Rats

Hello Everyone:

It is a Monday June gloom day and a fresh week on the blog.  Yours Truly spent part of the weekend rolling her eyes at the president's mind boggling interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos.  In essence, he admitted that he would consider accepting "dirt" on election opponents from foreign agents, calling it "oppo[sition] research." This is illegal to accept anything of value (including opposition research) from foreign agents for the purposes of swaying an election.  Further, he denied ever telling former White House Counsel Don McGahan to write a letter saying that he--the president--never told him to fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller, citing Article 2 of the United States Constitution.  Article 2, Section 2 gives the president the right to appoint advisers and cabinet ministers with the advise and consent of the Senate, period, full stop.  The Constitution says nothing about whether the president can fire his appointees, unless the appointee is unqualified, which in this White House can mean a lot of different things.  Speaking of firing people, the president dismissed his pollsters following dismal results from a hypothetical election between the president and Democratic candidate.  Pro tip: if your internal polling shows you losing by as much as 15 percent, the problem is not the poll takers, it is your message.  Soapbox moment over, time to move on.

Rat
smithsonianmag.com

 Rats.  For some people, rats make excellent, clean, well behaved pets.  For other people, they are disease carrying vermin.  Rats have invaded Downtown Los Angeles and City Hall cannot seem to figure out what do about the creatures.  What is certain is their source, trash from illegal dumping and the homeless encampments.  How did this happen and can, if anything, be done.

To their credit, Los Angeles City sanitation and members of a cleanup team hired by the business improvement district organizations regularly come around to pick up the mountain of rotting reeking trash.  The cleanup is a game for the rodents who pop in and out of the piles of debris before scampering for cover when the tractor comes to scoop up the trash.  Sorry to wreck your appetite.

Pile of rotting trash
nbclosangeles.com

How and where did the rats come from?  To answer this question, you have to go back to November.  L.A. City Council President Herb Wesson first became aware of the vermin issue in his office in November (nbclosangeles.com; Feb 8, 2019; date accessed June 17, 2019) and brought in the pest control firm, the appropriately named Cats USA, contracted by the General Service's Department.  The exterminators set traps and told Council President Wesson to get rid of the live plants the rats were eating, removing or containing all food products.  Blogger supposes a cat would have worked just as well but a cat would have been become a haven for the fleas that nested in the subsequently removed carpet.  However, what do rats and fleas bring?  Diseases like typhus.  Seriously.

What is typhus?
study.com

Typhus is a flea-borne disease that can spread to people from infected fleas and their feces (Ibid).

 According to a motion by Council President Wesson and a member of the Personnel Department, Parker Center's demolition, vacant since 2013, may be partly responsible for the rats.  In October, health officials announced an outbreak in Los Angeles County, including Skid Row, home to about 2,000 people (Ibid).  Mayor Eric Garcetti responded by announcing funding for "enhanced cleanup" in the area (Ibid).  The Parker Center demolition was only one part of the problem.  Another component of the problem was the possession of the area's homeless population.

In February, a quickly approved motion called on all city departments to develop and consider remedies to the infestation. During a committee hearing, prior to a full vote by city council, Council President Wesson said,

I want to make it crystal clear that is council truly believes that when individuals come to work for the city of Los Angeles that the only thing they should be concerned about is getting here on time,... They should not be concerned about coming to work and finding themselves in an unsafe or unhealthy environment (Ibid)

The motion stated that there has been a noticeable increase in the volume of rodents in the areas and within city buildings (Ibid; Feb. 1, 2019).  Cats USA conducted a comprehensive on-site survey of the City Hall buildings and the pedestrian bridge connecting the East Building on Main Street to the main campus.  The Personnel Department sent an email writing that Sanitation, Street Services, and Recreation and Parks would be tasked with the cleanup (Ibid; Feb. 8, 2019).  That was in February and now it is June.

Scene from L.A.'s Skid Row (2013)
dailynews.com

It is June and the trash problem persists as do typhus and typhoid fever.  You read correctly, the largest city in a state with fifth largest economy in the world is dealing with pre-Industrial Revolution period diseases in the 21st century.  Part of the problem: "We've got thousands of people huddled on the streets, many of them withering away with physical and mental disease.  Sidewalks have disappeared, hidden by tents and the kind of makeshift shanties you see in Third world places..." (latimes.com; June 2, 2019; date accessed June 17, 2019).  Here is a sobering thought, "According [files.hudexchange.info; Dec. 2018; date accessed June 17, 2019] to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 'California accounted for 30% of all people experiencing  homelessness as individuals in the United States and 49% of all unsheltered individuals...'"  This may be the 21st century but we are talking about typhoid and typhus; an army of rats has invaded the Civic Center.

The trash is everywhere.  Essentially, Los Angeles city streets have become giant toilets and dumpsters.  The easy solution would just get rid of the homeless encampments that take up the sidewalks but it is not that simple.  During public comments at the February council meeting, Councilmember Joe Buscaino pointed to a 2016 federal court injunction that limited the amount of encampment cleanup the city can undertake in Skid Row and prevents the seizure and destruction of the homeless' property without advance notice. (nbclosangeles.com; Feb 8, 2019).  U.S. District Court Judge S. James Otero also ordered Los Angeles to separate and store the belongings where they can be recovered.  According to Council member Buscaino, this led to a significant increase in encampments in downtown (Ibid).  Caught in the middle are the cleanup crews, sanitation workers, and the public who have to pick their way around the rubbish heaps on a daily basis.  The homeless encampments are another part of the problem, illegal dumping is another big problem.

Illegally dumped trash
dailynews.com

Parts of Skid Row look like landfills.  Trash is scattered on the streets and sidewalks.  There are old mattresses, furniture, tires,  and food.  The food, mostly spoiled produce, comes from the nearby wholesalers.  It is no secret that some of the illegal dumping is one by the local merchants and customers.  The rotting food is a magnet for the rats.  The murky water from from clogged or broken sewer lines is a breeding ground for all sorts of unimaginable germs and bacteria.  The sad part is the homeless live this muck and there is no end in sight.  Basically, it is a never ending clean up cycle: No sooner is the mess cleaned up, then another pile appears.  Call the city and someone comes out to clean up, until the next times.  Sorry to ruin your supper.  Is there any viable solution?

Inflatable rat
dailynews.com

It is the chronically homeless that are at the center of Los Angeles' deteriorating conditions but Los Angeles is not the only West Coast city.  San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland are also experiencing a rise in chronic homelessness, defined by HUD as,

...a person with a disability who has been continuously homeless for one year or more or has been cumulatively homeless at 12 months in the past three years... (forbes.com; June 4, 2019; date accessed June 17, 2019)

Housing the chronically homeless is not so simple because some are drug with little incentive to get into treatment thanks to state laws that classify possession of small amounts of illegal substances as misdemeanors with no jail time and mandatory treatment.  Often, the offenders are back out in the streets hours after their arrest.  Budget cuts to mental health care have forced psychiatric hospitals to release patients, some of whom require full time care that friends and families cannot provide.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti
lamayor.org

 Despite the promise to clean up the streets of Los Angeles, the heaps of trash remain on the sidewalk and there is no formal program in place to address the problem.  Mayor Eric Garcetti had to concede that the city has to do a better job in regularly clearing the rubbish that attract the disease carrying rats.  The problem is not confined to Skid Row; the problem has spread across the city and into local parks frequented by families with children.  The Mayor seems at complete loss over what do.  An army of feral cats is absolutely not the solution.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution to cleaning up Los Angeles city streets.  Perhaps, when businesses and people start retreating again from Downtown Los Angeles, as they did in the post-World War II era, then maybe something akin to a permanent multi-pronged solution will be found.  The coming 2028 Summer Olympics should provide another incentive to clean up the sidewalks and the parks.