This is what happens when people are priced out of housing.  Follow up with court rulings banning some cities from clearing homeless encampments and liberal guilt when it comes to the homeless.  But even Democrats have a breaking point.  In Berkeley, California, an ordinance was passed by city government.  It moved the nomads living in RVs off the streets.

The encampment shifted into neighboring Oakland.

We’ve got a persistent homeless population but nothing like what others are seeing.

There are numerous videos about the shantytowns cropping up around Portland, Oregon.  One of the most recent is the one I posted below.

In the early 1990s, a friend moved his family to Portland and took a job as the program director of a sports talk radio station.  Within five years he was selling real estate.  He made a fortune as the market boomed.  Portland was the dream location for many, many Americans.  Now the reckoning has arrived.

Two weeks ago, a friend was visiting Boise.  He hadn’t spent much time there since before the pandemic.  He was shocked at the changes.  Courts have ruled the city can’t force people into some shelters.  They can live on the streets.  Many have made the choice.

In any homeless population there are some people suffering from mental illness and addictions.  And then there are the people who simply have fallen on hard times.  Idaho’s economy is back on its feet.  There’s a labor shortage.  There’s also a shortage of affordable housing.  If you can’t afford a place to live, it complicates holding down a job.  This isn’t a problem with easy solutions.  There simply aren’t enough houses and apartments.  Let’s hope this plague doesn’t strike other Idaho cities, such as Twin Falls.  We’ve got a persistent homeless population but nothing like what others are seeing.

KEEP READING: Here are the best places to retire in America

 

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