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Wednesday, March 27, 2019

Montgomery County ends veteran homelessness? Not quite

WTOP article parrots Montgomery County Council
claim that no veteran is homeless in MoCo in 2015
"All homeless veterans have found housing in Montgomery Co.," a WTOP.com headline declared on December 15, 2015. "No veteran is homeless in Montgomery County, officials announce," a Washington Post headline blared six days later. Montgomery County had "found a home for every homeless veteran," NBC4's Jim Handly assured viewers at 5:45 PM the same day. Then-Councilmember George Leventhal was widely quoted and toasted by obsequious local media, just months after he had been condemned by homeless advocates for his attempt to criminalize panhandling by the homeless on County streets. He and the Council were understandably seeking to change the narrative.

Change it Montgomery County did - with eager help from their cheerleaders and Fellow Travelers in the local media. While actual homeless advocates working in the community would be the first to acknowledge the claim was impossible, and that it was based on a belief that there would be available housing units in the future as homeless veterans were identified, that is not how the County's elected officials and their buddies in the local news media promoted it to the public.
Montgomery County government "Paperless Airplane"
headline from January 2016
The shameful, false claim that there are no more homeless veterans in Montgomery County was trotted out again by County officials Monday. A press release boasted that "Montgomery County was one of the first communities to reach 'functional zero' for veterans’ homelessness in December 2015. Since January 2015, Montgomery County has permanently ended homelessness for 148 veterans." No one in the local media pushed back on the false claim this time, either.

I've now confirmed that there are indeed homeless veterans on the streets of Montgomery County, and ironically, I came across one due to the failure of our County Council to provide a functional master plan highway system. Last week, I spent 90 minutes traveling between Bethesda and Shady Grove due to an accident-related backup on the Beltway and I-270. Along with many other frustrated drivers, I exited to Old Georgetown Road, to begin a red-light-at-every-intersection crawl north.

Lo and behold, when I arrived at the intersection of Old Georgetown and Rockville Pike, there was a homeless man panhandling in the median. He was holding a sign that read, "Homeless Veteran." We all know he is not the only one. But the County is putting a $10 billion Bus Rapid Transit boondoggle, a $1 million-a-year Ride On Extra carrying one passenger in each direction, tax cuts for developers, and millions in kickbacks to supporters and campaign donors in the "non-profit" community ahead of our great veterans.

Fact check: Although the latest false claim easily earns a Four Pinocchio rating, the ongoing mendacity of our corrupt elected officials has required me to follow the Washington Post in adopting the new "Bottomless Pinocchio," which it describes as "a new rating for a false claim repeated over and over again."

 Rating: BOTTOMLESS PINOCCHIO
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7 comments:

  1. Anonymous7:33 AM

    Did you ask him when and where he served?

    More importantly, did you offer to help him in any way?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Woodmont7:48 AM

    Nothing will beat this classic legacy media headline: "Hans Riemer wants to give you a raise"

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous8:08 AM

    "...Due to the failure of our County Council to provide a functional master plan highway system. Last week, I spent 90 minutes traveling between Bethesda and Shady Grove due to an accident-related backup on the Beltway and I-270. Along with many other frustrated drivers, I exited to Old Georgetown Road, to begin a red-light-at-every-intersection crawl north."

    So you want some kind of Participation Trophy for doing what normal working people do ten times every week?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous9:31 AM

    8:43 AM On the ground reporting from the county and not from Frederick bedrooms.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous9:49 AM

    A lot of the panhandlers are fraudsters. You can make more money (and tax-free) panhandling compared to a real job. I'm sure putting "veteran" on the sign helps bring in donations, as does putting the word "homeless", even if neither are true.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous10:09 AM

    Police: "We've had complaints about con men pretending to be blind and crippled."

    Billy Ray Valentine [Eddie Murphy]: "I ain't seen nothing since I stepped on that landmine in Vietnam. It was very painful."

    Police: "You were in 'Nam? So were we. Where?"

    Valentine: "I was in...Sang Bang...Dang Gong...I was all over the place, a lot of places."

    Police: "What unit?"

    Valentine: I was with the Green Berets, Special Unit Battalions...Commando Airborne Tactics...Specialist Tactics Unit Battalion. Yeah, it was real hush hush. I was Agent Orange, Special Agent Orange, that was me."

    Police: Airborne, huh?

    [Police grab Valentine under the shoulders and lift him up off the ground}

    Valentine: "I can see! I can see! I have...I have legs. I have... Oh shit, look at this. Legs! I can walk. Jesus, praise Jesus."

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous11:18 AM

    Not to state the obvious, but just because his sign says he's a homeless veteran, neither is necessarily true. Loads of us have observed our friendly neighborhood corner panhandlers getting into cars in the G2 parking lot at the end of their shifts. I'd be more inclined to go with the county on this one. Incidentally, 2015 was four years ago. Stuff changes in four years, you know?

    ReplyDelete