They do have certain rights in common with the rest of us. But among those rights is not the right to camp on a public street. I don’t care how much homeless advocates whine and complain about homeless people being shoddily treated by cities. The unalterable fact is that homeless people do not and should not have the right to “live” wherever they want, and nothing they argue, no amount of shaming us, will change that.
That’s why I celebrate Berkeley’s decision to give part of Carlton Street, on the city’s west side near the Berkeley Bowl, to Bayer, the pharmaceutical company that already owns a factory there.
A large and growing Carlton Street homeless encampment has been the source of multiple fires, with entire stretches of the street rendered unpassable by pedestrians, including Bayer employees, due to the all-too familiar sight of tents, piles of tarpaulins-covered junk, and discarded furniture reminiscent of the worst of Wood Street. Berkeley gave the street to Bayer in desperation when the city couldn’t figure out a way to clean it up, and Bayer promised to get the job done. Which I’m sure it will, if the city steps aside and respects private property, as it is required by law to do.
Needless to say the usual pro-homeless activists immediately came out to criticize the move. It’s not fair, they whine. It’s cruel, they complain. One homeless person told the Berkeley Scanner, “Berkeley is herding its unhoused constituents into shrinking overcrowded corners of the city. Nearly all of us lack access to 24-hour bathrooms or dumpsters.” A local politician said, “You should let the people stay there, provide services, treat them like they're human beings. We know you don't care about humanity because you don't give a shit about Palestine and the inhumane treatment that's going on over there." Another said people have "found safety" on Carleton Street "because it's one of the few places that's out of the public right-of-way and simultaneously public property."
Not any more. Now it’s Bayer’s property. And the lack of bathrooms? Not the taxpayer’s problem. As for Palestinians, what the hell do they have to do with homelessness here?
Look, all sorts of oddballs get involved in these homeless brouhahas because they feel their particular grievance is somehow tied to homelessness in an “intersectional” way. That’s their way of muddying the waters: anti-encampment laws are somehow responsible for Gaza, or the Republican war on abortion, or the demise of the whales. But that’s not true. Anti-encampment laws have nothing to do with anything else. They are common sense rules, based on principles inherent to Western civilization for centuries. And that’s precisely the point: those who wish to overthrow anti-encampment laws actually wish to overthrow Western civilization and its economic underpinnings. They wish to replace it with—what? They couldn’t tell you. They just have a vague sense of socialistic “equity,” in which “to each according to his need, from each according to his ability.”
What Berkeley has done in giving Carlton Street to Bayer may be unusual, but I applaud the city for thinking outside the box. We have to get tough with these squatters and trespassers. If we can’t do so using conventional means—and apparently we can’t--let’s get creative, and never lose sight of the ultimate objective: these encampments have to go, by any means necessary.
Steve Heimoff