The view from the window: trashing the homeless
Beautiful Interco Plaza. (Photo by Urban Review St. Louis)
From the windows of our offices Thursday morning, we watched as St. Louis Park Rangers and a bright orange city garbage truck destroyed a makeshift homeless camp across Dr. Martin Luther King Drive from the Post-Dispatch building. People from our offices and from the St. Patrick Center for the homeless on the other side of the desolate park known as Interco Plaza poured out to intervene.
The city workers would not be stopped. “Just following orders,” one of the rangers told us.
In short order, the handful of tents and cardboard dwellings, as well as everything inside them, including sleeping bags and medicine, was stuffed into the garbage truck and crushed.
The occupants were not — you should pardon the expression — at home. When they returned, everything they owned was gone.
Homelessness is a difficult problem for cities, including St. Louis. The city has made great strides in recent years, but problems remain. But this scene, however atypical, was brutal.
We’d watched the little encampment grow over the past few weeks, knowing that sooner or later the city would intervene. Tent cities are considered an eyesore, even in an eyesore park. Parks have curfews, even parks that look like rubble in Baghdad. There are uncertainties for visitors and campers alike.
There’s supposed to be a protocol for this kind of thing. First comes an order to vacate from Park Rangers. Then comes intervention from the Department of Human Services, which offers to relocate people and tag and store belongings before garbage trucks roll.
It didn’t happen this time.
“There’s no question we screwed up,” said Bill Siedhoff, director of the Department of Human Services. He said his department never got a call. “We will make every effort to contact the individuals who were affected. We blew it and we’re going to do what we can to make it up.”
Well as usual the uber libs at the post decide to use their bully pulpit to whip us uncaring bastards in the STL into shape…I am sorry to say that STL has homeless folks and that when they “camp” in a city park it is ILLEGAL but the folks on the editorial board probably think that immigration enforcement is an affront to ILLEGAL immigrants. Let the city workers do their jobs without ridicule all we ask is that the post editorial board do its job and report THE NEWS..
I agree, how is it that the post can ridicule city workers for doing their jobs when they do not even do thier own due diligence when reporting the news? Perhaps they can run another non-news story on Maryville University, or the ridiculous smoking ban blah blah blah
The problem is that the park rangers didn’t do their job. They did what both JOHN and ACL would probably do and that’s act on their own. They have a protocol for dealing with that very situation. People didn’t sit down and think out a workable plan of action so that two Park rent a cops could flex their muscle on the homeless. No matter what, the way they dealt with HUMAN BEINGS (even those advocating for the homeless) is ridiculous. I think the rangers need a sensitivity course or something. You can’t be a public servant and treat the public in that way. Homeless or not they are humans first. Alot of people in this economic climate are one unexpected financial hardship away from being in a tent in a park. THINK ABOUT IT !!!
Messrs. Pendelton and intern obviously didn’t “think about it,” much less bring their A Game.
Read the ground rules, and bring the A Game next time, would you please guys?
Thank you.
I heard last night that Fredi / Fanny are now planning to buy homes from excessively upside-downers and rent them back to the original owners. I worry about the homeless, like anyone. Only now, I think it likely a lot more of us will give it a chapter or two of our lives. I guess the next public option will be to turn the vacant box stores into sec-8. And turn the nice / vacant homes into palaces for the politically connected.
Two kittens have been stopping by our house all summer for a handout. They always get it and we are trying to convince our dog it would be fun to have two playmates (its not going well, so far). However, it is going to start getting cold soon and we simply can’t bear the thought of them living in the elements during the cruel winter. So, pretty soon, I am sure they will take a trip to the vet and settle in as house cats. Now, think there are human beings out there. They aren’t living on my porch, but they are out there. Some don’t even have the survival skills of the kittens. Homelessness, like poverty will always be with us. That doesn’t excuse our ignoring it. It just means we will always have a job to do. It is a job none of us can every fix. All of us, however, can fix a little part of it. I’ve been involved in a housing ministry for about six years. By the end of the year, we will have built almost 60 homes for people needing a place to live. Some have been homeless. Others are at risk for becoming so. We have a waiting list of 50, but that’s only because that’s all we keep since building even one house is a big deal and there’s no sense giving people false hope. We could easily have 500 names. I can be frustrating, but at least you will know you did something.
All of us–homeless or not–should learn to keep things we value or need with us since something similar will happen to all of us eventually.
Just wondering if employees of the Post have been complaining to the city about the homeless folks in the park?
Funny thing that when they use to come over on the Post Dispatch Parking lot the Post would have the police run them off.
This is an unethical act on behalf of the City Park Rangers. Whoever decided that this act should have taken place, should have found alternatives to alleviate this issue. A source what witnessed this event indicated that SOME of the homeless people went to another place for shelter the night before and someone told them this would occur. Obviously, the word was not spread fast enough. These individuals were in getting lunch when this “Clean Up” took place. They could not bring all those things inside the center while they had a quick bit to eat. Someone made the comment that we being homeless or not should keep our personal belongs with us. Well that is not true that you can just tote around all of your furniture and other personal belongings with you all the time. It is easier said than done. The homeless have to have all their things with them and may have not even considered something like this to occur. The city could have warned them or something before taking some type of action. I believe the apology and recognition of the problems caused, but they cannot replace the pictures, vital medication and other things that the homeless may have had in that park. These are hard times for a lot of people and there are other things the city could do like fighting crime instead of picking on the homeless. There was a agreement made for a situation like this, but that is being minimized. I believe further action should be taken to avoid this problem in the future. There is a cause to every effect and maybe the city could invest in more research on homelessness and poverty in general to help sustain the resources that are available. After discovering the causes, a plan of action can be made to help these individuals utilize the resources so the society can flourish and poverty can be reduced.