Thoughts on Fresno's homeless challenge:

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There was plenty of talk last Thursday on City Council President Larry Westerlund's Median Island Ordinance -- which is on next Thursday's consent calendar for adoption.

Seems odd that something sparking considerable public interest is being grouped with other issues, all to be approved with one vote.

The consent calendar, like other items on the agenda, is subject to public comments, three minutes per speaker.

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The ordinance states: "The permit procedure for charitable solicitations by public safety personnel shall be as set forth in the California Business and Professions Code section 17510.25."

That means the Fresno Fire Department's Fill the Hat campaign to raise money for local charities won't be affected. State law, which trumps city law, allows public safety employees to solicit charitable donations while "standing in a public roadway."

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A violation of the Median Island Ordinance is a misdemeanor. You can get up to six months in the county jail or be fined up to $250 for a first offense. It's $500 for the second offense and $1,000 for a third offense within six months of the first offense.

Or, you might face both a fine and imprisonment.

You will be charged the cost to the city of cleaning up any mess you leave behind, plus the city's administrative and enforcement costs.

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There are many unanswered questions about how the Median Island Ordinance will be enforced.

Police Chief Jerry Dyer on Thursday said he favors a warning system. He didn't explain his thinking in detail, but apparently the warning system would operate just as it sounds: A traffic officer, seeing someone breaking the law, would tell the guy to move on and stay away from median islands until he has a permit.

Then Dyer raised the question in everyone's mind: What happens if the guy gets on a FAX bus and heads a few blocks to another traffic officer's patrol area?

Dyer said the Police Department probably would have to develop an easily accessible computerized data-storage system to assist officers.

Another challenge: Dyer said many homeless don't carry IDs.

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I wonder how the traffic officer will approach the solicitor. Will an officer on a motorcycle pull into the left-turn lane with lights flashing, park (thus stopping movement in the lane) and discuss the matter while standing on the median island with the homeless man?

That doesn't seem any safer for the officer than for the homeless man.

Or will the officer park on the side of the street, then walk to the median island on a green light for the key conversation? This method might cause the homeless man to flee before the officer gets to him, escalating the danger for all concerned.

Or will the officer park on the side of the street and motion for the homeless man to come to him? I wonder who would get the blame if the homeless man makes the attempt, but is hit by a car.

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Council Member Lee Brand said he's heard that solicitors on a median island in a good location can make $150 to $200 a day.

"It can be a profitable job," Brand said.

Some people in the audience at Thursday's meeting worried that the ordinance is designed to be a money-maker for a cash-strapped City Hall. Westerlund denied the charges, saying the permit fee (the amount still to be determined) will be set no higher than necessary to cover administrative costs.

Dyer and Brand suggested that permit fees could be used for homeless services.

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Brand also suggested that the best way to make the ordinance effective would be to fine the givers. They're usually driving a car and have a driver's license.

Dyer said some cities already tackle the problem that way.

There also was talk from council members about simply banning all median island solicitors unless they're protected by state law. That idea appeared to have some backers.

At Council Member Henry T. Perea's suggestion, the ordinance will return to the council in one year for a review of its effectiveness.

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Last Thursday's debate got intense at times, both among people speaking during the public-comment period and from the dais.

Council Member Cynthia Sterling said: "What do you do with people whose only way to make a dollar is to solicit?"

She cast the only no in a 6-1 vote to adopt the ordinance.

After the public comment period, Westerlund spoke for nearly four minutes before calling on other council members. Westerlund clearly was angry with the comments of some public speakers, one of whom had warned the council that they will have to justify their decision to God.

"You know, I'll stand before God someday -- and I believe -- and God will say I did the right thing," Westerlund said. "Because people who have other suggestions are not caring about public safety in this. I resent the fact that anyone would question my intention as to the this because there's only one intention and that is do with people's
safety. There's no discrimination here."

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The Median Island Ordinance isn't only about the homeless. As council members noted, people on median islands may be selling flowers or playing musical instruments or seeking help to pay for a funeral or selling special edition newspapers to help Children's Hospital Central California.

But anyone who has driven Fresno's major streets lately knows most people soliciting from median islands are holding signs saying they are homeless.

Westerlund felt that some of the public speakers on Thursday didn't realize, or chose to ignore, the immense efforts -- he praised Sterling in particular -- that City Hall has made in recent years to address the problem in a humane way.

Westerlund also seemed to suggest that people claiming to be advocates for the homeless actually were enablers of homelessness, that their aggressive advocacy in the halls of government was only instilling a sense of entitlement and helplessness in people, many of whom, with help, could get back on their feet if they had faith in themselves.

Said Westerlund: "You know, we've come a long way [from] where we used to be as a society, where we were individually responsible for ourselves and we respected that, and we believed that we pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps. We don't see that anymore. You know what? Everybody is [saying], 'I'm a victim. I'm a victim.' You know what? That's not the case anymore."

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Last September, I read an excellent article by James K. Glassman that bears on Fresno's homeless challenge. The article was titled "The Hazard of Moral Hazard," published at "commentarymagazine.com."

Glassman begins: "When someone insures you against the consequences of a nasty event, oddly enough, he raises the incentives for you to behave in a way that will cause the event. So if your diamond ring is insured for $50,000, you are more likely to leave it out of the safe. Economists call this phenomenon 'moral hazard,' and if you look around, you will see it everywhere."

The term comes from the insurance industry and dates back to 17th century London. In this case, "moral" refers simply to modes of conduct.

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Glassman continues: "The most dangerous kind of moral hazard is produced not from explicit insurance policies (on which, after all, the insurer can raise premiums) but from implicit ones. If your teenager thinks you will bail him out of jail or fix it with the judge if he gets arrested, then he will be more apt to drive drunk. More broadly, in the jargon of Alcoholics Anonymous, your behavior would be called 'enabling.'"

Glassman explains the role of moral hazard in current recession, and ends with a plea: "At the very least, policymakers need to take moral hazard -- in all its permutations -- into their calculations. They did so in the past."

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The Median Island Ordinance appears to be another step in a coordinated effort to reintroduce moral hazard into Fresno's response to the homeless challenge. The needy should get help. Those manipulating the system to the detriment of society need to change their behavior.

The examples of the city's effort are numerous and figure to grow.

There's the 10-year plan to end chronic homelessness in the city and county, a document published in 2007 and drafted with the help of just about every civic and community leader in the region.

Gregory Barfield began work as the city's homeless prevention and policy manager on the day before Swearengin took the oath of office in January 2009.

The city recently announced new rules for passenger behavior on city buses, and the committee created to implement them includes a homeless advocate.

City officials are pursuing a policy of "no more homeless encampments" at the same time they're investing hundreds of thousands of dollars in finding housing and help for the homeless.

The city's efforts to create a Fulton Mall specific plan and a downtown community plan figure in part to be a two-year project that gets downtown residents and businessowners deeply involved in the area's future and gives them a sense of ownership of public policy. If successful, this can only have a dramatic effect on downtown homelessness.

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New housing for the homeless may be coming. An official at Kerr Rug Co., the retail floor covering store on the southwest corner of Ventura and G streets, said Friday that the store is preparing to move to another site in Fresno. Sale of the store's site at Ventura and G, which covers most of the block, to a group headed by well-known developer Tom Richards is in escrow and could close in May, the official said.

Richards helped draft the 10-year plan on homelessness and owns a portion of the property to the west of Kerr Rug, on F and Ventura streets, that was site of a large homeless encampment. Richards said he intends to help develop 80 units of housing for the homeless in downtown, as well as 201 units for low-income renters.

Richards took a lot of heat in some quarters for supposedly turning a cold shoulder toward homeless campers when the city evicted them from the F Street camp. How ironic if Richards ends up helping provide the homeless a real home on that same piece of land.

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But the city also is trying to change the behavior of the homeless.

For example, Barfield has said that he is firm in telling the homeless that they also must reach out to family and friends for help. He says a man might be homeless because he said something hurtful to a loved one. "Repair those bridges," Barfield says.

And Interim City Manager Bruce Rudd has said that Fresno will do all it can to help the needy homeless, be they the mentally ill or people trying to get on their feet after serving a prison term or those devastated by the recession or those fleeing a dangerous relationship.

But for those living on the streets because it's a place to break the law, Rudd said, "Fresno isn't for you."

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Who are Fresno's homeless?

On Friday afternoon, Otis Ireland, 39, was sweeping the dirt in front of his tent on G Street, next to the Monterey Street bridge and a few hundred yards south of the Fresno Rescue Mission.

He had been living in the camp at F and Ventura.

"Nobody moved us here," Ireland said of the Monterey Street bridge camp. "We moved ourselves."

The camp is large. Most of the tents and makeshift shelters are located along G. One of the tents is on a large wood platform, with a railing of 2-by-8s and six wood steps leading to the tent's entrance. Several tents are on the bridge itself, long closed to car traffic because of structural flaws.

Ireland said he's homeless because of an armed robbery conviction about 15 years ago. No one will take a chance on him, he said.

"I've done my time," Ireland said. "I'm not like that anymore. Somebody, anybody, please give me a job."

Ireland said he expects to soon move into permanent housing. He said he and other homeless people in the camp could be filing a lawsuit against the city. He didn't give details about the city's alleged misdeeds. He said "lawyers from San Francisco" would represent him.

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Vernon Collins was standing on the dock of an empty warehouse on H Street, a long fly ball south of Chukchansi Park. He was eating sunflower seeds and keeping an eye on his bedroll.

The bedroll was immense, and must have included other personal belongings.

"I sleep on the mall, Fulton Mall," said Collins, 62. "But I can't stay there during day. I hang out here."

Collins said he worked in construction, but got hurt. He said he's on Social Security, but it's eaten up by debts.

Collins said the homeless sleep at night under the awnings and overhangs of stores along the entire length of Fulton Mall. He said he and about six others usually sleep near each other on the stretch of mall between Inyo and Tulare streets. Police and private security guards sometimes roust them in the middle of the night. He said they relocate to the middle of the mall if they can.

"But it's windy there," Collins said.

The bigger problem is thugs on bicycles "talking s--- and hassling you," Collins said.

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Bobby (no last name volunteered) was sitting on a crate next to the Union Pacific railroad tracks. He was living in a shelter of boards and tarps in a large field near H and Divisadero Street.

"All this is railroad property," Bobby said. "Pretty soon, they'll come and tear it all down."
He pointed to an abandoned warehouse further south on the tracks, saying he used to live there until it became too dangerous "because of all the druggies."

Bobby was feeding rolled paper into a small fire. He was cooking meat on a square sheet of metal.

A woman emerged from the shelter to stand by the fire. Her name was Linda.

Then a man emerged from the shelter to stand with Bobby and Linda. His name was Rick. He was in a wheelchair.

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Without specifically mentioning the homeless issue, Swearengin addressed the challenge in her State of Downtown speech on Jan. 26.

"You see, revitalization of Fresno's urban core is not just about the physical restoration of the infrastructure, the buildings, the neighborhoods. It is also about the people. It is about new starts for the people who live there today.

"If we envision downtown and the downtown neighborhoods as being vibrant, mixed income neighborhoods, how many of you know that there are a lot of people who need to start earning incomes?

"And how many of you know that to have an income, you need to have a job? Having a job means having the skills you need to get a job. Having skills means staying in school, going back to school, or getting some kind of training to get you ready to work. Getting into a training program and sticking with it means you have to deal with whatever barriers you have in your life that are keeping you from education, training, and a steady job now.

"Those barriers for some of our fellow Fresnans are pretty darn steep, yet they must be cleared for us to see complete revitalization in Fresno."