Thursday, August 26, 2010

Los Angeles County’s Project 50 delivers on its promise to the hard-core homeless - latimes.com

Los Angeles County’s Project 50 delivers on its promise to the hard-core homeless - latimes.com


question.all.now at 11:15 PM August 23, 2010

This was a fascinating series which looked at the most marginal members of our society without judgement and explored contributions of an extraordinary woman who was able to start a program to reach them.


The comments are intriguing. It seems that the people who have the motivation to write a comment are tending to be less interested in the story and the purpose of both the program and the telling of the story than in condemning people who are already condemned by their own flaws.


The program objective was to reduce the expense to the public of emergency room visits by the most likely to be involved in a health emergency. Not to change people, nor cure them, not get them to improve themselves and their lives, albeit those are goals are worthy and would hopefully be a side effect.


As a first world country, we don't leave people to die on the street when their lives can be saved. We don't turn people away from emergency rooms for having flawed characters or being destitute. Well perhaps for being destitute.


In purely economic terms, the goal was to spend a less on housing than on emergency medical care, the question was would shelter be enough to make a difference.


It's ok to feel compassion for people who fail at helping themselves, for the destitute mired in their own personal hells, for the condemned.



No comments: