Word of the Day: Compassion

On Tuesday night, the Monroe City Council called a special session to discuss the “homeless” problem affecting some residents in the city.

If you’re unfamiliar with what led up to this, let’s do a quick recap.

At the last council meeting, the mayor presented a petition signed by “50-60 residents” of an apartment complex near the homeless shelter. They told stories of criminals and drug addicts affecting their quality of life. Apparently, the rhetoric of “if you don’t like it, move” went out the window, and these folks are sticking around to improve the area they live in.

The mayor took this seriously! He immediately jumped on this issue faster than when he grabbed his video camera to record people using a public restroom.

I wonder...if a petition of 50-60 residents can get the mayor off his ass, should we start filling out more? But I digress...

Before getting into the testimonials from Tuesday night, I want to bring up a point made by Clayton Whitson, President of the Union County Chamber of Commerce.

There were actually two different issues being discussed, depending on who you were listening to: homelessness in Monroe and the Community Shelter.

Throughout the discussion, people repeatedly conflated the two.

The complaints coming from nearby residents were largely about the behavior of people outside the shelter, even though the shelter has no control over the actions of people beyond their area of jurisdiction. This was something we recognized pretty quickly after the previous meeting. People were complaining about homeless individuals, but those complaints were increasingly being attached to the shelter itself.

That distinction matters.

It would appear to those paying attention that complaints about homeless people need a scapegoat. A “problem” that the mayor can “fix.” Since he won’t do anything to fix homelessness (foreshadowing?), he’ll need to make the shelter his target.

177 People

If I told you that the current number of unhoused individuals in Union County is 177, that number could hit you in a variety of ways.

In a county of 260k+ residents, it might not seem like a lot. For people who think that one person without shelter is too many, that number might seem astronomical. To others, 177 might sound like a number small enough that, with some work, we could actually do something about it.

There’s a quote with mixed/unknown origins that popped into my head: “The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic.”

I heard 177 individual voices on Tuesday.

All with their own stories. All with their own circumstances.

Not a statistic.

No two stories among those 177 individuals will ever be the same. No single solution will fix everyone’s problem. Anyone who has truly spent time working with the homeless would know this.

And that became especially clear when people started speaking.

The People Behind the Building

I was busy listening to the speakers, so I didn’t catch a lot of names. Residents of the shelter were among the first to speak, and they did a fantastic job of putting stories to the building.

The folks standing up to defend the shelter were both informative and moving. Their success stories, histories, and current situations should have been enough to call off this entire charade.

Of course, that would require...compassion.

(He said the word of the day!)

Of particular note were two County Commissioner candidates who spoke. One of them, Madeline Byl, had already spoken in front of the County Commissioners, none of whom were present Tuesday night, and recycled her speech for the Monroe City Council.

When she got to the part about compassion, she quipped that the county commissioners didn’t seem to be affected by her plea for it.

I could clearly see three council members when she said that: Burns, Dotson, and Thompson.

From where I was sitting, the only person who seemed to be showing any compassion in that moment, or over the course of the whole night, was Julie Thompson.

That word, compassion, came up repeatedly during the night, including from people complaining about how the homeless population in Monroe was negatively affecting their lives.

They almost always tried to insert some version of the phrase, “My heart goes out to these people.”

Bullshit.

Trash people acting like they have love (and Christ) in their hearts when they have nothing but contempt for those in need.

These folks need to stop putting up obstacles, barriers, and conditions. You want me to believe that you’re here to help?

Then help.

“Get Rid Of” Them?

Probably the worst statements of the night came from our favorite pair of gym buddies, Burns and Dotson.

First, Dotson admits that we can’t “arrest our way out of this problem”...and then immediately asks the Monroe Police Chief if “his job would be easier if he could get rid of 10-15 individuals.”

Well, if we’re not arresting them, William, what exactly do you mean by “get rid of”?

Several times during the meeting, Burns made it clear that the council wasn’t “trying to solve homelessness.”

Well...no shit.

Could you imagine Burns actually working to solve a problem in the city?

Me neither.

Instead, we got an open-air gripe session where nobody seemed willing to commit to a side either way. Everybody simultaneously had compassion for the people using the shelter while sympathizing with the people in the apartment buildings nearby.

The only clear stance taken on the night was by Dotson, who apparently just wants them all “eliminated” one way or another.

Burns wasn’t trying to solve homelessness because he’s never trying to solve any problem.

He’s not smart enough.

Follow the Money

For those who are unaware, the City of Monroe gives some of our tax dollars to outside agencies working to make the city better. Usually, these are nonprofits serving underserved populations.

(And before you ask, yes, the Mayor’s friends at the HELP Pregnancy Center, a ministry catering to Christians while masquerading as a medical facility, were given the full $10k they asked for.)

In years past, the City of Monroe gave the Community Shelter an in-kind donation by covering its utilities. Then, a few years ago, the city decided to turn that support into a reimbursement instead.

That meant the shelter had to come up with the money upfront and wait for the city to pay it back.

This year, that reimbursement was cut by $20k.

Does that sound like a group of people who have sympathy and compassion for the homeless population of Monroe?

At this point, I am seriously questioning whether there is ever going to be a difference between mayoral candidates again.

If you vote with Burns, don’t call out his bullshit, and refuse to stand up to him, then what’s the fucking point of running against him?

What motivation do we have for supporting someone who will not fight back?

And Now We Get to the Point

Over-policing.

Anyone listening to this meeting knows that this is all on par with the overall strategy to increase police funding while cutting services to the rest of us.

From the Flock presentation back in February, where the MPD Chief, Dotson, and Burns supported $7,600,000 for more cameras, to the $77,000 grant the city secured to get Flock money without going through a pesky vote, these folks are hellbent on one mission.

And once again, Dotson gives away the plan.

He read off amounts of money, money that doesn’t actually fund the shelter of course, and talked about how much money we’re “wasting” on this problem.

Then, in the very next sentence, he wants to hire more officers, increase patrols, and start paying officers more overtime to police the area.

Which one is it, Dotson?

You hate “wasting” tax dollars unless it’s a boot for you to lick?

What a fucking waste of oxygen.

Maybe the next council will have some compassion.