Unfortunate this article fails to address the gentrification of Taos that priced out the locals creating desperation and homelessness... Taos business owners, residents decry crime, homelessness downtown santafenewmexican.com/news/local_new… via @thenewmexican
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican @Carrionflower1 Tropes? Have you seen the homeless in Santa Fe? The beggars at every intersection? Contrast that with the Help Wanted signs everywhere. These people are drug addicts. They weren't "priced out". They need help but most won't choose it freely.
My family moved to Taos in 2008, & even then rent was nearly double what my parents had been paying in a college town in Idaho. Expenses were high enough my dad's employer at the time gave him a stipend to compensate for the high rent. I can only imagine it's gotten worse since moving away 14 years ago. Add to that, Taos's cold winters drive costs of heating up. What annoyed me most living in Taos was the attitude of many Anglos who had moved there who wanted to regulate & restrict, living out of their $2M dollar homes, while their nextdoor neighbor lived in an old adobe they'd had for 300 years & were struggling to heat the place. What gives? The Anglos need an education on respect for other cultures and how they're destroying a culture.
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican I am in downtown El Paso once per week and rarely see homeless and panhandlers. They seem to be everywhere in NM. You would think El Paso would be overrun with homeless but it’s also one of the safest cities in the country. I am always curious about what they do differently.
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican This is a pattern, the same thing in Santa Fe, Espanola, and the rest of the US. The real estate lobbies approved narrative, with a bit of adversity porn. As if it is a mystery, why unhoused people are ending up in their neighborhood. Media describes only one "solution" too.
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican Back in 1998, the Realtors lobbied congress, to make it illegal to spend federal money on housing. They passed the Faircloth Amendment. Not one "compassionate" article about the unhoused, crime, or random non profit, will mention why people are unhoused, that part is censored.
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican Every article, contains the same tropes too. "They just don't want any help" or something about "drugs" Often they will go interview, one of the most visible, talkative unhoused people. The ones who have internalized the same false narrative, presented by media, +"helpers"
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican I talk about it on my youtube
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican That’s so real. Gentrification, taking no responsibility for destroying so many lives. I visited Taos in 1974, and there were happy, contented people, living simple lives. it’s nothing like that today.
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican This Taoseno is preparing a detailed response to this article. The problems highlighted in this article are the convergence of MANY problems in this town we refuse to address.
@JennBurrill @thenewmexican Or the high rate of suicide by young people that goes hand in hand with the failures of government and communities to address the issues