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Executive Director’s Message
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE
“Send in the Clowns”
By Daniel Yukelson
One must wonder..., but to me, it appears that the City of Los Angeles and its elected officials are a circus in search of their “Big Top” tent. From the perspective of this rental housing provider, the acts being performed today within City Hall of the once great “City of Angels” only make sense when one realizes that the roles of the elected are being portrayed by a bunch of clowns.
As the Stephen Sondheim song goes, “Send in the clowns.” Yes, we have all heard that song and apparently the voters in the City of Los Angeles have listened and heeded the songs advise. “Send in the clowns...” and that we have. Unfortunately, the actions being undertaken within the City of Los Angeles are not just “a little night music.”
Only in the City of Los Angeles does the “prize” for the largest homeless population get bestowed upon us. You mean opening-up our neighborhood streets to uninhibited parking by camper and recreational vehicles doesn’t solve the homeless problem? How about the tent cities that are pervasive in virtually every neighborhood in Los Angeles? We better get this cleaned up to put a good face on the upcoming Super Bowl and most certainly in time for the Summer Olympics. Sadly, the situation we see on the streets today has become such a pervasive problem that many have become somewhat oblivious to all the drug use, graffiti, prostitution, and crime that have invaded and seemingly conquered our streets.
Take any of these issues be it crime, homelessness, addiction, or even our lousy sidewalks and potholes, while I admit these are all (except for the condition of the sidewalks and streets) complicated issues, I am convinced there are
solutions out there. But, unfortunately, “Team City of L.A.” never seems to deploy or even propose any sort of workable solutions that could solve these problems. Defunding the police was an idea put forward, and the City did cut the police budget at a time when crime was just beginning to increase, riots and loss of property was taking place, and now we have constant “smash and grab” robberies and are riding a major crime wave.
On homelessness, it seems the only solutions are conceived by our elected genius, City Councilmember, Mike Bonin...G-d help us all. Other than the obvious camping on our sidewalks or in parked busses in front of people’s homes, Mike has been a proponent of building $550,000 to $650,000 each housing units, more like condominiums, to solve the homelessness crisis. No matter how generous the taxpayers of Los Angeles are and no matter how many billions of dollars in bond money is raised due to the generosity of California taxpayers, perhaps it could be a hundred billion, that will not begin to make a dent in housing the 60,000 or so homeless on our streets today when Mike wants to build housing that costs as much as $650,000. It just makes no sense, and solutions like these are not workable nor sustainable.
So, take the major underpinnings of homelessness...addiction, mental illness and then abuse (not necessarily in that order). Now, if we address each issue separately, the homeless population that suffers from addiction, mental illness or abuse, and work on solutions to those issues, perhaps some headway could be
made. Like I said, it is complicated, but something must be done, and quickly. However, the first step would be for those in the City of Los Angeles to admit these problems exist among the homeless population...fat chance! Instead, their rallying cry is always one against us, and that
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