People living in vans

[Lindsey]

…but not down by the river. Rather, in the alley behind my apartment. I’m pretty sure that there are some people living in vans and a school bus behind my apartment. At this point it is mostly an eyesore, and a bit creepy. Is there anything in the SMC about parking or abandoned vehicles in alleys?

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[Aim]

Are they creating any problems? If they’re simply down and out and trying to get by, I’d leave it alone. Most Americans are one paycheck or one major illness away from the same situation. If they’re “just an eyesore” where would you suggest they go? Serious question. If you had to live in your car, where would you park it in order to try to be safe and not hassled? I’d probably find a quiet residential street or alley.

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[bluebird]

If the vehicles are actually abandoned, you can fill out a report online.

http://www.seattle.gov/police/forms/Abandoned_Vehicles.htm

Because of right away issues, emergency vehicles, garbage trucks, etc, I wouldn’t think alley parking is ever legal.

And btw, all vehicles must be moved every 72 hours, even if parked legally.

http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/parking/parking72hour.htm

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[JG]

What’s up with that 72 hour law anyway? I rent an apt in West Seattle with no parking lot. I also work at a job that requires lots of travel. Do you have any idea how hard it is for a single professional that travels to NOT have their car towed in West Seattle? And God forbid I want to take the bus to work, walk to grocery stores, and otherwise not add to traffic when I don’t need to. Better remember to move the car around, or it’ll get towed. Honestly, this is the reason I’m looking to leave WS. Too much hassle.

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[cjboffoli]

Aim: I admire you for your very kind, humanist approach to the issue. But what if those people aren’t living in vans because they lost their jobs? What if they’ve walked out on their families or otherwise have fled responsibilities? What if they have substance abuse problems and/or have mental illness that they are not treating? What if they’re sex offenders or have criminal warrants? Where are they going to the bathroom? On the side of the road?

Everyone can have hard times. But what about the rights of the people who have to work their ass off to have a home, raise a family, pay their taxes and contribute to the community. Don’t they have the privilege to not have random vagrants living in janky vehicles parked on their streets? Surely there is a humane, empathetic way to deal with people who are having hard times that offers a better solution than living out of a car in an alley in West Seattle.

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[Sue]

JG, when we lived back in NJ and needed to leave a car on the street for more than the allowed time due to a vacation, we were able to call the police department and explain the situation, and they left the car alone. Is that an option here? I’ve never tried it (I’ve been lucky enough to live in places with off-street parking here in Seattle), but you might look into it.

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[JG]

Sue, you know, I didn’t think of that. I honestly don’t think it’ll work, but it is nice and straightforward. Thanks for the idea, I’ll give it a try.

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[FullTilt]

Cjboffoli There are so many things wrong with your statement i don’t know where to start.

“Don’t they have the privilege to not have random vagrants living in janky vehicles parked on their streets?”

So if they live in Maybachs it is OK? No, they do not have the right to not look at vagrants. Those vagrants have the same rights to those streets as you do.

“But what if those people aren’t living in vans because they lost their jobs? What if they’ve walked out on their families or otherwise have fled responsibilities? What if they have substance abuse problems and/or have mental illness that they are not treating? What if they’re sex offenders or have criminal warrants?”

There used to be places for the mentally ill, and then Reagan took care of that. Now we warehouse them in prisons. How many of your neighbors living in actual houses have substance abuse problems, mental issues, or have warrants? How many of your neighbors are a paycheck or an injury away from living in their cars?

There is a guy that lives in a van in my neighborhood that once owned his own taxi company until he started having seizures and couldn’t work. He lost everything, and now has a brain tumor that he can not afford treatment for, and sleeps in his van every night waiting to die.

We live in a brutal capitalist society that I think many were insulated from before this little “downturn”. I think it is criminal that we live in a country that lets the weakest get eaten by the strong. This is a culture that worships wealth. We have a government that is cutting public services, while awarding failed companies with billions of dollars.

I think the saddest thing really, is that there are a lot of people in this neighborhood, forced to live in their cars tonight, and all you can think of is how the property owners rights are violated by having to look at the poor and their janky cars.

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[JimmyG]

JG I don’t know where you’re going to go to escape the 72 hour law, it’s not just WS, but all of Seattle.

And if you move to the county it’s 24 hours and you can be towed.

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[Kimberley]

JG – definitely check with the police, I used to get a parking permit from my local precinct if I needed to leave my car in one spot for over 72 hours when I lived in D.C. (and I swear they’re the toughest mofos out there w/regard to parking enforcement).

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[JoB]

Full tilt…

compassionately said.

not everyone comes out of life’s little tragedies with a cosy nest egg…

even if they thought they would.

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[JoB]

reposted from TRs post in the What’s happening with Nicklesville thread…

http://www.youtube.com/invisiblepeopletv

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[Kevin]

Fulltilt,

Thank you for your thoughts! You are right on.

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[bluebird]

Because you’re concerned about “who” might be living in these janky cars, you’re somehow a heartless bastard?

When my young kids play in the backyard, I don’t have a right to wonder who that guy is who sits in the alley all day with his 40 oz?

Give me a break.

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[maplesyrup]

It would take some courage but maybe you could walk over there and talk to the people. Or ask your landlord to do it.

Then proceed accordingly.

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[cjboffoli]

FullTilt: Just because I don’t agree with you I wouldn’t assume that your opinions are “wrong.” And it is interesting to see what parts of my argument you’ve avoided addressing at all.

I don’t know Lindsey so she may indeed be part of some sort of vast right wing conspiracy. While what she posted wasn’t politically correct, it was honest. I have to honestly say that if random vagrants parked in the alley behind my house or on the side of the road and started living there it would make me uncomfortable too. It is possible to be empathetic for people and their plight but to also have discomfort with the situation. There are multiple reasons for that discomfort.

Those people may be out there because of hard times. But there may be other reasons too. The fact is, we don’t really know why they’re out there unless we go talk to them and in the end we might both be wrong. I’d agree with you that everyone has basic human rights. But I’d ask you to consider what responsibilities come with those rights. There are some people in our society who make a lot of sacrifices and work very hard. They follow the rules. They pay their taxes. They make good on their responsibilities to their families and they contribute to their communities. I disagree that someone who checks out of society for whatever reason and decides to live in an old school bus in an alley has essentially the same right to live on the block as another person who has to get up at 5 am to take care of a family, work all day to to earn a living, and do all the things that a productive member of society does.

You’ve deconstructed my opinion in terms of “property rights” but there I think there is much more to it than an argument about re-sale value or aesthetics. I simply don’t think it is a good solution for people to live out of their cars wherever they wish. I wasn’t flying a flag of elitism. I was saying there must be a better solution.

Incidentally, I’m not sure there is a fundamental difference between warehousing the mentally ill in prisons and keeping them locked away in the gulag-like system of state hospitals that we had before the 80’s. It probably doesn’t matter whether they are locked out of sight or if they are on the sidewalks in front of us every day. No one wants to take responsibility for them. Not their families, not their communities, not their governments.

It is interesting to me how, especially during an economic downturn, the blame gets shifted to the “capitalist” machine or governments but few people take any responsibility for their own predicaments. The life of Billy Mays was recently being celebrated in these Forums despite the fact that he made a living selling people shit they didn’t need and probably couldn’t afford. When people run up huge mountains of credit card debt the guilty party somehow becomes the evil banks. When they finance houses they can’t afford the blame falls squarely on the mortgage companies.

Justin, don’t we live in the same capitalist society in which you have been able to open your own business and earn a living by selling your ice cream? It is also the same system that is responsible for some of the most incredible innovation in the world and that also pays out billions a year in philanthropy. Our country obviously has a lot of problems. We could probably all be more actively engaged in finding solutions (including contributing more philanthropically) as opposed to just being fine with people living in a van or under a freeway overpass.

I agree with you completely that we need to provide better systems for people who legitimately hit hard times, be they a result of economic hardship, job loss, medical problems, mental illness, drug addiction. Our government doesn’t do a very good job of providing a safety net. Private philanthropies usually do a much better job of addressing the problems for which they specialize. But I think in some cases people have to be responsible for themselves and their family members and the poor decisions they made which precipitated their problems. And I think that rampant misuse and abuse of that safety net by people who don’t need it is a significant problem too.

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[Lindsey]

Maybe “eyesore” isn’t the right word. Isn’t not as if I live in the best neighborhood in West Seattle. I am torn. I’m sympathetic to anyone who is forced to live in their car. I’ve been homeless because of circumstances out of my control, so please don’t jump to the conclusion that I’m some uncaring a$$hole. I’m not uncaring, I’m cautious. Should I wait until something happens to take action?

Here’s what I think is strange: Generally, there’s little sympathy for criminals in the comments of a crime report. But who were these criminals before they committed these crimes? They were probably desperate people. If these people **who may or may not be living in their van** committed a crime in our neighborhood, would you be equally sympathetic to their plight?

My boyfriend and I talked at length about this last night, and covered many of the same points brought up in the thread. If the cops come, then they will just move somewhere else.

This also comes on the heels of something my brother witnessed not too long ago: a person living in a camper behind the building next to my brother’s nearly beat his own dog to death in the middle of the night. So yeah, I’m just trying to be cautious. I’m going to keep an eye on the situation, and approach my new neighbors with the same kindness and compassion with which I would want to be treated.

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[charlabob]

Thank you Full Tilt!

Christopher, who gets to decide what the cases are when people “deserve” a safety net? Do you? Do I? It’s gotta be one of us, because you certainly can’t speak for me, nor I for you.

That’s actually the point of a safety net. In those horrible scary Scandinavian countries, people pay more in taxes and EVERYONE has a floor under which they cannot fall. BTW, the cost of those higher taxes is less than Americans(sic) pay for our “ad hoc” method.

The good thing about a true safety net is I don’t have to worry about the deserving versus underserving poor. I can just loathe everyone who doesn’t live up to my standards or whose appearance or lifestyle inconveniences me or who pays too much or too little for bacon without having to feel guilty about it. And, yes, my final paragraph was sardonic sarcasm.

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[bluebird]

Lindsey, that is a totally thoughtful, rational, and legitimate approach.

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[cjboffoli]

charlabob: Well there has to be SOME standard because people who don’t need services are prone to abuse them to the detriment of people who actually need them. There was a thread in these forums recently about people who have less-than-visibily obvious disabilities being harassed by passersby for parking in disabled parking spaces. A more than reasonable rant. But then the Seattle Times publishes a story this week about rampant abuse (in excess of 75% of people who use them) of disabled parking passes. A different situation to be sure but a good example of an effective and necessary system for the disabled that is compromised not really by government ineptitude but from the abuse of selfish lazy people.

Actually, it is interesting that you bring up the Scandinavian countries because I have been reading a lot lately about their systems. I think there is a lot to admire about the way they do it, though one must consider the cultural and demographic differences between our vast, populous country and say, the Netherlands. But much of what I read suggests that in the end we probably end up paying just as much tax but that they get more services that benefit their society. Definitely intriguing.

I worked in the field of private Philanthropy for more than a decade so I have no philosophical issue with paying a reasonable portion of my income to support the people who need services. I’d even be in favor of paying more taxes if there was a system that actually worked. The problem lies in the massive inefficiencies, waste and corruption in government and the extent to which services are abused. There also seems to be a certain demographic (including perhaps people on the streets) who can’t be helped (or choose not to be helped) by existing systems and services.

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[beachdrivegirl]

Lindsey, there have been many individuals living in the cars along Beach DR. One thing our block watch has made an effort to do is just record the car make, model, and license plate number. We all want to *assume* they are harmless and are just in a rough patch however, we also all have to keep an eye out for things that are out of the ordinary. Best of luck to you.

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[EmmyJane]

Lindsey- just curious if you turned the guy in for beating his dog?

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[JanS]

Christopher..if you feel that people who live in their cars (for whatever reason, but it’s happening more and more because of our economy)should not park anywhere they want, is there a place, in your estimation, where they should park? What’s the right place vs. the wrong place? and who gets to decide? Do we create islands for “car residers”, so no one has to deal with them? Elucidate, please? I’m talking real world in the present, not what should be if it were and ideal world, because they wouldn’t be in their cars, then, would they?

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[JoB]

when did all homeless people become random vagrants we could just dismiss?

why is it so much easier to feel for the plight of the homeless children in Africa while ignoring those who might be parked in our back alleys?

My heart is too heavy today to read rationalizations for ignoring.. or even worse.. criminalizing.. those who are less fortunate than ourselves.

“There are some people in our society who make a lot of sacrifices and work very hard. They follow the rules. They pay their taxes. They make good on their responsibilities to their families and they contribute to their communities. I disagree that someone who checks out of society for whatever reason and decides to live in an old school bus in an alley has essentially the same right to live on the block as another person who has to get up at 5 am to take care of a family, work all day to to earn a living, and do all the things that a productive member of society does.”

key words here..

“for whatever reason”

even if we oppose funding that would give them a safety net for reasons that were out of their control?

some of the people in those buses and cars are people who worked hard and made sacrifices and did everything right… did everything they could and still didn’t prosper.

lucky thing that’s not us.. at least not today.. isn’t it.

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[kg]

Lindsey I think you have a right to be concerned if the people in the bus/van are blocking a right of way by being in the alley. Another concern would be sanitary conditions caused by them using the restroom on the ground.

As for the views on how we should feel guilty as Americans for letting such a thing happen I’ll leave that to the “experts” in the thread.

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