Downtown Tulsa residents concerned about encounters with the homeless

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MP43

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I’ll assume this is directed at me. I’m far from a liberal and don’t much care for some right wingers. I was born in late 71. Some of the first homelessness I saw was in the late 80’s early 90’s hitch hiking around California and the east coast. I don’t know where the decline started to really happen. It really shouldn’t be a political position. We all pay for these people to be locked up, released and re-locked up. As stated earlier in this thread though, cops usually leave these people to be because the law enforcement has become a business to generate revenue.

Wasn't my intent to make it personal. It's just that the "Reagan took away the funding for mental hospitals and the patients got dumped on the street" thing has been repeated so widely that LOTS of people of all political persuasions accept it as a true account of what really happened. Yet in reality the wheels were already well in motion. The 1981 federal spending cut may have hastened the inevitable by a small degree, but certainly didn't create the problem. Even if it had, blaming Reagan for merely signing a bill passed by a Democrat controlled House and a Democrat controlled Senate would still be an act of blame-shifting on the part of the Left.

But anyhow, I 100% agree with you that solving the problem shouldn't be a partisan issue, but in our current political environment, everything becomes a tool to bash the other side, sadly. I don't know the answer, but I believe a big part would be opening modern institutions where those struggling with mental illness can receive appropriate care in a safe environment. There would be much less opportunity for the ill to be exploited by unscrupulous "friends" and caregivers, mental health dollars would go further because its so much less expensive to provide care in a centralized setting, and it would provide a much more humane option for dealing with the more violent and criminal-minded in the ranks of the mentally ill than the arrests and incarceration occuring now, which in turn should better protect the public.

But anyone who thinks any Republican politician who proposes such an idea wouldn't immediately be accused of wanting to "lock away" the mentally ill, "turn back the clock," "bring back Nurse Ratched," etc., etc., hasn't been paying attention.
 

Rooster1971

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Round them all up, march them to he bus station give them a one way ticket to San Francisco .....Rinse repeat as needed.
That’s where I actually saw the first major homeless issue in 1990. The amount in Golden Gate park was crazy to me at the time. Haven’t been back in a long time, sure it’s worse now. Kinda sad. Like the city though.
 

OKC03Cobra

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Yeah, Reagan cut back funding for mental illness around 1981. That and the war on drugs with out substance abuse treatment swelled our prison system.
1967 Reagan signs the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act and ends the practice of institutionalizing patients against their will, or for indefinite amounts of time. This law is regarded by some as a “patient’s bill of rights”. Sadly, the care outside state hospitals was inadequate. The year after the law goes into effect, a study shows the number of mentally ill people entering San Mateo's criminal justice system doubles.

1969 Reagan reverses earlier budget cuts. He increases spending on the Department of Mental Hygiene by a record $28 million.
 

OKC03Cobra

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1967 Reagan signs the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act and ends the practice of institutionalizing patients against their will, or for indefinite amounts of time. This law is regarded by some as a “patient’s bill of rights”. Sadly, the care outside state hospitals was inadequate. The year after the law goes into effect, a study shows the number of mentally ill people entering San Mateo's criminal justice system doubles.

1969 Reagan reverses earlier budget cuts. He increases spending on the Department of Mental Hygiene by a record $28 million.
1981 President Reagan repeals Carter’s legislation with the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act. This pushes the responsibility of mentally ill patients back to the states. The legislation creates block grants for the states, but federal spending on mental illness declines.
 

OKC03Cobra

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1981 President Reagan repeals Carter’s legislation with the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act. This pushes the responsibility of mentally ill patients back to the states. The legislation creates block grants for the states, but federal spending on mental illness declines.
Pushing the responsibility for mentally ill patients back to the states is not the same as cutting back funding. All he did was shift it to the states. Nice try though.
 

Rooster1971

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SlugSlinger

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