"....And We'll Never Be Royals..." --- And Hey - We Don't Wanna Be!

I think the smooth stylings of singer Lorde put it best in her song "Royals"... But for those of you who couldn't wait to see Meghan Markle and Prince Harry walk down the aisle over the weekend and tie the knot in a lavish wedding (that most of us New Yorkers will never be able to afford in our lifetimes) good for you!

According to most studies, Americans don't particularly care much about details of the royal wedding that took place this weekend. Oh - the dress! Oh - the invite list! Oh dear - is Meghan's family going to fair well with this distinguishing transition she is about to embark upon??? Oh my - let's get a good look at her BILLION DOLLAR wedding ring and how her manicure so eloquently matches her stunning energy!!!

...OH PUH-LEASE!!!

Royal wedding overshadows tragic rubble?

Sarcasm aside, most Americans - as per my investigating on social media outlets - feel that there are much more important worldly and national matters to toil over instead of turning on our televisions (hey - does anyone really "turn on the TV" anymore instead of opening their Netflix or Hulu or YouTube?) to see a huge wedding in which we played NO part.

In the past couple of weeks, America has seen more chaos than we need to: mass shootings, one in which 10 people were killed in a horrible school shooting in Texas, a child and teacher killed in a New Jersey bus crash, and right here in New York City our residents - our POOR and STRUGGLING residents - who live in New York City Housing, are living in deplorable, deteriorating conditions that are making children sick!

With the world becoming hateful, violent and scary everywhere you turn, the royal wedding could have been a reprieve from the never ending gloom, doom and depression of reality. A beautiful wedding filled with perfection, poise and elegance can be a diversion - and a sign that there's something good in this mangled world of hatred and bigotry!! Right?

Let's get real! The royal family and their highfalutin lifestyles have no impact on us as a whole. Want to know how to do your makeup like Dutchess Meghan? You can Google that right now and have yourself looking fabulous in NO time!! Want to know how Prince Harry picked out that to-die-for engagement ring? Simple - just save up enough money and by the time you're too old to even want to get married, you'll be able to afford a nice sized rock for your lady!

On the flip side, want to know when city agents  receive your 311 call and will be sending someone to your house to fix that downed tree from last week's storm which totaled your brand new car? HA! Good luck with THAT! 

Want some real financial secrets for climbing your way out of student debt after taking out a huge loan that won't get paid off unless you manage to snag a six-figure-a-year spot in the career of your choice? HA! Dream on!

I honestly don't see how viewing the royal wedding is an "escape from  the real world" -nor do I understand how the nationally televised "distraction" will ease issues such as global tensions and ISIS' plans to carry out more mass shooting/bombings etc. 

Of course, there are celebrity weddings taking place all the time that don't receive the attention of the royal wedding -- since social status and lifestyle completely transforms the newlyweds as they take on new roles within the British family.

There's nothing about a lavish ceremony that effects me personally or screams "If you miss this, it will be a shame!!!" While all of that trash-talk on social media about Meghan's family does reflect what many of us endure in American culture, it's still a soap opera I won't tune in to watch. Yes, we do "crave a different kind of buzz..."!

A Legislation Slightly "Disconnected" From Reality

It was October 2012 and I was enjoying a mild Saturday morning tending to errands around Canarsie. Suddenly, my cell phone chimed with a text message notification from Catherine Rosa, one of my bosses at the Canarsie Courier newspaper.

"Something smells God awful over here - what's going on? I have a headache from the stench and can't even keep my windows open!" her text read. 

It wasn't out of the ordinary for Catherine to text me on the weekends or during the evenings - news leads and breaking stories don't stop when the office is closed. It also wasn't out of the ordinary for Catherine to message me about non-work related topics - our friendship surpassed professional boundaries and we'd sometimes gossip about shoes, clothes and family matters.

However, when it came to the stench she was griping about, I was slightly annoyed, thinking 'It's a silly smell...and it's a weekend morning...What do you want ME to do? Run over to Georgetown and take a picture of the stink lines?'

Suffice it to say, I did not ignore her message or tell her it's Saturday - I'm not "at work" and I have a right to disconnect from my job. Catherine's keen sense of smell, and her ability to sniff out a story,  led to me eventually contacting our local politician Alan Maisel, who also 'works on the weekend' - should an issue should arise. 

We're never disconnected!

When other residents started noticing the foul stench of gasoline in the area over the weekend, a full-blown investigation soon revealed that National Grid's attempt at decommissioning pipes under Paerdegat Basin went awry. Officials discovered that over 1,000 gallons of a non-toxic oily substance was leaking into the basin and had to be contained, then removed over a period of weeks. 

Still, had it not been for staying connected electronically to my boss and my career, I wouldn't have gotten a head start on one of the biggest federal investigation stories I worked on that year.

During my years as a staff reporter and Associate Editor for the Courier, it crossed my mind quite a few times to block out my "professional life" once I went home. Car accident - who cares! House fire down the street - fuggetaboutit!!! I had a right to declare my right for free time. 

Since hearing about a recent proposal that would make it illegal for New York City bosses to contact employees after working hours - called "The-Right-to-Disconnect" bill, I thought about all the nights and weekends spent toiling away at newspaper dealings for which I wasn't being financially compensated.  Sadly, Catherine spent even more time than I did dealing with the paper's operations for no extra pay. In the media business, that's the way we roll and we stay connected because of our passion and commitment to keeping others in-the-know 

As part of the "Right-To-Disconnect" bill, sponsored by Brooklyn Councilman Rafael Espinal, private companies with more ten employees would have to comply with certain communication rules or face a $250 fine. Sure, they can send a message to their employees - but they wouldn't be allowed to require a response. This fine is supposed to deter bosses from bothering their staff after working hours.

Let's get real! This nonsense bill may apply to limited industries where employees aren't "needed" outside of work hours. "Needed" can refer to inquiries about the office, like - "Sorry to bother you - where are the files you were working on?" or "Can you come in an hour earlier tomorrow?" 

In today's tech-obsessed world, most industries - especially the media, law enforcement and politics - you'll NEVER be disconnected!

When it comes to the media, if something critical breaks at midnight, you can bet your cell phone bill that editors, reporters, bloggers and photographers will be up at all hours of the night cranking headlines, following leads and leaking teasers all over social media.

While the "Right-to-Disconnect" concept is amusing - and a great incentive for low-wage workers to tell their bosses "Go f**k yourself if you think I'm answering that message about why the deep fryer is so dirty" - it's unrealistic to expect high demanding professionals like doctors, law enforcement officials and government employees to cut off communication when they're not in the office. For some professionals, their "office" is everywhere, nowhere and anywhere all at once. 

The major flaw in this bill is that it's being considered for a city that's riddled with non-stop action and people who can never get off their phones - even if they're walking upstairs on a crowded subway, they're glued to their technology! Thanks to social media apps, you can tell the world what you're up to every damned second of the day, so why would ANY company believe you're truly "disconnecting." 

Of course, you have the right to tell everyone when you're....say....in the hospital...or if you have indigestion and you can't sleep...or if you're busy taking a dozen photos of that gourmet cup of coffee from your favorite cafe. You have a right to share your most personal information with your friends and family while ignoring that text from your boss about where the direct deposit slips were relocated in the office.

Professionally, I've moved on to more calming pastures with less emergency situations occurring after hours or during the weekends.  Now, as an administrative assistant for a fashion company in the city, I can't do any physical work or actively help with tasks related to my job/position unless I'm at my desk in the office. 

Even though I wouldn't hesitate to respond to my current boss after hours if he had a quick question about something I was working on in the office, I'm grateful there's no urgency or necessity for me to be connected and "on" 24/7 the way I was required to be in the media world.

It's ironic that a bill of this technological nature would be introduced during an era when everyone is always connected, whether they want to be or not. Or maybe the proposal simply gives New Yorkers an excuse to continue playing that illusive Bedazzled game on their phone non-stop instead of helping their boss once they've clocked out. 

When Our Common Sense Goes Up In Smoke

“Only YOU can prevent forest fires!” Smokey The Bear has been bellowing for decades. If you don’t remember Smokey the Bear, you may be a Millennial or even younger - too young to remember those Boy Scout-like campaigns launched since the 1940s asking the public to be careful when they’re out in the woods.  According to the friendly, fluffy firefighting advocate, nine out of 10 wildfires are caused by…HUMANS!

Humans? We’re responsible for all of that destruction? You mean we’re careless and have no common sense when it comes to preventing things from burning to a crisp?

Unfortunately, that sounds about right!

Within the last month - before 2018 kicked off - the city’s FDNY recovered an overwhelming amount of victims from residential fires. Sadly, the most epic tragedy of the 2017 (and one of the deadliest in recent history) took 12 residents’ lives in The Bronx in December. The culprit? Reports and an extensive investigations found that the fire was a result of a boy who was playing with a stove in one of the apartments.

Playing with a stove? Various reports also claimed the child was known to fiddle with fire. Long story short, this horrible inferno COULD have been prevented 100 percent if the boy’s guardians were paying attention to his “pastime” and reprimanded him for his history of endangering other peoples’ lives. Numerous editorials have already provided some insight on how poorly a job this child’s parents/guardians did raising him if playing with a stove was acceptable. If the supposed arsonist was an innocent boy who didn’t link possible death with flames - that could spread throughout the entire building - what are we teaching or NOT teaching in order to enforce common sense about fire prevention.

The Bronx blaze was the deadliest fire in the city since 1990 when 87 people reportedly died at a social club. Despite the story making headlines nationwide, another fire in a building on Lenox Road in Brooklyn was reportedly caused by irresponsible people. Officials said a pig roast that was burning in the basement caused a blaze that forced tenants out of the apartment building and into the frigid weather for hours.

Really? Someone in the building felt the need to have a barbecue indoors and put hundreds of residents at risk by not using common sense?

Let’s get real, building codes have changed over the years and insulation materials/electrical wiring used to build or reconstruct old homes have to be up to code by law. With that in mind, human error, laziness and lack of common sense are to blame for almost every fire we read about in the news in New York City (states where brush fires and warehouse fires are common place - but in the city we don’t have many of those that wind up wiping out entire families).

With freezing temperatures hitting the area, residents are bound to turn up the heat in their homes - especially if their landlord doesn’t keep the atmosphere toasty. In retaliation, it seems, tenants turn to space heaters and their kitchen ovens for additional heat sources but fail to abide by simple FDNY safety measures - such as DON’T place space heaters within three feet of other objects and DON’T plus space heaters into extension cords.

How difficult are those advisories??? Really!!! If you ever used a space heater, you know that the power cord itself gets pretty hot to the touch. Why would you risk burning everything in your home - and possibly killing dozens of people?

I have a small space heater in my apartment - but it’s NOT placed within even ONE FOOT of my bed, television, couch or any other objects. It’s also unplugged during the night and when no one is home during the day. I, for one, don’t want to be responsible for the building going up in flames.

Public fire safety education DOES exist - the media publishes/airs a slew of rules to keep in mind about fire prevention. Oh - and how can I forget to mention that human-caused residential fires (fatalities and advisories) are ALL OVER THE NEWS!! If you pick up a newspaper, watch a local broadcast or scroll through social media, you’re going to be blasted with updates and reports on these deadly infernos.

If you’re not learning a valuable lesson by reading about OTHER peoples’ dangerous and tragic mistakes, you must have your head in the sand! Aside from the tragedy of lives lost, there is something tragic about the carelessness of those who could take a few simple steps to following fire safety rules.

In just about all of the fires reported recently, human error was to blame. Last December in Sheepshead Bay, a mother and her three children were killed in a fast-moving fire reportedly caused by an unattended lit menorah. It’s understandable that a devout family wants to observe the holidays, but the fire broke out after 2 in the morning (sleeping with candles lit in another room screams danger!). Clearly, no one was adhering to a common sense rule enforced by the FDNY about using candles in general - do NOT leave them burning in your home unattended. PERIOD!

Whether or not a building has smoke detectors isn’t particularly “life saving” if you hear the alarms too late and can’t escape in time, especially if the alarm goes off when there’s not - in reality - enough time to get out. Residential smoke detectors also don’t come with or activate sprinkler systems that will douse flames or announce safety measures (it would help if a voice programmed inside the alarm also gave evacuation instructions and an advisory to shutting doors, which can keep a fire from spreading).

This winter’s been brutal so far - and my estimation is that no matter how many fire incidents are reported, there are plenty of irresponsible HUMANS who could still use a lesson on the basics from an urban version of Smoky The Bear. 

Nobody's Opinion Really Seems To Count...Here's Why!

Every reporter has that one piece, that one project, that one “simple” assignment that they take on without thinking of the challenges and roadblocks they’re about to encounter. Mostly, they’re thinking about the prestige, the professional reputation they will gain and possibly the financial gain involved in the assignment - and perhaps they even care about how that one story will open doors to other rewarding projects.

It’s sad when a simple assignment - a straight-forward project that has a beginning and end - provokes you to learn more about who you’re surrounded by and how lackadaisical they are when it comes to their community.

I recently took on the Canarsie Courier’s weekly column: “What’s Your Opinion.” It’s a fun to read forum - usually compiled by different freelancers who are bold enough to hit the streets and survey residents on their opinions about certain topics. I was honored to take on this new role (if ‘honored’ sounds corny, it’s okay - I spent many years as the newspaper’s editor assigning people to ask a different opinion question every week).  This new endeavor wasn’t a problem for me socially or professionally!

So "simple" yet so opinionated!!

I was able to formulate the questions myself, as I kept the inquiries local and realistic. I mapped out the locations I would ask random people these questions. I was also prepared to show residents a published column from the week before so they could see what the finished product entailed. All I needed were a handful of people to answer a simple question and get their photo.

Great!

Those who are professionally close to me know that I’ve grown out of my shyness. I can approach anyone (who will actively respond) and I've had no problems addressing large crowds at meetings to foster a relationship between organizations and the newspaper. There’s nothing I fear about speaking to strangers. Everyone’s a stranger until you talk to them and make a connection…right?

I guess I gave myself too much credit during my second round as a roving reporter!

I planned on asking residents a simple question: How do you feel about the quality of transportation in our community? Also, what would you change about the local bus routes - or would you add a route to an under-served block/avenue? I know a lot of people are upset about transportation issues around here -so it should have been easy to obtain at least a couple good answers! 

Sadly, my attempt at trying to publicize how "outraged" people are about the MTA was brutally unsuccessful. One woman waiting for a bus at East 105th Street near Flatlands Avenue blatantly got the “no passengers” hand signal from a driver passing the stop. She was fuming.

Great! A chance to ask her what she would change about the local bus service.

“Hi miss. I’m with the local newspaper and we do a column every week surveying residents on quality of life issues. This week we want to know how you feel about the local bus service….”

“No, I can’t talk, there’s too much going on in my mind right now…” She uttered quickly, even though she clearly had plenty of time on her hands because her bus wasn’t coming. I rolled my eyes, knowing that if I mentioned the incident with this woman in the newspaper, she’d never read it because she has “too much on her mind” to care about what’s being published in her local newspaper.
  

I was also close to getting a great answer from one gentleman who was waiting for the B60 bus on Flatlands Avenue near Rockaway Parkway. He had all the right qualms for all the right reasons.

“It’s terrible! I live right there on East 86 Street and come all the way down here to get the B60 and it never comes - I wait 20 minutes for one bus!”

Wow, perfect! Of course, too perfect…He pulled the breaks on being a good candidate when I said I just needed a headshot of him to go with the statement.

“No…No..I can’t …..No..Sorry.”

No? What - is he a criminal? Is he wanted by the police and that tiny headshot in the Canarsie Courier would happen to be the ONE place authorities located him? Does he owe child support and his biggest fear is “baby mama” seeing his face plastered in a two-by-two column in the local newspaper?

I just didn’t get it - until I realized that these types of people in our community - the ones who didn’t want to have their words and face printed on paper - are the very residents who most likely don’t go to meetings, don’t want to influence change and don’t care about their community. They “have too much on their minds,” “don’t have the time” and don’t want to show their faces where/when it matters!

For all these shy/scared residents know, I could have done a full story on the quality of public transportation in the area and perhaps connected them with resources to help improve bus service. I felt like saying, “Well, you know why the bus service is so horrible? Because people like you don’t want to have their voices heard or their faces accounted for!”

I did finally get my answers from people I knew in the community and those who weren’t ashamed to tell me what needed improvement.

In the end, I didn’t care if people shoved me off - it gave me a clearer understanding of how unimportant it is for residents to express themselves to the press. It made me realize why the same familiar faces always go to civic meetings and you’ll rarely see dozens of new people at a time coming out to make a reputation for themselves in order to implement change. They're simply too afraid to be accounted for!

Let’s get real! Most people are busy or would rather hide behind social media and take “selfies” - where they’re only proud enough to show themselves to people who can’t influence change. They’re not looking to give their opinion on anything because they’re not annoyed enough or feel strong enough to show their faces. 
In my opinion, that’s an unfortunate way to operate in a small and quaint community.

Oh Rats! A Great Idea Ruined By Humans!

After a short hiatus from sounding off against quality of life issues, my latest rant renews all of the flavors and sentiments of an angry New Yorker just trying to make sense of this crazy city...

Now that I travel on New York City Transit every day to work in the city, I understand the real difference between rats and rats. You have the small animal rodents, which scurry out of street openings, train tunnels and subways looking for food/water/garbage...Then you have the human rats, which travel through the streets and subway system - depositing their food/water/garbage. 

With a new "plan" proposed by the city to invest $32 million in anti-rat receptacles, it's hard to say who's ratting out who when it comes to trash and the blame game.

To be honest, I don't get freaked out when I see rodents in the subway. Yes, I DO flip out when a mouse is in the clean space of my apartment! However, the world of the underground and the dumpy disasters that exist on our streets in our disgusting city has plenty of dirty, dark pits with feces-ridden crevices for rodents to camp out and multiply.  Despite reports that the city will buy 336 solar-powered trash cans that supposedly keep out rats with a mailbox style opening, it's humans that are at the root of many sanitary problems - and that's not something a fancy garbage bin will change.

I've considered a few points that make the city's initiative a go-nowhere plan:

- New Yorkers are filthy litterbugs. Okay - maybe you're not a litterbug...Maybe you take your trash with you to dispose of in a garbage pail. Maybe you have..um..manners! From what I've witnessed, commuters and city folk have NO problem leaving their garbage on the street, "accidentally" dropping paper wrappers or left over foodstuff somewhere in their travels. I've seen people leave empty bottles on the streets and others take bags of bulk trash from THEIR OWN HOMES and leave it on a street corner for the city to collect.  Don't get me started on illegal dumping! Those piles of refuse from God knows where attract vermin and other critters to make a perfect home. 

- New York City is one big toilet bowl. An exaggeration, perhaps - but not really. In my travels, I've seen more people use our public streets as bathrooms than I should have. One day while I was on my way into a train station, I saw a young woman crouching down by the subway stairs with her pants halfway down, urinating right there! To make matters worse, she had a youngster with her, obviously showing the child that it's okay to defecate public property in our city. And you know the offensive phrase "men are dogs?" Well, in one sense I can say it's true. I've seen way too many men in our community sidle up to a tree or against a building and empty their bladder as if they were an anxious dog on a short walk! With all of the human waste that uncouth citizens deposit onto our city, is it any wonder why the stale and funky conditions of our streets DO NOT deter rodents from joining what I call the "defecation parade"?

-Rats aren't bummed out by people. With the homeless population increasing, the number of people rats can get food from is also increasing. When you see a homeless person with their bags laying in the street, chances are, the bum is also harboring food and liquids somewhere in their makeshift "home." Perfect places for rodents to curl up and find a meal! I'm no exterminator, but rodents don't need much to thrive other than food and water. Whenever I see a homeless person on the street laying in a corner with bags of food or bottles they probably found in the garbage, I also see a perfect opportunity for vermin to join them and have a nice meal. 

The Daily News reported last week that the city's prior efforts at wiping out rats simply weren't combative enough. Poisoning and blocking their burrows? Come on! That's like using cotton balls to fight heavily-armed military troops! 

Other efforts to battle the beady-eyed monsters include requiring buildings in the city's most infested communities with ten or more units to put out their trash for collection after 4 in the morning instead of in the evenings. 

With a few other alterations in the works to fend off the furry creatures - including cementing the basements of city buildings that have foundations made of dirt (yeah, okay - they can't even allocate a budget to make structural repairs for their tenants!) - NONE of the plans include enforcing HUMANS to be cleaner. There aren't many residents who even see the value in being clean and sanitary. Why don't residents care that THEY are the reason rodents are overpopulating the city? Why doesn't that guy throwing his food onto the streets care if his filth attracts vermin? 

In a world where so many diverse cultures - clean and unsanitary - live among animals, New Yorkers simply represent another population of humans that must learn to live with the critters we've enticed.

Clown Cars And NYC Charter Schools

Don't you just love to laugh at those circus acts where dozens - sometimes hundreds - of clumsy clowns exit a really tiny car? The way they fumble out the doors, onto the ground and on top of each other, you know they were hiding in some hatch underneath that small automobile. Still, the thought that they're trying to create a "magic" scene of stuffing the red-nosed entertainers into a Volkswagen Beetle is, I think, a hilarious comparison to how the general public tries to smush lots of things into considerably small physical spaces. 

Let's see how many we can get in here!!!

Speaking of smushing things into small spaces, a recent report in the New York Daily News revealed that charter school representatives are upset with city officials for turning down various requests to facilitate public space.

One group claims that the city has denied 79 percent of applying charter school requests to occupy space in public buildings.

Considering how many meetings I've covered for the Canarsie Courier that focused on charter schools requesting space in an already-established public school - where studies show there is "underenrollment" - I was angered at the Daily News article for being so broad in its disheartening report.

Over the years, public engagement sessions have been hosted all over the city so that parents and teachers could provide feedback on charter schools seeking to co-locate at a certain school. Charter schools seem to be the bane of the general public's existence. Parents by and large have claimed students from a new school will take away resources available to pupils who already attend the public school. Some parents have also voiced their concerns over academic competition among charter and public school students.

Let's get real! Charter school reps shouldn't blame the city in general for denying them space in a school - they should blame the yammering parents, teachers and civic leaders who fight to keep charters out of buildings they consider a second home to the community's children. It's true - if you fight hard enough against an issue and you make enough noise, you just might frighten away those who are looking to share your home!

There are more schools in the city now where multiple "academies" exist in one building. Doesn't matter how small the school building is physically - it only matters that the ratio of students to classroom space is under a certain percentage. The Department of Education (DOE) typically calls these schools "underutilized" and, of course, school officials who don't want to share their space will challenge the DOE about those figures and the space their school actually has available.

In some instances, charter schools may be turned down because public engagement has so strongly protested egregious co-locations, such as placing an elementary school inside of a high school. Concerns over the safety of younger students sharing space with teenagers is reason enough to take that co-locating idea back to the drawing board.

Personally, I refer to buildings like South Shore High School in Canarsie the Clown Campus,  where more than a handful of small academies - some with long and highfalutin names to make them sound pretentious and overly successful - are jam packed into one space. Say all you want about how much space is "physically available"...Show the us the crazy "formulas" created by some intelligent agency whose engineers may or may not even have children enrolled in that public school! Every year or so the DOE manages to shove another school inside of a school building with multiple academies! Is this the DOE's way of treating our children like clowns in a circus? Just get as many of them in there as you can!!!

Even though there haven't been many complaints about charter schools that share space with public schools, as a community we have a right to protest their requests and turn them down just like any other plans brought to the table that will effect childrens' learning experience.

Hey - I'm sure if you asked all those clowns coming out of that tiny car if they wanted a separate ride to the circus instead of piggybacking off someone else's already-cramped trip, they'd gladly go where they're not packed into a place they're probably not welcomed.

Sheltering Our Homeless Isn't The Biggest Problem

When I exit the Times Square train station every week day, I'm reminded of the growing homeless problem in New York City. With dozens of bums setting up makeshift beds compiled of flattened cardboard boxes, stuffed garbage bags and metal chairs, you can't walk down one block and NOT see a trash-strewn body radiating the stench of human feces.

Now that I've created a visual (and perhaps stirred your nostrils) I can definitely attest to the fact that since Mayor Bill de Blasio has been in charge, the homeless problem is getting worse. Not only is  the percentage of bums in the street increasing, the homeless are also taking over the subways. When I get on the L train at around 6 in the morning, there's at least one or two homeless men in each car - some lying down - taking away seats from those who are on their way to work - some are sitting crouched over in a two-seater with huge garbage bags next to them.

Some of the homeless people I've seen on the trains travel with shopping wagons filled with GARBAGE. Real garbage - not items like their clothes or perhaps blankets. They travel with TRASH - including dozens of empty soda bottles or bottles filled with what appears to be their own urine. Also attached to their mini-home-on-the-go are torn up plastic bags that obviously can't be used to hold anything! Other homeless individuals are trekking around with years-old newspapers and ripped up literature that I'm sure has no lucrative purpose...right? Are these people able to function normally? What person in their right mind (who is mentally healthy) travels all over the city with dozens of bottles filled with their own urine? Did I miss something?

Rent-free, perfect home! Courtesy of NY DAILY NEWS

Let's get real! Now that Mayor de Blasio has planted his pipe dreams of establishing more homeless shelters in the city, should we feel better about the possibility of there being less homeless people on the streets? Or are his elusive plans - which don't pinpoint specifically where the 90 new proposed shelters will be located - proof that he's clueless about how bad the situation really is?

I've been known to strike a few negative chords among my blog readers, who think I'm cold and heartless due to my general statement/belief - that most of the homeless population does NOT want help or housing. Many officials have found that homeless individuals do NOT want to stay in shelters because the conditions there are worse than the streets or subways.

Put it this way - if there were an increasing amount of homeless people turning their lives around and becoming a productive part of society, where are all of those reports??? In my opinion, instead of highlighting de Blasio's plans which may or may not involve using hotels to house the homeless, what percentage of that "growing homeless population" WANTS to live a productive life?

Has anyone surveyed how effective drug abuse programs are and how effective treatment is for those wagon-pushing street dwellers? As we've heard from various news reports, there are homeless people mad/insane enough to push an innocent straphanger onto train tracks!

Mental health facilities may be able to diagnose and medicate those who have imbalances and diseases like schizophrenia. Sadly, people with mental diseases - which prevent them from functioning at a job - may never live in a clean and habitable home.

What about those who point the blame at the high cost of living in our city? Certainly, if you're reading this blog and you have a job/career and a roof over your head, you're functioning normally enough to know that you need to make money and be a productive part of society - no matter where you live or how many roommates you have to tolerate at once to have your own "place."

The New York Daily News does an excellent job of contradicting its own reports with diverse/contrasting articles. In their March 1st edition, they showcased de Blasio's "Nowhere Plan" on page 5. However, to prove that displaced residents with brains - who function normally and want out of the shelter system - they published a story on page 12 in the same issue titled: "Grad To Be Here," which highlights Rosemary Rodriguez, a once-homeless teen who earned a "Beat the Odds" scholarship worth $10,000. As the article states, the 17-year-old and her family were forced to seek refuge in a shelter. But the determined youth didn't let unfortunate circumstances stop her from taking vital steps that could lead to her professional success. The article proved to me that if a teenager could fight through a tragic situation, why can't a normal adult (carrying torn shopping bags in their feces-laden pockets) turn their lives around to be...I don't know...a city worker? Maybe a drug counselor?

What excuse will we make for the thousands of homeless who increasingly refuse to even TRY to make a decent living? If homeless individuals are content with their day-to-day operations and if they're perfectly fine with wreaking of alcohol and yelling out obscenities to strangers for no reason during a quiet morning commute, then why convince them to live otherwise? Some people collect urine bottles while others collect pipe dreams of wiping out homelessness...