At its regular Tuesday meeting, the Anchorage Assembly is slated to approve over $1.4 million in additional funding to support ongoing shelter operations and services for individuals who are without shelter. The expenditures are outlined in a series of Assembly Memorandums and represent a continuation of the city’s broader efforts to underwrite and expand shelter capacity amid a crisis in vagrancy and substance abuse addiction that has made Anchorage a daunting place for others to live and work.
The proposed allocations include the following:
- $730,000 to Catholic Social Services for continued operations of the Brother Francis Shelter (AM 387-2025). This amendment to the existing grant agreement with the Municipality of Anchorage and the Anchorage Health Department (AHD) would support one of the city’s central emergency shelter facilities.
- $50,000 to Restorative & Reentry Services, LLC for professional third-party oversight of emergency cold weather shelters operated by the municipality (AM 404-2025). This contract aims to ensure accountability and quality in the delivery of shelter services during the harsh winter months.
- $1,144,847 to Habitat for Humanity Anchorage for property acquisition to be used by the Municipality and the Anchorage Health Department (AM 407-2025). This investment is intended to expand long-term shelter or transitional housing capacity.
- $265,710 to MASH Property Management LLC for non-congregate shelter services (AM 413-2025), replacing services previously anticipated to be provided by Henning, Inc.
These proposed allocations follow several other significant expenditures by the city in 2025 focused on addressing homelessness. In previous months, the Assembly approved:
- $1.5 million in operational support to expand non-congregate shelter options in early February.
- $3.2 million for transitional housing development and support services allocated in March, which included funding partnerships with local nonprofits and behavioral health providers.
- $500,000 to the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness for data coordination and client services, approved in April.
The Assembly meeting will take place starting at 5 pm the Loussac Library Assembly Chambers on Tuesday.
Here are the appropriations and their links on the agenda:
You know how it is…
You’ve had a long day of stealing bikes, packages and shopping carts! You need a break!
Lucky for you Anchorage has provided a wide variety of parks and trails for that weary street criminal, drug addict, or alcoholic!
Just come on in and relax!
I’m sure you’ll find friends there right away! Pop together any type of shelter or tent you wish! Feel free to cut brush and trees and start a fire!
Let’s face it this is what these spaces are for! Feel free to leave all your garbage and personal waste we will clean it up for you!
You are the type of person we want in Anchorage . We are also ready to provide a large number services for free! Trust me , you will never be expected to work again! Food, shelter, cell phone, medical care, transportation…just ask or take it ..you decide!
Anchorage welcomes you!
You nailed it.
That was a perfect reply, by Bill
You don’t know anything why don’t you take the time to speak to some of these people and find out why they are homeless. Not all homeless folks are drug addicts alcoholics or anything that you think they are you have no idea some are thrown into homelessness because of circumstances out of their control and they’re trying to get back on their feet but judgmental people like yourself are the reason why we’ve learned how to hate up any people that think they’re better and above it just remember the more you judge will be the faster that you will become one of who you judge
Put your money where your mouth is Tabby, you have one of the homeless staying with you?
She does not. Much like punctuation the homeless can be difficult and it’s best to let others handle these things.
I don’t want a penny of my hard earned tax money going to the homless!! And you are completely wrong!! I would say about 90% have substance abuse issues….and most of them steal to get bye …..and I am speaking because i have lived amongst them!!! The thing is they are smarter than me and most definitely way way smarter than you…….while I get up to go to work at 5:45am go work all day and take care of my responsibility they are sleeping till 11am and get up and the party starts all.over again!!! And post up camp where ever they want….and end up getting free housing and a bunch of sympathy and use my money to fund this bs……you are obviously know nothing about the homeless people.or belive everything you tell you……you know what you don’t see alot of at homeless camps is children because they would be taken in a matter a minutes because it is not just familys and people having hard time make ends meet!!.it is a bunch of people that don’t want to get up go to work deal with the stress of feeding a family and paying the bills!! Most of them.choose that lifestyle or have been kick out of the places they where munching off of or kicked out of there village or community.
If you have been homeless for years…It is a choice. Period. Time to stop incentivizing bad behaviors.
I never identified with the sheriff from Rambo more than I do living in Anchorage. Haul them out of town and tell them to keep walking.
The people who are truly just having a rough go, have options available. The people in the bum camps are there because traditional shelters will not admit inebriates. We do need better facilities for the mentally ill, If they are controlled on medication, they also have places available, many choose to not take their meds.No one begrudges a responsible person who is having some financial misfortune. Those people do not live in toxic waste dumps.
Tells us…
What percent of the homeless are “thrown into homelessness because of circumstances out of their control and they’re trying to get back on their feet?”
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Take your time, I will wait.
Tabitha, I had to spend a month in the Rescue mission on Tudor and Lake otis about 12 years ago. I can tell you that 90% of them are actually, drunk, drug additced, entitled lazy people who don’t want to contribute to society.
Maybe you should spend stop being a hypocrite and talk to them.
PS, it’s not a mental health issue; it is an attitude issue. They all need to stop blaming others for their problems.
Don’t forget to poach fish, pollute the creek, and erode the bank. When you’re feeling frisky, harass taxpayers and demand things. If they don’t give you what you want, threaten them with violence.
Yes Bill, we do know how it is.
Great post.
The assembly ought to schedule all their meetings in the east Mountain View Hobo Acres facility.
Four contractors for this great endeavor. Were these favored “no bid” contracts? What do we get for our money? Any accountability or tracking? Probably not, just have to take their word for it.
MASH is a Mark Begich swindle, and of course Zelatel gets a slice. It’s just so disgusting how the same circle are always cashing in on this.
That should be enough to keep the leftist money launderers and human traffickers funded until the next traunch of confiscated taxpayers funds are excised from their paychecks
What joke. The Assembly’s greatest accomplishment is creating these camps for their favorite constituents.
More BS for homelessness in Anchorage. And of course Meg Zaletel is the head of the Anchorage for Coalition for homelessness which is already been under investigation for accounting errors that they can’t seem to figure out where the money went to… Just follow the money Yes that’s our Anchorage city assembly come on in we’ll give you something for free with no accountability whatsoever just come on in we’ll give you some money shelter and you don’t have to do a thing but show up! It’s disgusting shame on you Anchorage assembly.
Anchorage used to be known as the “All American City” but it is now the “All American Sh_thole”.
The homeless are there. They are a part of your city, and they have a right to be there if they wish. And you have a right to move away if the city is not as you like it.
What do YOU want to do with them? And I mean more than just complain about them.
Somebody’s got to try, and the organizations you list are doing just that.
Yes we have to take care of the less fortunate but it need to come with stipulations. Accepting treatment for their addictions or mental problems. Work requirements for those able. And incarceration for criminals. And yes, work programs in the prisons. Mandatory work programs. And no it doesn’t have to be like the horror stories from the deep south. It’s simply called being held accountable for your actions.
Okay then explain to me how it is that the people that are working like myself on disability my fiance does work The problem is that the cost of living is so high you can’t get an apartment for under $1,400 a month for a studio and if you’re lucky enough to find one for around a thousand what the hell you can’t live like that I’m sorry I want to go to work you have no idea I can’t I can’t stand up long enough to do so My fiance does work but even with that money coming in we don’t have enough to survive please explain how we’re supposed to live to you need one of us have drug problem either one of us have alcohol problem we need to bring homelessness cuz the landlord moved back to our place ever since then has been a nightmare we here trying to keep our head above water without losing it and I don’t have mental problems and neither does he please understand not everything is black and white and I do appreciate your support and understanding this if you want this genre they need to go out and ask people why they’re in this situation right not just judge everyone for what they’re done for everyone else don’t put us all in the same pocket cuz we don’t belong
Sorry Tabs…
Plenty of places in ANC renting for less than $1,000/mo.
Took me about 30 seconds to find them.
A reasonable approach. What I hear on MRAK is usually things like give them a bus ticket to anywhere but here, i.e. pass off the problem to someone else.
The people living in the “camps” are chronic inebriates who refuse treatment. They will not go to shelters because they must be sober. Some, too many, have serious mental illness. The entire state needs to look after the mentally ill, In locked, gentle, but firm, long term care. The problem offenders, don’t care that they are problem offenders. If they had any sense of pride or responsibility, this would not be a problem. The least they could do is clean up their own trash and not steal bikes and shopping carts. Sometimes I wonder WHAT world you live in.
Whidbey; show us evidence that you went to a homeless camp and talked to the bums. Let us know how your “compassion” and “empathy” and “understanding” of these drunks.
Show us how many you’ve invited to live in your house to help them.
This is the trouble with people like you; you want everyone else to pay for your expensive solutions. Then you cry that we are “heartless”… when we don’t want to shell out our tax dollars that go to waste.
Show us YOUR compassion.
Annex a plot of land between beluga and tyonek. Build a massive homeless camp out there and ship all the homeless out to it. Brown jug can open a new store. Flights available daily, if the passengers can pass a piss test.
I have solved the anchorage homeless crisis and it can be done at a tenth of the cost anchorage is currently spending
Run for office.
Why don’t you. You will fit right in.
Well, Whidbey, how about we make them adhere to the law. No trespassing, no camping except in approved campsites, no loitering, no littering, and certainly no crapping in public. How about we bust them for using drugs, both buying and selling, how about we bust them for raping one another, how about we bust them for vagrancy? Or are you all in on criminal behavior without consequence?
There are a great many programs that will get a person sober, get them a job, and get them housing if the want it. They don’t. So they need to go to jail. Period.
1) I agree that if they break the laws they should be prosecuted.
2) I am not in favor of criminal behavior, of course.
3). Some take advantage of these programs but many don’t. That’s too bad.
4). But if they don’t break the law then you can’t put them in jail just because they make you uncomfortable.
5). Your statements outline just how intractable the problem is. Even with laws and resources the problem remains. But being a FREE COUNTRY WITH DUE PROCESS does not allow you to send them to jail. And I’m pretty sure that jailing them will be more expensive than providing them with other types of help.
6). So the only solution is to try harder to fix things, because just hating them is not a solution. Other countries do it, so why can’t we?
Gl lay down by your dish, Whidbey. It’s long been my impression that Suzanne allows you to post your dreck exclusively for its clickbait value. Be that as it may, apparently even trolls have an esoteric value.
In your first item you state that “if they break the laws they should be prosecuted”. Vagrancy is a prosecutable misdemeanor. So are the other issues Ms. Nygaard pointed out; loitering, rape, drug use and sale, public defecation, trespass, littering, prostitution and more. There’s another element that operates on the periphery of the blue tarp community and an xlnt example of that was Ms. Valerie Kessler. APD lied to the public about a good Sam having found a thumb drive in a gutter near the now defunct Carrs Gamble but it was actually a homeless prostitute that stole a client’s cell phone and scrolled through the pics and vids until she found a video of a friend of hers being tortured and murdered. Your support of that community is support for their tawdry behavior. At the link below you can take a peek through the eyes of serial killer Brian Steven Smith who preyed upon Ms. Kessler and her friends in the blue tarp community:
‘https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tOdbrmCR90
– To support the homeless community (a monstrous misnomer) is to support criminal behavior.
– None of them take advantage of any of the tools available to them; they take advantage of others.
– Theirs is an existential law breaking. You missed it before so vagrancy (trespass, littering, prostitution, drugs, rape, poop), etc.
– You pretend that trying harder is a possible solution and though I’ve read a pile of your tripe this is the first time you’ve ever proposed anything that (you) construed as a potential solution. It’s not one but keep trying; you may have found a working synapse. Other countries don’t try harder to coddle miscreants as they understand that your reward for such idiocy would be more of them.
And who’s we? You’re retired and have transitioned to a hedonistic and parasitic life, no longer a contributing member of society. As such your opinion is flawed by the myopic view you have of problems that apply primarily to others but not you… unless it is that you enjoy an NGO relationship of some kind. That would certainly make your comments easier to understand. Your view also makes it easier to understand how the more densely populated parts of WA from Seattle to are such sh*tholes (to quote our current President and your future patron saint).
Your leadership would lead to a society of dirt bags and the devaluation of women. Your blue tarp friends call women ‘tent wives’.
Welcome the women in your family to the dystopia you support:
‘https://www.youtube.com/shorts/SdLBBbPagbY
Bravo. Thank you.
If someone breaks the law, it makes everyone else uncomfortable.. sometimes even dead.
But lets make the criminals feel comfortable, right?
This is an outgrowth of the NGO cash cow industry and you understand that well. Coddling social detritus makes no sense to reasonable people and the concept only exists to feed the parasitic industry that it fuels.
Open your yard to these folks. How many would you like?
…and in what manner do you benefit from this industry? Your contrarian posts don’t make sense unless you’re benefiting from the scam that’s being sold to taxpayers as a homeless crisis.
They are “trying” exactly the same things that have been proven to fail every other time they have been tried.
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That’s the problem, among others.
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And they are using my money to “try.”
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But, as the dedicated leftist you are, I’m sure you think the intent is what really counts. The aviator outcomes are not important, just that they tried.
Perhaps YOU should step up, since you like them so much. Except that you’re not even here!
Nobody has a right to camp wherever they wish.
Not a single soul has that right.
Whatever it costs to make Anchorage an All-American City again.
A former (twice) disciplined lawyer gets money from the Anchorage Assembly so they can provide services for the homeless. What could go wrong?
See
https://alaskabar.org/wp-content/uploads/2008annualreport.pdf AK Bar Assoc. 2008 Annual Report on Page 3 “Summary of Public Discipline Actions in 2008: The Alaska Supreme Court disbarred … Cathleen N. McLaughlin effective June 5, 2008;…..” among others in 2008.
See https://alaskabar.org/wp-content/uploads/July-Sept-2008-Alaska-Bar-Rag.pdf The Alaska Bar Rag — July – September, 2008 edition
Page 14
Attorney Discipline – Court orders a Second Disbarment of former attorney
The court disbarred Ms. McLaughlin shortly after Ms. McLaughlin become eligible to seek reinstatement from an earlier disbarment for misconduct involving many clients. The facts underpinning this second disbarment arise from a debt collection.
Cathleen N. McLaughlin is the principal CEO of Restorative & Reentry Services, LLC (As signed on the Agent Change Form April 2019 AK Corporations Database search).
Yep, MASH Property Management LLC is owned 100% by MASH LLC which is owned 50% Mark Begich and 50% Sheldon Fisher (AK Corporation Database search of both LLCs or an LLC within an LLC aka “nested LLC”). Both LLCs enjoy pass-through taxation, which means they don’t pay corporate income tax. Anchorage Assembly sure likes Mark Begich and his LLCs.
I recall your last city election has several bonds issues that were pretty low dollar. $3M for police radios was one, if I remember correctly.
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The assembly didn’t have the money for police and fire equipment, or park access. But they have the money for the homeless?
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That, right there is the biggest problem I have with this. Buying a luxury item, and funding the homeless is a luxury item, then borrowing money for the necessities. It’s a good way to end up broke.
How many times does it take for people to turn around and try and judge people they don’t know good situations they don’t know everybody is a very judgmental evil person nowadays no one knows the true story no one knows the full end up of why people have ended up homeless have a heart don’t judge couldn’t you offer solutions rather than throwing everyone into a hole per say and saying that’s where they all belong because not all of us are in the same situation not all of us have done the same things he doesn’t have done and will never do but we’re categorized with them and we shouldn’t be just remember if you judge somebody else’s situation you will end up in that situation because your mind will put you there eventually or the universe will
Look, Tabitha, I’ve tried to make sense of the poorly constructed messes you’ve posted here and it sort of looks like you’re trying to scold good people who’re tired of paying for and putting up with a destructive nest of parasites who’re destroying what’s left of what was once a nice, prosperous city while you simultaneously try to harvest pity from those you’re scolding.
And while I find myself brimming with concern over your plight, I also have to conclude that you’re in way over over your head and there’s no better time for you to move on to where you’ll be more appreciated.
Washington is literally awash with dilapidated indigents and your needy self will no doubt be welcomed with open arms and public funds if you’d care to leave your tarp and cardboard behind you.
In fact, I’ll further presume you could couch surf and raid fridges all over Whidbey Island for as long as you want to and you’ll never have to put up with the mean people in Anchorage ever again.
You need to go back to school and learn punctuation cuz it’s is way to difficult and not worth reading, your ONE, very long, rambling sentence in your multiple posts.
Tabitha; exactly how many times have you sheltered a single homeless person in your home? How many times have you talked to one of them?
Or we could spend it on just one of the bathrooms that were nearly crammed down our throat
There is no intention to solve the Anchorage homeless problem. It’s a cash cow for the Anchorage ruling class…the people running the listed businesses are not doing it out of the kindness of their heart. They are doing it to line their pockets with gold.
I moved here from San Francisco 2 years ago & thought I was escaping the madness of this issue. In California, massive amounts of money flow to organizations that literally make millions of dollars to rehab a few gross apartments and have a revolving door facility that helps literally no one. Throwing money at the homeless problem serves only to enrich those with the contracts. Services need to come after intervention & treatment. Empower the city to enforce the laws, fund the first responders first, then fund services for rehabilitated folks, post incarceration or treatment.
There are plenty of historical examples of cities that did exactly as the assembly seems to be doing with this new funding. Ask any Portland, SF, or Seattle resident how that model worked out.
WWDD. What Would Duterte Do?
My neighbor shared an accurate saying regarding this very issue: “Behavior rewarded is behavior repeated.” The Assembly is literally loving them to death. Unless and until the homeless take responsibility for their plight and engage in the work necessary to dig themselves out of it, these behaviors WILL be repeated. As long as local government is doing everything but wiping their butts, it will be business as usual.
I believe Mr. Constant could help greatly w/ that last comment of yours, Brad. He very much likes posteriors and he professes to be a huge fan of drug addled indigents and societal filth. Could be a win / win were he to consider taking a QC shift every morning in one of the open defecation fields surrounding any of our fine blue tarp establishments.
A squirty bottle, a roll of paper towels and a few garbage bags would be all he needed to be in situation where he could work within his core competency and at a job he truly loves. Whoops… can’t forget the trowel. Smells like victory!
HAAAA!! That reply of yours made my day. Thank you.
😀
Everything but wiping their butts?
The amount of OUR money they are spending on them I would say they are kissing their butts.
There’s a word for this stupidity… “enabling”.
a : to provide with the means or opportunity.
b : to make possible, practical, or easy
These elected officials spend our finite tax dollars worse than drunken sailors – it is a compelling argument to vote for change, and (for those who live in Eagle River or Chugiak) EaglExit to be able to walk away with our tax dollars so as to build a better and more responsive local government.
We’ve spent more and more on the homeless since the early 1980s and all we’ve received in return is more and more homeless. We’ve enabled this kind of behavior. Sure, there are severe mental cases among these people caused by drugs and alcohol abuse, but the real issue us that the Assembly and law enforcement are not aggressive enough on booting these people out of OUR parks and trails. If you make it difficult enough, they’ll move on and use the services available and hopefully clean themselves up. There should be shame in being homeless. They should be forced to face their issue and dig their way out rather than being enabled and stealing from neighborhoods to live rent free in the parks that we can no longer visit or take our children to because they’re filled with this dangerous human detritus. And mark my words, when it’s hot and dry this summer, at least one of these camps, perhaps the one behind the Tozier Track, will go up in flames again, and devour the Anchorage hillside. It is inevitable.
“We’ve spent more and more on the homeless since the early 1980s and all we’ve received in return is more and more homeless. We’ve enabled this kind of behavior.”
That is The Plan. The Homeless Industry has money to make, and you don’t make more money by having fewer homeless.
The homeless can’t be held accountable because they’re mentally ill, and/or addicted.
The homeless can’t be incarcerated and/or treated because they don’t want to be.
They don’t want to be treated because they’re mentally ill and/or addicted.
The cycle repeats, and the Homeless Industry leaves them in filth, criminality, and degrading conditions while spending millions more every year to [not] fix the problem, by doing more of the same.
It is inhumane to leave mentally ill addicts to continue criminal behavior and die in conditions that we would call animal cruelty if they were a dog.
I understand why the Homeless Industry does it; they’ve got to make a comfortable living.
What is incredible is that no one in the state calls out the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority and their — Eight Hundred Million dollars — in money. Where is the long-term inpatient treatment facility? Where are the beds? Where are the doctors?
Seems like every other month we see another million dollars appropriated, and no results. Huummmm, I’m wondering who is lining their pockets? And to the person above who said we can move, I’m going to. So are others. I’m looking at other US cities. One just built a new park for outdoor concerts for citizens and added a new area for people with radio controlled cars. Streets are constantly being repaved. It doesn’t take long to look at other towns and cities across America to see that the quality of life is better for those of us who are sick of paying for these entitled creeps! Pretty soon the number of paying taxpayers will be less than the enabled.
It’s cheaper to send the homeless back to where they came from. They don’t want the help. They would rather stay outside with their “friends” than fix their own situations. And it’s the Native people for me. The ANHMC send them to the airport but they don’t leave. If you pack them up and move them back to their villages, let the people who can help them help. For the others send them back to where they were born as well. A village an Island wherever. As a life long taxpaying Alaskan I have never had a handout. And no life wasn’t easy, but I have worked 2 to 3 jobs to make ends meet. They all have “EXCUSES” and the only people that are paying for it is hard working Alaskans and I’m tired of it. I want to go to the parks and not be bothered or step in human feces!!! Clean it up Anchorage and shut these camps down! Stop making excuses for people who don’t want to help themselves! And for those here with the “You don’t know these people, not all of them are drug addicts!” Please go out there and give them your address so they can GET A JOB AND GET OFF THE STREETS!
Looks like Meg Zelatel is going to pocket more money even though she’s currently under investigation for losing, or can’t account for the last million dollars she received for her Coalition To End Homelessness Program.
I was homeless for 20 years when my parents and grandparents died in my sophomore year of HS, and I went through the same drug and alcohol addiction issues and I also learned how to manipulate the system to get what I needed for free from the cities I lived in to keep my addiction going. Now I’m clean and own a house, RV, Harley Sportster, suburban and Malibu.
So having lived their life knowing how easy it is to manipulate the system and live for free, my view has changed. Now some of you may find this harsh, but I say Anchorage gives the homeless nothing and let them slowly die off, and then the ones who truly want to change their lives will appear once they know they have nothing free coming. And then that’s the people who Anchorage should help and let the rest die off.
This is coming from me, a former homeless drug addict for 20+ years and I decided to get my act together and they do too, but not when the free world is their oyster. Meanwhile Meg Zelatel is cashing in on millions of dollars she can’t account for and the current investigation against her will amount to nothing. I don’t know about all of you, but I didn’t vote for approval of $1.4 million dollars so how’d it get approved????
I’m happy for you Joe. You earned everything you have. Naturally, the Assembly wouldn’t want you to step up to their microphone to share your story. All the best.
What’s the point of Free Speech if you deleted my comment, there was foul language and vulgarity or discrimination in my statement.
I see Must Read Alaska is in censorship column if you don’t post my reality
Suzanne, we never found out who won the homeless camp naming contest! any update?
It’s in the Monday newsletter. Check it out here: https://mustreadalaska.substack.com/p/house-and-senate-bills-limit-the?r=36mgj
Anchorage is not even in Alaska. Sh// hole of a city that the Anchorage voters created. How do these assembly members get voted in, time after time? Soon the city will be no different then and city in the north west coast. Wake up Anchorage voters, you know the ones that vote in a candidate to protect your job. The candidate’s that vote 100% for your union raises. Ya that’s great watch the city you live in and work turn into Portland.
Get your frustration 100%, Jim, but disagree on one thing.
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All we know about votes and voter turnout is what we’re told by unelected officials, we have no forensic proof.
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The unelected officials who count the votes work for the Assembly. They count votes for Assembly members running for election. They count votes for bond issues sponsored by their Assembly bosses. What could possibly go wrong?
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Why should taxpayers, who justifiably challenge unelected officials on everything else, accept their word about who voted for what?
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There’s a lot of reasons for “easily corruptible” and “Anchorage elections” showing up in the same sentence and, to date, nobody’s explained ’em.
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Try not to be too hard on Anchorage voters. They’re suffering from Stage IV political rot, prognosis is so bad that half the community’s filing for divorce under Eaglexit.
It’s a natural progression when the economy burps. Over the prior decade we’ve seen that many of the wage earning population moved out for work reasons and when that happened Alaska was left w/ a thicker proportion of retirees, bums, low income wage earners and welfare recipients, each of whom have a voice and each of whom votes exclusively for free stuff.
It’s critical that only responsible people vote, a concept that came into clear focus once every trailer rec’d multiple ballots as our dear friend Ms. LeDoux so aptly illustrated.
When Alaska’s oil teat runs dry both City and State coffers will immediately collapse due in large part to the short sighted mail-in ballot approach which attracts input from a disproportionately irresponsible electorate.
And here we have Frank, once again standing up for the criminal element and their statist, far-leftist enablers.
We SHOULD go in, as citizens, and tear down those vagrant camps! Steal all their trash and pitch it! WHO is going to stop us?
Try it and see.
You would be in 100% support of doing exactly that if the homeless were conservative voters and Trump supporters.
Many here are upset about their tax dollars supporting homelessness services, but it’s important to clarify who actually pays these taxes in Anchorage. If you aren’t a homeowner, you aren’t directly paying property taxes. For those who are, the typical annual property tax bill is around $5,600 to $6,800 for a median-priced home, and only a small fraction of that-often less than $100-goes toward homelessness services. The fact that this relatively minor amount is driving such outrage is, in itself, a bit absurd.
It’s frankly astonishing to see such fierce hostility directed at people experiencing homelessness, as if painting them all as lazy, addicted, or willfully unemployed somehow justifies your brutish perspectives. What’s even more baffling is seeing commenters who have struggled with homelessness themselves now turn around and claim that others in the same situation are just lying, stealing, or manipulating the system to avoid work. This isn’t just a shallow stereotype-it’s a self-serving narrative that lets people feel morally superior while ignoring the reality that escaping homelessness almost always involves some form of help, support, or sheer luck, which is easy to disregard once your own circumstances improve. Demonizing the most vulnerable among us doesn’t solve anything; it only deepens the divide, excuses inaction, and reveals your moral ineptitude.
None of us makes only “good choices”; some people simply have better choices available to them. Compassion and understanding, not contempt, are what truly strengthen our community.
Is it okay with you if we are frustrated with chronic inebriates that are ruining our community? There is compassion for the truly situational unemployed short term folks that just need a couple months to get back up. There is compassion for the chronic schizophrenics who SHOULD be housed in a clean, secure facility, until a miracle drug is developed that the patient will take and stay on.
There are programs and resources for all that are WILLING to take responsibility for their lives and either admit their mental illness requires treatment or that their alcoholism is killing them and are willing to become sober. We are not willing to spend millions of dollars a year to enable people to drink themselves to death.
Bravo bravo bravo. A voice of compassionate reason in a wilderness of enmity.
Enabling people to drink themselves to death is compassionate? If we must do that how about not wasting any more money on the program. Perhaps the “compassionate” left can start a beer fund.
Need to see more compassion from you in something other that words. Adopt a few bums of your own. You can make the difference!!
I have yet to see a single liberal show any direct compassion for a single homeless person.
“Compassion” and “understanding” are over used words by liberals.
They often lead to the addage: “The road to ruin is paved with well meaning”.
In short, “Thoughts and prayers” is all you liberals have on this exact issue.
And….
That ruling was overturned a few years ago. Please try to keep up.