A Recipe For Disaster

When Ed Rendell was elected as governor of Pennsylvania in the early 2000’s, he began a campaign to shut down hospitals for the mentally ill, and shelters for the homeless in Pennsylvania. The skeptics argued that it was a recipe for disaster.

Rendell claimed that community programs were less expensive than residential treatment hospitals. His goal was for residents to end up in privately run group homes, public housing or with family members.

At that time, my employer offered medical services and outreach to one of the city  biggest shelters. Our health center provided in-house two fulltime social workers and two medical providers embedded in the shelter. When the shelter closed down, we lost over1,000 patients.

Now 20 years later, the city of Philadelphia in conjunction with SEPTA is in the process of implementing outreach services to people dealing with homelessness, addiction, and is planning to arrange for shelters to those in need. One of the reasons why SEPTA (the city public transportation services) is getting involved, is because almost daily someone using drugs or suffering from mental illness jumps or falls onto the train tracks. 

In my opinion, the main reason they are getting involved is because ridership for SEPTA is down pre-pandemic levels. Less people are using public transportation than ever, people feel unsafe when they see open drug use and behavior like that. In my opinion, it is too little and too late for them to take action now. 

As you are probably aware, Philadelphia has the nation's worst opiod crisis and probably homelessness in the United States. If you look at the posted images, they were taken by me recently in the Kensington-Allegheny area infamously known as the Badlands. 

The homeless guy on the first picture was so high on drugs at the train platform, that he stepped on his shoelaces and dropped the cardboard full of dozens of needles in front of me. The second picture is of a bus bench being used by homeless drug addicted individuals to get high and sleep all day, everyday. The third image is of a young man so high on drugs, that he decided to sleep in front of the entrance door of the local pharmacy.

Twenty years ago the skeptics were proven right, it was a recipe for disaster.

I am guessing that since we have elections in less than 30 days, the local politicians are now desperate fishing for votes to stay in power. It is the typical wash, rinse and repeat survival mode of our useless politicians.