Don't Feed the Bears... I mean the homless

Good post, Emily. It's interesting to note the contrast between this recent post on Smart City Memphis, which calls from increased police attention to the city’s downtown vagrancy problem, and Otis White’s column, which argues that locking up sidewalk sleepers won’t solve the problem until cities first provide adequate options for shelter. (Of course, I guess one could argue that Memphis has provided adequate options, and it’s now time for a crackdown on those who are not taking the options.) This is a tricky problem because while it is hard not to view a “sweep up the homeless” campaign as part of an attempt to create a shiny tourist bubble (making the city look nice for outsiders while hiding our real problems), I can understand the frustration of the Smart City Memphis poster:

We tried to be philosophical this year, but it’s just too hard when the problem
takes up residence on the front steps.So, don’t tell us in the posters
canvassing our neighborhood that we should “say yes to charities that help the
homeless and the needy.” We say yes to the charities but we also say yes to
dealing with the problem where it exists, in the alleys and sidewalks all over
downtown.

There’s more good discussion in the comments to the Smart City Memphis post.