Posted on 01/14/2011 7:19:38 AM PST by cdga5for4
Bobby and Amanda Herring spent more than a year providing food to homeless people in downtown Houston every day. They fed them, left behind no trash and doled out warm meals peacefully without a single crime being committed, Bobby Herring said.
That ended two weeks ago when the city shut down their "Feed a Friend" effort for lack of a permit. And city officials say the couple most likely will not be able to obtain one.
"We don't really know what they want, we just think that they don't want us down there feeding people," said Bobby Herring, a Christian rapper who goes by the stage name Tre9.
(Excerpt) Read more at chron.com ...
Teach a man to fish ...
http://www.sohmission.org/netcommunity/page.aspx?pid=251
Houston’s panhandling problem
Is Houston finally going to begin cracking down on its rampant panhandling problem? I’ll believe it when I see it, but news like this gives me hope: a TV and radio campaign featuring the mayor urging people to help the homeless by giving to local charities instead of giving panhandlers spare change.
Of course, things won’t drastically change until the police finally begin enforcing Houston’s civility ordinances, but anything that attempts to combat the free reign panhandlers have in Houston is a step in the right direction.
I am really tired of being confronted by panhandlers on a constant basis: at gas stations, in grocery store parking lots, on METRORail platforms, at intersections, in front of bars and restaurants, even in the downtown tunnel system! Some of these people are clearly homeless. Some likely are not. Some of them are polite. Others are belligerent. It doesn’t matter. When they come up to me and ask me for money, I find it incredibly rude, annoying and sometimes even threatening.
It is certainly appropriate to have compassion for the less fortunate. This is especially true for homeless people, since so many of them suffer from debilitating mental problems or drug and alcohol addictions. But one’s compassion for the less fortunate should not get in the way of the fact that panhandling is a public nuisance. It is disruptive and it makes people uncomfortable. It also can be dangerous, especially for the roadside panhandlers who dart into busy intersections to collect money from passing cars. And, most importantly, it doesn’t really help anybody. Giving money to panhandlers only encourages the practice and, in turn, makes the problem worse.
So please: stop giving panhandlers your spare quarters or dollar bills. Give your money to a local charity instead: the Star of Hope, the Houston Food Bank, etc. By supporting organizations that are set up to help the city’s less fortunate, you’ll be doing more good than you’ll ever accomplish by handing your money over to strangers on the street.
http://indotav.blogspot.com/2006/08/houstons-panhandling-problem.html
Invite a homeless guy to your front doorstep. Give him some food and tell him that there will be more free food everyday. See how many show up the next day. Then see what they leave in your yard. Then see them knock on your neighbors doors. Then see them complain about your food.
If you haven’t seen the poverty pimps up close, you might overlook what they are really about. They have a vested interest in perpetuating homelessness, poverty, drug addiction, mental illness, and alcoholism. The bigger their numbers, the more money they get. The more money they get, the more people they hire, and the more the bosses make. Always, grow the bureaucracy. If you can lure more homeless people to your town, all the better. Offer more programs, advertise, and oila! More work to do. More grants. More donations.
Without poverty, they would have no jobs.
You have nailed it.
If cities allow the homeless to panhandle, then less people will live there, visit there, do business there, shop there.
This is not complicated.
P.S. Cities shouldn’t be complaining about all their businesses and stores going to the suburbs if they don’t have the “nuisance factor” under control.
Nailed it again.
The government is supposed to honor "equal protection" under the law, by which the law is not suppose to be "special interest law", using "the law" to favor one man's interest, commercial or otherwise, over another.
When those in government use the law to favor one commercial interest over another interest, they are acting on the supposition that failure to favor that interest will hurt the tax revenue from that interest and to them that tax interest is their "right", the government's "right" not to be denied.
Ben Franklin was so prescient with his warning:
Outside Independence Hall when the Constitutional Convention of 1787 ended, Mrs. Powel of Philadelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, "Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?" With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, "A republic, if you can keep it."
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quotes_by/benjamin+franklin
Our main city in the county, Hyannis, has been turned into Detroit By The Sea. A walk downtown is a tour of skid row.
BTW, the dynamic you described one an economist named James M. Buchanan a Nobel. He called it ‘Public Choice Theory’. Basically, he said that it is in the best interest for bureaucracies to grow the problem.
You'd think some of those charities would set up something like having people buy food vouchers from them so those who "donate" to the homeless could hand them out instead of cash. Then again, the vouchers would be discounted and sold for booze or drugs, etc. The upside is that it would prove, for the umpteenth time, that these people are nothing more than freeloaders.
A couple things come to my mind:
1) Jesus said you will ALWAYS have the poor and hungry
2) Talked with a young man who has diligently worked to solve the hunger problem in my county. He has collected food and developed a distribution system. Said to me “There is no excuse for anyone to be hungry in Story County anymore.”
Mark Twain, once said, “Any damn fool can begin a speech, but it takes considerable skill to end one.”
I said to him. “Anyone one can begin a ministry, but it takes considerable skill to end one.” Didn’t hear anything further from him.
Bottom line. I applaud what he is doing but it will not solve the problem. But on the other hand, me just talking about it doesn’t help either.
At least half the people people don’t need the help and shouldn’t be helped. The other half do need help and encouragement.
I’m familiar with Buchanan. You are correct. The poverty pimps are acting rationally in their self-interest. They mobilize their employees and their clientele to vote in elections, hence their power over elected officials.
THIS IS WHAT OBAMA DID AS A COMMUNITY ORGANIZER. We need to act rationally as well. Now that we understand the scam being perpetrated, we must bring an end to all of it.
This kind of crap, in a city where there are hundreds if not thousands of itinerant Mexican vendors selling out of trucks, parked trailers, etc., all over town, is ludicrous.
The vendors set up shop on a vacant lot, in store parking lots, wherever they can get good traffic and parking. And I’m absolutely sure they maintain perfect sanitary and refrigeration conditions, and impeccable food handling and preparation procedures.
NOT !!
Somebody’s losing a buck due to the charitable folks in the article, and is using the city “health” clowns to hose them. This is the typical vice of “permitting” - it’s protectionist collusion between businesses and goobermint.
It’s certainly better for the bums to be eating out of garbage cans than eating home cooked meals from this charity !
Houston is run by a liberal lesbian.
Liberals oppose helping the poor and homeless.
It’s the money they want not the help.
Houston is a Sanctuary City.
Illegals are OK there.
Let’s create Food Sanctuary Cities.
Last night (I think) Mayor Parker said officers do not have time to check immigration status of drivers they have pulled over. But I read today that officers do have the time to find people helping and feeding homeless to check and make sure they have proper food handleing permits?
The vendors set up shop on a vacant lot, in store parking lots, wherever they can get good traffic and parking. And I’m absolutely sure they maintain perfect sanitary and refrigeration conditions, and impeccable food handling and preparation procedures.
NOT !!
Great point! What?...no need for a license for all those left-indoctrinated, protected, Sanctuary-City, future Dem-voting vendors?
Exactly how many people can we offer dinner to before we need a LICENSE??? 1, 2, 10?
Will there come a time when we need a "Home License" to serve dinner to a proscribed number of assembled guests?
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