
Judge rules Seattle homeless man’s truck is a home - nouveaux
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/homeless/judge-rules-seattle-homeless-mans-truck-is-a-home/
======
felipelemos
Imagine the situation. The only property that you have is a truck. You get out
of money and cannot afford gas anymore, so for 72h straight your truck stay
parked in some street. The city notices this and impound your vehicle. Now you
have to:

1\. Pay for the time your vehicle is in city deposit and the fine

2\. Do nothing and wait for your vehicle got auctioned.

You end up with the second option because you don't have any money (or the car
wouldn't be impounded in first place). So you now have: a fine to pay and no
car.

And no place to live.

~~~
FussyZeus
Just another one of those fun ways that being poor in America is ludicrously
expensive.

~~~
ythn
So how does this play out in Europe? Say, a poor immigrant can't afford
housing in London so he sleeps in an illegally parked car.

~~~
pas
The car gets towed.

But asylumseekers and refugees get some money from the state they are doing
the legal asylum/refugee process.

Oh, and you can push a car by human strength. Preferably at night, to
somewhere else.

------
influx
I'm watching closely for the implications of this ruling. There are already
Seattle neighborhoods who have folks living in their RVs, cooking meth, with
no trash service, no working sewer system, selling drugs out of their RV,
spewing needles around the ground, and the police already refused to do
anything about it.

Sympathetic to the plight of the homeless, but there needs to be enforcement
of laws and respect to the neighborhood that you are living in, whether or not
you are homeless.

[https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/meeting-draws-
hund...](https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/meeting-draws-hundreds-
frustrated-by-rvs-property-theft-in-seattle/)

~~~
ProAm
This ruling is completely different from your example. Making and selling
drugs and even littering is still 100% illegal, regardless of if you do it in
your home or car. Very different from selling your car/home to pay parking
tickets and fines.

~~~
influx
Seattle police have already been told to stand down enforcing homeless folks
living in vehicles, including when residents report drug selling, and health
violations. This ruling will just add to the pressure for police to look the
other way.

It's not fair to the residents of the neighborhood, or people living in
vehicles that are respecting the law and minding their own business.

[http://www.kiro7.com/news/local/seattle-business-owner-
frust...](http://www.kiro7.com/news/local/seattle-business-owner-frustrated-
by-crime-violent-incident-near-unauthorized-rvs/681752879)

~~~
evanlivingston
Are the people living in vehicles not minding their own business? How do you
know the people living in homes are respecting the law?

Do you see that you're putting a value judgement on ownership of a home and
attributing them with some ownership of the "neighborhood" while denying that
broader sense of ownership to people choosing to reside in that neighborhood
in their vehicles?

~~~
toasterlovin
The people who own property contribute to the upkeep of the neighborhood in
the form of property taxes. People living in cars do not. That is the
fundamental difference.

~~~
dragonwriter
> The people who own property contribute to the upkeep of the neighborhood in
> the form of property taxes. People living in cars do not.

That's, if true, entirely the fault of how your state allocates revenue from
vehicle license fees, not the people living in (currently licensed) cars.

~~~
munificent
If you were to jack up vehicle license fees, you would further punish low-
income people who are barely getting by and need to drive for work.

~~~
newnewpdro
You're willfully ignoring the obvious classifiable difference between a
vehicle used as a dwelling vs. a vehicle used for commuting. There could
simply be a registration category for vehicle dwellings with increased fees to
offset the difference. This could even translate into states providing
facilities for pump outs and showers for those registered for vehicle
dwellings to improve the sanitation of what's going to be happening
regardless.

The reality is the law, as always, is lagging behind reality. Things have
changed substantially in the last few decades in terms of how realistic it is
to live a fairly normal and connected life from a vehicle. There is
essentially no practical need for a mailing address or land line anymore for
example, smart phones, internet, efficient solar panels...

Drug addicts/cooks living in squalor who happen to be in vehicles will be
committing myriad obvious and easily policed crimes. Why those police are not
doing their job is entirely orthogonal to if a vehicle should be considered a
potential legal residence.

~~~
munificent
_> There could simply be a registration category for vehicle dwellings with
increased fees to offset the difference._

What incentive do people have to not lie about that? When someone loses their
home, are they obligated to go to the DMV and update their registration and
throw in a bunch of extra money? How do you police this? Do you have the
police capacity to handle this?

How do you enforce violations? If someone is living in their car but didn't
pay the registration, do you tow their car? Doesn't that get right back to the
original problem?

 _> This could even translate into states providing facilities for pump outs
and showers for those registered for vehicle dwellings to improve the
sanitation of what's going to be happening regardless._

In the Seattle area, at least, there are free RV hookups for people to dump
their waste. Many people just don't use them. Their vehicle may not actually
be that driveable, or maybe they can't afford the gas, or maybe they simply
don't care.

 _> There is essentially no practical need for a mailing address or land line
anymore for example, smart phones, internet, efficient solar panels..._

Yes, a well-adjusted, committed person _can_ leave reasonably from a vehicle.
But what about the people who live in vehicles in part because they aren't
doing the work required to keep the social contract and be a participating
member of society?

 _> Drug addicts/cooks living in squalor who happen to be in vehicles will be
committing myriad obvious and easily policed crimes._

Many of these crimes aren't easily policed, actually. Drug possession requires
a warrant to search a vehicle. Finding discarded paraphernalia isn't enough,
nor is a witnessing drug use. Littering and waste dumping are almost
impossible to police — you have to be caught in the act by a police officer.

Ignoring that, the reality is that Seattle _isn 't_ policing these.

------
AdmiralAsshat
> Moreover, the courts "have consistently held that there is no constitutional
> right to housing."

I'm still puzzled at how our society affirms our Right to Life, while
simultaneously affirming food, water, and shelter as Essential to Life, yet
will never make the logical conclusion that food/water/shelter are necessarily
included in our right to life.

1\. All men are entitled to life.

2\. Food, water, and shelter are essential to life.

3\. Fuck you, get a job or freeze to death.

~~~
RcouF1uZ4gsC
Rights are mainly seen in the US as negative rights. The Bill of Rights
Constitutional amendments are all proscriptions on government behavior. A
right to life means that I must not kill you. If however, you are choking to
death, there is no obligation for me to help you.

I think negative rights are the way to go. Once you start having positive
rights, then you place obligations on others which ultimately require force or
the threat of force to make people do something. In addition, positive rights
has a tendency to keep on growing - for example a right to Internet access.
The downside of that is that rights then do not become something that is
stable across time and space but just a synonym for something someone
arbitrarily decided to call a right.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
> The Bill of Rights Constitutional amendments are all proscriptions on
> government behavior.

Which the government conveniently forgets.

~~~
jdoliner
One of the many pitfalls you run into when the institution enforcing your
rights and the institution being enforced against happen to be one and the
same.

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lr4444lr
I can't imagine the legal ramifications of this. How would a court or
government agency deliver legal notices to such people, for example?

~~~
nikanj
How do they deliver them to tents under the bridge? We need to stop pretending
the homeless don’t exist.

~~~
Kalium
You're absolutely right! The homeless have always been with us, and it's high
time government policy caught up with that. Yet, might there be a kernel of
subtlety here?

In some places, the homeless quite commonly register intersections or similar
locations as their stationary home location. Then things like notices are
delivered to them there. This, as grandparent implies, is not so
straightforward with a mobile vehicle.

What does that leave? A requirement to constantly update your location of
record with local government? Overbearing surveillance to track the homeless
so government can reach them? All-electronic systems relying on devices and
services the homeless almost certainly can't afford? None of these are great
solutions. All are clearly problematic, in the damning social justice sense.

Again, you're completely correct. We need to admit, accept, acknowledge, and
embrace our unhoused friends and neighbors. It's just possible that a truck
and a tent under a bridge might pose slightly different levels of difficulty
for addressing-type needs.

~~~
bsimpson
There are also folks who choose to live in vans or RVs as a lifestyle. There
are also folks who go backpacking overseas for months or years at a time, or
who work nomadic jobs (like travel nursing) which move them every few months.

You don't have to be homeless to lack a permanent address.

~~~
Kalium
You're right! All of these things are true, real, and valid scenarios that can
lead to this situation.

Those who have relative means will often maintain a mailbox of some sort.
There are services that accept mail and scan it for you and other ways. Few of
which are available to the homeless, due generally to a lack of financial
means.

Lacking a real permanent address doesn't inherently make you uncontactable by
governments. It's the combination of lacking a permanent address and lacking
the means to work around it that creates a perfect storm.

------
vkou
> He had been living in his 2000 GMC pickup, parked on a side street, but the
> city of Seattle towed it because Long had violated a city rule that requires
> vehicles be moved every 72 hours.

Judging by the amount of leaves, gunk, and other crap that accumulates
underneath the parked cars on my street (Which were also in the same place
day, after day, after day), this is another one of those rules which is
enforced incredibly selectively. If it weren't, half the cars on Capitol hill
would be in impound.

~~~
newfoundglory
I live on Capitol Hill and regularly see parking enforcement checking cars,
but if there are cars that you think are hanging around too long near you, you
can report them at [https://www.seattle.gov/police/need-help/abandoned-
vehicles](https://www.seattle.gov/police/need-help/abandoned-vehicles)

~~~
vkou
What are the owners of those cars supposed to do? Repark them, when there is
no parking available? The residential buildings there don't have enough
parking spots[1].

This isn't Soviet Russia, it's not like I'll get an extra ration and a pat on
the back for turning my neighbour in.

[1] This has gotten better since they've added a parking permit requirement.

~~~
newfoundglory
What? They are supposed to find longterm parking if they want to leave their
car sitting useless for days at a time, not use public space for it. And if
they are regularly not needing their car for days at a time and they're
unwilling to pay for storage, maybe they should get rid of it and find another
way to take their weekly ski trip.

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dsfyu404ed
>Shaffer also ruled the fees the city required Long, 58, to pay to retrieve
the truck were too high, violating constitutional protections against
excessive fines.

This is really good for anyone who owns a towing and impound company in
Seattle.

------
olympus
"could have great implications for homelessness"

Thinking like a politician, one of the implications might be- since we can
count a car as a home, all the people living out of their cars aren't homeless
anymore. With this huge reduction in homeless people we can cut the budget to
the shelters because they are serving fewer people. They'll definitely win re-
election because they simultaneously reduced homelessness and cut spending,
and they didn't even have to put forth any effort. Total win for the
politicians.

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fenwick67
this is my own private domicile and I will not be harassed

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c3534l
This makes sense and it's good for the courts to step in on this. The point of
the law is clearly that there's a limit to how much the government can take
from a person which is fair and just. There needs to be a rational-thinking
person in the room who knows it's wrong to take away a person's car when
they're currently living out of it because of economic troubles. It's always
good when common sense and decency wins out in a court of law.

~~~
klipt
It's even mentioned in the old testament:

"If your neighbor is poor and gives you his cloak as security for a loan, do
not keep the cloak overnight. Return the cloak to its owner by sunset so he
can stay warm through the night"

Deuteronomy 24:12

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jey
According to the much better article at [https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-
news/homeless/judge-rul...](https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-
news/homeless/judge-rules-seattle-homeless-mans-truck-is-a-home/), it was a WA
state judge who ruled based on WA's "Homestead Act".

~~~
cag_ii
That's in the article linked.

~~~
TomMarius
The linked article is on a different domain...?

EDIT: I misunderstood the point, sorry

~~~
cag_ii
I'm not sure I understand your question.

The submission links to an article at fox13memphis.com. The user I'm replying
to suggests a "much better" article at seattletimes.com because it includes
content which I'm pointing out is already contained at the submission link.

~~~
TomMarius
Ah, okay, sorry. I understood it literally, like "this is the same link".

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lisper
There is a significant segment of American society that believes that if you
are poor you must have done something to deserve it, like not work hard
enough. Because of this, to help poor people is to subsidize (and hence
encourage) laziness, and that is unacceptable. On the other hand, we can't
just shoot all the poor people (though we can shoot some of them, as long as
they're black and threatening) and we can't just have them loitering in the
streets because that's bad for business. So the best we can do it run them out
of town on a rail. Out of sight, not our problem any more, that's good enough.
We don't need a long-term solution, we just need to stave off disaster long
enough for Jesus to return, and that will be Real Soon Now.

Sadly, this is not an exaggeration. Tens of millions of Americans really do
believe all of the above.

~~~
doesnt_know
I think you ruined your point at the end there by implying this attitude is
unique to those that are religious. It definitely isn't and the "fuck poor"
sentiment runs deep throughout every part of western culture.

~~~
openasocket
The sentiment is hardly unique to western culture either. Off the top of my
head the Hindu Caste System seems like a pretty good example of a system that
excuses the mistreatment of the poor.

~~~
newfoundglory
I think the difference is that the caste system relies on the poor being
there, it doesn't imagine that they should all disappear.

