Speaker 1: The City of Fresno is considering a measure to ban
Speaker 1: homeless encampments. And it's kind of interesting how this has
Speaker 1: come to be. And it seems as though there's a
Speaker 1: tidal wave breaking on the left in California as well
Speaker 1: as the right. And it took a Supreme Court decision
Speaker 1: to sort of allow this allow this almost to become acceptable.
Speaker 1: A Supreme Court decision and Gavin Newsom, so, let me
Speaker 1: explain what's going on.
Speaker 2: So you've got the.
Speaker 1: City of Fresno. City of Fresno is proposing an ordinance,
Speaker 1: an ordinance that'll be enforced by the City Attorney's office.
Speaker 1: So they're not going to put this on the County
Speaker 1: DA's office, which I think is smart. The DA's office,
Speaker 1: I think has so many and so much worse crimes
Speaker 1: to prosecute that this is probably not something that's wise
Speaker 1: to sort of place in their lap, although it looks
Speaker 1: like the county might take up a measure like this. Also,
Speaker 1: a county supervisor, Steve ran Out, says he was considering
Speaker 1: an ordinance like this. Basically, the measure would impose up
Speaker 1: to a year in jail and up to a one
Speaker 1: thousand dollars fine for persons engaged in camping in public places.
Speaker 1: So public places include, but are not limited to, sidewalks, streets, alleyways,
Speaker 1: or other public spaces, city property, et cetera. So to
Speaker 1: get rid of homeless encampments, now the knee jerk. I
Speaker 1: don't want to get either of the two knee jerks.
Speaker 1: I think there's a conservative knee jerk that I have
Speaker 1: always been a little uncomfortable about with when dealing with
Speaker 1: the homeless. And I think there are some conservatives who
Speaker 1: might say that I'm soft or whatever, but whatever, I
Speaker 1: don't care. These are human beings. These are human beings, yes,
Speaker 1: who are making bad choices. But I feel like I
Speaker 1: can't sit in church every Sunday and hear about, you know,
Speaker 1: loving your neighbor, loving the poor, and take an attitude
Speaker 1: of well, not these poor people.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I get the sense that there are a lot of
Speaker 1: folks today, or some folks today, who take this attitude. Well, no,
Speaker 1: the poor people Jesus was talking about in his time,
Speaker 1: they were all like, it wasn't their fault they were poor.
Speaker 1: They were like good poor people, not these poor people,
Speaker 1: and which I just think is naive. There's no such
Speaker 1: thing as a good poor person or a there's no
Speaker 1: such thing as a good rich Perton. We're all sinners,
Speaker 1: all right. And I doubt that every single poor person
Speaker 1: who was poor in the time of Christ was this
Speaker 1: richly virtuous person who had just fallen on hard luck. Now,
Speaker 1: certainly there have our examples of Sometimes, yes, people are
Speaker 1: poor by virtue of they're down on their luck and
Speaker 1: they've had tough circumstances and it's really not their fault.
Speaker 1: Sometimes people are poor because it is their fault, because
Speaker 1: they have made poor choices, and on a certain level
Speaker 1: that doesn't matter. We're supposed to love and care for
Speaker 1: all of them. So I don't want to have a
Speaker 1: knee jerk reaction of not caring about the person. And
Speaker 1: what I would say, looking at this ordinance and how
Speaker 1: the city intends to use it to enforce it, I
Speaker 1: don't think that's the approach that's being taken by the
Speaker 1: city as best as I can see. So the things
Speaker 1: that I think is interesting is the group of city
Speaker 1: council members who are supporting this, the mayor is supporting this,
Speaker 1: and then at his press conference about it, you've got,
Speaker 1: you know, stalwart of the right. Gary Brettefeld standing right
Speaker 1: next to the mayor. On the other side, you've got
Speaker 1: stalwart of the left, Miguel Arrius, and you've got Tyler Maxwell.
Speaker 1: So pretty much that runs the gamut of the ideological
Speaker 1: spectrum on the city council, left, right, and center, and
Speaker 1: all of them are supportive of this measure. Now, Maxwell's
Speaker 1: comments about it, I think are illustrative. Maxwell said, what
Speaker 1: this ordinance will allow us to do is clear the
Speaker 1: large encampments building up in front of your children's schools,
Speaker 1: your neighborhood parks, to local bus stops, and in front
Speaker 1: of our chais's small businesses. We want to help the homeless, truly,
Speaker 1: we do. We have tried our hardest the these last
Speaker 1: four years I've been on the city Council, added Maxwell,
Speaker 1: referring to the renovation of Rundown motels into emergency shelters
Speaker 1: or transitional housing, meals, showers, bus rides, and other services.
Speaker 1: We're here to help you if you want that help,
Speaker 1: Maxwell said. If you don't want the city's help, that's
Speaker 1: okay too, But I hope you find that help somewhere else.
Speaker 1: Because our school's parks and businesses are off limits. Any
Speaker 1: individual charge with violation of this article in lieu of
Speaker 1: being taken to jail, may at the election of the
Speaker 1: siding officer, and with the consent of the individual, be
Speaker 1: taken to a place that provides social services, including mental health,
Speaker 1: housing or substance abuse treatment. So the point is, anyone
Speaker 1: who's being arrested for this, it's up to them if
Speaker 1: they want to get prosecuted or not. The options are
Speaker 1: get to services to help you, and if you don't,
Speaker 1: then we will prosecute you. But basically, I think that
Speaker 1: the problem is these resources are available and people aren't
Speaker 1: availing themselves of it. And maybe that's because they've got
Speaker 1: an addiction and they don't want the help that's available.
Speaker 1: But I think this is at a certain point there's
Speaker 1: a kind of tough love that has to be exercised,
Speaker 1: and I don't think it's loving to let people just
Speaker 1: continue to live in encampments when we were spending all
Speaker 1: this money on services to help the homeless and they're
Speaker 1: just not availing themselves of it. The posture that Andrew
Speaker 1: Jans is taking the city attorney, I think is also good.
Speaker 1: Let me read some of the quotes from Jans. So
Speaker 1: the one thousand dollars fine or the one year in
Speaker 1: jail penalties. So basically this is a miss These are
Speaker 1: misdemeanor crimes that people will be charged with. Okay, So
Speaker 1: the definition of a misdemeanor for those who don't know
Speaker 1: what's what's the difference between a felony and a misdemeanor.
Speaker 1: We hear those words all the time, and I think
Speaker 1: people have a sense of oh, felony means it's serious,
Speaker 1: and misdemeanor means it's not. A felony just means a
Speaker 1: crime that's punishable by a year plus in jail. A
Speaker 1: misdemeanor means a crime that's punishable by less than a year.
Speaker 1: So all these so the penalties for violating this homeless
Speaker 1: encampment order is thousand dollars fine up to a year
Speaker 1: in jail. So clearly they're structuring this as this is
Speaker 1: a misdemeanor. So one thousand dollars fine or a year
Speaker 1: in jail are the maximum that a judge can impose
Speaker 1: or that a prosecutor can ask for. Andrew Jans said,
Speaker 1: so Jan's had this quote. I'm directing my prosecution team
Speaker 1: and even though the actually let me back up, so
Speaker 1: most of the time, crimes are enforced by the district Attorney.
Speaker 1: And the district attorney is a county wide office, right,
Speaker 1: So Lisa smit Camp is the Fresno County District Attorney.
Speaker 1: Sally Moreno is the Maderra County District Attorney, and each
Speaker 1: of them are charged with prosecuting crimes that happen within
Speaker 1: their district, which in this case is just the county.
Speaker 1: So Lisa smith Camp oversees criminal prosecution for crimes committed
Speaker 1: throughout the County of Fresno. So if it happens in Fresno,
Speaker 1: if it happens in Clovis, if it happens in Redley,
Speaker 1: any of these, if it happens in Sanger, all these crimes,
Speaker 1: if they happen within Fresno County, Lisa smith Camp oversees it. Now,
Speaker 1: the interesting thing about this ordinance is that it's going
Speaker 1: to be enforced by the city attorney of the City
Speaker 1: of Fresno. This is only applying to the City of Fresno.
Speaker 1: And I think the reason why is because the district attorney,
Speaker 1: she's overseeing criminal law enforcement for all kinds of crimes,
Speaker 1: most of which are a lot more serious, you know,
Speaker 1: not to say homeleost encampments aren't disruptive to people or
Speaker 1: businesses or what have you. But frankly, if the district
Speaker 1: attorney's office has a limited amount of time and resources
Speaker 1: at its disposal, they only have X number of attorneys.
Speaker 1: They have a lot of attorneys, but they only have
Speaker 1: X number of attorneys with X many hours of daytime.
Speaker 1: And I think often when measures like this get dumped
Speaker 1: into the lap of the district attorney, they're prosecutors are
Speaker 1: so busy charging people with gang related offenses and murders
Speaker 1: and theft, and you know this that and the DUIs
Speaker 1: and this that and the other, that something like a
Speaker 1: homeless encampment prosecution is a misdemeanor. Homeless encampment prosecution is
Speaker 1: just not going to be priority A number one. And
Speaker 1: maybe you'll have a prosecutor who's more willing to, you know, plea,
Speaker 1: bargain this out and get this case out of the way.
Speaker 1: So what's happening here is enforcement of this measure is
Speaker 1: going to be undertaken by the city attorney and the
Speaker 1: city attorney's office. Now, usually the city attorney's office isn't
Speaker 1: so much concerned with the broad range of criminal law
Speaker 1: enforcement so they can expend more time, more energy on
Speaker 1: something like this than the DA's office can. And obviously
Speaker 1: the district attorney is overseeing the whole County of Fresno.
Speaker 2: Which includes the hire city of Fresno.
Speaker 1: The City Attorney's office is just going to be focused
Speaker 1: on Fresno. Okay, So this is just the city Attorney's
Speaker 1: office for the City of Fresno. If there's a holmost
Speaker 1: encampment in Clovis, they're not going to be able to
Speaker 1: prosecute anything with it. So Andrew Jans said, the City
Speaker 1: Attorney for Fresno. Andrew Jans said, quote, I'm directing my
Speaker 1: prosecution team to make sure we don't engage in any
Speaker 1: type of plea bargaining when it comes to these types
Speaker 1: of cases. We're going to demand accountability on all of
Speaker 1: these cases. Jan said, if you accept services, if you
Speaker 1: accept help in the criminal justice system, then we're going
Speaker 1: to go that route. But he added that his attorneys
Speaker 1: will seek maximum sentences from judges and juries for those
Speaker 1: who refuse help. And honestly, I think that's a good approach.
Speaker 1: I honestly think that's a really good approach. If we
Speaker 1: have these services available and we've expended so much money
Speaker 1: at the state level, at the city level to help people,
Speaker 1: then maybe police involvement, maybe criminal justice involvement can become helpful.
Speaker 1: Maybe this is the way to transition people out of
Speaker 1: this cycle I think often of drugs and then homelessness.
Speaker 1: So Dyer sort of capped this off by saying, the
Speaker 1: hope is that the judge in any case will offer
Speaker 1: that individual, the homeless individual treatment in lieu of jail time,
Speaker 1: and our hope is that they will take advantage of that.
Speaker 1: If not, then there are going to be criminal justice
Speaker 1: system consequences. Now, when we return, I want to talk
Speaker 1: about the Supreme Court case that allowed the City of
Speaker 1: Fresno to take this step and the Ninth Circuit decisions
Speaker 1: that had held it up. That's next on the John
Speaker 1: Girardi Show. The reason the City of Fresno is able
Speaker 1: to promote these this new measure that's been introduced to
Speaker 1: the city Council. It's being supported as of now, supported
Speaker 1: by Mayor Dyer, by council members Brettefeld, Arius and Maxwell,
Speaker 1: and I'm guessing other council members support it. Those are
Speaker 1: just the people who were at the Those are just
Speaker 1: the people who were at the press conference. I mean
Speaker 1: if if both mc if both Miguel Arius and Gary
Speaker 1: Brettefeld support it, who are pretty much at the polar
Speaker 1: opposite ends of the ideological spectrum of the city council.
Speaker 1: If both of them support it, I'm guessing pretty much
Speaker 1: everyone in the middle supports it too, So I would
Speaker 1: expect that this is likely to pass. How did this
Speaker 1: come to be? Why now, all of a sudden do
Speaker 1: we see Why now, all of a sudden do we
Speaker 1: see Gavin Newsom promoting issuing this executive order urging people
Speaker 1: to clear homeless encampments. Why do we see the city
Speaker 1: of Fresno.
Speaker 2: Moving in this way?
Speaker 1: Well, it's because of a recent Supreme Court decision that
Speaker 1: just came down a few weeks ago that was looking
Speaker 1: at a similar kind of law that was passed in
Speaker 1: the city of Boise, Idaho. Now, why do we what
Speaker 1: were we doing waiting on something that happened in Boise, Idaho? Well,
Speaker 1: Idaho and the federal district courts in Idaho, they are
Speaker 1: under the jurisdiction of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals,
Speaker 1: the Federal Circuit Court, the Federal Appeals court that hears
Speaker 1: all of the appeals from the federal courts in Idaho,
Speaker 1: but also California and Washington and Oregon and Arizona and
Speaker 1: Nevada and Montana and Alaska and Hawaii and Guam, so
Speaker 1: the ninths and maybe some other states that I missed.
Speaker 1: The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is an appeals court.
Speaker 1: They hear appeals from all the decisions made by district
Speaker 1: court judges in all of those states, and they are
Speaker 1: making decisions about federal law the interpretation of federal law
Speaker 1: as it applies in that region of the country. The
Speaker 1: Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is far and away the
Speaker 1: largest of all the circuit courts as far as the
Speaker 1: number of people who live within its jurisdiction. The Ninth
Speaker 1: Circuit is also, and has been for a long time,
Speaker 1: notoriously the most liberal of all the federal circuit courts.
Speaker 1: In fact, one of the great accomplishments of the Trump
Speaker 1: administration for his first term was making the Ninth Circuit
Speaker 1: Court of Appeals, taking it from being the most whacked out,
Speaker 1: radically liberal court in human history to being just moderately liberal. Underrated.
Speaker 1: What an enormous accomplishment that was during the Trump years
Speaker 1: by Trump and McConnell and Lindsay Graham and Chuck Grassley
Speaker 1: and all the guys in the Senate Judiciary Committee, all
Speaker 1: the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Now so, Boise,
Speaker 1: Idaho is part of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
Speaker 1: and the city of Boise had passed an ordinance like
Speaker 1: this one making homeless encampments illegal, and this was challenged
Speaker 1: as a constitutional matter. Basically, people sued the City of
Speaker 1: Boise to say that this law, that this ordinance that
Speaker 1: the City of Bois had adopted banning homeless encampments, violated
Speaker 1: the Constitution of the United States of America. And basically
Speaker 1: they said that it violated the Eighth Amendment. The Eighth
Speaker 1: Amendment which prohibits cruel and unusual punishments. The argument goes
Speaker 1: that if you don't have enough beds for the homeless
Speaker 1: to stay in, if you don't have enough social services
Speaker 1: available within your city to allow the homeless.
Speaker 2: To get a place to sleep, it.
Speaker 1: Is cruel and unusual punishment to penalize someone for the
Speaker 1: state of being homeless. That that is a cruel and
Speaker 1: unusual form of punishment. The Supreme Court got to hear. Now,
Speaker 1: so let's let's take a step back. The Ninth Circuit
Speaker 1: Court of Appeals agreed with this argument. The Ninth Circuit
Speaker 1: Court of Appeals agreed with this argument and said that
Speaker 1: it was in fact cruel and unusual punishment, that if
Speaker 1: a city has x number of homeless and doesn't have
Speaker 1: that many beds, that therefore it's cruel and unusual punishment
Speaker 1: to penalize someone for the state of being homeless.
Speaker 2: Now, I think that this is probably wrong on a
Speaker 2: couple of levels.
Speaker 1: First, I think, okay, so there are three thousand homeless people.
Speaker 1: I don't think you need to have three thousand and
Speaker 1: one beds before you characterize homeless encampments as illegal, just
Speaker 1: as a fairness, Just as a question of fairness, It's
Speaker 1: not like the first night you arrest all three thousand
Speaker 1: people or something like that, that that's not what's going
Speaker 1: to happen. A city can have a plan for how
Speaker 1: you enforce this in a way that can transition to
Speaker 1: population away from homelessness and living in an encampment. The
Speaker 1: fact that it is illegal can provide people with an
Speaker 1: incentive to get off the street. I don't think as
Speaker 1: a policy question, I don't think there's a fundamentally evil
Speaker 1: thing involved with making homelessness illegal when you don't quite
Speaker 1: have that precise number of sheltered beds.
Speaker 2: Okay, But secondly, I.
Speaker 1: Think the argument that it's cruel and unusual punishment is
Speaker 1: very hard to sustain if you have the approach of
Speaker 1: what were the framers of the Constitution saying?
Speaker 2: By cruel and unusual punishment?
Speaker 1: All right, Well, what the frames of the Constitution meant was,
Speaker 1: we're not going to torture people to death by you know,
Speaker 1: having them hung, drawn and quartered. You know, we're not
Speaker 1: going to you know, pull their intestines out in front
Speaker 1: of their eyes and you know, like, we're not going
Speaker 1: to engage in medieval forms of torture as a form
Speaker 1: of criminal punishment. We're not going to burn people alive
Speaker 1: at the stake or you know, things like that. That's
Speaker 1: what the Eighth Amendment is about, saying that you might
Speaker 1: think that a certain form of punishment or penalizing certain
Speaker 1: kinds of conduct, you might think that it's unwise, you
Speaker 1: might think that it's bad policy, but it's not a
Speaker 1: thing that the Eighth Amendment is there to prevent against.
Speaker 1: The Eighth Amendment's goal is not to prohibit that kind of.
Speaker 2: A regulation by a government.
Speaker 1: So I think that's the argument the Supreme Court had,
Speaker 1: and I think it's a sensible argument. I don't think
Speaker 1: that's the kind of conduct the Eighth Amendment was designed
Speaker 1: to prevent. So because the Supreme now here's the problem.
Speaker 1: The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that, yes, it
Speaker 1: is cruel and unusual punishment to outlaw homeless encampments when
Speaker 1: you don't have enough beds for them to stay in.
Speaker 1: And because the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal said that
Speaker 1: for a case in Boise, Idaho, well that becomes the
Speaker 1: interpretation of federal law for all of the states that
Speaker 1: are under the jurisdiction of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals,
Speaker 1: including California. So after the Ninth Circuit issued that decision,
Speaker 1: California was stuck. California basically couldn't enforce any laws against
Speaker 1: homeless encampments. Why because someone would challenge it and say, hey,
Speaker 1: the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal Court of Appeals already
Speaker 1: ruled on this, this violates federal law. And the Ninth
Speaker 1: Circuit's decisions are binding for everyone who lives within California.
Speaker 1: So because of a decision emanating out of Boise, Idaho,
Speaker 1: but within the federal court system, California couldn't pass laws,
Speaker 1: couldn't pass city or banning homeless encampments. However, now that
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court stepped in and said, nope, we're overturning
Speaker 1: what the Ninth Circuit said. This isn't cruel and unusual punishment.
Speaker 2: Now, all of a sudden, Gavin.
Speaker 1: Newsom can issue an executive order calling for the end
Speaker 1: of homeless encampments, and the City of Fresno can issue
Speaker 1: stuff and county supervisors can't. This Supreme Court decision has
Speaker 1: cleared the way.
Speaker 2: So again, I.
Speaker 1: Hope that these kinds of measures get enforced in a
Speaker 1: just way. I hope that there are actually services available
Speaker 1: for the homeless. I am inclined to trust the judgment
Speaker 1: of guys like Jerry Dyer and Tyler Maxwell and all
Speaker 1: of them that there are such services available, And I
Speaker 1: hope this can lead to a better situation in Fresno
Speaker 1: with homelessness, because it is a real problem. When we return,
Speaker 1: I want to just talk about some of the problems
Speaker 1: with homelessness that even I've just experienced. That's next on
Speaker 1: John Jrardy show now that the City of Fresno is
Speaker 1: introducing an ordnance to ban homeless encampments, and this follows
Speaker 1: up from a Supreme Court decision overturning a Ninth Circuit
Speaker 1: Court of Appeals decision that basically cleared the way for
Speaker 1: city governments and state governments to pass measures like this.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about just my
Speaker 1: own experience as a business manager. I'm run I'm executive
Speaker 1: director of a nonprofit and we have a business building
Speaker 1: in the city of Fresno. I just want to talk
Speaker 1: about my experiences with homelessness. So I'm not going to
Speaker 1: give I mean, I guess someone could just look up
Speaker 1: right to Life of Central California's address. It's not exactly secret,
Speaker 1: but you know, we our business is located near I'll
Speaker 1: just say we're located near Blackstone in Ashland, Okay. So
Speaker 1: we have a lot of homeless people in the neighborhood.
Speaker 1: And the outside of my business the it's just an
Speaker 1: office building. Our office building used to belong to this
Speaker 1: company that basically they the owner of the company. He
Speaker 1: basically he owned all the Wendy's in KFC franchises in Fresno,
Speaker 1: and the gentleman who owned it before he died, and
Speaker 1: this was about I think it was twenty plus years ago,
Speaker 1: he decided to donate his old management building to Rite
Speaker 1: to Life of Central California. So he completely I think
Speaker 1: at first he let us be there sort of as
Speaker 1: a tenant, and then he just gave us the building,
Speaker 1: donated the building to us free and clear. So we
Speaker 1: own it and it's up it's on the street, and
Speaker 1: the part of our building that's against the street, there's
Speaker 1: sort of the wall of the building there and against
Speaker 1: the wall of the building there's like a garden bed
Speaker 1: with sort of brick on the outside. And the garden
Speaker 1: bed is about about three feet tall. I'd say it's
Speaker 1: right at the perfect height for someone who's walking by.
Speaker 1: They can just sit on it on this kind of
Speaker 1: brick wall, and it's containing a big patch of dirt. Well,
Speaker 1: we can't really plant anything in the dirt because of
Speaker 1: all the passerby. Now, the problem is with having that
Speaker 1: garden bed with a little wall there that's like perfect
Speaker 1: for sitting on is that people sit on it constantly
Speaker 1: and it's shaded also, so people are constantly stopping by
Speaker 1: to sit there. And whether it's homeless people whoever it is.
Speaker 1: People are constantly coming by to sit there, and I
Speaker 1: don't know that all of them are homeless necessarily. Like
Speaker 1: just yesterday, I had a big crowd of people who
Speaker 1: all had bicycles, all decided just to sit there all
Speaker 1: day and smoke weed. And I didn't even get the
Speaker 1: sense necessarily that they were homeless. They just seemed like,
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe they were just ne'er do wells.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not I mean, it's hard to stereotype
Speaker 1: and you can't tell just by looking at someone. But
Speaker 1: they weren't necessarily in like really raggedy clothing or anything.
Speaker 1: They were just sitting around smoking weed. I've had times
Speaker 1: where people just sort of hang out there and they're
Speaker 1: literally gambling against the side of my building. They're like
Speaker 1: shooting dice. They're rolling dice for money against the side
Speaker 1: of the building. Now, we do often have homeless though
Speaker 1: who in camp there. And it's kind of I can't
Speaker 1: always see that outside wall of my building because of
Speaker 1: sort of it's the outside wall and I'm inside the building.
Speaker 1: But there's a used car dealership that's kind of right
Speaker 1: across the street from us, who they look out, you know,
Speaker 1: their salesman or you know, hanging out in the parking
Speaker 1: lot as car salesmen do at a dealership, and they
Speaker 1: see everything. Oh yeah, people are peeing against the side
Speaker 1: of my building all the time. People are shooting up
Speaker 1: drugs against the side of my building all the time.
Speaker 1: I know because I see the needles. People are drinking
Speaker 1: near my building all the time. I know because I
Speaker 1: see the little liquor bottles or beer bottles or beer
Speaker 1: cans or whatever that people are constantly. People are constantly
Speaker 1: leaving trash in this garden bed up against the side
Speaker 1: of my building. I remember one time. This is The
Speaker 1: other thing is maybe it's someone who has a car.
Speaker 1: There was a homeless man who was in a wheelchair
Speaker 1: and he had no legs. Okay, both of his legs
Speaker 1: were amputated below the knee, and he was going around
Speaker 1: in a wheelchair. And I felt really bad for this guy.
Speaker 1: He had parked his car where he was clearly living
Speaker 1: out of his car, right in front of my business.
Speaker 1: And my business is kind of on a side street.
Speaker 1: It's off of Blackstone, So there was a part of
Speaker 1: me that was like, well, gosh, am I gonna call
Speaker 1: the cops on this guy, like, you know, where else
Speaker 1: does this guy have to go? Does this guy have
Speaker 1: anywhere else he can even go? Like, like, what are
Speaker 1: we doing here? Then I learned from people that he's
Speaker 1: basically having a party on my sidewalk. I'm hearing from
Speaker 1: someone that he was who sees the guy that he's
Speaker 1: drinking and carousing and he's got girls over there hanging
Speaker 1: out right out against the side of my building. So
Speaker 1: which made me feel a little less sympathy for this gentleman.
Speaker 1: And again though, it's like I kind of call the
Speaker 1: city and I tell them, listen, I don't want this
Speaker 1: person to get arrested and go to jail, but can
Speaker 1: you just get this person hooked up to services? And
Speaker 1: sometimes I think the city just feels sort of power
Speaker 1: had felt sort of powerless about this, Like they can
Speaker 1: offer for people stuff, but they weren't always able to
Speaker 1: force people to leave. So the kind of spotty responses
Speaker 1: I would get from the city led me to sort
Speaker 1: of give up and sort of not want to always
Speaker 1: call them. Also, I'm running a nonprofit organization. I feel
Speaker 1: bad for these people on a certain level, Like I
Speaker 1: don't want to be known as like a heartless, cruel
Speaker 1: jerk towards the homeless. So, I mean, anytime I heard
Speaker 1: that people were actively doing illegal stuff, I would, you know,
Speaker 1: call the cops. But short of that, I mean, if
Speaker 1: someone's just sitting there, what am I supposed to do?
Speaker 1: And then people would bring I get more and more
Speaker 1: apparatus and stuff that they would just leave there. It
Speaker 1: kind of came to a breaking point last November. So
Speaker 1: last November, one of the gals who works with me,
Speaker 1: my friend, she pulls into our parking lot and she
Speaker 1: sees a bunch of water coming out of We have
Speaker 1: kind of a courtyard area in the middle of our
Speaker 1: office building that you walk from our parking lot into
Speaker 1: the courtyard area, and she sees water flowing out of
Speaker 1: the courtyard into our parking lot.
Speaker 2: She says, oh boy. She calls me.
Speaker 1: I'm at the radio station or I forget where I was.
Speaker 1: She calls me and says, you need to get over here.
Speaker 1: So I come in. So a homeless person had managed
Speaker 1: to break into our I presume a homeless person. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure. And maybe you'll see what it is after
Speaker 1: I describe it. Someone had taken one of our large
Speaker 1: rolling garbage cans. That we leave in our parking lot.
Speaker 1: He had tipped it on its side and stood on
Speaker 1: it reached over the top of our large courtyard gate.
Speaker 1: We have a large locking courtyard gate that you can't
Speaker 1: open without a key. He had managed to somehow reach
Speaker 1: over the top of it by standing on a large
Speaker 1: garbage can and whacked the inside pushbar lever to open
Speaker 1: the door of our courtyard. So he gets into our courtyard.
Speaker 1: Then he goes into the bathroom, which is accessible in
Speaker 1: the courtyard. You can access two bathrooms. He goes into
Speaker 1: one of the bathrooms. He proceeds. I'm saying, a he
Speaker 1: I don't know, Maybe I should be more open minded.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was a female criminal. He proceeds to steal
Speaker 1: copper fixtures underneath the sink in the bathroom, which have
Speaker 1: to be I mean, it must be a big haul,
Speaker 1: you know, stealing copper like that. I mean, it's got
Speaker 1: to be worth two whole dollars. So he steals these
Speaker 1: copper fixtures under the sink, but he doesn't shut the
Speaker 1: water off for the sink, so he's take He's ripped
Speaker 1: the sink apart, all the plumbing under the sink, but
Speaker 1: he didn't shut off the water, so you've got water
Speaker 1: now gushing out unabated. He also lights a fire in
Speaker 1: the bathroom. He lights it in the cabinet underneath the
Speaker 1: bathroom sink. It kind of in the same area where
Speaker 1: he was trying to steal the copper fitting. So I
Speaker 1: don't know what his order of operations was. He stealed
Speaker 1: the fittings and then the water came out, and then
Speaker 1: he lit the fire, or the light the fire first,
Speaker 1: and then he stole the cop I don't know. All
Speaker 1: I know is that this guy lit a fire in
Speaker 1: the cabinet under the bathroom sink, right next to the
Speaker 1: water heater, So goodbye water heater. All of its wiring
Speaker 1: was completely fried. All this water is gushing out. This
Speaker 1: guy has made a royal mess. I mean, thank god,
Speaker 1: he put the fire out before the whole.
Speaker 2: Building burned down. So he leaves.
Speaker 1: And I show up at work. I don't know how
Speaker 1: many hours later. I don't know when he showed up.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was four o'clock or something. I show up
Speaker 1: at work to see all this flooding, fire damage, et cetera.
Speaker 1: So for the next month, basically I have to have
Speaker 1: contractors in there fixing things. Thank God, my insurance covered vandalism.
Speaker 1: But I mean, so you know we were out only
Speaker 1: you know, our five thousand dollars deductible as opposed to
Speaker 1: you know, that would have cost us. He probably I
Speaker 1: think I remembered looking at the insurance claims and stuff.
Speaker 1: It cost us about twenty five thousand dollars worth of damage.
Speaker 1: All the water that had flooded from the bathroom to
Speaker 1: another room, to another room, to another room to another room,
Speaker 1: ruined a bunch of cabinets in one room that had
Speaker 1: to be completely ripped out and replaced. We had to
Speaker 1: then we had to retreat the flooring in the bathrooms
Speaker 1: which the tiles had been adhered to. The tiles had
Speaker 1: been set, you know, decades ago, and the tiles had
Speaker 1: been adhered with asbestos. So we needed as bestis abatement.
Speaker 1: Like it was a nightmare. Then like two nights later,
Speaker 1: I see a bunch of burnt stuff right up against
Speaker 1: the building. Clearly this same Dufus came by the building
Speaker 1: and lit another fire. I don't know if he's just
Speaker 1: trying to warm himself. I mean it was in kind
Speaker 1: of November. I don't know if he was just trying
Speaker 1: to warm himself, but he kept kept lighting fires on
Speaker 1: the street, and I've read more about fires and fire
Speaker 1: damage that's just being caused by homeless people, i think,
Speaker 1: just trying to get warm. So just my experience of
Speaker 1: homelessness just at my property. And by the way, I'm
Speaker 1: sure that I am not exceptional. I'm sure when we return,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about that. That my experience, I'm sure
Speaker 1: is far from unique. That's next on the John Girardi Show.
Speaker 1: I'm encouraged that the city is taking steps to deal
Speaker 1: with homeless encampments. I hope that it is done in
Speaker 1: a fashion that is just and kind and equitable and
Speaker 1: fair to homeless people and in a way that genuinely
Speaker 1: gets them help. And from everything i'm hearing from the
Speaker 1: city Attorney Andrew Jans, to the mayor, to the city
Speaker 1: council members, everything I'm hearing sounds good that the idea
Speaker 1: here is to get basically just to get these people
Speaker 1: to help, and if they refuse to get help, then
Speaker 1: that is the only point at which they will suffer consequences.
Speaker 1: We have help, we have help available to people, we
Speaker 1: have resources available to people. We need them to take
Speaker 1: advantage of it. I hope it works, I guess I'm
Speaker 1: I desperately hope it works, because again, you know, I've
Speaker 1: seen the disruption that sort of our un checked homelessness
Speaker 1: has caused, Just just for my own business, where you
Speaker 1: know I have, I've constantly been having people just hanging
Speaker 1: out outside my building, people that I'm not always even
Speaker 1: sure are really homeless. They might just be losers, ne'er
Speaker 1: do wells who are just sitting there, not because they
Speaker 1: actually don't have anywhere else to stay, but because they
Speaker 1: just want a place to hang around and smoke weed
Speaker 1: or drink or do drugs.
Speaker 2: Or gamble.
Speaker 1: So I've been you know, I'm tired of dealing with
Speaker 1: this at my business. I'm sure that you know. I
Speaker 1: remember that there's an old hospital that the county owns
Speaker 1: that they were thinking of selling where homeless people breaking
Speaker 1: into the hospital had caused a million dollars worth of damage.
Speaker 1: They were going to sell the property for like six
Speaker 1: million dollars, but they have a million dollars worth of
Speaker 1: repairs that they have to do because of the homeless breaking.
Speaker 1: That's a huge loss for the county. So the costs
Speaker 1: that are accruing to businesses because of homelessness it's not negligible.
Speaker 1: So I hope that this is enforced in a way
Speaker 1: that is kind and fair to the people that it's targeting,
Speaker 1: towards the homeless themselves, and because you know, this is
Speaker 1: a real burden on the city and on taxpayers. So
Speaker 1: that'll do it for John Girardi Show. See you next
Speaker 1: time on Power Talk.