Joseph Issa Calls for New Law in 2016 To Force Street People into Shelter.

Civic Leader and Philanthropist Joe Issa, has called for new legislation in 2016 to force homeless people off the streets and into special care facilities with appropriate rehabilitation programmes and for them to be treated with dignity. 

“It cannot be overlooked that here we are with food to eat and place to sleep while another set of human beings live on the streets on leftovers in rubbish bins and sleep on sidewalks and open spaces on cardboard,” argues Issa, who has several charities to his name.

In 2010 there were 1,450 homeless people in Jamaica, of which 650 were adults and 800 or so children and adolescents. About 60 percent of the males were mentally ill, and drug abusers and 10 percent were deportees.

The homeless were concentrated in the major urban centres such as Kingston and St Andrew with 50 percent and the rest in places like Montego Bay, May Pen and coastal resort towns like Ocho Rios.

The Cool Corporation chairman adds that “forcing them to leave the street for care and attention and a place to sleep, must be seen as an act of kindness which they are legally bound to accept for their good and protection.” 

Recently, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed an executive order to get local officials to force homeless people into shelters when the temperature reached a freezing point (32 degrees Fahrenheit or O degrees Celsius) and vowed to defend the proclamation if challenged in court.

Like Issa, Governor Cuomo called his edict to get them out of the cold an act of humanity.

“Our state, which has a beautiful tradition of social progress and community, should not leave anyone outside in freezing temperatures. That is called basic humanity,” said Cuomo, in an interview on New York City news channel NY1 reported by Reuters.

According to the article, “New York and other big U.S. cities have long wrestled with the dilemma of dealing with homeless people who refuse to be taken to shelters, even in the most, bitter cold. Many of them fear falling victim to crime in the shelters.”

Unlike the New York Governor, however, Issa’s humanity goes beyond having the law to force them to leave Jamaican streets only when they are in imminent danger, such as the approach of a hurricane.

According to Issa, “living on the streets as we know it should be outlawed and those found liable are to be taken into the shelter, but they are not to be abused and disrespected and are to be given the best rehabilitative care possible.”

Jamaica is not as fortunate as New York which has 80,000 homeless people and 77,000 shelter beds.

“To accommodate the homeless on the island will require a huge increase in the number of shelter rooms, as we can expect the homeless figures to increase every year,” Issa says, blaming the economic situation in which many are losing their jobs and the five percent of the 3,000 deportees who arrive here every year with no family in Jamaica.

Issa says “we need to build some centres to meet the needs of homeless people in Jamaica, some of whom need psychiatric care, some need health care while others need positive engagements such as introduction to gainful employment, and when they have graduated there must be home waiting to welcome them. Otherwise, they will go back to the streets, and all the efforts will have to no avail.”