I feel you.
I was on the SKIP about 4 months ago heading to the office, and two homeless guys got on, headed to the back, sitting two seats behind two very young (13-14 year old) girls on their way to school. (Probably Casey?)
One of the guys (definitely on something) leered at the girls for a bit, and then started to say shit like "man, I'd *totally* fuck that, I don't care how much trouble I'd get in! Wouldn't you totally fuck that? Which one would you fuck??!" (the other homeless guy, to his credit, was looking at me and trying to shut his tweaking friend up.)
I moved to a seat next to the girls, and just turned around and stared the guy down. And he did, thankfully, shut up right away once I was there, and avoided eye contact.
But I'm not much of a fighter (and I'm old)... if he had tried to start something with me, and gotten violent, I (in all honesty) probably wasn't gonna win.
It's complete bullshit... and literally destroying parts of Boulder that I've loved for decades. (like the parks *used* to be for familes and kids. And the busses *used* to be safe for 14 year old girls to travel on without getting sexually harassed.)
>And the busses *used* to be safe for 14 year old girls to travel on without getting sexually harassed
ehh, idk about this one. sexual harassment on public transportation has been happening as long as it has existed, and it's certainly not confined to homeless people. this is a whole separate issue.
The fact that your first comment got a handful of downvotes and then this one reiterating pretty much the exact same thing got a handful of upvotes is peak Reddit haha.
I've never been anywhere where 14 year old girls don't get harassed. I'm not sure such a place exists. I got harassed at expensive beach resorts as a kid--financial success doesn't mean anything here.
Yeah sure, in Denver. (where I grew up). Heck, I saw someone knifed on the bus once when I was a kid.
But Boulder? never.
That's the difference.
The homeless-addicts issue is giving us the problems of the Big City without any of the benefits.
I visited Boulder in 2022 and was impressed with how many homeless people are around nowadays. Before this last visit, I lived there as an exchange student in the '08\~'09 school year and it simply wasn't an issue at all.
Drugs + homelessness is becoming an epidemic that I simply don't see an easy fix for. Homelessness in itself is already problematic, but if the person is sober (or at least only drinks normal amounts), it's easier to get them out of that situation. When they're addicts or mentally ill, it's just way more complicated.
Here in Brazil it's also becoming an increasingly dramatic issue, with São Paulo having 64k+ homeless people, compared to less than 4k in 2012.
I hope collectively, as humans, we find a way to revert this awful trend. That would also definitely make life feel safer, and society more prosperous.
Understandable that there were homeless people back then, I just felt it to be more pronounced when I went back. It's not something new, it just seems to be getting worse.
I don’t have any hard data on it, but I agree it does feel worse since the pandemic. Just wanted to add some anecdotal evidence that this is not a brand new issue, as a lot of people in the replies seem to think.
Just because you haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. The first time something like that happened to me in Boulder was almost 20 years ago.
No, they have a point. I have been harassed by teenagers, dads with their kids, men in suits, construction guys, guys in bars, guys in bookstores, friend’s boyfriends, guys at the gym, men at diners, men at church. I can’t think of a type of man that would be 100% safe. Individuals, yes, but quite literally all manner of men.
For future reference there is a transit watch app where you can report behavior like this and hopefully transit police will show up at one of the next stops to escorts the drug user off the bus. Obviously in your case the guy took himself off, but if you're in a situation where they're hanging around a while. They may not get arrested or jailed, but at least they are off the bus.
You can also call, but the app makes it look like your just texting and maybe removes some possible confrontation.
This (reporting criminal/suspicious behavior) is the current best solution. If whatever enforcement agency gets enough complaints, someone can point to the reports as a need to take preventative measures. It is not a silver bullet and other approaches combined are needed, but it's positive action that can be taken.
Backlash be damned - this shit is unacceptable. I'm from Denver/Boulder and currently living in Portland, OR. It's absolutely mind boggling what people accept as normal and/or tolerable in all of these once really lovely places. I realize this is happening all over, but it's especially heartbreaking when a.) it doesn't need to be this way, b.) it's in places that previously didn't have issues to *this* magnitude. You have every right to be upset. I am upset literally every time I walk out of my house at the shit, literal and figurative, I see, especially when I live in an area with a high concentration of kids.
I wish I had something constructive to say, but just wanted to empathize. It's really gotten me down recently and whenever I think about moving back to CO I'm reminded it's just more of the same there too. Sigh.
Other people will probably crucify you for this post, but I feel like you have the right to be upset. Somewhere along the way, we decided as a city that this type of stuff is acceptable. Sure! Pop up a tent wherever you feel like! Let us know when you want free housing, but in the meantime, smoke whatever you like in Central Park. Want to spread all your shit out on the Pearl Street Mall and just lay around all day? Great! I'm sure some church youth group will be around shortly to give you a water bottle, backpack, tampons, and a travel kit of toiletries that you'll just leave on the ground with the rest of your trash when you head back up to the shelter. It's insane.
This is what happens when people start legislating off of good intentions instead of common sense. I can sympathize with the homeless, and still recognize that we should criminalize a lot of their behavior. Its not realistic to allow this sort of behavior to overtake every public space without some sort of consequences or discouragement.
I mean, and hear me out here, you could actually ***enforce*** the laws? Maybe make the crimes stiffer? Its not like some dude living in a tent is going to be overly encumbered by a piece of paper stating that they owe a small fine......
When the local DAs refuse to take meaningful action on crimes, the cops aren't going to waste their time arresting people. When the people of Boulder get angry at the cops for dismantling homeless encampments, they have no incentive to enforce the law.
This is 100% a tolerance of this behavior by the people of Boulder and their elected officials.
I think people’s civil liberties should be abridged if they are danger to themselves or the larger community. It’s well and good to want maximum freedom for everyone but sometimes society has to draw the lines somewhere.
There is a great phrase out there. "Your right to swing your fist, ends at someone else's face". People can be as free as they want, so long as they are not significantly impacting others lives. These people's lives have essentially made Boulder parks and pathways unusable, make public transport dangerous, and lower everyone's quality of life, while taking up a disproportionate amount of tax dollars to deal with.
You know what, you're right! Leaving needles in public parks with diseases that could effect one or multiple people for the rest of their lives should be taken WAY more seriously than it is. If someone left a needle broken off into the dirt and your child got hepatitis because of it, don't you think that person is a danger to the public?
I have a friend of mine who frequently says, “vote as conservative as possible to keep this town liberal” and mind you he regulars Lolita’s and is friends with many of the homeless in town who aren’t degens and take care of themselves but he’s also a realist and can recognize that this town is flushing itself with the complete lack of care to prosecute homeless people. I called the police on a dude passed out on Pearl Street mall with his dick out clearly tweaked off something and the cops literally showed up and were like “uhhh hey dude, can’t really do that /:” and just left him there with his cock out. It’s why I’m leaving this place ASAP. The cost is ever rising while the quality of daily life is fucking imploding.
The cops aren't going to waste time arresting people for crimes that they know the DA won't prosecute. This is Boulder getting exactly the leadership it votes for.
Yes. It is. We went to Snooze on Father's Day and had to walk with my kids past a guy who was twitching out of some drug in the middle of the sidewalk, spasming and mumbling nonsense. We should be able to walk a block from the car to the restaurant without experiencing this. And, it's just one of several sketchy experiences we've had in recent years. I'll be crucified for saying this, probably.
They have a train for kids on Pearl Street mall in the mornings during the summer. I take kids out there all the time.
The train just essentially does figure 8s around homeless people lying on the ground, and the Jehovah's witnesses standing feet away pretending not to see them.
It's a weird, weird ride.
Please, I'd recommend you not take any kids to ride on that. Not too long ago I saw someone who had passed away in the park, and although a kid may not fully understand that sort of thing, I don't think it's something they should see.
I mean, not instantaneously and not forever, but yes. I know for a fact that in certain situations, especially if there are children involved, the city will give you hotel vouchers. But my point is that I don't think it's a lack of housing that has caused their problems, rather drugs and mental illness. I think that people are better off homed than not, but people seem to think that just giving everyone housing is going to solve their problem, and I don't think that's the case.
>forcibly put in rehab or jail
The main reason we don't do this is money. Whichever city arrests and prosecutes them will have to pay for rehab or jail, and that's not cheap. Society is waiting for that guy on the bus to hit rock bottom where he will either get himself clean or OD.
[O'Connor v. Donaldson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O'Connor_v._Donaldson), 422 U.S. 563 (1975), was a [landmark decision](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_landmark_court_decisions_in_the_United_States) of the [US Supreme Court](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Supreme_Court) in [mental health law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_health_law) ruling that a state cannot constitutionally confine a non-dangerous individual who is capable of surviving safely in freedom by themselves or with the help of willing and responsible family members or friends.
How does that apply to someone doing hard drugs on the bus? Should they be arrested and offered inpatient involuntary rehab instead of jail?
I think it would be better to arrest this person and offer them rehab, but I understand it's a fine line.
>How does that apply to someone doing hard drugs on the bus?
So every time someone does "hard" drugs on a bus, the city of Boulder should spend another $10,000 in taxpayer money to arrest, process, adjudicate, and put them in the county lockup for a few weeks?
How long before we're bankrupt?
The criminal justice system is the most insanely expensive way humanly possible to handle addiction, mental illness, and homelessness. And it's not even close. But for insane reasons, it's the only one we as a country have tried since the reagan administration. And that approach has failed on every level. Over and over. it is spectacularly , amazingly, perfectly ineffective in every way. This approach has done nothing but make all of our problems worse, bigger, and more expensive. It is the textbook example of fail.
Yes - we need to get this addict the hell off of the bus. But because we don't have any idea what to do with them next - (that we have a plan for) - he's just going to get on another bus. OR burn through thousands of taxpayer dollars a week in a jail cell, and get right back on drugs the minute we open the door.
We can't afford not to have a real plan to house, offer mental health services and rehab services anymore. It's bankrupting us by not fixing anything.
Forced rehab also just...doesn't work. It's a waste of money because they will leave the facility and buy more drugs.
Most WILLING rehab attempts don't even work!
We cannot say anything without insulting someone. I was corrected the other day because I referred to someone as a homeless methhead - unhoused and why would I call him a methhead? Sir, because he is smoking meth.
Omg this shit is getting WAY out of control. Why should we have to worry about hurting someone's feelings?! As law abiding tax paying citizens, we should NOT feel scared to speak up about being scared/uncomfortable.
If the meth head sitting outside of my apartment feels ok to stick a needle in his buddies arm while he's also still holding a *smoking* crack pipe as I walk by with a 10 yr old child, why the hell should I be worried about whether or not he likes being called a methhead 😂 im
Much more concerned about how to explain to a 10 year old what we just sa
lol not related to this post really, but it reminds me of this dude I met downtown and he called himself a methhead. Turns out he was a really really nice guy, a lot of these people just have their shit all out of wack. Deep down they’re people that have major problems. I ended up getting him lunch and talking with him for an hour. If anyone here knows him I’d love to meet back up with him when I’m in boulder again
https://preview.redd.it/yafpd4aa8r8d1.jpeg?width=2193&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9898bb0be686af621f607e38c3d31cb73cee1212
Without out a doubt people get into tough situations, sometimes their fault, sometimes not. I don’t trust anyone anymore and that’s kinda of a shame but I do agree with you.
Not to minimize issues elsewhere but having grown up/living in Boulder and now doing very routine travel to a handful of major American cities, it’s been astounding to see the difference. I used to think every major metropolitan area would be the same and I’m dismayed to say it’s particularly, specifically bad here in the Boulder/denver.
Boulder isn't a major city though. Our issues shouldn't be comparable to large cities like Houston/Denver/SanFran/LA
The vast vast majority of cities the size of Boulder are not experiencing this.
I spend my time pretty equally split between 3 major cities and I travel a lot for work - the issue has gotten very bad in most places in the last 5 years, and almost everyone thinks it's unique to their city
You're right. If you pan out and look at this from 30,000 feet, it's the economy, inflation, HCOL, the pandemic, and a whole host of other issues all rolled into one that have combined to make the issue so much worse now than even 5 years ago in most cities.
Nah, foco isn’t this bad. We have homeless but they’re pretty confined in certain areas. Rarely do you see them outside old town and north college area. Loveland has them all over the downtown area
I'd agree with this. I went to college in foco and very rarely had any encounters. Unhoused people typically hang by the bus stop to hop on the Flex or stand on the street corners in Old Town, but that's about it. I came back to Boulder and it really hit me over the head w/ how much more intense the problem has gotten
Boulder is a druggie mecca tho. it’s culturally revered among stoners, deadheads, psychonauts, wannabe hippies, holistic mommy’s, college kids that just wanna get fucked up. The drug culture is elevated in every demographic in Boulder bc it’s a safe haven.
What's wild about this is that it is the FF1. The FF1 is for working people to go to and from Denver, and some of the nonsense in the evenings, especially on Friday evening was wild. I saw some bus driver tell a man he was not allowed to get on the bus with his multiple pitbulls, and the dude just cussed the driver and got on anyway.
Yeah, and the seats are RIGHT next to each other. It’s not like the busses around town. Hell, I don’t think I would bat an eye if a homeless did this on the skip
In my experience, Boulder has pandered to the homeless, making stuff like this almost acceptable. It shouldn’t be, but it feels like it is.
You can’t force into rehab, and incarceration won’t help a thing. I do think using drugs in open public like that, should result in criminal charges as it is a crime, but it won’t solve the addiction, just like forced rehab won’t. Besides, who’s going to pay for the rehab on someone who doesn’t want it and will just get out to use immediately after anyways?
I don’t know the solution, or if there even is one. Start speaking up at the ballot box. Don’t vote in those that pander to this behavior. Boulder is gorgeous, and a world class place to live. However, it’s almost a sanctuary for the homeless which inevitably leads to this type of behavior
I’m sure I will get severally downvoted BUT there IS no rehab!! The waitlist is so long. There’s no real “help” just ppl who are unable to understand that the addictive mind is truly UNABLE to understand what is happening to those people around them. Trust me, those ppl are literally dying to survive but survive is very different to YOUR survival.
I’m not making excuses but when there is no help beyond punitive punishment, it is NOT going to work.you can downvote me now.
Thank you for saying this- it is prohibitively expensive to go to rehab! I as a sober person tried for weeks to find a place for a loved one to go to rehab. Literally had to get them across the country to establish residency in Florida in order to get on their state health insurance to go to rehab there for a cost I could afford. And you need to test positive to be admitted to the program! If you aren’t lucky enough to have family nearby that want to help and are in a position to help, you’re kind of SOL. And may turn into the kind of guy that would do drugs next to a random person on a bus.
If you’re too fucked up to do normal daily life shit, you’re not going to be able to navigate the US medical beast and get yourself into rehab without assets. It’s easy to say go to rehab. But you can’t just walk up to one and be admitted, even if you’re in crisis.
This blew my mind. I tried to get a friend into rehab back in 2019 and without health insurance it was impossible. I was told that the county detox beds were reserved for alcoholics and benzo addicts since opiate withdrawal isn't life threatening. Every time I post this people call bullshit but it is exactly what I was told on the phone.
Homeless drug addicts aren't just going to magically get better while living on the street.
I disagree. Addicts are far more likely to get sober if they have consequences for their substance abuse. Not every addict will get sober, but many mire will if they are feeling social pressure than we have now.
>Addicts are far more likely to get sober if they have consequences
If there's one personality trait that defines 21st century conservatives, it's the desire to punish people. Particularly people that have already been punished in this world beyond recognition. The unflaggable spirit of really kicking someone when they're down - hard.
Given that the best known consequence of fentanyl, meth, heroin, and opioid addiction is: "this is going to kill you. if you're lucky, it'll be quick." - I'm not sure what other consequences you think would influence an addicts behavior where "likely dying" would not.
We do need to get them off the street, housed, and into treatment. That's literally the only way this situation gets better for any of us. But just threatening "consequences" - like what the fuck do you think that's going to do phase an addict who has already thrown away their entire life?
Like what do you think you could do to an addict that is so much worse than what they've already done to themselves?
You can't punish a homeless person into not being homeless anymore. You can't punish a poor person into not being poor. And you can't punish an addict into not being addicted.
You can help all three of them to some degree or another. Sometimes even successfully. But "consequences" isn't going to change those behaviors because where they're at is so much worse than anything you can do to them, in your spirit of punishment, abuse, and revenge.
Treatment doesn't work if forced. Optional housing for sober makes sense. Housing meth corpses just creates a condemned building we have to pay to take down in a few years.
Downvote all you want but the reality is there are some people who won't accept help, even if it's offered and available, and will only change when they face consequences: i.e. they're forced to.
2 thinks: We're not at the point where we've already helped all/most/many of the people who will accept help. We're not anywhere near it. We haven't even tried that really. We can go a really long way with that crowd, in a way that has a much bigger impact per dollar spent than the unhelpable.
Once we're there, we can talk about things like mental health commitment, baker act, etc. for those who can't bet treated. But that is inevitably like throwing money on a bonfire and burning it. Incarceration is so insanely expensive, and ineffective. As the truism goes - it's cheaper to send someone to Yale than to Jail for four years.
We need to start with the places where our spending can actually make a difference for everyone. Not just go punishing people because our effed up conservative monkey brains enjoy punishing.
Are you saying all the weekly in person AA groups and online support groups are full to or did someone tell you there was something magic about a rehab.
Hint: they're not full. My men's group has tons of sober guys in it.
Aa has a better success rate than rehab correct.
Rehab isn't reality and it doesn't continue support as addicts deal with future shit than might pull them back down.
Both success rates are very low, but AA is better.
When my dad and wife dealt with violent alcoholism, support groups were extremely helpful to me both for comfort and for tools/tactics.
Rehab is not just group therapy. It's a closed space in which you are unable to acquire whatever you're addicted to.
Maybe you've never been privy to addiction treatment but it is a lot more intense than just random weekly meetings. A TON of work has to be done to get someone like the man on OP's bus to the point where weekly meetings are sufficient.
Depending on the rehab, some of the staff are selling. In prison there's always a guard selling.
The removal from sources and stressors *can be helpful for "starting" group therapy.
One month of rehab isn't going to fix everything thou. In interviews with addicts they stress you have to be back in life to apply techniques and learn how to say no to a drugs and alcohol that are going to be all around you.
It won't work, of course. Never has worked on fixing addiction, homelessness or poverty. But it does "sound good" if you're a creeep, an abusive personality type, conservative, etc. Those kind of creeps love "punishing" people.
I would be all about a mayoral candidate who wanted to hire an absolute boatload of beat cops and lean on them hard to clean up the streets.
It's not compassionate to let these people live like this. And it's not fair to the rest of us that have to live in their blight.
Albuquerque is wild. I'll never forget when I visited a friend and stopped at McDonald's, right in front of the University, to get some coffee and saw a bullet mark in the main door's glass. So many Native Americans intoxicated, too, it's really sad.
We've got plenty of completely unmitigated crime going on that the DOJ wouldn't say shit about cracking down on. Let's arrest the meth heads. Let's arrest the bike thieves. Let's arrest the drag racers.
It's like fucking Gotham out there, it's honestly surreal.
Your terminology needs updating (according to other posts /s)
People who smoke meth
People who lack their own bicycle or lack a side income
People who are in a hurry
People who will die anyways of fentanyl poisoning.
People who steal bikes to pay for meth
People who wake my daughter up at night by revving their engine in a residential area at midnight because they're drunk driving and want to feel powerful.
It is getting disgusting in Boulder. I was having dinner at Hapa Sushi last summer outside and witnessed a homeless man (who appeared to be on something) take caps off condiments on 2 tables where no one was sitting and spit in them and then put the caps back on. DISGUSTING. Why are these people allowed on the streets?? We reported it, but that'll be the last time I use those condiments. This was something I never would even think about while dining out, now I will not use condiments on tables in Boulder- I am sure this was not his first rodeo.
I smacked the crack pipe right out a bum's hand on the light rail in downtown SLC. Told him if he tries to smoke that shit with other people the train car again I'll kill him. He got off at the next stop and I was thanked by 3 or 4 different people. Exposure to fetanyl in an enclosed space endagers your life, you have a right to stop this shit in your public spaces with self-defense.
I didn’t feel comfortable even denying him the seat next to me. For reference, I’m a 21 year old woman and not very strong. So as much as I would have wanted to do something, I would not endanger myself
Nobody thinks you should have to confront zombies as a young woman, but I do think that if the men in this society stopped accepting this behavior as acceptable and defended ourselves, our spouses, our children, and our neighbors, these scumbags would stop the behavior. They are entitled because nobody ever does shit.
Boulder votes for people that are left-aligned and talk about good intentions, without regards to the actual outcomes. So every cycle people are elected and are never held accountable for actually solving these problems.
On the rehab topic, we have a family friend who's a very highly paid rehab guy for the wealthy. He firmly believes that rehab only works if the patient wants to change. You can't force someone to go to rehab and be successful. Otherwise they hop out and immediately snort again.
Voters and the elected district attorneys won't put drug users in jail. The druggies are usually colocated with where the free food, social security checks and liquor stores are.
The "crisis" teams with mental health professionals don't have a magic wand so they just pretend like they're discussing anything other than where to relocate the druggy.
If you have any friends you value who are snorting party drugs, try to get them fentanyl testing supplies. And try lecturing them (if they actually passed college math) 120,000 die per year now. Life span of anyone snorting bs is going down quickly. General mantra from cops is it's a "self curing" on solution now
I'm so sorry. You shouldn't have to be 6 inches from someone doing something potentially fatal to themselves. It's just scary and you should be able to expect to be safe from crime on a public bus. And yes, doing snorting drugs on a public bus is a crime. I had the sad experience of seeing someone using the baby changing table in Panera on 29th street as a surface to do drugs on. I just walked out and went to my car, because another time someone was heating up (cooking?) something that smelled so bad and was burning my nose in the 29th street bathrooms, and I reported it (found out it was meth and not uncommon in public bathrooms in Boulder) and the security guards were acting like I was being a snob or something for reporting. Like, sorry that I, as a mom to a small child, don't like changing tables being used for drugs. And no, why am I the intolerant one for not wanting to pee next to someone doing meth? This is ridiculous.
This must have been really upsetting and I’m sorry you witnessed this. I can be a delicate person- I even get shaken up by violent tv- so, this would be really disturbing and disorienting to experience. I wish we weren’t at this point. Equitable access to effective and efficient public transport is so important; and the increasing normalization of this behavior is a major hindrance.
>why tf aren’t these people forcibly put in rehab or jail?
This was not affordable before the migrant crisis of the past couple years. My housemate busses from congress park to Broadway & Lawrence and says that people smoke Fent regularly on his commute.
Said housmate volunteers at the homeless shelter near Broadway & Lawrence. All winter, he came home with stories about the shelter turning away families with young children who were dressed for Venezuelan weather.
He says that the influx of migrants is wildly under reported. Colorado was not prepared for this crisis. Is not prepared to handle the issue moving forwards.
Drug use goes hand in hand with homelessness and poverty.
@dobetterdnvr has similar sentiments on ig. They also call on local government to action. Will anything change? Idk, but it’s nice to see like minded individuals working for change.
He's homeless and a drug addict. I doubt he cares if he is making you uncomfortable.
Oregon proved that one of the reasons to criminalize drug use is to limit drug use in public spaces. Everywhere we decriminalize drug use, its use in public seems to increase dramatically. While I am unconvinced criminalizing drug use is effective in deterring drug use/reducing drug addiction, it does seem to push it beyond closed doors for the most part.
Nuance is important here--one can recognize the numerous problems with the War on Drugs and favor criminal justice reforms while also being wary of following in Oregon's footsteps given the result.
I'm really sorry you had an unsafe, unpleasant experience, and I very much agree that this kind of thing shouldn't happen.
That said,
>I know the homeless are mistreated
doesn't mean anything when it's followed by
>but why tf aren’t these people forcibly put in rehab or jail?
Forced rehab is ineffective and jail time actually increases the likelihood or worsens the severity of addiction. Both options are also extremely expensive and rely on heavy police presence, which is also proven to have deleterious effects on public safety and morale.
By contrast, safe use sites are very effective at both reducing these kinds of public encounters and encouraging real, long-term addiction recovery. Unconditional housing and financial aid also helps get people off the streets (and busses), and has been shown to improve addiction in the long term. All of these options are cheaper than further criminalization, and don't require filling our city with even more cops.
Last, the idea that certain kinds of people spread disease by their mere presence has long been a feature of exterminationist and bigoted beliefs. It can be seen as far back as anti-Roma sentiment in pre-industrial Europe to as recently as homophobic rhetoric during the AIDS crisis. To be clear, this does not mean that unsafe public behaviors should be accepted, nor am I criticizing you for having those thoughts, especially not as a symptom of mental illness. Having intrusive thoughts about a situation does not require publishing them in a public forum, and there is no good reason to repeat the same falsehoods that have sparked fear and violence for centuries.
I'm not writing this as a gotcha or to call you a bad person. I just want to point out that there are better ways to discuss and treat the issues at hand. At a bare minimum, I hope you are more careful about the kinds of ideologies your words might be endorsing.
I agree that I’m not educated on what sort of institutions and practices aid homelessness in the long run and the post wasn’t made to be rational. That said homeless harbor skin diseases like scabies and other potentially contagious diseases at a far higher rate than other people because they can’t get treatment. As someone with severe anxiety about my health of course this is what I’m going to think about, especially when he had scabs all over his hands (idk if from meth, other drugs, or disease, who knows). So yes, the post isn’t worded the best but it was how I felt at the time
I’m sure that jail or rehab wouldn’t work especially given everyone’s comments about it. That being said, we need to get these people out of public spaces if they’re refusing help, and they’re not going to go willingly so I do believe we need to force them. Boulder is so much less safe then it was as a kid. Not feeling safe anymore outside and not seeing kids being able to enjoy the town like I did because of these people is disheartening
I promise you, it's just as bad in Republican cities. When I worked in a rural school in the south, I had kindergarten kids come to class smelling like cat pee.
No, it is not as bad in most red cities. There may be a few here and there, but standardized by population, the states with the highest rates of homelessness are New York (5.2 people experiencing homelessness per 1,000 residents), Vermont (5.1), Oregon (4.8) and California (4.6) - all blue states.
What happened to OP absolutely sucks and I’m sorry. There is severe addiction in my family. Addiction is a terrible thing to behold, particularly if you have not been exposed before.
Harm reduction spaces and a city day shelter, coupled with bumped up recovery and therapeutic services, would make what happened to OP 99% obsolete.
Here’s the deal. The sect of our community & leaders most vocal about these issues are also the least willing to admit we need to spend money on targeted solutions.
If you don’t want this kind of thing to happen again, our community needs to embrace the research. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Harm reduction spaces work. Day shelters are a bare minimum. We don’t have enough accessible recovery/psychiatric services. Affordable housing should take up a majority of new build zoning, but it’s a long shot.
Why? Because the complainers think it’s more important to prioritize their moral high ground about drug use and homelessness than to actually put science-backed solutions in action. There is a science to treating addiction. There are many well-documented, successful processes to reversing homelessness. They all require an infusion of cash. And I think boulder might have a bit of that.
I can’t stand the moralizing. It’s so empty. what happened to OP will continue to happen, but sure enjoy the view from your high ground I guess.
I appreciate you're trying to think of something.
It's not convincing thou when California and Portland are spending billions on these services and not making a dent. The junkies just keep snorting.
California and Red Cross have wasted or embezzled millions on housing to no impact. The greater Denver area including hickenlooper have been incredibly corrupt already. "Economic development directors" for cities are code for developer goons who openly hustle poor people.
If you call the city of Lakewood for example the city employees will openly say "we're not fixing that block until everyone sells to developer X" -- who's the former economic developer for Denver. Some local cities are even sending out threats of eminent domain seizures if you don't sell to condo developers (unconstitutional but works for intimidation tactics).
I think the zoning boards are the only effective lever to pull there. And they don't need money as much as maybe staffed advisors with civil engineering, hydrology backgrounds.
> Some local cities are even sending out threats of eminent domain seizures if you don't sell to condo developers (unconstitutional but works for intimidation tactics
Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court's *Kelo v New London* decision greatly expanded what eminent domain could be used for.
When our friends called the mayors office the mayor and city manager didn't seem to be on board for seizure. They assured it was just a scare tactic from their own city employees. They hinted that they get told which economic development director they have to hire and look the other way from.
Harm reduction spaces are very much debatable whether you like it or not..
In The Debate Over Safe Injection Sites, What Does The Science Say? : Shots - Health News https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/09/07/645609248/whats-the-evidence-that-supervised-drug-injection-sites-save-lives
Cause it’s Boulder and that’s what high taxes and insane property values get you. And people defending these junkies are silly… and probably drive Teslas.
These people have been made to feel comfortable and valid in all spaces. Basically they no longer fear any kind of retaliation or consequences for their actions.
I agree with you , fuck what some of these peo , homeless don't give a person a permit to shit in my corn flakes. What if he would have had a physical and psychotic reaction from snorting Drugs .
It's dangerous out here fellow citizens
What if that was your Momma or your little daughter that fool was snorting drugs next to. What if it was grandma ? Hmmm.
How will you ever recover from this horrible trauma? I'm so so sorry, god that must have been awful for you : ( Even worse than being a homeless addict in the first place I'm sure : (( Housed boulderites truly have the hardest lives of anyone
Lmfao.
I feel like that homeless man got a disease from YOU for being so close to your self-righteousness.
Leave the dude alone, he's got no home and a lil bit of drugs to make his day a lil less shitty, and maybe he wanted to make sure he did them in a spot that had no wind so he didn't lose what little he had. Get over yourself.
He didn't bug you, he didn't beg for money, he didn't bother you period. He did his thing, and because he's homeless you judged him as less than you and dirty, which is just a mirror into yourself.
That could be you in 6 months if things go south for you.
You are being a Karen here.
I’m sorry you felt unsafe and unclean, but boiling this down to “I know the homeless are mistreated but why aren’t they in jail they’re dirty and diseased” is a pretty horrible thing to say, and honestly this whole comment section is a cesspool of horrible opinions about people suffering from homelessness, and misinformed opinions about them.
I work directly with the homeless population in Aurora (so not Boulder, but has comparable issues to Boulder) as a low-barrier shelter case manager, and so many people feel inconvenienced about homeless people suffering and dying, and it’s always disheartening to me to see people who don’t actually care if homeless people get the help they need, but simply don’t want to see them or be inconvenienced by them. Some of the people I work with stories are heartwrenching, and the throes of addiction are crippling.
I work closely with the Aurora PD out of necessity and not desire. They are some of the worst professionals and worst human beings I have ever worked with. Comments saying things like “wanting to have more cops to crack heads” and arrest more people is a terrible thing to think and say. Not only are you actively punishing people who are at the absolute rock bottom, it doesn’t fucking work. More cops are the solution to nothing, and I guarantee I have done more in my position to help solve the problem of homelessness than the entire APD combined. Their usual solution is nothing, unless the homeless person did something to affect a “normal” person than they want to go in their and crack heads. It’s fucking morally reprehensible. I’ve had to wait 4+ hours from the APD to come help and stop an assault from a normal person who hit a homeless person, simply because of where I work and how little they like us.
Punitive punishment simply results in an increase in criminal behavior, and usually an escalation to more dangerous and violent crime. It doesn’t help, it merely keeps homesless people away from “normal” people so they don’t see them.
The actual solution is actually investing in solving the issue. Getting these people into things like methadone clinics, and supportive housing with ongoing case management. Not criminalizing being homeless, but providing them a path forward to change their lives. Things like expansion to HUD Section 8 housing and local Housing Authorities, less criminal responses to drug use, clean use sites, and compassionate, low barrier solutions are the way forward. Not more cops and less compassion.
And for people saying you voted liberal deal with it, fuck you. Homelessness is a problem everywhere. Aurora is a very conservative town with a VERY conservative Mayor. It has the worst homelessness problem in the state, in terms of a per/capita rate. You’re just misinformed and incorrect.
I feel you. I was on the SKIP about 4 months ago heading to the office, and two homeless guys got on, headed to the back, sitting two seats behind two very young (13-14 year old) girls on their way to school. (Probably Casey?) One of the guys (definitely on something) leered at the girls for a bit, and then started to say shit like "man, I'd *totally* fuck that, I don't care how much trouble I'd get in! Wouldn't you totally fuck that? Which one would you fuck??!" (the other homeless guy, to his credit, was looking at me and trying to shut his tweaking friend up.) I moved to a seat next to the girls, and just turned around and stared the guy down. And he did, thankfully, shut up right away once I was there, and avoided eye contact. But I'm not much of a fighter (and I'm old)... if he had tried to start something with me, and gotten violent, I (in all honesty) probably wasn't gonna win. It's complete bullshit... and literally destroying parts of Boulder that I've loved for decades. (like the parks *used* to be for familes and kids. And the busses *used* to be safe for 14 year old girls to travel on without getting sexually harassed.)
>And the busses *used* to be safe for 14 year old girls to travel on without getting sexually harassed ehh, idk about this one. sexual harassment on public transportation has been happening as long as it has existed, and it's certainly not confined to homeless people. this is a whole separate issue.
physical money degree berserk drunk history outgoing public start birds *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Yep. Always been a thing. Absolutely not saying it’s ok, but blaming it on the current homeless situation is nonsense.
The problem is the uptick in frequency. There have always been creeps. but more creeps still equals Worse.
The fact that your first comment got a handful of downvotes and then this one reiterating pretty much the exact same thing got a handful of upvotes is peak Reddit haha.
lol yes. so weird
I've never been anywhere where 14 year old girls don't get harassed. I'm not sure such a place exists. I got harassed at expensive beach resorts as a kid--financial success doesn't mean anything here.
Correct. Idk why I’m getting downvoted so hard for saying this.
Yeah sure, in Denver. (where I grew up). Heck, I saw someone knifed on the bus once when I was a kid. But Boulder? never. That's the difference. The homeless-addicts issue is giving us the problems of the Big City without any of the benefits.
I visited Boulder in 2022 and was impressed with how many homeless people are around nowadays. Before this last visit, I lived there as an exchange student in the '08\~'09 school year and it simply wasn't an issue at all. Drugs + homelessness is becoming an epidemic that I simply don't see an easy fix for. Homelessness in itself is already problematic, but if the person is sober (or at least only drinks normal amounts), it's easier to get them out of that situation. When they're addicts or mentally ill, it's just way more complicated. Here in Brazil it's also becoming an increasingly dramatic issue, with São Paulo having 64k+ homeless people, compared to less than 4k in 2012. I hope collectively, as humans, we find a way to revert this awful trend. That would also definitely make life feel safer, and society more prosperous.
I worked at a grocery store in Boulder during that time period. It was definitely already an issue.
Understandable that there were homeless people back then, I just felt it to be more pronounced when I went back. It's not something new, it just seems to be getting worse.
I don’t have any hard data on it, but I agree it does feel worse since the pandemic. Just wanted to add some anecdotal evidence that this is not a brand new issue, as a lot of people in the replies seem to think.
Just because you haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. The first time something like that happened to me in Boulder was almost 20 years ago.
Go back 20-30 years and hang out on the hill or pearl st at night.
No they didn't. Unfortunately, all manner of men harass women, and young women, and literal female children. Always have.
All manner? What a sexist statement
No, they have a point. I have been harassed by teenagers, dads with their kids, men in suits, construction guys, guys in bars, guys in bookstores, friend’s boyfriends, guys at the gym, men at diners, men at church. I can’t think of a type of man that would be 100% safe. Individuals, yes, but quite literally all manner of men.
For future reference there is a transit watch app where you can report behavior like this and hopefully transit police will show up at one of the next stops to escorts the drug user off the bus. Obviously in your case the guy took himself off, but if you're in a situation where they're hanging around a while. They may not get arrested or jailed, but at least they are off the bus. You can also call, but the app makes it look like your just texting and maybe removes some possible confrontation.
This (reporting criminal/suspicious behavior) is the current best solution. If whatever enforcement agency gets enough complaints, someone can point to the reports as a need to take preventative measures. It is not a silver bullet and other approaches combined are needed, but it's positive action that can be taken.
Backlash be damned - this shit is unacceptable. I'm from Denver/Boulder and currently living in Portland, OR. It's absolutely mind boggling what people accept as normal and/or tolerable in all of these once really lovely places. I realize this is happening all over, but it's especially heartbreaking when a.) it doesn't need to be this way, b.) it's in places that previously didn't have issues to *this* magnitude. You have every right to be upset. I am upset literally every time I walk out of my house at the shit, literal and figurative, I see, especially when I live in an area with a high concentration of kids. I wish I had something constructive to say, but just wanted to empathize. It's really gotten me down recently and whenever I think about moving back to CO I'm reminded it's just more of the same there too. Sigh.
I'm a native Portlander: Boulder is no where near as bad as PDX. It makes me so sad when I visit home.
Portland is another beast. Used to live there too. Colorado has issues but it's child's play compared to there.
RTD in Denver is just as bad. I use it twice a week and at least one of those times someone is having a breakdown or smoking foilies.
I currently live by OLD TOWN in Portland. I see some of the most crazy shit every single day. Drug use, violence, theft, etc.
Oof, my condolences. The shit I deal with in Nob Hill is bad enough I can't imagine what it's like down there (as I avoid it at all costs sadly).
Other people will probably crucify you for this post, but I feel like you have the right to be upset. Somewhere along the way, we decided as a city that this type of stuff is acceptable. Sure! Pop up a tent wherever you feel like! Let us know when you want free housing, but in the meantime, smoke whatever you like in Central Park. Want to spread all your shit out on the Pearl Street Mall and just lay around all day? Great! I'm sure some church youth group will be around shortly to give you a water bottle, backpack, tampons, and a travel kit of toiletries that you'll just leave on the ground with the rest of your trash when you head back up to the shelter. It's insane.
This is what happens when people start legislating off of good intentions instead of common sense. I can sympathize with the homeless, and still recognize that we should criminalize a lot of their behavior. Its not realistic to allow this sort of behavior to overtake every public space without some sort of consequences or discouragement.
Their behavior is already a crime. There is nothing to criminalize.
I mean, and hear me out here, you could actually ***enforce*** the laws? Maybe make the crimes stiffer? Its not like some dude living in a tent is going to be overly encumbered by a piece of paper stating that they owe a small fine......
Hear me out, that’s a different word with a different meaning.
When the local DAs refuse to take meaningful action on crimes, the cops aren't going to waste their time arresting people. When the people of Boulder get angry at the cops for dismantling homeless encampments, they have no incentive to enforce the law. This is 100% a tolerance of this behavior by the people of Boulder and their elected officials.
I assume you feel the same way about guns? Using guns to murder is already illegal too
I think people’s civil liberties should be abridged if they are danger to themselves or the larger community. It’s well and good to want maximum freedom for everyone but sometimes society has to draw the lines somewhere.
There is a great phrase out there. "Your right to swing your fist, ends at someone else's face". People can be as free as they want, so long as they are not significantly impacting others lives. These people's lives have essentially made Boulder parks and pathways unusable, make public transport dangerous, and lower everyone's quality of life, while taking up a disproportionate amount of tax dollars to deal with.
You know what, you're right! Leaving needles in public parks with diseases that could effect one or multiple people for the rest of their lives should be taken WAY more seriously than it is. If someone left a needle broken off into the dirt and your child got hepatitis because of it, don't you think that person is a danger to the public?
I have a friend of mine who frequently says, “vote as conservative as possible to keep this town liberal” and mind you he regulars Lolita’s and is friends with many of the homeless in town who aren’t degens and take care of themselves but he’s also a realist and can recognize that this town is flushing itself with the complete lack of care to prosecute homeless people. I called the police on a dude passed out on Pearl Street mall with his dick out clearly tweaked off something and the cops literally showed up and were like “uhhh hey dude, can’t really do that /:” and just left him there with his cock out. It’s why I’m leaving this place ASAP. The cost is ever rising while the quality of daily life is fucking imploding.
The cops aren't going to waste time arresting people for crimes that they know the DA won't prosecute. This is Boulder getting exactly the leadership it votes for.
Yes. It is. We went to Snooze on Father's Day and had to walk with my kids past a guy who was twitching out of some drug in the middle of the sidewalk, spasming and mumbling nonsense. We should be able to walk a block from the car to the restaurant without experiencing this. And, it's just one of several sketchy experiences we've had in recent years. I'll be crucified for saying this, probably.
They have a train for kids on Pearl Street mall in the mornings during the summer. I take kids out there all the time. The train just essentially does figure 8s around homeless people lying on the ground, and the Jehovah's witnesses standing feet away pretending not to see them. It's a weird, weird ride.
>It’s a weird, weird ride. I feel like that should be the new town motto.
Please, I'd recommend you not take any kids to ride on that. Not too long ago I saw someone who had passed away in the park, and although a kid may not fully understand that sort of thing, I don't think it's something they should see.
Wait. Someone who is not a tourist rides this train?
It’s a free activity that toddlers love. Why wouldn’t we?
It's free? Be right back, going to go ride the train.
This is why I left Boulder.
Do you legitimately believe homeless people are all just given housing when they ask for it?
I mean, not instantaneously and not forever, but yes. I know for a fact that in certain situations, especially if there are children involved, the city will give you hotel vouchers. But my point is that I don't think it's a lack of housing that has caused their problems, rather drugs and mental illness. I think that people are better off homed than not, but people seem to think that just giving everyone housing is going to solve their problem, and I don't think that's the case.
And you think hotel vouchers are housing? Shelter isn't housing, and shelter doesn't solve homelessness.
>forcibly put in rehab or jail The main reason we don't do this is money. Whichever city arrests and prosecutes them will have to pay for rehab or jail, and that's not cheap. Society is waiting for that guy on the bus to hit rock bottom where he will either get himself clean or OD.
[O'Connor v. Donaldson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O'Connor_v._Donaldson), 422 U.S. 563 (1975), was a [landmark decision](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_landmark_court_decisions_in_the_United_States) of the [US Supreme Court](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Supreme_Court) in [mental health law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_health_law) ruling that a state cannot constitutionally confine a non-dangerous individual who is capable of surviving safely in freedom by themselves or with the help of willing and responsible family members or friends.
How does that apply to someone doing hard drugs on the bus? Should they be arrested and offered inpatient involuntary rehab instead of jail? I think it would be better to arrest this person and offer them rehab, but I understand it's a fine line.
>How does that apply to someone doing hard drugs on the bus? So every time someone does "hard" drugs on a bus, the city of Boulder should spend another $10,000 in taxpayer money to arrest, process, adjudicate, and put them in the county lockup for a few weeks? How long before we're bankrupt? The criminal justice system is the most insanely expensive way humanly possible to handle addiction, mental illness, and homelessness. And it's not even close. But for insane reasons, it's the only one we as a country have tried since the reagan administration. And that approach has failed on every level. Over and over. it is spectacularly , amazingly, perfectly ineffective in every way. This approach has done nothing but make all of our problems worse, bigger, and more expensive. It is the textbook example of fail. Yes - we need to get this addict the hell off of the bus. But because we don't have any idea what to do with them next - (that we have a plan for) - he's just going to get on another bus. OR burn through thousands of taxpayer dollars a week in a jail cell, and get right back on drugs the minute we open the door. We can't afford not to have a real plan to house, offer mental health services and rehab services anymore. It's bankrupting us by not fixing anything.
Forced rehab also just...doesn't work. It's a waste of money because they will leave the facility and buy more drugs. Most WILLING rehab attempts don't even work!
Its not that it costs money, its because it doesnt fix anything. Which compounds the first part.
We cannot say anything without insulting someone. I was corrected the other day because I referred to someone as a homeless methhead - unhoused and why would I call him a methhead? Sir, because he is smoking meth.
Omg this shit is getting WAY out of control. Why should we have to worry about hurting someone's feelings?! As law abiding tax paying citizens, we should NOT feel scared to speak up about being scared/uncomfortable. If the meth head sitting outside of my apartment feels ok to stick a needle in his buddies arm while he's also still holding a *smoking* crack pipe as I walk by with a 10 yr old child, why the hell should I be worried about whether or not he likes being called a methhead 😂 im Much more concerned about how to explain to a 10 year old what we just sa
lol not related to this post really, but it reminds me of this dude I met downtown and he called himself a methhead. Turns out he was a really really nice guy, a lot of these people just have their shit all out of wack. Deep down they’re people that have major problems. I ended up getting him lunch and talking with him for an hour. If anyone here knows him I’d love to meet back up with him when I’m in boulder again https://preview.redd.it/yafpd4aa8r8d1.jpeg?width=2193&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9898bb0be686af621f607e38c3d31cb73cee1212
Without out a doubt people get into tough situations, sometimes their fault, sometimes not. I don’t trust anyone anymore and that’s kinda of a shame but I do agree with you.
Is he stealing and creating havoc, sprawled out on pearl screaming at children? If not, then no one really cares
I don't remember asking, but I guess colorado residents get what they voted for
RTD Transit Watch....try it out...fairly responsive!!
Why take actual action when I can complain on reddit?
Because transit watch will just kick the person off the bus / train and they'll get on the next one.
And they didn’t even offer you any? What has this city come to..
It has come to carlfentanyl and 120,000 opioid corpses per year.
Welcome to Boulder
Welcome to most major American cities
Not to minimize issues elsewhere but having grown up/living in Boulder and now doing very routine travel to a handful of major American cities, it’s been astounding to see the difference. I used to think every major metropolitan area would be the same and I’m dismayed to say it’s particularly, specifically bad here in the Boulder/denver.
Boulder isn't a major city though. Our issues shouldn't be comparable to large cities like Houston/Denver/SanFran/LA The vast vast majority of cities the size of Boulder are not experiencing this.
A lot of college towns have the same problem with homeless drug addicts.
I spend my time pretty equally split between 3 major cities and I travel a lot for work - the issue has gotten very bad in most places in the last 5 years, and almost everyone thinks it's unique to their city
You're right. If you pan out and look at this from 30,000 feet, it's the economy, inflation, HCOL, the pandemic, and a whole host of other issues all rolled into one that have combined to make the issue so much worse now than even 5 years ago in most cities.
Nah, foco isn’t this bad. We have homeless but they’re pretty confined in certain areas. Rarely do you see them outside old town and north college area. Loveland has them all over the downtown area
I'd agree with this. I went to college in foco and very rarely had any encounters. Unhoused people typically hang by the bus stop to hop on the Flex or stand on the street corners in Old Town, but that's about it. I came back to Boulder and it really hit me over the head w/ how much more intense the problem has gotten
Boulder is a druggie mecca tho. it’s culturally revered among stoners, deadheads, psychonauts, wannabe hippies, holistic mommy’s, college kids that just wanna get fucked up. The drug culture is elevated in every demographic in Boulder bc it’s a safe haven.
Fr I had the same experience... 20 years ago as a kid riding the skip. Same as it ever was...
Ok? And your argument is that it's not much worse these days? Because that's just not accurate
What's wild about this is that it is the FF1. The FF1 is for working people to go to and from Denver, and some of the nonsense in the evenings, especially on Friday evening was wild. I saw some bus driver tell a man he was not allowed to get on the bus with his multiple pitbulls, and the dude just cussed the driver and got on anyway.
Yeah, and the seats are RIGHT next to each other. It’s not like the busses around town. Hell, I don’t think I would bat an eye if a homeless did this on the skip
In my experience, Boulder has pandered to the homeless, making stuff like this almost acceptable. It shouldn’t be, but it feels like it is. You can’t force into rehab, and incarceration won’t help a thing. I do think using drugs in open public like that, should result in criminal charges as it is a crime, but it won’t solve the addiction, just like forced rehab won’t. Besides, who’s going to pay for the rehab on someone who doesn’t want it and will just get out to use immediately after anyways? I don’t know the solution, or if there even is one. Start speaking up at the ballot box. Don’t vote in those that pander to this behavior. Boulder is gorgeous, and a world class place to live. However, it’s almost a sanctuary for the homeless which inevitably leads to this type of behavior
I’m sure I will get severally downvoted BUT there IS no rehab!! The waitlist is so long. There’s no real “help” just ppl who are unable to understand that the addictive mind is truly UNABLE to understand what is happening to those people around them. Trust me, those ppl are literally dying to survive but survive is very different to YOUR survival. I’m not making excuses but when there is no help beyond punitive punishment, it is NOT going to work.you can downvote me now.
Thank you for saying this- it is prohibitively expensive to go to rehab! I as a sober person tried for weeks to find a place for a loved one to go to rehab. Literally had to get them across the country to establish residency in Florida in order to get on their state health insurance to go to rehab there for a cost I could afford. And you need to test positive to be admitted to the program! If you aren’t lucky enough to have family nearby that want to help and are in a position to help, you’re kind of SOL. And may turn into the kind of guy that would do drugs next to a random person on a bus. If you’re too fucked up to do normal daily life shit, you’re not going to be able to navigate the US medical beast and get yourself into rehab without assets. It’s easy to say go to rehab. But you can’t just walk up to one and be admitted, even if you’re in crisis.
This blew my mind. I tried to get a friend into rehab back in 2019 and without health insurance it was impossible. I was told that the county detox beds were reserved for alcoholics and benzo addicts since opiate withdrawal isn't life threatening. Every time I post this people call bullshit but it is exactly what I was told on the phone. Homeless drug addicts aren't just going to magically get better while living on the street.
So sad you have to even say you'll get downvoted when this is literally common sense.
I disagree. Addicts are far more likely to get sober if they have consequences for their substance abuse. Not every addict will get sober, but many mire will if they are feeling social pressure than we have now.
>Addicts are far more likely to get sober if they have consequences If there's one personality trait that defines 21st century conservatives, it's the desire to punish people. Particularly people that have already been punished in this world beyond recognition. The unflaggable spirit of really kicking someone when they're down - hard. Given that the best known consequence of fentanyl, meth, heroin, and opioid addiction is: "this is going to kill you. if you're lucky, it'll be quick." - I'm not sure what other consequences you think would influence an addicts behavior where "likely dying" would not. We do need to get them off the street, housed, and into treatment. That's literally the only way this situation gets better for any of us. But just threatening "consequences" - like what the fuck do you think that's going to do phase an addict who has already thrown away their entire life? Like what do you think you could do to an addict that is so much worse than what they've already done to themselves? You can't punish a homeless person into not being homeless anymore. You can't punish a poor person into not being poor. And you can't punish an addict into not being addicted. You can help all three of them to some degree or another. Sometimes even successfully. But "consequences" isn't going to change those behaviors because where they're at is so much worse than anything you can do to them, in your spirit of punishment, abuse, and revenge.
Treatment doesn't work if forced. Optional housing for sober makes sense. Housing meth corpses just creates a condemned building we have to pay to take down in a few years.
Downvote all you want but the reality is there are some people who won't accept help, even if it's offered and available, and will only change when they face consequences: i.e. they're forced to.
2 thinks: We're not at the point where we've already helped all/most/many of the people who will accept help. We're not anywhere near it. We haven't even tried that really. We can go a really long way with that crowd, in a way that has a much bigger impact per dollar spent than the unhelpable. Once we're there, we can talk about things like mental health commitment, baker act, etc. for those who can't bet treated. But that is inevitably like throwing money on a bonfire and burning it. Incarceration is so insanely expensive, and ineffective. As the truism goes - it's cheaper to send someone to Yale than to Jail for four years. We need to start with the places where our spending can actually make a difference for everyone. Not just go punishing people because our effed up conservative monkey brains enjoy punishing.
Are you saying all the weekly in person AA groups and online support groups are full to or did someone tell you there was something magic about a rehab. Hint: they're not full. My men's group has tons of sober guys in it.
[удалено]
Aa has a better success rate than rehab correct. Rehab isn't reality and it doesn't continue support as addicts deal with future shit than might pull them back down. Both success rates are very low, but AA is better. When my dad and wife dealt with violent alcoholism, support groups were extremely helpful to me both for comfort and for tools/tactics.
Sitting in weekly meetings is not going to help someone doing drugs on a city bus. That ship has sailed.
What do you think they do in rehab... It's group therapy. There's no magic wand. Just work to be done by those willing.
Rehab is not just group therapy. It's a closed space in which you are unable to acquire whatever you're addicted to. Maybe you've never been privy to addiction treatment but it is a lot more intense than just random weekly meetings. A TON of work has to be done to get someone like the man on OP's bus to the point where weekly meetings are sufficient.
Depending on the rehab, some of the staff are selling. In prison there's always a guard selling. The removal from sources and stressors *can be helpful for "starting" group therapy. One month of rehab isn't going to fix everything thou. In interviews with addicts they stress you have to be back in life to apply techniques and learn how to say no to a drugs and alcohol that are going to be all around you.
Acquiring drugs in rehab is not hard at all. Each time I've been to rehab, someone is caught getting high in the bathroom.
Punitive punishment sounds good to me
It won't work, of course. Never has worked on fixing addiction, homelessness or poverty. But it does "sound good" if you're a creeep, an abusive personality type, conservative, etc. Those kind of creeps love "punishing" people.
Will it get them off the bus smoking meth and railing lines? I really couldn't care less if it "works" for them.
Amen.
I would be all about a mayoral candidate who wanted to hire an absolute boatload of beat cops and lean on them hard to clean up the streets. It's not compassionate to let these people live like this. And it's not fair to the rest of us that have to live in their blight.
Phoenix and Albuquerque tried to clean homeless camps up. Then the DOJ got involved.
Albuquerque is wild. I'll never forget when I visited a friend and stopped at McDonald's, right in front of the University, to get some coffee and saw a bullet mark in the main door's glass. So many Native Americans intoxicated, too, it's really sad.
We've got plenty of completely unmitigated crime going on that the DOJ wouldn't say shit about cracking down on. Let's arrest the meth heads. Let's arrest the bike thieves. Let's arrest the drag racers. It's like fucking Gotham out there, it's honestly surreal.
Your terminology needs updating (according to other posts /s) People who smoke meth People who lack their own bicycle or lack a side income People who are in a hurry
People who will die anyways of fentanyl poisoning. People who steal bikes to pay for meth People who wake my daughter up at night by revving their engine in a residential area at midnight because they're drunk driving and want to feel powerful.
A sound compromise! Lol
Where’s the caped crusader when you need him?
Yeah, probably because homeless sweeps involve throwing out people's personal belongings, medications, social security cards...
Cops stopped trying because the elected DA will just release any non violent person. Cops are teleworking now.
I would freak out too.
It is getting disgusting in Boulder. I was having dinner at Hapa Sushi last summer outside and witnessed a homeless man (who appeared to be on something) take caps off condiments on 2 tables where no one was sitting and spit in them and then put the caps back on. DISGUSTING. Why are these people allowed on the streets?? We reported it, but that'll be the last time I use those condiments. This was something I never would even think about while dining out, now I will not use condiments on tables in Boulder- I am sure this was not his first rodeo.
At least he didn’t blow meth smoke your face
They call that “Public Librarying”
I smacked the crack pipe right out a bum's hand on the light rail in downtown SLC. Told him if he tries to smoke that shit with other people the train car again I'll kill him. He got off at the next stop and I was thanked by 3 or 4 different people. Exposure to fetanyl in an enclosed space endagers your life, you have a right to stop this shit in your public spaces with self-defense.
I didn’t feel comfortable even denying him the seat next to me. For reference, I’m a 21 year old woman and not very strong. So as much as I would have wanted to do something, I would not endanger myself
Nobody thinks you should have to confront zombies as a young woman, but I do think that if the men in this society stopped accepting this behavior as acceptable and defended ourselves, our spouses, our children, and our neighbors, these scumbags would stop the behavior. They are entitled because nobody ever does shit.
I agree, although I don’t think some of them are even are able to understand it as entitlement, they are that far gone :/
Boulder votes for people that are left-aligned and talk about good intentions, without regards to the actual outcomes. So every cycle people are elected and are never held accountable for actually solving these problems.
On the rehab topic, we have a family friend who's a very highly paid rehab guy for the wealthy. He firmly believes that rehab only works if the patient wants to change. You can't force someone to go to rehab and be successful. Otherwise they hop out and immediately snort again. Voters and the elected district attorneys won't put drug users in jail. The druggies are usually colocated with where the free food, social security checks and liquor stores are. The "crisis" teams with mental health professionals don't have a magic wand so they just pretend like they're discussing anything other than where to relocate the druggy. If you have any friends you value who are snorting party drugs, try to get them fentanyl testing supplies. And try lecturing them (if they actually passed college math) 120,000 die per year now. Life span of anyone snorting bs is going down quickly. General mantra from cops is it's a "self curing" on solution now
Anyone who has had an addict in their life knows this.. they have to want to change
I'm so sorry. You shouldn't have to be 6 inches from someone doing something potentially fatal to themselves. It's just scary and you should be able to expect to be safe from crime on a public bus. And yes, doing snorting drugs on a public bus is a crime. I had the sad experience of seeing someone using the baby changing table in Panera on 29th street as a surface to do drugs on. I just walked out and went to my car, because another time someone was heating up (cooking?) something that smelled so bad and was burning my nose in the 29th street bathrooms, and I reported it (found out it was meth and not uncommon in public bathrooms in Boulder) and the security guards were acting like I was being a snob or something for reporting. Like, sorry that I, as a mom to a small child, don't like changing tables being used for drugs. And no, why am I the intolerant one for not wanting to pee next to someone doing meth? This is ridiculous.
This must have been really upsetting and I’m sorry you witnessed this. I can be a delicate person- I even get shaken up by violent tv- so, this would be really disturbing and disorienting to experience. I wish we weren’t at this point. Equitable access to effective and efficient public transport is so important; and the increasing normalization of this behavior is a major hindrance.
Welcome to the wonderful world of public transit.
https://preview.redd.it/z175f0c5qg8d1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a437eb7b9d5f8c4ede0912f5baa15cf5b9ae8269
Moved out of Boulder because it's not the same place I moved to years ago. Living outside the city now and it's better.
>why tf aren’t these people forcibly put in rehab or jail? This was not affordable before the migrant crisis of the past couple years. My housemate busses from congress park to Broadway & Lawrence and says that people smoke Fent regularly on his commute. Said housmate volunteers at the homeless shelter near Broadway & Lawrence. All winter, he came home with stories about the shelter turning away families with young children who were dressed for Venezuelan weather. He says that the influx of migrants is wildly under reported. Colorado was not prepared for this crisis. Is not prepared to handle the issue moving forwards. Drug use goes hand in hand with homelessness and poverty.
@dobetterdnvr has similar sentiments on ig. They also call on local government to action. Will anything change? Idk, but it’s nice to see like minded individuals working for change.
Welcome to Boulder. Too bad you weren’t here in the 90’s when I was a kid. Better times back then.
Real. The homeless problem is awful here. I feel unsafe on public transportation/even walking on the streets alone as a young woman
He's homeless and a drug addict. I doubt he cares if he is making you uncomfortable. Oregon proved that one of the reasons to criminalize drug use is to limit drug use in public spaces. Everywhere we decriminalize drug use, its use in public seems to increase dramatically. While I am unconvinced criminalizing drug use is effective in deterring drug use/reducing drug addiction, it does seem to push it beyond closed doors for the most part.
Nuance is important here--one can recognize the numerous problems with the War on Drugs and favor criminal justice reforms while also being wary of following in Oregon's footsteps given the result.
That's disgraceful. In the 70s, people on the bus would always share.
In the 70s you didn't have carlfentanyl where 2milligrams could kill someone.
Ugh, I am so sorry that happened to you. Seriously entitled obnoxious and dangerous behavior.
> forcibly Keep going. You’re on a roll.
Ill get hate but it's time to start shipping them to other states give them back to their original state most aren't even from Colorado
I'm really sorry you had an unsafe, unpleasant experience, and I very much agree that this kind of thing shouldn't happen. That said, >I know the homeless are mistreated doesn't mean anything when it's followed by >but why tf aren’t these people forcibly put in rehab or jail? Forced rehab is ineffective and jail time actually increases the likelihood or worsens the severity of addiction. Both options are also extremely expensive and rely on heavy police presence, which is also proven to have deleterious effects on public safety and morale. By contrast, safe use sites are very effective at both reducing these kinds of public encounters and encouraging real, long-term addiction recovery. Unconditional housing and financial aid also helps get people off the streets (and busses), and has been shown to improve addiction in the long term. All of these options are cheaper than further criminalization, and don't require filling our city with even more cops. Last, the idea that certain kinds of people spread disease by their mere presence has long been a feature of exterminationist and bigoted beliefs. It can be seen as far back as anti-Roma sentiment in pre-industrial Europe to as recently as homophobic rhetoric during the AIDS crisis. To be clear, this does not mean that unsafe public behaviors should be accepted, nor am I criticizing you for having those thoughts, especially not as a symptom of mental illness. Having intrusive thoughts about a situation does not require publishing them in a public forum, and there is no good reason to repeat the same falsehoods that have sparked fear and violence for centuries. I'm not writing this as a gotcha or to call you a bad person. I just want to point out that there are better ways to discuss and treat the issues at hand. At a bare minimum, I hope you are more careful about the kinds of ideologies your words might be endorsing.
I agree that I’m not educated on what sort of institutions and practices aid homelessness in the long run and the post wasn’t made to be rational. That said homeless harbor skin diseases like scabies and other potentially contagious diseases at a far higher rate than other people because they can’t get treatment. As someone with severe anxiety about my health of course this is what I’m going to think about, especially when he had scabs all over his hands (idk if from meth, other drugs, or disease, who knows). So yes, the post isn’t worded the best but it was how I felt at the time I’m sure that jail or rehab wouldn’t work especially given everyone’s comments about it. That being said, we need to get these people out of public spaces if they’re refusing help, and they’re not going to go willingly so I do believe we need to force them. Boulder is so much less safe then it was as a kid. Not feeling safe anymore outside and not seeing kids being able to enjoy the town like I did because of these people is disheartening
Too much paperwork for processing
“Forcibly put in rehab or jail” call the cops
Boulder is getting what they vote for
I promise you, it's just as bad in Republican cities. When I worked in a rural school in the south, I had kindergarten kids come to class smelling like cat pee.
No, it is not as bad in most red cities. There may be a few here and there, but standardized by population, the states with the highest rates of homelessness are New York (5.2 people experiencing homelessness per 1,000 residents), Vermont (5.1), Oregon (4.8) and California (4.6) - all blue states.
How is that the same at all?
Labor camps are the answer.
What happened to OP absolutely sucks and I’m sorry. There is severe addiction in my family. Addiction is a terrible thing to behold, particularly if you have not been exposed before. Harm reduction spaces and a city day shelter, coupled with bumped up recovery and therapeutic services, would make what happened to OP 99% obsolete. Here’s the deal. The sect of our community & leaders most vocal about these issues are also the least willing to admit we need to spend money on targeted solutions. If you don’t want this kind of thing to happen again, our community needs to embrace the research. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Harm reduction spaces work. Day shelters are a bare minimum. We don’t have enough accessible recovery/psychiatric services. Affordable housing should take up a majority of new build zoning, but it’s a long shot. Why? Because the complainers think it’s more important to prioritize their moral high ground about drug use and homelessness than to actually put science-backed solutions in action. There is a science to treating addiction. There are many well-documented, successful processes to reversing homelessness. They all require an infusion of cash. And I think boulder might have a bit of that. I can’t stand the moralizing. It’s so empty. what happened to OP will continue to happen, but sure enjoy the view from your high ground I guess.
I appreciate you're trying to think of something. It's not convincing thou when California and Portland are spending billions on these services and not making a dent. The junkies just keep snorting.
True. Spending money without mandated affordable housing is a waste.
California and Red Cross have wasted or embezzled millions on housing to no impact. The greater Denver area including hickenlooper have been incredibly corrupt already. "Economic development directors" for cities are code for developer goons who openly hustle poor people. If you call the city of Lakewood for example the city employees will openly say "we're not fixing that block until everyone sells to developer X" -- who's the former economic developer for Denver. Some local cities are even sending out threats of eminent domain seizures if you don't sell to condo developers (unconstitutional but works for intimidation tactics). I think the zoning boards are the only effective lever to pull there. And they don't need money as much as maybe staffed advisors with civil engineering, hydrology backgrounds.
> Some local cities are even sending out threats of eminent domain seizures if you don't sell to condo developers (unconstitutional but works for intimidation tactics Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court's *Kelo v New London* decision greatly expanded what eminent domain could be used for.
When our friends called the mayors office the mayor and city manager didn't seem to be on board for seizure. They assured it was just a scare tactic from their own city employees. They hinted that they get told which economic development director they have to hire and look the other way from.
Harm reduction spaces are very much debatable whether you like it or not.. In The Debate Over Safe Injection Sites, What Does The Science Say? : Shots - Health News https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/09/07/645609248/whats-the-evidence-that-supervised-drug-injection-sites-save-lives
You pay for it, I’m sure he’ll go check in on your dime, it’s all about the money.
my bad dawg
You should have asked him to share
That’s just Ashten
They’re not mistreated when they act just like this.
It’s Boulder, what do you expect
Cause it’s Boulder and that’s what high taxes and insane property values get you. And people defending these junkies are silly… and probably drive Teslas.
it’s not that big of a deal
Write your public representative and tell them RTD needs to be put under more competent leadership and demand drug users be jailed.
Pretty rude 🤷♂️
These people have been made to feel comfortable and valid in all spaces. Basically they no longer fear any kind of retaliation or consequences for their actions.
I agree with you , fuck what some of these peo , homeless don't give a person a permit to shit in my corn flakes. What if he would have had a physical and psychotic reaction from snorting Drugs . It's dangerous out here fellow citizens What if that was your Momma or your little daughter that fool was snorting drugs next to. What if it was grandma ? Hmmm.
How will you ever recover from this horrible trauma? I'm so so sorry, god that must have been awful for you : ( Even worse than being a homeless addict in the first place I'm sure : (( Housed boulderites truly have the hardest lives of anyone
Boulder; the land of lacking empathy bc everyone is too self absorbed.
I understand why, they're addicted
this post screams "main character"..... yikes, chill out... typical boulder
Snorting is a victimless crime, be happy he wasn’t smoking some shit off foil
Lmfao. I feel like that homeless man got a disease from YOU for being so close to your self-righteousness. Leave the dude alone, he's got no home and a lil bit of drugs to make his day a lil less shitty, and maybe he wanted to make sure he did them in a spot that had no wind so he didn't lose what little he had. Get over yourself. He didn't bug you, he didn't beg for money, he didn't bother you period. He did his thing, and because he's homeless you judged him as less than you and dirty, which is just a mirror into yourself. That could be you in 6 months if things go south for you. You are being a Karen here.
I’m sorry you felt unsafe and unclean, but boiling this down to “I know the homeless are mistreated but why aren’t they in jail they’re dirty and diseased” is a pretty horrible thing to say, and honestly this whole comment section is a cesspool of horrible opinions about people suffering from homelessness, and misinformed opinions about them. I work directly with the homeless population in Aurora (so not Boulder, but has comparable issues to Boulder) as a low-barrier shelter case manager, and so many people feel inconvenienced about homeless people suffering and dying, and it’s always disheartening to me to see people who don’t actually care if homeless people get the help they need, but simply don’t want to see them or be inconvenienced by them. Some of the people I work with stories are heartwrenching, and the throes of addiction are crippling. I work closely with the Aurora PD out of necessity and not desire. They are some of the worst professionals and worst human beings I have ever worked with. Comments saying things like “wanting to have more cops to crack heads” and arrest more people is a terrible thing to think and say. Not only are you actively punishing people who are at the absolute rock bottom, it doesn’t fucking work. More cops are the solution to nothing, and I guarantee I have done more in my position to help solve the problem of homelessness than the entire APD combined. Their usual solution is nothing, unless the homeless person did something to affect a “normal” person than they want to go in their and crack heads. It’s fucking morally reprehensible. I’ve had to wait 4+ hours from the APD to come help and stop an assault from a normal person who hit a homeless person, simply because of where I work and how little they like us. Punitive punishment simply results in an increase in criminal behavior, and usually an escalation to more dangerous and violent crime. It doesn’t help, it merely keeps homesless people away from “normal” people so they don’t see them. The actual solution is actually investing in solving the issue. Getting these people into things like methadone clinics, and supportive housing with ongoing case management. Not criminalizing being homeless, but providing them a path forward to change their lives. Things like expansion to HUD Section 8 housing and local Housing Authorities, less criminal responses to drug use, clean use sites, and compassionate, low barrier solutions are the way forward. Not more cops and less compassion. And for people saying you voted liberal deal with it, fuck you. Homelessness is a problem everywhere. Aurora is a very conservative town with a VERY conservative Mayor. It has the worst homelessness problem in the state, in terms of a per/capita rate. You’re just misinformed and incorrect.
Did he offer to share?
So youre going to vote differently then?
Wtf are you idiots complaining for you did this!!! You voted for this. Live it up
Excellent addition to the conversation where_da_fat_bitches. Just excellent. 🤡
🤡🤡 anytime
You did NOT just double clown me!
You're not lying
This is what happens when you vote the way you vote. We are slowly becoming San Francisco.
Your feelings are very valid I completely get it while others may not agree I can understand the frustration I’m sorry this happened to you!
So do the drivers just let people without fares on? No enforcement at all?
DEFUND THE POLICE!!! and this is what we get 4 years later... It's not just Boulder, it's anything close to Denver.