executive order<\/a> that pledged to enforce prohibitions and promoted the institutionalization of those living on the streets with mental illness or substance use disorder.<\/p>\nHousing advocates say that the court ruling presumes that people living outdoors have choices that they often do not. Shelter beds are full, waiting lists are long, and conditions for housing can be prohibitive for those struggling with employment, substance abuse, or even having children or pets who also need shelter.<\/p>\n
“Because so many of us move through our days full of choices, it\u2019s easy to assume that everyone has choices, many choices every single day,\u201d said Phyllis Chamberlain, executive director of the Housing Alliance of Pennsylvania. \u201cAnd when we start from that assumption, it leads some people to believe that homelessness must be a choice, too.\u201d<\/p>\n
The proposed legislation would not prevent towns and cities from enforcing rules so long as there were available alternatives for people to turn to.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know very well that public parks aren\u2019t the best places for people to call home,\u201d said Amos Stoltzfus, the SoWe Neighborhood Director at Tenfold, a Lancaster housing organization. \u201cBut at a time when many of our communities don\u2019t have enough shelter beds to meet the demand, a park is sometimes the best that we can offer.\u201d<\/p>\n
He recounted a recent instance in which he provided a woman fleeing domestic violence with a locker to keep her valuables safe. With a park curfew enforced in Lancaster and no empty shelter beds, there was no legal place for her to sleep.<\/p>\n
Advocates say the consequences of enforcement undermine the work being done to serve the homeless. At worst, they can be fatal to a demographic where the life expectancy is just 50, according to physician\u2019s assistant Joanie Miller who practices street medicine.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor example, an individual who by choice entered into opioid use disorder treatment with us directly on the street has successfully stopped the use of fentanyl and is on the housing list,\u201d said Miller. \u201cA street sweep, forced removal of herself from public space and resulted in the loss of essential items critical to surviving, including her tent, her medication, and the photo of her son that reminded her why she was working so hard to get off the streets.\u201d<\/p>\n
Miller\u2019s patient, a rape victim, relapsed, overdosed and died that night. Another told her he was considering hanging himself from a nearby tree, unsure if he could survive another winter outdoors.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will bend the arc of government here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania away from a sort of municipal surrender that says the only form of affordable housing that we will invest in is prisons and toward an approach to local government that is defined by justice and human interests before business or political interests,\u201d said Rep. Izzy Smith Wade-El, D-Lancaster.<\/p>\n
The legislators said that this bill would be just the beginning of a push for housing reform aimed at addressing the root causes of homelessness. Their goals fell in line with the dissenting opinion of Justice Sonia Sotomayor on Grants Pass.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is possible to acknowledge and balance the issues facing local governments, the humanity and dignity of homeless people, and our constitutional principles,\u201d wrote Sotomayor. \u201cInstead, the majority focuses almost exclusively on the needs of local governments and leaves the most vulnerable in our society with an impossible choice: Either stay awake or be arrested.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(The Center Square) – Just as homelessness rates across the country reached record highs, the impact of a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":37921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[61,338,28,30,29,294],"class_list":["post-37920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-economy","tag-healthcare","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-public-safety"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}