What do you expect? Decades of negligence, systemic disenfranchisement, and brutish treatment have borne fruit, in every manner of social illnesses -- homelessness, mental illness, et al. People don't change overnight, but people are changing at OPDX. Everyone is changing, growing, learning from each other, finding new ways of being. Don't be afraid of what's already happening. It can't be stopped now.

People need to take into consideration why the mentally ill are roaming our streets. I'm old enough to remember that, at one time, the state actually housed these individuals and assured them of care on all levels.

While some here will immediately think "Damish" and "Cuckoo's Nest" (i.e. "snake pit") there was something going on with "managed care" a few decades back.

*In the cost-driven medical marketplace, psychiatry and, more broadly, mental health have suffered more than the rest of medicine. Private health insurance benefits have been cut significantly, and the public mental health system is in a state of collapse that varies only by degree from state to state.* ~ http://ps.psychiatryonline.org/article.aspx?articleID=84430

And that quote/article is from many years after "they" unlocked the doors of state run mental health care facilities.

With all the advances in mental health, can we all now start to talk about reinstating state run care instead of demonizing those who'd seek to welcome and assist this forgotten segment of our population?

I'm probably just assuming here, but isn't that what Occupy is all about - making society more humane again? Am I wrong?

What is unfortunate is that since we as a society haven't figured out a way to deal with this "troubled population" of homeless, mentally unstable, and addicted (often all of the above) people, OPDX has sprung up as their best and/or only hope. Of course there is more crime - drug addled, psychotic people tend not to worry to much about obeying those pesky laws while they seek out ways to quiet the voices in their head.

Quit bitching that these poor dissenters aren't able to "manage" themselves. If we can't figure out how to deal with the problem as a society, why should we expect a tidy resolution in a few short weeks in those two parks downtown?

The way I see it, OPDX has done a better job interfacing with PPD, homeless services, and others than we should have expected. Meanwhile, they are also doing a great job keeping things from blowing up while still getting out a message around the plight of the 99%.