Northwest Arkansas must deal with homelessness

Five things.

The homeless woman who died in the woods and the problem of how to keep those people out of such areas. Right. That’s the problem.

The recent study that says our homeless population is large and growing.

The ongoing financial struggles of 7 Hills Homeless Center, which appears to be our main relief valve for the homeless.

Homeless people asserting their First Amendment right to panhandle.

The excellent feature on our homeless citizens in a recent issue of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

There’s more, of course.

What it all adds up to is much more than the sum of its many parts. What it adds up to is Fayetteville and other cities in NWA have large and growing populations of homeless citizens, and we are not doing right by them.

It’s a fact of life. A city of any size, even one ranked as a “Best Place to Live” or whatever, has homeless citizens.

Currently, our homeless citizens are mainly charity cases. Our government leaders want to help and do, somewhat. But they are restrained by the current anti-tax-anti-spending-my-tax-money-on-those-people-who-could-get-a-job-if-they-wanted-one-but-they’d-rather-stand-on-the-street-corner-and-beg political climate.

We will always have homeless citizens. It’s one of the ways we keep score in the game of capitalism, which is one of my favorite games, by the way. They will always need charity. But they are not trees or dogs or cats or whales to be saved, or unsaved souls on the mission field, or litter to pick up. They are citizens. Some have jobs, but that’s a whole other issue.

Charity is not the answer. We must own the problem and deal with it as communities through our local governments. It should be a budget priority for cities, counties and even schools. Two last things.

At this potentially brief point in time, we are prosperous enough, our homeless population is small enough, and our leaders are smart enough to design, fund and implement processes needed to appropriately serve our homeless citizens with an infrastructure that also includes charitable agencies, federal agencies and state agencies.

Homelessness is an extreme symptom of income inequality. It should be dealt with not using sales tax funds but property taxes. Maybe a surcharge on McMansions.

HOWELL MEDDERS

Fayetteville