Page 8 - Sonoma County gazette September 2018

OPINION: Homeless in America
Our Canary in the Coal Mine
Around 1913 British coal miners began taking canaries into the coal mines to warn them of odorless toxic gases like carbon dioxide. The canaries were an effective early warning system because they took oxygen into their lungs when they inhaled and
again, because of their physiology, when they exhaled. So the canaries got an extra dose of oxygen, and if there were toxic gasses, they would get a double dose of poison too! Apparently, the miners would whistle at the little songbirds to see if they were still alive. If the birds stopped chirping or died, it was time to go!
In America, homeless people are like canaries in a coal mine. When a homeless person dies from lack of care, they are showing us something is wrong with our coal mine! The problem, however, is no one’s yelling, “Watch out! Get out of the mine!” Why bother? There’s nowhere to run. America is one big mine. You’re on your own. Good luck homeless people!
More often than not, someone may say of a homeless person who died,
“They died because it was freezing.”
Or “They died from an overdose.”
And then someone else will say “We need more low-income housing so they
OPINION: This is UNACCEPTABLE!
By Jay Beckwith
As a reader of the Gazette, you have a secret power. No kidding. I’m going to
By Brad L. Smith, Songwriter
reveal to your secret power if you promise only to use it for good. OK?
What would you do if you were invisible? Rob a bank? Sneak in the girl’s locker room? Or use your power for good?
The fact is, to certain people you are invisible. Let me prove it to you.
don’t freeze to death!”
If you take more than you need, like when you’re at the all-you-can-eat buffet, that is being greedy. For some people, that’s occasional bad manners. For others, it’s a way of life. Remember, its hardwired into their brain and is automatic. They don’t even think about it.
Or “We need more rehab places!”
Now for your secret power and how to use it. The thing is that for most of the greed and bias folks, you, me and most of the readers of the Gazette are probably invisible. Don’t believe me? Let me prove it to you by relating a current event regarding housing.
That is all well and good, but these great ideas are, by themselves, not a solution to homelessness. They are part of the solution, but they can never be the fix.
Homeless people have a myriad of problems. And we know most of them -- child abuse, broken hearts, broken families, drugs, medical issues, mental health problems, lack of skills, alcohol, racism, injustice, etc. The list goes on and on.
As you undoubtedly have heard, the County proposed a $300 million bond issue to address the housing crisis. Those funds would have been leveraged two or three times and generate enough funds to make a significant impact. The surveys showed that the vast majority of residents supported the measure. Great, right?
Over time, we have all watched the unraveling of our society’s commitment to care for everyone in a practical way. For some reason, taking care of each other, including 43 million Americans who live below the poverty line, is not seen as important as giving our corporations more money by dramatically cutting their taxes! But this all leads to the real truth about homeless people stuck in the coal mine.
Well not so great, a few wealthy and well-connected people felt compelled to put their greed and bias ahead of what is good for the county. As the Press Democrat reported: “Plans for a $300 million housing bond to support the construction
of affordable housing in Sonoma County appear to have fallen apart after influential agriculture and business groups opposed the idea.”
The only thing that will begin to solve homelessness is if homeless people have access to medical and mental health care on an ongoing basis. And since we cannot provide more than half a million homeless people in America with health care and not provide it to others, America cannot stop there!
All they had to do was threaten to oppose the measure, and because bonds are a complex proposition and funding for a campaign is tight, the measure has been tabled. So those who have been externalizing their costs for housing for labor for decades will now be bailed out by our towns picking up the slack, such as Santa Rosa and hopefully Healdsburg.
How can such a few people have such power? For one, to these folks, you my dear reader are invisible. Even the idea of you having any say is to them, unthinkable, literally. The other fact is that money and power tend to be drawn together. It’s like the 3rd law of thermodynamics or something. Societies for eons have had to grapple with this, often with bloodshed, when the disparity in wealth gets so far askew that the whole economy grinds to a halt. My guess is that we are close to that tipping point.
To be fair, America must, out of decency, expand health care to include the 43 million Americans existing below the poverty line who also need access to health care but cannot afford it.
Note: 16 million are children.
This is Unacceptable! It seems like every day there is yet another outrage by the greedy and biased crowd. We want to fight back but what can we do? It’s so complicated. I’m just one person. My life is so demanding I just don’t have time. Enough with the excuses!
STEP ONE - Here’s what we are doing and need to do a lot more of:
1) Pick a cause, find a project, make a commitment, anything that will do good.
2) Work on yourself to be healthy in mind and body, give yourself a bit of love.
STEP TWO – Call out what’s really happening
1) When we see greed and bias call it out.
2) Don’t allow those who are abusing their wealth and power to continue to be anonymous. Name them and shame them (in a loving way).
At that point, we might as well provide health care to everyone. After all, life is full of surprises and all of us may be the canary in the American coal mine at some point. As we know from past experience, America has its share of toxic environments.
The word “socialism” seems to scare a lot of people as if the Earth’s about to be attacked by aliens! Relax. We already have “socialism” in America – Social Security, Medical (in California) Medicare and Medicaid, etc. And it seems
to be working! Ask people who are using these services a question: “Do you like it!” Can you imagine Trump‘s supporters saying “I don’t want my Social Security check!” Can you imagine Trump supporters saying, “Take me off Medicare! Send me the bill instead!”
Currently, homeless people, like canaries, have found their way into the depths of the American coal mine. We pray they stay alive! But right now all we can say is “Good luck down there!”
Brad L. Smith worked for Catholic Charities 1992-1999 at the Santa Rosa Homeless Service Center & Family Support Center as the Adult Education Coordinator.
8 - www.sonomacountygazette.com - 9/18
Don’t panic when someone shouts “socialism” like it’s a disease.
I don’t think so!
STEP THREE – Wake up! When building codes become so onerous that the resulting homes will be too expensive for most people to buy, they are just plain wrong and need to be changed and/or new technology employed such as factory production. We as a community have allowed codes to become a weapon of the greedy and biased.
We can whistle and call out, “Sing! Sing little bird!” And cross our fingers. But until homeless people have ongoing access to health care, there will always be canaries in the coal mine. It’s a cold truth.
When we allow farms to be converted into industrial agribusiness, producing massive profits without adequate accountability for labor and the environment, we need to demand corrections to policies and land use rules.
See, there are two kinds of people out there. One group believe in and live with love and generosity. The other group believes in greed and bias.
When I say believe in, what I mean is that, according to the most recent neuroscience, their brain is actually hardwired to see the world in these ways. Now very few people are all one sided or the other. For example, everyone has some biases, which for the most part are unconscious. If you see a homeless person are you repelled? If you see a Latino driving a new Mercedes, do you wonder where he got the money? If you see someone covered in tattoos do you think ... well, you get the idea. The point is, if you are in the love and generosity camp, you work at being aware of these biases and try to just observe them and move on as you might in meditation.
The whole Bay Area is a massive profit generating machine. We have already seen how this has impacted our area. Big money is headed towards Sonoma County like a tsunami! We, the invisible, need to plan for how to accommodate this tsunami, for we cannot stop it. But you can be sure that the greedy and the biased will welcome it, in ways that will not be loving and generous.