I have lived in Ottawa, Toronto, Fort Erie, Montreal, Ste Agathe, St Jean, St Paul Mn and Arlington Va. Our world is amazing I wake up happy every day knowing I'll get to explore a little more of it.
The people finding themselves living in tents never thought they would be homeless. They are functional, capable people that are willing to work. The problem is there is no work.
Some people in the community are starting to counter the development of tent cities and are demonizing the people that are unfortunate enough to need a tent city.
Quote from http://www.stoptentcity.com "The Diocese allows drug addicts, alcoholics and persons with mental illness into their Tent City. They have stated to the media that a violent felony or sex offense conviction does not necessarily preclude admission to their Tent City.
Why is it that to work for the Diocese you must submit to a thorough national database background check, but as a resident of Tent City you only need a simple FDLE internet check to get in? What if an out of state pedophile is off the grid and gives a false ID?
A very high percentage of those in Pinellas Tent City have either refused or failed drug and alcohol treatment, or have refused mental health care. They are chronically homeless, and have made a conscious choice to be homeless. Frank Murphy himself has admitted that half of those in Pinellas Tent City end back up on the street. We do not want untreatable addicts, alcoholics, and mentally ill people brought into our community. As a local homeless services minister recently told us, they WILL wander into our neighborhoods and loiter at our local businesses. Will our children be safe to freely ride their bikes and play in our neighborhoods as they have done for many years? Will our elderly be safe? Will we be able to walk our dogs in the evenings? Will our neighborhood events be clouded with fear for our own safety?
Where will these people go if they are kicked out of the facility or are denied entry? The Church is not going to put them on a bus and ship them back to where they came from, or take them to another facility. What about when the facility is full? Where will those that have been turned away sleep that night or loiter during the day?"
The economic downturn is not over, it is going to get worse. Here's a quote from USA Today that gives us a small glimpse of the magnitude of the problem.
"Communities elsewhere are facing similar pressures:
• In Massachusetts, a record number of homeless families need emergency shelter, says Robyn Frost, executive director of the Massachusetts Coalition for the Homeless. In mid-April, there were 2,763 families in shelters, including 655 in motels because the shelters were full, an increase of 36% since July, she says.
"We have a high number of foreclosure properties, and many of them are multifamily apartments," Frost says. "We were seeing a great number of families being displaced."
• Reno officials shut down a tent city in October after making more shelter space available, but new encampments are popping up along the Truckee River and elsewhere, says Kelly Marschall of the Reno Area Alliance for the Homeless.
The homeless include "a startling number of first-time homeless," she says. "We asked them what industries they were involved in. The majority were talking about construction, the housing industry, real estate. There was a direct correlation to the housing market crash."
• In Santa Barbara, Calif., 84 men and women sleep in their cars, trucks or recreational vehicles in 17 parking lots around the city, says Jason Johnson with the New Beginnings Counseling Center, which runs the RV Safe Parking Program. The city, which allows the use of three municipal lots at night, supports the program, says city parking superintendent Victor Garza. Last May, there were 58 participants and no waiting list. Now 40 people are waiting.
"People's last refuge has become their vehicle," Johnson says."
What does the subprime market have to do with you?
I just watched Jim Cramer take a fit on television. Here it is.
This video was made afterwards and Jim spends some time explaining why he reacted the way he did.
Subprime refers to mortgages or loans to lower quality borrowers. These loans have a value and are bought and sold, so we can say there is a "subprime market". Banks like to do this because there are limits to the amount of money they are permitted to lend (a ratio based on cash and other assets on hand) and by selling the mortgage they now have more cash to do what they like to do (lend us more money).
Some of the fundamentals have recently changed. Several years ago the U.S. real estate market was booming so people were refinancing their existing homes to pull out equity. Others were buying homes they could not afford with exotic mortgages (i.e. "interest only", "liars loans" and what has to be one of the most diabolical "the "negative amortization loan"). Many of these mortgages were sold with "teaser rates" (i.e. an initial low interest rate that would reset to a much higher interest rate after the introductory period) that made sense in a market that was growing. You could always get a new mortgage based on the new higher equity value of your home! Unfortunately the U.S. residential real estate market is not growing like it was so people are not able to renegotiate as easily as they thought and many are losing their homes. This is compounding the problems in U.S. residential real estate and further dampening property values because there are so many motivated vendors.
Absolutely fascinating; but in all seriousness who cares! This is happening in the United States why should that have an impact on us here in Canada? The answer to that is superficially simple Financial Contagion.
Central banks in the U.S., Europe, Japan, Australia and Canada added about $135.7 billion to the banking system in an attempt to avert a crisis of confidence in global credit markets.
The Federal Reserve, in a second day of action in concert with the European Central Bank, provided $38 billion of reserves and pledged further funds ``as necessary,'' in a statement unprecedented since the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The European Central Bank loaned 61.05 billion euros ($83.6 billion) after injecting a record amount yesterday.
The central banks are responding to the 'liquidity crisis' by making extra liquidity available. Let's hope it works! If it doesn't then we can expect a period of time where it is difficult to get new loans and those that are able to get them will be forced to pay a higher interest rate (note: the Fed's focus is on inflation which in my experience has always meant that they want to continue increasing interest rates).
So, what does the subprime market have to do with you? Well that really depends on what you intend to do in the next couple of years!
Please meet Helmut Sartarelli. He is the craftsman that creates these amazing works of art. Everything from statues to architectural components and some of the nicest water fountains I have ever seen.
This link will bring you to a map of Alfonso Da Rosora. If you are in the neighborhood stop by and take a look. Walking though these gardens is an uplifting life experience. If you happen to see Helmut please let him know that we can see his fountains from space.
