Why is San Francisco ... covered in human feces?

[turbinetree]

Nathan Robinson
People aren’t pooping on the streets because they unlearned basic hygiene. Rather, the incidents reflect shameful levels of inequality in the city


It’s an empirical fact: San Francisco is a crappier place to live these days. Sightings of human feces on the sidewalks are now a regular occurrence; over the past 10 years, complaints about human waste have increased 400%. People now call the city 65 times a day to report poop, and there have been 14,597 calls in 2018 alone. Last year, software engineer Jenn Wong even created a poop map of San Francisco, showing the concentration of incidents across the city. New mayor London Breed said: “There is more feces on the sidewalks than I’ve ever seen growing up here.” In a revolting recent incident, a 20lb bag of fecal waste showed up on a street in the city’s Tenderloin district.

A city covered in poop is so disgusting it has to be almost comical. But the uptick in street defecation is the symbol of a human tragedy. People aren’t pooping on the streets because they have suddenly forgotten what a bathroom is, or unlearned basic hygiene. The incidents are part of a broader failure of the city to provide for the basic needs of its citizens, and show the catastrophic, socially destructive effects of unchecked inequality.

It’s impossible to talk about street feces without talking about homelessness and housing. While there aren’t actually more homeless people than there have been in the past, the gentrification of San Francisco has had a severe effect on the homeless. Development has pushed homeless residents out of secluded spaces, and there is less and less space for them to inhabit as “places where homeless people used to sleep becoming offices and housing”, in the words of a city official. The city routinely clears away encampments, causing people to wander around the city in search of a new temporary space.

Poop on the streets has another obvious cause: a lack of restroom access. Many businesses restrict their bathrooms to customers only, precisely because they don’t want their facilities to be frequented by the homeless. But the “privatization of bathrooms” means people are left without obvious places to go. There are even websites offering tips on how to go to the bathroom in San Francisco, such as by pretending to be interested in furniture at Crate & Barrel or finding the “hidden gem” of a bathroom on the second floor of a Banana Republic. The city has installed 25 small self-cleaning public toilets and recently commissioned a set of futuristic-looking new bathrooms, but a few dozen toilets for a city of 870,000 is woefully insufficient. Bathroom access should be considered a basic right, and it’s worth considering the idea of banning “customers only” toilets. In a city with generous public spaces and a commitment to equal access, no one would ever have to use the street.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/18/san-francisco-poop-problem-inequality-homelessness

-snip-

But there are “solutions” that simply put the problem out of mind – like Michael Bloomberg’s proposal to give every homeless person a one-way bus ticket out of the city.


Michael Bloomberg can go fuck himself........................Cholera and typhoid fever is caused by unsanitary conditions.....................shipping the inequality issue out on train or bus just shows how one person thinks .............no empathy, its all about fucking greed...............

[ghostsinthemachine]

1. Mostly around the Civic Center/City Hall

That area is awful now. The homeless have been squeezed into a small area around Civic Center.

But, there are lots of public bathrooms around there, at least during the day. Couple of the DeCaux restrooms, public buildings like City Hall, the library, and others. The problem is, what do you do with your stuff when you go inside to relieve yourself?
At night, it is Thunderdome there. Shit, piss, junkies shooting up in public, hundreds of people sleeping on the sidewalks with belongings chained to them so they dont get stolen. Sad when you see a person with no legs chain their wheelchair to their body. City crews do a great job in cleaning the area, and Market Street in general, hosing it down every night. Of course that puts the homeless on the move, with no bathrooms available that late. It does clean those areas, but they don't wash the entire city and some areas around there dont get cleaned nightly.
Making bathrooms available doesn't. Work either. Ive found two dead junkies in the same fast food bathroom, years apart. They use them to bathe, to shoot up, to have sex in, to get out of the weather etc. I dont think it is up to a business to deal with opening their restrooms to everyone. The cost is astronomical, and the customers are inconvenienced greatly. It's up to the city to provide, but that thought is fraught with complications as well.
Just like every other issue concerning homeless people, theres a lot to it, more than saying, build more bathrooms.

[Sophia4]

2. Ahhh! The famous public toilets of Paris, France.

Of course, in the US, a public toilet is an invitation to drug addicts for a "safe" place to overdose and for criminals for a safe hiding place.

What is easy in a society that values equality, brotherhood and all those kinds of feel-good values (and I am not saying France is such a society, but it at least makes the claim to be such) is not so easy in a society that values climbing to the top of the ladder no matter how cruelly you kick everyone else down.

This is a problem we could easily solve if we became a better society.

[SoCalNative]

6. Except the public toilets like this

in France and elsewhere in Europe aren't free. In Amsterdam it was .50 Euro to use one.

[Sophia4]

7. Even homeless people can afford that just from the hand-outs they get.

[MichMan]

3. People should be able to use a bathroom anytime they need one

While I don't live anywhere SF, I wonder if the problem of bathroom access might be addressed by banning "customer only" toilets like the OP suggested. A special tax could be assessed on all residents and businesses that would build enough public toilets to ensure there are an adequate number. This could also provide city jobs with benefits to maintain the facilities.

In the meantime, since there are few businesses open 24 hrs, a city ordinance requiring private businesses to stay open all night for that expressed purpose may be the only viable solution. I realize the business community isn't going to like having to staff someone around the clock , but I don't see any other viable solution.

If that isn't enough, it may also be necessary to take it a step further. The other possibility which would even be less popular would require private residences to give bathroom access to anyone who requests it. A lot of people aren't going to like letting strangers in their homes when someone knocks on the door at midnight, but that might be what it takes in a modern society to ensure a basic right like bathroom access is available to all.

from the link

"A broader problem, though, is the lack of interest that many San Franciscans seem to have in improving the lives of the homeless. Many seem to view this population as a simple inconvenience, such as the tech bro who complained to the mayor about having to see “homeless riff-raff” or the rich woman who took out a full-page ad in the San Francisco Chronicle to report having seen a homeless man with a pair of scissors."

Maybe if people were forced to let the homeless use their ritzy bathrooms in their homes they might change their opinions about inequality.

[Codeine]

4. No business or homeowner

should be forced to allow access to people to their bathrooms. I ran a business for years in an area heavily populated with people who were homeless and we allowed people access to our facilities until we got sick of people blasting feces all over the walls, leaving blood drops and filthy syringes all over, or people just disappearing into the restroom for an hour or more.

The amount of cleaning required was insane and often unsafe because of the heroin paraphernalia left behind. Nothing erodes empathy for a group like being forced to scrape diarrhea off the floor, wall, and toilet tank of your restroom just so you can take a leak.

Eventually our only choice was to close off the restroom to everyone except employees.

This is a public health issue and needs to be solved as such, with a publicly-funded and government-enacted solution. Allow certified and trained health workers to clean up the bloody shit and haul the overdosed junkies out, and allownthe cops to chase out the sex workers turning tricks in the stalls, rather than putting that responsibility on the shoulders of the folks making minimum wage at McDonald’s or Starbucks.

[MineralMan]

5. No question about it. It's an enormous problem.

The answer isn't just providing toilets. It's providing a decent way for everyone to live. It's about society having some compassion for those who are unable to provide for themselves for whatever reason. It is about taking responsibility for finding equitable solutions that assist those in our society who are the least able to function.

It's a public health issue, but it's also a public responsibility issue. The solution isn't simple, but it's essential.

[Sophia4]

8. Yes. We need to deal with the underlying reasons why people are homeless, and then

we can have clean public toilets (which we should have but not just for the homeless).

[Hekate]

18. I agree. It is a public health crisis & needs to be treated as such.

A couple of years ago I returned to my home state for my 50th high school reunion, and the presence of the homeless was really disheartening. I took my husband to a favorite local eatery, where a prominent sign outside said the restroom was out of order. Same sign stuck to the door leading to the restrooms inside. When I commented, the waitress told us to go right in -- the issues caused by the homeless meant they had to restrict use to customers.

[Revanchist]

13. I'd give it a week

Before the first rape or robbery if you forced people to open their doors to complete strangers at all hours of the night. Your opinion of the human species is much higher than mine.

[Hekate]

22. You first

[MichMan]

23. We don't have people pooping all over the streets here

[2naSalit]

9. I was

homeless for the majority of last year and finding a place or planning out which place to go to the bathroom was a big part of my day. Finding a shower was really hard.

[treestar]

10. Wow, I'm so sorry that happened

the only time I ever saw a public shower was in the airport in Alice Springs, Australia. It gets so hot there, so I suppose they saw that as a good thing to have.

[Skidmore]

14. Lately I have been

dreaming about becoming homeless. In my dreams, I worry about just those issues. And where to sleep safely . Chronic health problems have made me dependent in ways I never dreamed possible. Losing supports would be devastating in many ways. I'm glad you seem to have found improved circumstances after such a difficult time.

[2naSalit]

16. I had

some rather prophetic dreams prior to the situation that led up to it. Part of it was that I needed to stop working before I became incapacitated by working. I had had an injury but w/o insurance (pre ACA), I couldn't even get diagnosed due to rural clinic w/crook operating it. The WC agency in my state is there to make sure nobody is made to accommodate you if you get hurt on the job so I had to keep working until I was able to get MRIs on my own through our state's newly adopted Medicaid expansion. Then I had to apply for disability and actually stop working. I also relocated during this time and ended up not having a reserve to live on, all I had was my SUV and a storage unit to warehouse from. Fortunately I got into housing and was able to get disability in a very short time w/ no courts or lawyers. I am very thankful for that, now I'm trying to heal up a little but this whole political mess is distracting me. Now that I am dependent on the government, I am hoping that they won't start up the death panels.

[MineralMan]

11. Fully Staffed "Public Assistance Centers."

That's the answer, i think. In a city like San Francisco, about three of them, strategically located. Each would offer:

1. Ample public restrooms, with janitorial services on-site.
2. Shower facilities, available to all, cleaned by staff as needed.
3. Free personal hygiene supplies, donated by retail stores.
4. A clothing exchange, with gently-used clothing donated by charitable organizations.
5. First Aid and Medical clinic, available to both residents and tourists, staffed by a nurse practitioner.
6. Social services, counseling and referral office to provide assistance in finding housing and other resources.
7. Meal vouchers donated by local food service businesses.
8. A hand-picked police officer at a law enforcement desk to take reports and ensure safety.

Expensive? Yes. Worth it? Absolutely. It would not only serve the homeless, but also tourists and visitors, who also often find difficulty in locating needed services and facilities.

That's my idea for dealing with the problem. It's very unlikely to happen, though.

[peabody]

15. Best idea I've heard of

This could work.

[heaven05]

17. good one

but as you say, very unlikely.

[MicaelS]

19. Fort Worth has places just like that.

One is called the True Worth Place. It is the Presbyterian Night Shelter's Day Shelter.

It has 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 and 8.

The Union Gospel Mission down the street also provides hot meals 3X a day, 365 days a year and gives out clothes, and also has beds for the night for men AND women. So that covers 4 and 7. Plus the UGM is building a $12 million low income housing project, all with private funds.

The local MHMR has a Homeless Clinic.

There is another service, When We Love that helps people get signed up for Housing, ID services, and so on.

All within a 5 block radius on East Lancaster Avenue in Fort Worth.

Fort Worth has great Homeless Services. Even better than Dallas.

Still a shortage of public bathrooms, though.

[MineralMan]

20. The Twin Cities has similar things.

However pubic toilets are not part of that. Not right where they are needed. That's big deal. In St Paul, government buildings do, but security screening keeps people out. Parks are about the only option, but their facilities are not always kept clean.

We're not there yet for the people everyone wishes would go somewhere else.

[Hekate]

21. Makes a lot of sense, both morally and fiscally. The LA Times runs an intermittent series...

...on the homeless in Los Angeles. I think they said Skid Row now covers about 50 square blocks. The cost of housing is absolutely brutal, and is a significant contributor.

Once you (and possibly your family) have fallen through whatever crack you were standing next to...

[Anon-C]

12. How about a cyanide capsule instead of a bus ticket?

You know, a one-way trip.