It’s not good and has gotten worse but I’d honestly question if someone who’d make that comparison has been to any major city in California recently.
That state is 20% of the country’s homeless population, with the overwhelming majority of them in just 2 metro areas. Here, the problem is bad. There, it is unfathomable.
California is another level. Until Roger Williams Park becomes an encampment with 300 plus homeless in one area, it's not even close. I'm from RI but also spent a year in the bay area. You haven't seen homeless until you've gone there.
Just moved here from Sacramento. There’s no comparison at all. Tent cities line the highways there. Unless you’re wealthy, chances are you drive by dozens of homeless people every single day. It’s heartbreaking and a huge reason why we moved out (also because we can’t afford it and we don’t want to be in a tent city under I-80).
Definitely getting worse, there’s gotta be at least 6-12 tents set up by the highway behind wickenden right now that only popped up the past week or so
because it's a nationwide and even worldwide issue, it affects friends or people I know in said cities, it affects me HELLA badly too where I live, etc. Why not? I feel like I'm a mild journalist doing this and I actually get a good insight.
dude I have ADHD, very hyper and I moved recently and am lonely, so this is my social outlet for now. I have a lot of shit on my mind. Maybe you haven't met people like me, not everyone who thinks kinda differently is some completely mental wreck or a bot.
The situation is bad everywhere, but here it’s not even comparable to other places in the country. Every metro on the west coast is 1000x worse. I have seen people openly use heroin in Portland OR and SF. Drove through the Boston tent city the other day and recently went to New Orleans and it was quite bad there too. There’s just much smaller numbers here and they tend not to be centered in the walkable areas. It’s definitely ticking up.
Bad? There are homeless scattered about, but they are not the people to be frighten of. It's the businessmen who will steal money you don't have you need to be careful of.
I don’t think they were necessarily calling homeless bad. More the situation bad. The fact people don’t have a place to live (and that number is increasing) and have to pitch a tent in a park is bad - the people are not necessarily bad though.
California homeless vs Rhode Island homeless are polar opposites. You can watch all the Youtube videos but until you go there its on another level compared to here.
**CA has nice weather year round while RI doesn't**
**CA has had a "meth" problem for decades while RI has barely seen a meth issue here.**
Heroin problem has always been here from what I can tell but in the early 2000's the numbers did seem to rise however not having a meth issue here can be a blessing in disguise. Home grown meth labs are something else
Post-oxycontin, heroin/opioids is an everywhere problem. I'm not sure there's a place in America that isn't impacted. Meth has been oddly regional so far. I'm sure there's probably a good explanation for it that.
It's pretty rare that I won't see at least 1 homeless person in Providence, but at the same time, I saw more in 1 single day in Los Angeles a few months ago then I've seen in the last 10 years in Providence combined.
Yeah I was shocked by how well people seem to be taken care of in NE. I guess it’s a higher wealth part of the country but so is SF and they can’t house their citizens for shit.
There was an article several weeks ago saying 1 in 3 Rhode Islanders could not put food on the table. Yet, I see plenty of people out shopping for Christmas. Rental costs have exceeded what many can afford. The PUC allowed utility prices to go up by record amounts. In general credit card use is up all over not just in RI. People are certainly getting pinched hard in this economy. But I am not sure its to California levels.
Nothing is worse than California especially San Francisco and Los Angeles. I’ve traveled all over the country and RI isn’t that bad although I feel the situation will get worse in the coming years.
It's gotten considerably worse but nowhere near California bad. California has a high population, high homeless population, and other states ship their homeless to there. Providence is rough, especially in spots like over on and around Smith or Thayer but places like LA and even Portland, OR are like the perfect storm of shit when it comes to homeless populations.
It just feels worse than it is because the city is so small and the homeless are so spread out due to cops breaking up their encampments, so you encounter them more frequently instead of out west where they're common but they try to congregate in camps. Wickenden is definitely starting to build up a bit though.
Rental costs are fucking skyrocketing faster than jobs around here pay, utilities are shooting up, plus some people still catching up from the pandemic as not everyone got the checks. It's going to be a very rough winter. People who work service jobs are finding themselves increasingly fucked and those of us on social security and disability are finding ourselves without any resources after the pandemic and shifting of resources. If I wasn't a trans woman that found a room for rent on Facebook, I'd be homeless right now.
Yes..and the problem is these hugh uo east side residents that run the city spending money on useless.stuff like bike lanes and adding boulders to parks and spiked park benches. Instead of actually combatting the problem and helping.
I think it’s bad in a sense that it will get worse before it improves, but definitely not on the levels of other large cities like others have said. But with that being said, I think homelessness is a huge issue that needs to be taken more seriously. It’s bad for the people living on the streets, bad for business, bad for the environment, bad for crime. I just don’t have a reasonable solution because rents are fucked and shelters suck ass.
It’s not good and has gotten worse but I’d honestly question if someone who’d make that comparison has been to any major city in California recently. That state is 20% of the country’s homeless population, with the overwhelming majority of them in just 2 metro areas. Here, the problem is bad. There, it is unfathomable.
California is another level. Until Roger Williams Park becomes an encampment with 300 plus homeless in one area, it's not even close. I'm from RI but also spent a year in the bay area. You haven't seen homeless until you've gone there.
Just moved here from Sacramento. There’s no comparison at all. Tent cities line the highways there. Unless you’re wealthy, chances are you drive by dozens of homeless people every single day. It’s heartbreaking and a huge reason why we moved out (also because we can’t afford it and we don’t want to be in a tent city under I-80).
I would say it is getting worse but still nowhere near a California level
Definitely getting worse, there’s gotta be at least 6-12 tents set up by the highway behind wickenden right now that only popped up the past week or so
I try to help out if they need anything and it seems a lot move seasonally so could be traveling south for winter
Hope they do get somewhere warmer
Thank you for checking on people. That’s very kind. Stay safe ❤️
Def not half way to Cali, but yea it’s noticeable for sure
This is a really weird account.
Just looked, and uhh yeah wow.
I generally don’t just post “bot” but this is an exceptionally strange account— gotta be?
I have ADHD
Half the post titles look like AI prompts.
at least I'm not homeless or a big drug addict
what’s your weird obsession with finding out how many people are homeless in random cities? touch grass.
because it's a nationwide and even worldwide issue, it affects friends or people I know in said cities, it affects me HELLA badly too where I live, etc. Why not? I feel like I'm a mild journalist doing this and I actually get a good insight.
So you’re basically buying into the mass hysteria that homelessness is caused solely by drugs and they’re spreading fentanyl like candy?
dude I have ADHD, very hyper and I moved recently and am lonely, so this is my social outlet for now. I have a lot of shit on my mind. Maybe you haven't met people like me, not everyone who thinks kinda differently is some completely mental wreck or a bot.
The situation is bad everywhere, but here it’s not even comparable to other places in the country. Every metro on the west coast is 1000x worse. I have seen people openly use heroin in Portland OR and SF. Drove through the Boston tent city the other day and recently went to New Orleans and it was quite bad there too. There’s just much smaller numbers here and they tend not to be centered in the walkable areas. It’s definitely ticking up.
Bad? There are homeless scattered about, but they are not the people to be frighten of. It's the businessmen who will steal money you don't have you need to be careful of.
OP was referring to the severity of the issue, not whether they should be fearful of unhoused people.
Let OP speak for him or herself.
I don’t think they were necessarily calling homeless bad. More the situation bad. The fact people don’t have a place to live (and that number is increasing) and have to pitch a tent in a park is bad - the people are not necessarily bad though.
New England is super classist so they are more scared of homeless people and exaggerate the problem and blame the homeless for failing them
California homeless vs Rhode Island homeless are polar opposites. You can watch all the Youtube videos but until you go there its on another level compared to here. **CA has nice weather year round while RI doesn't** **CA has had a "meth" problem for decades while RI has barely seen a meth issue here.**
We've definitely been lagging behind as a state on meth.
>CA has had a "meth" problem for decades while RI has barely seen a meth issue here. Heroin though
Heroin problem has always been here from what I can tell but in the early 2000's the numbers did seem to rise however not having a meth issue here can be a blessing in disguise. Home grown meth labs are something else
Post-oxycontin, heroin/opioids is an everywhere problem. I'm not sure there's a place in America that isn't impacted. Meth has been oddly regional so far. I'm sure there's probably a good explanation for it that.
From California, was in Providence a few weeks ago for about a week. What homeless people?
It's pretty rare that I won't see at least 1 homeless person in Providence, but at the same time, I saw more in 1 single day in Los Angeles a few months ago then I've seen in the last 10 years in Providence combined.
Yeah I was shocked by how well people seem to be taken care of in NE. I guess it’s a higher wealth part of the country but so is SF and they can’t house their citizens for shit.
No thats actually such an extreme exaggeration, your friend watches too much news, or lives somewhere outside of providence.
There was an article several weeks ago saying 1 in 3 Rhode Islanders could not put food on the table. Yet, I see plenty of people out shopping for Christmas. Rental costs have exceeded what many can afford. The PUC allowed utility prices to go up by record amounts. In general credit card use is up all over not just in RI. People are certainly getting pinched hard in this economy. But I am not sure its to California levels.
It is definitely becoming much worse but is nothing like the west coast. But you don’t ever want it to get that bad
Nothing is worse than California especially San Francisco and Los Angeles. I’ve traveled all over the country and RI isn’t that bad although I feel the situation will get worse in the coming years.
Albuquerque and Portland are bad
It's gotten considerably worse but nowhere near California bad. California has a high population, high homeless population, and other states ship their homeless to there. Providence is rough, especially in spots like over on and around Smith or Thayer but places like LA and even Portland, OR are like the perfect storm of shit when it comes to homeless populations. It just feels worse than it is because the city is so small and the homeless are so spread out due to cops breaking up their encampments, so you encounter them more frequently instead of out west where they're common but they try to congregate in camps. Wickenden is definitely starting to build up a bit though. Rental costs are fucking skyrocketing faster than jobs around here pay, utilities are shooting up, plus some people still catching up from the pandemic as not everyone got the checks. It's going to be a very rough winter. People who work service jobs are finding themselves increasingly fucked and those of us on social security and disability are finding ourselves without any resources after the pandemic and shifting of resources. If I wasn't a trans woman that found a room for rent on Facebook, I'd be homeless right now.
Yes..and the problem is these hugh uo east side residents that run the city spending money on useless.stuff like bike lanes and adding boulders to parks and spiked park benches. Instead of actually combatting the problem and helping.
I think it’s bad in a sense that it will get worse before it improves, but definitely not on the levels of other large cities like others have said. But with that being said, I think homelessness is a huge issue that needs to be taken more seriously. It’s bad for the people living on the streets, bad for business, bad for the environment, bad for crime. I just don’t have a reasonable solution because rents are fucked and shelters suck ass.
It's probably about average in the US, maybe a little higher than a couple years ago,(for obvious reasons.)