Daytona Beach Police Chief: Give Homeless Bus Tickets To Leave

[The Straight Story]

Daytona Beach Police Chief: Give Homeless Bus Tickets To Leave

POSTED: 1:37 pm EST December 28, 2006

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- The city's police chief wants to give free bus tickets to the homeless so they can find housing with out-of-town family and friends and get help with problems such as mental illness.

It is Chief Michael Chitwood's latest proposal to deal with the homeless population he thinks has given the beachside city a bad image. Earlier in the year he instructed police officers to arrest the homeless for petty crimes such as trespassing and panhandling to push them into getting help from social-service agencies.

Chitwood thinks the bus-ticket idea will help the homeless and reduce their local population of 2,600.

"I will do everything humanly possible to help somebody who is out on their luck," Chitwood said.

Other communities, including several in South Florida, have tried giving the homeless bus trips. Some advocates say it's a waste of time, while others think it's working.

The American Civil Liberties Union supports Chitwood's idea.

http://www.local6.com/news/10623102/detail.html

[MrCoffee]

1. seems like a better idea than locking them up on petty charges.

[mitchtv]

2. What makes me think they'll be tickets to Calif?

Oh, that's right, they did it already to AIDS patients- tickets to SF

[hashibabba]

3. Why can't he assist them in getting help from LOCAL social

services agencies? A lot of them don't have families anywhere, at least not families that care or are equipped to help them.

He wants to help them allright--right out of town.

[jmowreader]

4. Because then he'd have to spend LOCAL money on taking care of them

instead of passing his problem off on other communities.

The chief of police in Daytona Beach is a Repuke, correct?

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Two possibilities

1.- Best case, he doesn't have the money or resources

2.- Wost case, he wants to pass the buck

reality must be somewhere in between these two

But social soervices have suffered nationwide

[KamaAina]

6. They once thought spring break "gave the beachside city a bad image"

so they chased the college kids out of town. My, how times have changed -- or maybe not.

reduce their local population of 2,600.

I don't believe I just read that! The whole city has only 65,000 population -- so 4 percent of the entire city is homeless?! If that's anywhere near accurate, bus tickets aren't gonna get it done. Only SF-style social services will -- a pipe dream, I'm afraid, in the heart of Jebbieland.

edit: Good thing the chief is too cheap to spring for one-way air tickets to Hawai'i! Seriously, this was once the practice in California, Nevada, and elsewhere. We're still dealing with that influx.

[fishnfla]

7. To be fair: his plan is more than this

I have heard him speak alot on the issue because, well, he is doing something about a problem we have in this area and he is all over the place talking on it.

And how he is doing it makes sense to me. He has had task force meetings with local service agencies, local goverment officials (its not just DB, but countywide)police and neighborhood groups, media, and business leaders as well.

Most of the homeless are not from around here, just like many of the people that move to Fl. They come here for the weather, makes it easy. Some of the neighboring counties are dropping them off here.

The social services in this area are at a crisis level, even for tax paying residents of our community who need the help

His basic goal is to identify the homeless and the source of their problem and get them the help they need. He feels getting them back in touch with
their familiesis a possible solution.

But its all part of a multi-faceted approach, not just shipping them out. Its part of a program he learned from dealing with urban problems in Philly.

I'll give the guy the benefit of the doubt, for now

[MrCoffee]

8. i was wondering about the state of social services, thanks for posting.

[fishnfla]

9. One of the main ones just took a big hit

ACT corp, I think. Financial scandal and shenanagans with its director. The local drug and alcohol center, Stewart Marchman is at max capacity and has a waiting list for referrals.

The county wanted to build a new treatment center as theirs is woefully small.Politics shut it down.

The local programs for pregnant teens? Shut down.

Those are the ones that I can recall off the top of my head.

We are dealing with an area that is low-rent and run down. Service industry economy with a median income of around $18, 000 last time I checked

[maxsolomon]

10. funny - i've read that small towns give bus tickets TO the big cities

i can't tell you how many homeless we have in seattle from all over the country - we didn't breed em, but we get to pay for them.

must be the sunny weather that draws them here...

[Cleita]

11. A really stupid idea. If relatives could or wanted to take them in,

they would. It's been tried before in other states and it doesn't work. All it does is move a population of homeless into another county burdening them with the problem.