City leaders are complaining that the various area counties are actively shipping their homeless in to the city to live in group camps like the infamous “Hopeville” encampment. Of course by “shipping” we mean driving them in a car in to the city and then telling them to get out, but it’s way more funny if you think of it like the county is setting homeless guy traps filled with homeless guy treats like beard combs and flanel jackets only to shake them out of their cages, releasing them in the wilds of south city and downtown.

Of course none of this would be a problem if we just did what grown-up cities do and merge the county in to the city, but then there’d be less politician jobs and there’s less chance of politicians working to get rid of political positions than there is of the DH going way in baseball. We should be sharing our homeless guys, not passing them around, but alas, it’s not to be.

The extra homeless population is stretching city resources to its limits.  No laws are being broken by dropping the homeless into the city, but officials say it is getting out of hand.

The St. Louis Director of Health uses “Hopeville,” a homeless camp along the river, as an example of how the homeless are being taken to St. Louis.  Sixty people lived at the camp last summer.

“Every one of the individuals in the encampment came from outside the city limits,” William Siedhoff, St. Louis Director of Health, said.

This is a total dick move if county leaders are indeed doing this. Downtown is really the worst place for homeless people to be dropped in. It’s constantly filled with stuffy business guys (day time), drunk douchey kids (at night), fat hoosiers (summer time) or  stabby people (all the time) all while building after building of nice un-purchased lofts look down on them like industrially designed puppy dog eyes. The county seems like a better place all around for homeless people anyway with tons of Applebee’s throwing out unordered mexican egg rolls of fajita whatevers, and far more Quiktrips for late night loitering.

St. Louis County officials say they do drop off homeless people in downtown because the county pays the private shelters per bed that they use.

So when accused by the city for dumping homeless people across it’s borders, the county officials responded with something like: “Of course we don’t do that, because if we did it would save us a ton of money.” Um…ok. That seems like you defending yourself by supplying a clear motive. Nicely played.

Has it occurred to anyone that maybe the county, with it’s large population of hunters, is dropping off it’s homeless here to hunt them ala Ice T’s “Surviving the Game“? Chesterfield just said you can’t go around shooting guns in your backyard, but random gun fire rarely garners a glace in the city. However, the lack of homeless guys with expensive arrows through their back means either we’re wrong or that the plans are happening, but like so many upper deck sporting event tickets, the county folk are passing at the last second. “Ugh. The city? I really don’t feel like going there for this. It takes up the whole day! You know the privacy hedge isn’t going to mulch around itself!”

via KMOV