Homelessness in California has risen to new heights in recent years, and cities certainly have a problem with it. They’re contributing to a health crisis, to the public, and to each other. We, in our passivity, are all but encouraging it.
True, it’s all been chalked up to the “high cost of housing” and “income inequality” in the past, but the truth of the matter is that ineffective legislation forwarded by elected Democrats has been contributing to failure after failure for years now. They’re shrugging off the responsibility, neglecting every one of their fundamental duties, and proving their willingness to leave a broken system just as broken as it was when they took office.
However, a new candidate is bringing new hope to the homeless. Brian Maryott has proposed a homelessness plan that goes against the grain of naive passivity currently present under Democratic rule. He demands the repeal of Proposition 47, as it has failed to make neighborhoods and schools any safer. If anything, it only increased the amount of illness related to addiction, contributed to drug violence, and heightened property crimes.
Maryott rightfully notes that “from a moral and ethical perspective, allowing people to legally poison themselves is just plain wrong. Law enforcement and rehabilitation groups must once again be allowed to provide safe, monitored facilities for withdrawal.”
He also wants to shift the focus away from the inefficient “housing first” policy which delays the process of getting the homeless the help that they need. Instead, Maryott aims to deploy resources to help people right away.
Lastly, Maryott calls for local community intervention. He reminds us that “the young people overdosing in our parks and the older people comatose in raggedy tents are not random strangers from another planet. They are our children; our siblings; our parents; our fellow citizens; and, too often, our honorable soldiers.”
Democratic legislators suggesting that the housing market is the sole cause of the homelessness problem is suggesting that the issues facing these citizens didn’t matter in the first place.
Denying these people the help that they need is not only inhumane, but also proof of the failures of our Democratic legislators. Maryott is taking the problem seriously and proposing tangible change—he is, undoubtedly, the perfect example of a candidate who truly wants to get the job done.
