OK Kansas An Explanation Of What The Hell You Are Doing Over

there and why you are the way you are towards the homeless.

Not accusing you of anything just an explanation. Know some of you live over there. Just curious of how this survey was taken.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=121616&mesg_id=121952

I am 30 miles away so I don't really know what the deal is with this but I gotta say it stunned me. Lawrence is the most liberal area and it would stand to reason that it would not treat people like this. :shrug: I hope someone (Mabus, ComerPerro, Gilmore) will tell us what is happening.

about Lawrence that this is bullshit.

Lawrence is the only town in KS that really lives in the real world "other than basketball".

In fact, we are looking at some condos that are being built downtown there.

OK, someone over there must have some idea.

Thanks Mabus.

told me he wanted to open up a second store there and he was told that they did not want him. It is a feed store, I know there are farms and livestock owners there that would appreciate another choice. He has a very nice and a very honest business, I was just really surprised.

Have you been to our meetups? I have not been able to attend since the summer so if you have that is why I don't know you. You should go, they are a great group. We have a good mix of Kansas and Missouri.

Chamber of Commerce? Local banks or realtors?

I had the opposite happen. I called a Chamber of Commerce to find out if the town had bookstores. They had three, but the Chamber person said they would love to have me. I had to wonder if the other three store owners would feel so positive about it and if they were Chamber members. I certainly would not want to be part of an organization that was inviting competition for me.

who, I was busy trying to figure out a way to get out of the fact that they are Democrats running Lawrence and I was getting beat around the head by this. LOL, I was really stuck with that one. I will try to remember to ask him next time I am in there.

I think the overall problem is that there isn't enough funding and there aren't enough facilities to accomodate the ones we have. The developers want to clean up downtown without helping to resolve the homeless problem.

Here are a few of the things that I know have happened in recent memory. This is from my imperfect memory (but I'm no James Frey), from talking to the homeless when I did volunteer work at one of the shelters and from my own observations. Some of it you can verify by checking the LJ World archives.

Last year the developers were wanting to shut down the Salvation Army shelter. Why? There was a restaurant that was wanting to sell alcohol but couldn't becuase the church was located across the street. More importanlty, the Salvation Army shelter is also near (across the street)the location of where the developers are pushing to build the new library. BTW, there are a lot of us who want the library to stay where it is and expanded. The developers pumped a lot of money into the city commission race and pushed the idea of building a new library.

We've had several homeless that have died under suspicious circumstances over the past few years. A number of others have been beaten or roughed up, sometimes by each other.

The Drop-In Center is catching a lot of heat from the neighbors. The Center is across the street from the church that provides hot food for the homeless. The neighbors are complaining that the homeless are too loud.

At an area near the Kaw River (between 6th & Kentucky and Burcham Park) was a place that the homeless set up tents. It was bulldozed and the occupants were not given time to collect what few belongs they had before the bulldozer came through.

Some of the homeless that I've talked to have complained that they get run out of parks in the evenings although others (mostly college & high school) kids aren't. I know they let people drink after baseball games in the parking lots, the homeless aren't allowed to do the same. Baseball players are also allowed to sit around the shelters and drink, the homeless aren't allowed to do the same. Even the homeless that aren't drinking in public (and this is most of them) don't seem to be welcome to congregate in our local parks.

A number of downtown businesses no longer allow public use of their bathrooms. The parks with bathroom facilities lock them down after 11:30 p.m. and during the winter most of them aren't even opened during the daytime.

A few months ago there were a number of fires in downtown alleyways. It was hypothesized that it was a homeless person trying to stay warm by burning trash. Although there was (I think) at least one where the fire seemed a little more arson-related than warmth related.

I've talked to a few of the neighborhood homeless and a few of them have said that there are a few cops (not all, a very few - four or five at most) who like to harass them. The cops do this by pulling up where a few people are camped out and honk the horns, sound the siren or turn the spot light on them. The homeless aren't asked to the leave the area. Rather the people I've talked to feel like the cops are just trying to keep them from getting sleep. You know, just messing with them.

You have to understand that the downtown area is set-up to cater to out-of-towners and the college crowd. The homeless make Lawrence look bad, so rather than helping to provide/fund facilities that would help or allievate the homeless problem a number of developers are behind a push to get rid of them and/or drive them out of downtown. I think you can also count the publisher of the Journal-World as one of those developers. They've got a financial stake in developing the downtown area. They haven't been kind to the homeless in the paper.

I do what little I can. I've given some of the neighborhood homeless shelter, food, clothes, small jobs and encouragement. There was a couple we helped out a few years ago that I still hear from every once in a while. They worked their asses off and haved landed on their feet.

There are so many that are mentally ill and have no place to go. It's so sad. I remember during the Reagan budget cutting era that there were a lot of mentally ill people that ended up in Lawrence when they started shutting down facilities. During hard times a lot of people come to Lawrence because they think of it as friendly or have heard good things about it.

reply. I was really curious because I think Lawrence is one of the better communities around and just could not figure out how they got on this survey. Still doesn't make sense to me. What you are saying does make sense as the poor and disadvantged always get hurt from economic development.

Anyway, yes, I do intend to make one of your guys meetings one of these days.

When things calm down a little for me, will try to do that, sounds like fun. Thanks again.

I was stunned by this report but it all is beginning to make sense now. You all must stay strong, I have been hearing some interesting and disturbing rumors about some of the pressures going on in Lawrence. I don't know what to think and usually just hold them in until I get some actual confirmation. It sounds as if you all may end up with some similar problems to Topeka with your developers. Good luck.

I should have guessed that you would be one of the people helping. Do you know how much respect I have for you? I hope so.

I haven't been that active lately. I've been recharging my batteries so to speak. I'm feeling that old surge coming back in a big way though.

you are just recharging, we all need to do that now and then. Resting on your laurels? Not you. I don't believe it.

Were they started by that arsonist they caught here in Olathe? He admitted starting fires in Lawrence too.

I'm pretty sure the downtown fires aren't related to the Olathe kid.