to roughly 55,000 from about 32,000 — in the last six years. (Including Glendale, Pasadena and Long Beach, which conduct their own homeless counts, the total is nearly 58,000.)

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-homeless-how-we-got-here-20180201-story.html#

This is not a specifically California problem although housing here is very expensive.

It's warm here. (Unbearably hot last weekend.) Easier to live outside. People come to California from around the nation and world because they hope to "make it" or just have a better life.

And housing is so expensive here that just having a job and working every day does not guarantee that you can afford a place to live and still get to work.

As a nation, we need to at least work on solving this problem. But it is rare to see even a news report on it

Thanks to the United Nations and PBS for bringing the facts to our attention.

And I assure you, people living in trailers, tents or just sleeping on the street or under a bridge or in a sort of park somewhere do not have septic tanks or toilets.

Homelessness is not a problem over there that doesn't affect you and me as we sit with our computers. It is a national problem that affects all of us.

Recommendations

0 members have recommended this reply (displayed in chronological order):

Latest Discussions»Region Forums»Alabama»PBS: The story of America...»Reply #3