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Because the cost of housing homeless families in shelters is so high, the Bloomberg administration has been quietly funding a $500,000-a-year program to buy one-way plane tickets for indigent individuals if they agree to stay away. Well, the program was quiet until it was featured in today's Times, so who knows how many New Yorkers will now start posing as transients for one-way tickets to Burning Man. So far the city has paid for more than 550 families to leave since 2007.
To get the free ticket, the recipients must prove they have a relative ready to take them in. According to a map of their destinations, most of them (136) have been bound for Puerto Rico, while Florida was the #2 destination (100). Taxpayers paid $6,332 to send at least one family to Paris, and other ports of call have included Antigua, India, Russia, Peru, and Barbados. One city official says, "We have paid for visas, we’ve gone down to the consulate, we’ve provided letters, we’ve paid for passports for people to go. Anyone who comes through our door." In some cases, the city even advances the family up to four months’ rent, a one-month security deposit, a furniture allowance and a broker’s fee!
Officials say none of the relocated families have returned to city shelters. And one family from North Carolina illustrates the fast turnaround now experienced by some poor newcomers: Justin Little and Eugenia Martin, both 20, owed back rent on their apartment in Fayetteville, so they moved here Saturday with their 5-month-old, Inez. They planned to stay in shelters while looking for jobs, "because there’s always work in New York." But by Monday they were on their way back home, courtesy of NYC and a relative who came up with money for the back rent.
Arnold Cohen from the Partnership for the Homeless thinks the whole thing stinks: "The city is engaged in cosmetics. What we’re doing is passing the problem of homelessness to another city. We’re taking people from a shelter bed here to the living room couch of another family."
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Are you kidding me?
Just because you're homeless.....
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=111091624
what happened to all the affordable housing?
Arnold Cohen from the Partnership for the Homeless thinks the whole thing stinks: "The city is engaged in cosmetics. What we’re doing is passing the problem of homelessness to another city. We’re taking people from a shelter bed here to the living room couch of another family."
You know, sometimes life is hard and you have to rely on your relatives to help you out, especially when the alternative is the taxpayers helping you out. It's not "passing on the problem of homelessness" for someone to live with a relative until they get back on their feet. In fact, it's exactly what I was raised to believe family is for!
> "We’re taking people from a shelter bed here to the living room couch of another family."
wait, why is that bad? wouldn't the couch of a relative or friend be better than a shelter? It certainly would be cheaper for the city and would open up a bed in the shelters, which we are always being told are overcrowded.
It doesn't seem all that bad to me. Arnold Cohen: Why should the taxpayers of NY be stuck with them? The homeless themselves seem to be pretty pleased with the arrangement, from what the article says.
release the homeless stats. bloomberg's legacy.
Why is the assumption that these folks will remain homeless in another city? The cost of living is unreal in this town. If you manage to get a minimum wage job you can't afford a cardboard box to live in, let alone an apartment. Take that same minimum wage and move it to a more affordable city. You may have a better chance of surviving...
The homeless have all the luck
It's not like the families are being deported against their will. These individuals are happily going back to their hometowns.
Can anyone explain how Mr. Little and Ms. Martin ditched out on their back rent, moved to NY, failed, had some relatives bail them out, and then returned to North Carolina TO THEIR SAME JOBS?
I guess they were on the run, didn't bother to tell their employers, and then in 48 hours were able to return soon enough to avoid getting fired, but wow, they are stupid. If you can't afford rent in NC, how on earth can you afford it in NYC, or find a better job than the one at a call center that Mr. Little had.
This whole thing stinks, but it saves the city money from the alternative of actually housing them, and I also agree that shipping people off to their relatives is not a bad concept, being that people should rely on their loved ones and turn to the government only out of desperation, not as a first choice.
It's like the Morning After pill for idiot bums. Hope they liked Times Square though.
At first this seemed nuts -- just sending homeless people to another city to be homeless.
But on reflection, it could work if there's sufficient screening. Some people do get stuck -- they can't get a job, and spend every dime just on living. Saving up even the modest amount needed for a bus ticket (or flight back to, e.g., PR)is out of the question.
But if they COULD get home, their situation would be different -- a job, a relative, whatever. With those people -- people who are homeless only because they can't get home -- it makes far more sense to spend the relatively small amount sending them home than it does to spend a greater amount housing and feeding them for years. It may be a windfall for them -- hey, free trip home -- but so what? I don't want to spend my tax money housing and feeding someone just to make sure he doesn't get a "freebie." If his freebie saves me money, too...great.
But it only works if it's reserved for people in those singular circumstances. If you're just shuffling people around to live on someone else's streets, you're not doing anything. So it must be very well screened and tightly limited.
That guy in the Times article has a bluetooth in his ear and doesn't look very homeless to me. Why should we pay for people like that to fly back to PR? If they have family or someone to live with why can't they get the family to pay for the flight or bus ticket? Sell that fucking bluetooth and buy the ticket yourself.
I think this is a pretty genius idea.
+1, at least until Soylent Green production starts.
When do the homeless from all over the world start arriving to live with their prosperous New York families?
And in no way is this going to actually help the real homeless people who have nobody to help them. That's why their homeless!
except it frees up beds and space in shelters for them
AND services. Some of the homeless need more than just food and a place to stay to get back on their feet.
That guy in the Times article has a fucking bluetooth in his ear and they don't look very homeless to me. Why should taxpayers pay for flights to PR? Can't his family help him out? Sell that bluetooth and buy your own fucking ticket!
woops, posted this twice...
So what's the problem? These people are moving in with families or friends, people who can help them get back on their feet better than the city.
I've seen that guy walking around!
I know Arnold Cohen and I think he and his organization do great work - but he's off-base on this one. He comes off seeming like he has to be anti-City regardless of whether their plan is a good one or not.
And I second (or third) what another poster wrote re: "this is what family is for".
At least I now know what to see when I see a panhandler with a sign "...need money for a bus ticket home".
Bloomberg is shipping out the homeless so he can make room for illegals. Those dang homeless refuse to help build condos that nobody can afford.
is there a mandatory bathing procedure before boarding?
So does this mean we can ship all the gutter punks out of Williamsburg?
For anyone who thinks this is a good idea.
Do you also think sending the elderly, the handicapped and the infirm to other states is also a "good idea"?
We already do. It's called Florida.
Matty, the homeless people that are the beneficiaries of this program hardly seem elderly, handicapped, or infirm. Not only that, but it makes perfect sense to me that if someone is one or more of those things, sending them home to relatives is a good thing to do, rather than letting them fester in a homeless shelter.
As much as homeless shelters aim to improve the lives of its residences by acting as a stepping stone, the elderly, handicapped, and infirm are the least likely to be able to get out of such a difficult situation.
Your logic is not working for me.
@Stereotypical, that bluetooth shit is whack, yet not surprising of idiots that make themselves broke and homeless from making poor decisions with their money. I'd guess at least half of the homeless population is truly destitute and has been dealt a really shitty hand, but it's infuriating to know that idiots like bluetooth guy make people like us detest helping out the homeless because of the poor decisions that more people need to take responsibility for.
You don't just ship off your poor. I'm sorry but that's some shit they do in Singapore, not NYC.
Well I guess they do now.
It's an opt-in program. If someone is just plain stuck and wants to go home what's wrong with helping them get there. Besides, if you read the article, the city will not put you on a plane unless social workers at both ends confirm that there is, indeed, a family waiting to collect and house the person when they arrive.
They won't be poor in a town they can afford though...
What about the couple from North Carolina that had been here for 48 hours? Do they count as "our poor," or just some fools that were way better off going back to where they came from (and I mean that sincerely)?
Yes, they might be the exception more than the rule, but this program seems limited in scope and specific in its targeting.
I also agree with #11 Thespis that a lot of people just get stuck here. Really poor people can't afford more than one Metrocard swipe at a time, so it's easy to imagine they'll never be able to afford a bus or plane ticket. Obviously they'll need to be taking a major risk to leave, but for all the promise and American Dreaminess of NYC, I think it's quite evident that it can also be a lot harsher on people than other places.
Nobody is being sent anywhere against their will so get off your soapbox. And honestly, this country might be a little bit better off if people looked after their elderly relatives. I'm all for maintaining Social Security but I was more than a little disturbed to listen to a person representing Rock The Vote speak on C-SPAN a few years back about how Social Security freed young people to move wherever opportunity took them and not have to worry about their elderly parents back home. Maybe some of these homeless will actually do better somewhere else if they have friends or family to support them.
Maybe you can start giving cash handouts for any poor people who decide to sterilize themselves too. That's reccomended in Freakponomics, the liberal bible, right?
Eugenics, it's totally so hot right now.
Maybe jen carlson should write an article about it.
BS. Many people who leave could also be mentally handicapped, still homeless in their own countries/states, etc...the only reason the city is doing this is to send their dirty laundry to other states so they don't actually have to deal with the problem.
It's robbing peter to pay paul.
Why not just do as the english did and send everyone in rikers to australia?
Many people who leave could also be mentally handicapped, still homeless in their own countries/states
It clearly says in the linked New York Times article as well as ON THIS PAGE that the "recipients must prove they have a relative ready to take them in." So what was your point again? You lost by trying to portray this as mass forced migration.
Nobody said that!
Freakanomics is the liberal bible?
I thought it was libertarians/ayn rands/repub lites bible?
and money and capitalism is the cure for all that ails ya.
too bad if you're not born into money.
it would be really cheap to put them all in a boat and send them off in to the atlantic. right? think of all the money the city would be saving that way.
So a homeless man walks up to you. He says "Here in NYC I'm homeless and miserable -- I'm eating garbage. But in Arizona I'd have a job working for my brother, and he'd put me up. Trouble is, I can't get there. I'd need $150 for a bus ticket -- and I don't even have 50 cents to buy a cup of coffee." Assuming you believe him, is it your position that it would be immoral to buy him a bus ticket, because that would be "shipping him off" to Arizona for them to deal with?
If he wants to go to Arizona, if Arizona is a better place for him, and if we don't particularly want to pay the far higher price involved in supporting him here (particularly when he could support himself there)...what's your objection? If he'd rather live here, he can. But why does he HAVE to live here if he doesn't want to?
This program works the same way -- just on a larger scale. So I get where you're coming from but I think you're spectacularly missing the point here.
Haha absolutely not. It's anathema to us libertarians.
Interesting read, but I agree with maybe 5% of what's in there.
Hey wait a minute...
What happened to all of the affordable housing that Amanda Burden and Bloomberg kept boasting every time
another 'hood was rezoned for luxury condos?
What a joke!
This may be a good policy for illegal immigrants as well.
Rather pay $6000 in tax payer money now than $30,000 per year every year in welfare upkeep for these indigents.
How big was this extended family that it cost $6K to fly them to Paris? A RT ticket to Paris is like $600 if you plan ahead.
Because I'm sure NYC has a college student account with STATravel.com.
Whoa. One of the families mentioned in the article who were granted tickets are a couple with 10 (!) kids on their way back to PR. Jeeze...condoms are a helluva lot cheaper than 12 plane tickets to PR.
Cartman from South Park is the biggest prick in the history of television and film characters, but he's also got a point when he rails against poor people for pro-creating.
I'm one of five, myself and I can't stress enough just how nuts (fun, but crazy) my household was when we were all kids. I have nothing against big families, but then again, my parents planned for a big family and planned to sustain a big family not fricking move us all to a city that is notoriously diffcult for even one person to survive in. Stupid, stupid people....
I just realized, I am homeless and family members in Paris are ready and willing to take me in.
I spent a long time working with the homeless, and the fact is, if you are homeless it is because you are an addict or you're mentally ill. That IS our 99% of the shelter system. So this, unfortunately, probably will not help them much, which is a shame, since the best place for most mentally ill people to be is in a stable home.
OTOH- we have a lot of lazy slackers in this city of all stripes- off they go if they promise not to come back!
AHEM!
>>> To get the free ticket, the recipients must prove they have a relative ready to take them in.
I seem to recollect reading a book by Focault on madness and society years ago. In it he said that eurpoean towns in past centuries would load all the homeless and mentally ill on a boat and send them down the river to the next town, where they would be unloaded until the mayor could cough up money to get them to leave and go elsewhere. This is apprently where the phrase "ship of fools" came from.
Why the Burning Man crack? It's not an event for slackers. Anyone that showed up there without putting in a few month's advanced prep work would wind up either a) embarrassed b) dead c) both. And you sure as hell would want a *round-trip* ticket!
He was here for one fucking week??!!? What the fuck?
Can we please vote out these liberals with their cockamamie ideas.
Methinks you did one of the following:
1) Mis-quoted or,
2) Mis-understood that when it says "last week" he was only in America for a week before he went to a shelter.
Work on your reading comprehension before you go chasing a straw-man, fella.
Ah. I read too fast.
the mayor says this will save money,
here's another money saver, those lawsuits against the NYPD, how bout saving the taxpayer dollars in those????
why no comment on that?
Will take only moments before somebody sets up a virtual family member service in Paris and New York, undercuts Priceline, and Captain Kirk is looking for work again.
In the old days, if you were a public nuissance, ie; drunk, disorderly, or just flat out insane, you'd get a one-way bus ticket out of town. It only worked until the cities that got the new arrivals freaked out and reciprocated. If this is truly voluntary and the people involved are functional and could restart their lives elsewhere, why not? But if they are like many of the homeless, messed up with layers of addictions mental illness, and dysfunction, there will be blowback. Right now, Los Angeles has a nice bumper crop of bums in Skid Row they'd love to ship our way...
JDS, why'd you put Barbados in italics? Are you seriously jealous of homeless people?
Damn, some guys in Brighton Beach just took my idea!
Gas the geese, rid the city of homelessness. Bloomberg is a tool
For reasons why there is nothing wrong with this plan see thread #27. If you really think there's something wrong with helping stranded, penniless New Yorkers reach family members willing to take them in your are cold and heartless.
Huhhh. Looks like most of these people have "hit hard times" for a moment there, have not been homeless for months or years.
One could see a positive side, if they have a shot at a better life somewhere else, why not help them out. But those people who got sent back after a couple of days, come on! They just wanted to vacation in NYC without paying for a hotel!
Better program administration, anyone?
sucks to be the guy next to them on the flight "home"
It's a tough choice. PR and florida have gentle weather but there are more free food programs here. hmmm
on the other hand the homeless bring the rents down
Someone is going to take advantage; that happens with every program designed to help the needy. We cannot turn our backs on people because of a few bad apples.