Tuesday, September 01, 2015

ISBL Asshat of the Week: Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers

Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers is your typical Republican who doesn’t want to help anyone, he wants them removed from sight.

At the mayor’s request, Colorado Springs city officials are working on an ordinance to ban people from sitting or lying on sidewalks, planters or anywhere else not specifically designed to be sat upon in downtown Colorado Springs and in Old Colorado City.
"I don't see this as a civil rights or human rights issue. No one ought to be able to lie on the sidewalk. We ought to make our sidewalks safe for passage so people don't feel obstructed or harassed. I just don't see that it's anti-homeless to say you can't lie or sit on sidewalks." — John Suthers
So, I’m guessing he’ll have police out in force to move people along who shouldn’t be sitting where there isn’t a chair, or lying down where there isn’t a clearly designated Please Lie Down Here sign. Of course, it might be just as easy to create places for people to sit, but sit it’s mostly homeless folks sitting there, why not just get rid of them and make the “rest of us” feel safer knowing that we don’t have to see homelessness and therefore don’t have to deal with it.

And, of course, keep in mind that may homeless are LGBTQ youth kicked out of their homes for being LGBTQ, so this is just a way to rid the streets of anyone who is heterosexual, I guess. And let’s not also forget that many homeless are vets, who returned from fighting overseas suffering from PTSD and cannot get adequate medical care — don’t get me started on that VA mess — and therefore have to live in the streets; move along, soldier.

And what makes this even mode disgusting, is that Suthers has made no effort to see about housing the homeless, finding them a place where they can sit down, or even lie down; he just wants them gone.

And there is evidence, even in Colorado, that it’s actually cheaper to house the homeless than to shoo them off the streets. The Colorado Coalition for the Homeless estimates that state taxpayers spend $43,240 per homeless individual — and 2012 estimates say there are 17,000 homeless people in the state — each year on everything from emergency health care to legal issues. But, if the state of Colorado were to provide places for the homeless to gather and sit and even sleep, the cost drops to just $16,813 per person, less than half the cost of leaving them on the streets.

But, Mayor John Suthers doesn’t care about that, possibly because homeless people don’t vote so they mean nothing to him.

Colorado Springs Mayor, and Republican, of course, John Suthers: the ISBL asshat of the Week.

7 comments:

  1. Mayor, Republican and no doubt Christian:
    ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
    Matthew 25:34-36

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  2. prob a rich rethuglican mofo; save the unborn, but do nothing for the ones already here.

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  3. In a town just over the border, in Oregon, they are considering making it illegal to camp just outside of the campground - where they paying customers are. The homeless camp outside and ask for water.

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  4. $43,000 is more than I've ever earned in a year and $16,000 is considerably more than I make on Social Security...perhaps they could use some of that money to create jobs...

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  5. I can only imagine the rest of the story. No doubt a homophobe and a pro-gun kook.

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  6. "...the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; those who are in the shadows of life; the sick, the needy and the handicapped. " ~ Last Speech of Hubert H. Humphrey

    "A nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members." ~ Mahatma Ghandi

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  7. Keeping the homeless homeless means they can't register to vote Democrat. Is this all part of making it harder for any but white middle class and upwards to vote?

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Say anything, but keep it civil .......