What the heck is going on in Oregon?

Why are homeless people camped everywhere? There was a time when you only saw a few people near Burnside passed out in a doorway -- not camped there. Everyone else considered homeless was hidden out of sight, near trains, bridge areas and the like. They weren’t on every street corner with their permanent cardboard signs. They weren’t a burden on society as we now know it. Yes, they went to soup kitchens for hot food and help if needed.

We see this mess when you enter Oregon cities. But never do you see anything like this in on I-5 or I-205 driving into Washington along freeways and streets. Why is that? What does Washington do differently? Enforce the laws better? Not allow camping on public property? Not give out free handouts like we do? Maybe they don’t advertise all the freebies as much?

Oregon, let’s take a long hard look at what we do and how we do it to help people in need. Let’s not work harder to enable them, but get them to work for themselves and quit living off us. Make the ones who like to live that way do it somewhere else, rather than helping them. We tend to help their ways of life by giving more handouts. We don’t need this. Stand up and make them be productive members of society rather than a drain and disgrace.

Roger Currier, Newberg