Posted on 10/15/2013 4:02:48 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
To those people paying only casual attention, the Occupy movement has become nothing more than a footnote in history. Their ragtag encampments have been removed for the most part, and there is little to indicate they made much of an impact. In Madison, Wisconsin, however, the Occupy movement has suddenly resurfaced, but with a totally new mission: addressing the basic needs of people who are homeless.
As issues around collective bargaining rights for public employees and other significant alterations to the social contract were initiated by Governor Walker and the Republican-dominated legislature, Madison became famous for very loud and angry protests. People camped out on the Capitol grounds to the point where legislation has been passed limiting the number of people who can enter the building, and requiring a permit for any kind of gathering.
Those protests merged into the Occupy movement in Madison, although with a few unique aspects. Unlike most locations, the Madison movement had to pack up every night and move to a new place because of local ordinances. As the winter of 2011 came, it became harder and harder to hold the group together, and, it turns out, a large number of the people camping out were homeless. The homeless in Madison had realized that these camps were a place where they could get food, shelter, and a safe place for their belongings.
Now, Occupy Madison has raised funds and is working with people who are homeless to build tiny shelters in the form of 98-square-foot houses, with an eye toward creating a village of these homes with shared facilities. As word has spread about the project, donations have been flooding in. An artist from North Carolina has donated artwork to be hung in the first five that are completed. Businesses have donated a solar power system, window shades, and more.
As of now, the buildings have to be put on wheels and moved every 48 hours because of the aforementioned ordinance. The Madison Planning Commission recently recommended that the Common Council change the city zoning code to allow the buildings to be placed on the property of churches and any other organization whose mission includes helping people who are homeless. There is some debate, however, about whether this is simply a stopgap measure to deal with the homeless in lieu of creating a comprehensive policy that would address the issue.
The idea of a village of small shelters is not new. Portland, Oregon, has Dignity Village, which was established in 2001. The goal there is to create one-stop help for people seeking to make the transition back into mainstream society, offering shelter, personal hygiene, phones, an address, etc. As Occupy Madison seeks to establish a similar village in the Midwest, will this emerge as an effective way to help, or will the villages become the equivalent of the shantytowns of lean-tos, shacks, and untold poverty seen on the outskirts of many large cities around the world?
This can’t be possible.
Under the Baraqqi Regime the homeless disappeared.
That term hasn’t been used by the MSM since Jan 2009.
I was looking at one of these. They’re a reaction to places with absurd property costs (LA and the Bay Area) and by people who feel like they don’t need a bunch of space.
That’s a function of restrictive zoning and declining standards of living, but it’s also a sensible, market-oriented reaction to property values.
I would love to buy a plot of land and build a relatively tiny house and not get locked into the usual kind of house, but local governments HATE these.
> Obamavilles
LOLOLOLOL!!!!!!!
That’s REALLY good!
=D
Won’t you be my neighbor?
A luxury prison cell?
Didn’t Ted Kaczynski, better known as the Unabomber, live in a small-volume cabin when he was plotting to even the score with those he imagined to be “enemies”?
Small cramped spaces cause one to live even more within the box than may otherwise be the case. The hermit literally could not “think outside the box”.
You will find them next to the Barrycades. Up the street are some Barrackades.
Well, it’s nice to see these reprobates scum libtards doing something constructive instead of defecating on police cars and raping women...
98 square feet? My bedroom is bigger than that (16x12)!
I would guess he crapped outside and also did a lot of his cooking outside. He went to town and visited the library on a regular basis. Not my idea of a hermit...just someone who needed to be alone to do his thing.
Don't know about all that. When I was doing the mountain man thing for a couple of years, my cabin was 8 ft x 12 ft. I'm certainly not an in-the-box thinker. Not with all of the great outdoors just outside my cabin.
/johnny
Al Gore's baffroom is probably larger than that.
Tornado bait.
yup, you can open the door to leave ;)
These are where they put the new immigrants.
More and more we are just following the lead of the Europeans rather than the exceptional trail we once blazed.
They may have donated window shades and solar power, but they’re also going to have a smelly poop-house out back, not to mention a bunch of smelly hippies hanging around all the time.
But hey, as long as they have good 4G....
Why do they even need that much space. Greedy bass turds. What is wrong with them?? Do they want to kill the planet? All they need is a chair, a pillow, an umbrella, and a large gift card to McDonald’s.
I was tearing down a 10 x 10 shed but then I realized it was someone’s house. The toilet was in the shower, which was the kitchen sink, which was under the bed, which was the dining room table.
Think more in terms of the U.N. " AGENDA 21 " .
Actually , they are smaller than most jail cells .
There are several planned villages of these small units being started throughout the U.S., including South Carolina and Florida.
They are being promoted as 'saving natural resouces', economizing , and eco-considerate.
If everyone is working a full time job of less than 30 hours , this will probably be all the housing that our kids can afford !
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