City Beat posted an article yesterday about the city council's proposal to change zoning laws for social service agencies that would help regulate new construction and expansion of existing facilities.
The article gives the impression that city council is trying to avoid future conflicts with social service groups like what happened with CityLink recently. They are trying to protect manufacturing zones as areas that should be used for creating new jobs, not warehousing homeless individuals.
This brings up the opportunity to start a discussion about whether or not organizations such as City Link are really the answer to helping to fix the problem of homelessness in Cincinnati. It seems to me that these sort of projects overlook the root of the problem and simply serve as a dumping ground for the suburban communities who don't want to see homeless individuals in their own backyard. I believe that improving public schools, graduation rates and college attendance would give better results at reducing the number of homeless individuals in the long run than projects like City Link. Additionally, creating new jobs and strengthening the local economy would go a long way in insuring these people have a viable future.
I'd really be interested in hearing how others feel about this issue. I'm still learning and trying to figure out where I stand with this.
How do you feel about City Link?
What do you think needs to be done about the homeless problem in downtown and OTR?
Thursday, May 29, 2008
City Beat: Zoning and the Homeless
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3 comments:
My feeling is that in order to build a better community, people need to not only take pride, but have a sense of belonging, and change the manner in which they look at where they are living. In other words proovide opportunities for indiviuals below the poverty line to experience something besides poverty within the confines of OTR. Im not saying that CityLink is the end all solution, but I think it would do us all good if we got over the stigmas of those who might be formerly imprisoned, as it is doing no one good to always judge such a large group.
Citylink is not what it pretends to be. The perpetrators call it a "campus of care". I call it a suburban attempt to confine the under served, and, newly imported felons from the prison system, in the urban core; as well as a fund raising tool, (think federal tax dollars for transitional housing of felons), for Crossroads Imperial Church of Oakly. The one thing I would never call it, is a benefit for Cincinnati. The story behind this nightmare for the city, is fairly complex and has many players. For the background story visit; notocitylink.com.
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