Mike MacFadzen: Laconia should take Manchester’s approach to homelessness

To The Daily Sun,

There are many issues that face the City of Laconia. The homeless issue is the one issue that affects the most departments within the city. The homeless issue drains resources from housing, public works, parks and recreation, and our first responders. The police and fire departments handle many calls every day from unwanted persons and trespassing complaints, drug overdoses, panhandling, assaults, unattended fires, and many other types of calls for service. This drains valuable taxpayer resources and funds that could be used more effectively elsewhere. The homeless issue also effects tourism and business in Laconia. Consumers will not visit the downtown area to shop, sit outside and enjoy a cup of coffee or visit with one of the many merchants in the downtown if they can't do this without being accosted by a homeless person begging for money or something else.

There are many contributing factors to the situation and there is no one answer to solve the problem. The major contributing factors are drugs, mental health issues, enabling giveaways, etc. This is going to take a multi-agency effort to solve it. This will mean enforcing the law, offering individuals an opportunity for substance and mental health treatment, cleaning up the encampments and not allowing them back. We can't just keep moving them from one spot to another. We need to take an approach similar to what Manchester is doing to deal with their homeless issues. We can't arrest our way out of the problem but the arrest is often the introduction to the system that an individual needs to begin the recovery process. This issue will take everyone working together without being concerned for personal political agendas in order to solve it. Great things can happen when no one cares who gets the credit. 

Mike MacFadzen

Laconia