My question is, why is this situation -- and many others like it -- happening in an area that is absolutely saturated with social services agencies and shelters that are presumably meant to help people in crisis such as the man shown?
Where is the system going wrong? Are the many social services agencies and their free services attracting down-on-their-luck people such as this man to our area? The historical acceptance that "no one poor can possibly be held accountable"? Are the social services agencies falling down on the job, or are people such as this man slipping through the cracks?
It's absurb to live a neighborhood that has more social services concentrated in one place than anywhere else in the country and have people sitting in trash in our alleys.
If the system worked the way it could, or should, Uptown should have less of these scenarios than anywhere else in the city.
Seriously, what can we as citizens do to help these people get off the streets and get the care that is readily available here?
I am not sure it is possible, whether mentally handicapped or some other reason, many of the homeless people here choose to stay out of the shelters and only go for the daily/meal-to-meal help. I look to those who study and work in this field to explain more, but I guess I believe that other then the mass institutionalization of the many mentally ill homeless there is little a social service org can do. They can offer help, but they can not force help. So to get less of this situation on our streets I would suspect that Uptown would need to offer less of the hand-out type social service, and more of the hand-up type service. With so much of the “help” without case management I think this is what you get. Its to bad, I think this is just one of those ugly realities in the world, unfortunately there are people who are mentally ill and due to that “choose” to be in the situation pictured above. Its sad…….
Seen this afternoon at Sheridan and Broadway.
Oh, my God.
ReplyDeleteSomebody please get this man some help. Seriously.
That is a very striking and disturbing photograph. It saddens me to contemplate that man's life.
ReplyDeleteMy question is, why is this situation -- and many others like it -- happening in an area that is absolutely saturated with social services agencies and shelters that are presumably meant to help people in crisis such as the man shown?
ReplyDeleteWhere is the system going wrong? Are the many social services agencies and their free services attracting down-on-their-luck people such as this man to our area? The historical acceptance that "no one poor can possibly be held accountable"? Are the social services agencies falling down on the job, or are people such as this man slipping through the cracks?
It's absurb to live a neighborhood that has more social services concentrated in one place than anywhere else in the country and have people sitting in trash in our alleys.
If the system worked the way it could, or should, Uptown should have less of these scenarios than anywhere else in the city.
Seriously, what can we as citizens do to help these people get off the streets and get the care that is readily available here?
I am not sure it is possible, whether mentally handicapped or some other reason, many of the homeless people here choose to stay out of the shelters and only go for the daily/meal-to-meal help. I look to those who study and work in this field to explain more, but I guess I believe that other then the mass institutionalization of the many mentally ill homeless there is little a social service org can do. They can offer help, but they can not force help. So to get less of this situation on our streets I would suspect that Uptown would need to offer less of the hand-out type social service, and more of the hand-up type service. With so much of the “help” without case management I think this is what you get. Its to bad, I think this is just one of those ugly realities in the world, unfortunately there are people who are mentally ill and due to that “choose” to be in the situation pictured above. Its sad…….
ReplyDelete