09 August 2013

Road to the Wet House: personal responsibility and public safety

There's a controversy in my old home town of Troy NY over whether to build a "wet house" in the city's "Little Italy" neighborhood. As this article explains, a wet house provides housing for chronic alcoholics who would otherwise be homeless and, most importantly, allows them to drink on the premises. That's all you need to know to understand why some neighborhood residents, and others in the city as a whole, oppose the idea. The idea guarantees a NIMBY backlash, represented in the local paper by Troy's former mayor. You can predict all the arguments against a wet house. It will supposedly draw alkies to Troy. It will ruin the neighborhood. It's a shame to let those bums drink instead of figuring out some way to make and keep them sober. Why should those bums have things so easy? All those arguments make sense -- and I'm inferring the last one, -- but so do some arguments.

Let me argue from some personal experience. I live in Albany, and my neighborhood is already haunted by a chronic alcoholic. He's sort-of friends with other people who live in the building; sometimes they invite him in and have a good time, and sometimes they throw him out and tell me to call the cops should he show up again. He always does. He seems to think that because he has virtually if not actually lived there in the past -- as recently as this year he had some bills delivered to our building -- that our front stairs are a kind of safe harbor where he can pause in his wanderings to drink from his bagged beer cans. He's a mean drunk, filthy-mouthed, argumentative and provocative. On our multi-racial block he'll use every incorrect epithet in the book when the mood hits him. I've heard his life threatened after he called the wrong person the wrong name, but he doesn't seem to care. From what I'm told, he has a place to stay -- but he's not allowed to drink there. So he wanders the city in search of safe places to drink, staying in one place until someone chases him off or calls the cops. He gets arrested frequently but for his petty offenses he never stays long. To me he looks like the perfect candidate for a wet house, and while I understand the concerns of neighbors wherever a wet house may be established, my hunch is that people like this bum will be under more control in such a location and thus less of an annoyance, and much less of a threat, to people in the immediate neighborhood than the wanderers can be throughout a city. Perhaps they can be more effectively isolated from residential neighborhoods, but unless alcohol is delivered to them wet houses will have to be located where tenants can buy beer or booze within walking distance or on the bus line. Dumping them in the countryside is an unlikely option.

What of the moral argument against allowing alcoholics to drink? While the former mayor asks, "Who among us does not know someone who has successfully conquered such addictions?" even Alcoholics Anonymous, according to the New York Times, concedes that some "unfortunates" will never sober up and will more likely drink themselves to death. Boosters of the wet house idea claim that some tenants actually end up drinking less, while a few even quit there. That's not the object of a wet house, however. The real object seems to be twofold: first to keep the chronic drinkers from dying "under a bridge," and second to save the rest of us the trouble of dealing with them. The thing to remember, based on my experience, is that in the absence of wet houses these hard-core alcoholics won't just wander around; they'll try to impose themselves on others so they can drink without risking arrest for open containers or other offenses. Society already takes steps in many cases to force people to dry out, but it lacks the resources and will to force them to stay dry. The worst cases end up as recurring problems, draining the resources of police, emergency rooms, etc. If we can't force them to stay sober, and we can't execute them for being addicts, then what is preferable? Letting them cause trouble for other people until the moral suasion kicks in, or leaving them where they're most likely to leave the rest of us alone? The answer should be obvious, but still begs the further question: where? It has to be in the city, but the rest should be open to negotiation. I don't know enough about the situation in Troy to assume that the proposed location for the wet house is the best one, but if the city does need such a place some neighborhood -- though not necessarily a residential one -- may need to take a chance for the good of the whole community.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not to sound like a right-winger, but why should taxpayers have to fund addiction? Should we start buying heroin for junkies and crack/meth for addicts of those drugs as well? Why should a community have to be forced to deal with citizens who are lacking self-control?

Take the example you give of the rude drunk that infests your porch. A wet house full of such people would only cause problems for the other inhabitants, not to mention the presumed volunteers who would have to maintain the residence.

Addicts are on a path to self-destruction and the damage they inflict on society should be minimized. They should not be encouraged to continue their behavior, nor should it be funded by taxpayers who have their own problems to worry about.

Addicts who are at least respectful of those around them should be empathized with and helped when they admit to needing it, but those who are disruptive to society should not be tolerated in the least.

Samuel Wilson said...

The idea of the wet house is to minimize the damage done to society by the most self-destructive drunks, but your objection to subsidizing the scheme is understandable. What follows from it? Back in the day you could warn someone like the drunk from my story out of town, but now the laws don't seem to permit us to simply throw him into a hole or chase him from place to place until he drops. What should we do differently?

Anonymous said...

Stricter punishments for public intoxication, disturbing the peace and whatever laws cover irresponsible behavior. If guys like the drunk in your example were to be put away for 6 months after a predetermined number of "drunk & disorderly" charges, he'd be forced to go sober. If it killed him, well his misery and the problems he causes are at an end. If he survives, then maybe he can make a new start.

Anonymous said...

Also consider that, just because a wet house exists, this doesn't guarantee that the alcoholics still won't be wondering the streets, drunk, during the day. Imagine such a house next door to you. Multiply the mean, foul-mouth drunk by 5 or 6 and they're all hanging out on the porch next door. Does that really alleviate your problem?

Samuel Wilson said...

10:09 -- definitely a valid point. Any wet house should strictly regulate the tenants' comings and goings. If the idea is to keep them out of our hair, they're going to have to accept less freedom of movement, which means careful thought is necessary about how they acquire their booze. But if confinement and quarantining are the top priorities, perhaps we may as well put them in jail for longer terms as 9:58 suggests.

hobbyfan said...

Here's a better idea: The more chronic alkies should be directed either to AA meetings or the nearest detoxification center, then getting educated on the dangers of their station in life. Just giving them a cookie and making them go away, as Don Rickles might imply, won't work, but if we want to help these people, treating them with kindness always is an option.

Anonymous said...

Addicts will not accept help until they are ready to admit they need help. Forcing an alcoholic who doesn't want to change into a rehab program will only ensure he/she goes right back on the bottle soon after they are released.