These two accounts are compelling. One is from Austin, who provides cleaning services in downtown Belllingham. The other from Adam, a business owner on State St. [See Related Files below for their full narratives.]

Austin:  

"Last Friday [December 5th], In the front alcove of where I clean, Sojourn, there were a group of guys, smoking pot and cigarettes, on drugs, with garbage all over and spilled liquid. A guy asked if I was being nosy, was I being judgy. One guy was going off on how he hates the police and the government. When I went in to the shop, someone pissed in the alcove. A guy helped me clean up the garbage, talked about the negative vibes, with that, someone tried to pick a fight. The group ended up moving in front of The Bagelry, as they [the police] do not move people along.

"Railroad avenue was strewn with garbage, clothes, excrement [see photo above] and street people hanging out. I saw 35 individuals downtown, by 8:20AM. Little Cheerful is the hub. An overdose was occurring earlier. In the alcove of J J’s, a tweaker was sharpening his stick weapon using the wall. On the corner of Horseshoe, there were people huddling with an umbrella and blanket covering. I saw fentanyl foil."

[Further on she states...]

"A policeman said one of the reasons why downtown is the way it is, Love2Hope and other agencies provide food, clothes and pet supplies, in the alleys, in front of the bus station, by the library and every day there are pop ups. People don’t have incentives to receive services. Downtown is getting the brunt. Bellingham is known for what is offered. Realize that more and more street people are finding their way here. When will you be working together, supporting their noble cause at an appropriate location?"

Adam:

"Austin is right to be critical of various non-profits' outreach in the area... it doesn't appear to be making things better. Handing out materials that prolong the suffering evidently isn't working. Fentanyl and other drugs are so powerful, any enabling of the continued drug use on the streets is taken. In my view, most of the people on that one square block area meet the criteria for the Involuntary Treatment Act under state law. What are the gaps in the system that are preventing this? The city should take a firmer lead in coordinating non-profits actions. I've seen a lot of resources go into these organizations with poor or even counterproductive results. The first question I ask every non-profit dealing in the homelessness and addiction space is: "How many people are you pulling out of homelessness and/or addiction?" This should be the most important metric to measure, but instead it's "How many people served?" when I review contracts. If "serving" is actually enabling destructive behavior, we get what we see today."

What is missing here is a realization that the so-called non-profits, charities, faith-based organizations or whatever you may call them, are representative of, and by their very existence, are measures of and contributors to the failure of governments. In a sense, they provide cover for societies and their leaders to ignore the true scope of the problems, and therefore, the actual extent to which government falls so miserably short and will not improve.

This is certainly not to malign those involved in these charitable activities or those who contribute their time and money to support them. They do yeoman’s work. But in a sense, this good work distorts the reality of the situation and allows private financial contributors to these organizations to feel better about themselves while ignoring the failings of government entities. It takes the heat off those who govern and, rather perversely, allows them to self-congratulate as they intermittently become the fillers of the gaps…when they deign to be.

The simple truth is that we are condemned to operate under the equivalent of a Thunderdome where there is no present solution to these intractable situations. This system we operate under is broken. Capital needed to confront these issues has flown, instead, into the coffers of the rich and the absent. Consequently, we will continue to snap and snarl at one another until such time as the current structures fail totally and a rethinking and rebuilding can take place. So that there are no illusions, that simple truth must be told first.