Texas Bill 987 ---- To be voted on soon

[rootusrootus]

Because you said you got stage 2 warnings
I am going off topic here so I'll be brief
Offsite storage of your back up stuff...another town preferably
Fire proof safes are not fire proof! Unless you paid a lot for it, yes that means fire proof gun safes too
Go when they say go! 85 people perished in my community, most in their cars, sitting in traffic jams

That's good advice, thanks! We definitely have taken some steps since then to better prepare ourselves in the future. Between that and the ice storm and weeklong power outage we got a few months ago, we're having all of our disaster preparedness plans put to the test and the cracks exposed.

[Calnca]

I think it’s Seattle where a judge ruled that RV’s on public streets are considered to be people’s homes. They are not subject to ticketing or towing.

What a surprise......Seattle

[Calnca]

Austin was getting pretty bad, trashy squalor tent camps that stink to high heaven under the over passes, they even had a big fire at one of the camps inside a drainage tunnel, begging at nearly every stop light on Ben White Blvd. 6th street venues got really bad with stabbing's, fights and such between homeless people begging and assaulting tourist. Not good for SXSW, ACL, Formula 1 Racing and a host of other main Austin attractions. The State tried to do something about it, the Governor and Austin City Mayor Steve Adler were throwing words at each other, the city wouldn't do anything about it. The State donated a property to give the homeless a free safe place to camp even indoor facilities with running water, showers, transportation, assistance. Then they cleaned up the the horrible trashy under passes in Austin. But no the homeless wouldn't stay in the provided free camps, they moved back to the underpasses so they could continue to beg at stop lights and tie up traffic and now its worse than ever before.
It doesn't surprise me this Texas bill has come up.

Blame all the CA folks that relocated to Austin, and brought their "attitudes" with them, and now ruined Austin, after ruining CA and then leaving.

[[email protected]]

It's popping up in communities in PA too. One-size fits all approach overlooking the non-offending (I hope).

Just like most all gun laws.

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[rootusrootus]

Just like most all gun laws.

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Just like all laws, period. We don't need to make this political.

[D2Reid]

Well as usual when I make an assumption I get called on it. I hadn't considered the mentally ill when I made my "bad life decisions" statement. Nor did I consider a disaster. My Social/Economic background, lack of education, and lack of exposure make it very difficult for me understand the why's of the problem. I hate it when my bigotry peeks out, I guess the folks behind bill 987 have a similar issue.

[BobLandry]

In 2011 the town of Van Horn Texas did this very thing, pressured by the local RV park owner over loss of revenue. It was illegal to park overnignt anywhere but in one of the local RV parks, which promptly raised their rates. It was all over RV.net for a long time and people were encouraged to not stop there for anything including fuel. I can't imagine how much money that tinhorn town lost over the greed of a few park owners.
This current bill is another knee-jerk reaction and will be a disaster, like most things that government attempts to fix.

[Steven@147]

i don't know much about the bill but I suspect it has nothing to due with natural disasters like hurricanes and wildfires or whatever. And yes we lived through the Bastrop/Union Chapple wildfires back in 2011 where 17,000 acres and near 2000 homes were destroyed. The Union Chapple wildfire started 50 yards behind our house. We were evacuated 4 times because of reburns, but we got lucky, several of our friends were not. After we got our Imagine we practiced hitch and go, with a minimum hook up, throwing stuff in the back of the pickup, how fast we could hook and go. We got it down to less than 15 minutes starting with backing the truck under the hitch, the slides were always closed at home, we were 1/4 mile from a major 4 lane divided highway to get out of the area, then stop and full hook with the WDH. We lived on edge for several years after that and whenever it got dry and a drought in the area.

As far as the chronic homeless, I suspect there are many reasons how they got there, mental illness, school dropouts, abuse, family issues, drug addition, illegal's status, I'm sure the pandemic is a factor, or just lazy. But what to do about it other than stick them in an area where nobody can see them. Maybe that's what the bill is aimed at, out of site out of mind. I don't know.

I can only relate to Austin, I don't know what its like in other cities but Seems to me, I'm sure city Mayors would say they don't have the money to deal with it, their budgets are stretched to the limit now. Taxes are sky high now and nobody is going to vote for increased taxes to deal with the homeless. For cities there is no upside to dealing with the issue, its all cost and no gain, until the public and voters get sick and tired of it then you get bills like this.
It would take an ongoing commitment in human resources, time and lots of money to deal with it. Even private charities couldn't deal with it alone. With the way the cost of living is around Austin, even with low income housing, and a less than $10/hour job sweeping sidewalks, cleaning up trash along streets, highways and such. For most or a lot of them their education or skills couldn't provide for much more if anything, even for some just riding garbage trucks. Most likely some of these people would never be employable, others with minimal employment would never make enough money to provide their own housing. So a camp or facility of some kind needs to be provided. That is what the State tried to do here in Austin but once it got cleaned up it came roaring back.

[Wicked ace]

Being a Texas resident I'm not opposed to this Bill. In our travels we have witnessed Wall Mart parking lots containing overnight, weekly, monthly etc. RV's that look pretty seedy. I would prefer to move those problems to an adjoining state LOL. I'm thinking it's better to take advantage of our state parks system or commercial camp grounds.

NICE....if you don't see them they aren't a problem or have a problem.

[Wicked ace]

I volunteer at Manna on Main St, a soup kitchen/food bank during holidays so that the regular staff gets a break and I have a humbling experience. I see mental health issues along with alcoholism and drug abuse, which by the way have long been considered a disease, as large contributing factors in homelessness. For the cold hearted I will say that it's difficult to make poor life choices when you have no choice. Minimum wage and rising rents due to housing shortages do not go well together. Face it low level manufacturing jobs are long gone in this country. Finding any job that pays a living wage if you don't have specific or special skills is also tough. In the last ten years this has become more and more a cause of displaced people. Also the system makes it difficult to get assistance because in person application is required which means not spending time looking for or at work.
I have seen families that are scraping by trying to stay together. They take meals at the kitchen or get groceries at the food bank. I have seen parents who had to give their children up to social services because they couldn't care for them. Over the last holidays I became engaged with an elderly man, a proud man, living on a small Social Security stipend and found him a new recliner on Craigslist that he thought was the greatest.
I try to help where I can to make small differences in others lives. I realize I won't change the world. I realize that a concerted effort is needed that many don't want to address. So maybe it would help if some with the big first world issues would get out and see for yourself rather than complain.