“...triage could be done in any room in the city. The hearing room, for example. People could come in the side door (leaving dogs and cats outside), over here would be the social workers, over here the RNs, then the housing specialists, and finally the case managers (just as an example). Then they can go out the back door with their housing voucher or other papers. There’s no need for the Sand Island lot for triage. What the city described with its slide show today was a tent city to be occupied by the houseless. They want to be able to say, in order to get the various punitive ordinances passed into law, that there is someplace to relocate the houseless living in Waikiki.” the city and the state have an obligation to more than those 100 persons who could be accommodated at any one shelter, they have a responsibility to those who are “at-risk” for homelessness, especially when the federal government reports that there is a 4% increase in the numbers of families who are amongst the homeless population…families are losing ground and only caps on rental amounts will save them, not more rules and laws, and definitely not sand island... the city/state can’t create a de facto internment camp to bolster unconstitutional rules and laws, and call it a day on their obligation to the community… ”due diligence” requires that the city/state not only conduct a thorough site assessment of the proposed site - including identifying hazardous conditions, like contaminated or irradiated soil, methods and reliability of transportation, and availability of medical services for these “most vulnerable”...diligence requires input from all the stakeholders, eg: service workers (and not just IHS, they don’t speak for all behavioral health providers - they are great, but they are just one of many and they represent one model of service and alternatives shouldn’t be ruled out), surrounding business/home owners, and especially the homeless persons themselves, who so far appear to be against the planned site…advice to the city/state: “first, do no harm”
Posted on: Sun, 14 Sep 2014 23:02:40 +0000
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