The Problem With Sweeps
I’ve written about how there’s not help for the homeless a month ago. I’m going to go into why there’s not at least a bit deeper and we’re going to start with sweeps. For those that don’t know or aren’t at least aware, a sweep is when a city or town goes in and either puts a notice up notifying someone living in a homeless encampment to pack up their stuff and leave or they just tell them from the word go the next morning without any notice.
People might think that this is good because homeless people are drug addicts and mentally ill and whatever horrible thing people want to assume. But homeless people are people first. Most homeless people don’t start off as drug addicts and didn’t become homeless because of drugs or even mental illness. I myself am a victim of narcissistic abuse at the hands of my own mother.
I decided to finally leave home on a whim and ended up in Denver, where I spent months trying to make money and get an apartment. I had a boyfriend at the time who ended up abandoning me and dumped me. I ran out of money because I was staying in hotel rooms throughout Denver just trying to stay afloat so I didn’t become homeless until I ran out of money, was dumped and while I nailed a freelancing gig, I quickly lost it the week after because I was homeless.
I didn’t have a stable place to work from home so to speak. And then my laptop broke so being able to make money was impossible. Now that being said, I’m not a drug addict, don’t smoke or drink. My only way of coping with it is through music, spending time with my boyfriend who is also homeless and being able to write and draw.
Now personally I think that the sweeps are a waste of time. At least in San Diego, homeless people will go from one spot and walk across the street to another one. Wait for an hour or two to let the cops and urban corps do their thing and then move back to where they were. They do this song and dance maybe twice or three times a week. It’s honestly annoying. Having to pack everything up, and move it.
Now I know what you’re thinking: But Ari there are shelters and there are resources available.
And my response is: No there’s not.
For the shelters there are only about 1400 beds available, if that. My boyfriend and I have tried that route trying to get into Tent City because we can’t be separated from each other. It sounds stupid, but when we got to San Diego, we ended up getting off on the wrong stop and then on the wrong trolley to where we got separated.
We both had a nervous breakdown and after three hours we found each other again and realized: we don’t do very well being separated like that. And the other reason is that my boyfriend has health issues and I’m more or less his caregiver. Despite that we’ve never had luck getting a referral nor has anyone that we know.
We like a lot of people living on the streets to just camp out for lack of a better word. And honestly we don’t really do anything too crazy. We keep our area clean, take out our trash when our trash bags fill up. We collect recycling that we see from the streets and trash cans. We at least try to walk around and go to places like the library to charge most of our electronics and so that I can write and do college homework.
We don’t harass any of the normal populace nor do the people that we associate ourselves with. We’ve built up a little community and try to help each other out when we can. Whether that’s getting trinkets for each other or passing around food. Hell sometimes we look out for each other. We police ourselves in an essence. Or at least the group that we associate ourselves does.
I know the purpose of sweeps is supposed to help the homeless population, but when there are no beds or help for the homeless all it is going to do is trap the wrong person into a corner and something bad is going to happen. Which would lead to the deaths of homeless people.
If cities or towns wanted to help then they should better set their sights on other initiatives such as turning any abandoned houses into homes and take away work requirements and such for a year or two. Have 24 hr showers and public bathrooms open. Have a place for them to take a nap and do their laundry. (God forbid we need clean clothes or need to recharge.) Have more places for homeless people to go to for free and without being harassed by cops or security.
I think the notion that they do drugs is a stupid one and that was something I didn’t like when I wasn’t homeless. My opinion was always “so what? As long as they keep to themselves and don’t hurt anyone, why does it matter? They deserve our compassion regardless.” Over the past few months I’ve learned that there are two types of drug addicts, those that handle their drugs well and can blend in with society and those who can’t. The former are more than likely to help you in a tight spot than those that aren’t. And trust me when I say this: I’ve gotten more help from drug addicts than I have from any shelter.
Taking a homeless person’s stuff because you need to clean the sidewalk or pat yourself on the back and throwing it in the trash is not the way to do it. You don’t know if they bought that with their hard earned money or not or that it has some sentimental value or it’s something important like their birth certificate. I mean hell for me I have all mine and my boyfriend’s clothes, my new laptop, sketchbook and journal. If I lost those things I’d be upset as would anyone.
I just think that there needs to be better initiatives than the ones that are in place and maybe we need to start treating homeless people like people. Because remember that everyone is one step away from going homeless.
What do you think? What sort of initiatives would be good for the homeless? Let me know in the comments below. Like this post? Don’t forget to share it with your friends. Want to keep up with the latest? Hit the subscribe button. Want to support the blog? Check out my tip jar.
Until next time!