Poverty's fatal wages: San Antonio man, seeking warmth, killed by trash compactor

[Nova]

In this state in 2007 the homeless population was at 28.2% in 2007....

I'm sure you have plenty of homeless people in Hawaii, Kat, just as we do in Southern California. Understandably, many prefer to be homeless where it is warm.

But the figure you give is almost 1 in 3 people! Or roughly 400,000 homeless people on 6 small islands. That can't be right, can it?

 

[Kat]

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2007/Jun/17/ln/FP706170365.html

Posted on: Sunday, June 17, 2007

The homeless population on O'ahu rose nearly 30 percent in the past two years, new figures show, despite recent efforts to address one of Hawai'i's most critical social problems.

[video=youtube;PdRbPWWVhcA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdRbPWWVhcA[/video]

Really bad audio on that video above. That is westshore after you pass through Waianae heading out towards the Ka'ena Point (State Park).

They did a sweep (county) and made everyone move. Some were lucky to get placed into a a few new temp housing units for homeless but most weren't.

http://www.kpua.net/news.php?id=8551 (this article is from 2006 but is relevant from what I can see when I drive off post).



When they passed an ordinance to make it illegal to camp out at the beaches like that some moved to Honolulu.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/us/15homeless.html
Published: March 14, 2011

Now they are making them leave Honolulu (APEC is here this week IIRC). No place for them to go. There is one organization that pays for one way tickets back to the mainland for some lucky ones.

It's not an exaggeration Nova. It's an abomination that people have to live like this. Setting up tents for themselves and their children to live in while tourists walk past them having spent 10,000 that week on vacay. Lot of tensions building. Gotta keep the tourists happy. JMHO

 

[Kat]

Just one more fact I remembered: The wait list to get a government apartment here is 10 years.

 

[Nova]

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2007/Jun/17/ln/FP706170365.html

Posted on: Sunday, June 17, 2007




Hawaii's homeless on the westside of Oahu - YouTube

Really bad audio on that video above. That is westshore after you pass through Waianae heading out towards the Ka'ena Point (State Park).

They did a sweep (county) and made everyone move. Some were lucky to get placed into a a few new temp housing units for homeless but most weren't.

http://www.kpua.net/news.php?id=8551 (this article is from 2006 but is relevant from what I can see when I drive off post).



When they passed an ordinance to make it illegal to camp out at the beaches like that some moved to Honolulu.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/us/15homeless.html
Published: March 14, 2011

Now they are making them leave Honolulu (APEC is here this week IIRC). No place for them to go. There is one organization that pays for one way tickets back to the mainland for some lucky ones.

It's not an exaggeration Nova. It's an abomination that people have to live like this. Setting up tents for themselves and their children to live in while tourists walk past them having spent 10,000 that week on vacay. Lot of tensions building. Gotta keep the tourists happy. JMHO

With all due respect, my friend, you misstated the figure in your original post.

What your link says is that the total number of homeless people has risen 30% in the past two years, which is indeed a shocking number. If you had 1,000 homeless people in 2009, you now have 1,300. (That's just an example and probably too low a number.)

But your original post said "the homeless population was at 28.2% in 2007," so that seems to be talking about the total rate of homeless people relative to total population, not the recent increase in their numbers. 28.2% of the population of Hawaii is nearly 400,000 people, an impossible number for any society to support.

That's what I was questioning. But a nearly 1/3 increase in the number of homeless people in two years is plenty significant in and of itself. And not surprising, given our economy.

I don't know about Hawaii, but I also live in a resort area (Palm Springs) and tourism is way down. People just don't have the money to travel.

 

[Kat]

Sorry Nova, thanks for correcting me! We still have thousands though. It's just horrifying.

There was a deal made with Asia (I can't remember which countries, Japan already a deal so I'm thinking one of the countries is Korea) so our tourists are coming from there since the drop in Mainland tourists.

I found a better (I hope) statistic.

The UH Center on the Family report released Tuesday determined that nearly 13,900 people in the state experienced homelessness and received outreach or shelter services during the 2010 fiscal year that ended June 30.

http://www.necn.com/11/16/10/Study-...ockID=3&apID=d04519667dd241d79922e184a20d6561

 

[Nova]

Sorry Nova, thanks for correcting me! We still have thousands though. It's just horrifying.

There was a deal made with Asia (I can't remember which countries, Japan already a deal so I'm thinking one of the countries is Korea) so our tourists are coming from there since the drop in Mainland tourists.

I found a better (I hope) statistic.



http://www.necn.com/11/16/10/Study-...ockID=3&apID=d04519667dd241d79922e184a20d6561

No problem, Kat, and you're absolutely right: either way it's a staggering number of homeless people. And when one considers that the homeless also need food, sanitation, medical care, etc., the situation is obviously dire.

 

[badhorsie]

I chatted to a homeless guy when I was waiting for a train. He was in his, I would say, 60s. Worked for the local authority for many years as a park keeper. Made redundant about 5 years ago. He was drinking. Had lost his flat, no chance of a new one without a good credit report and a deposit. His credit card bills, manageable when he was employed, were not payable.
He was stuck, no way out. I felt so sorry for him. I gave him some baccy and donuts, all I had. I cannot condemn these people, sorry if it offends some but I just cannot