City Goes After Couple Feeding Homeless
Turns out they're feeding them, free of charge, without a permit. Hundreds and hundreds of Houston's 10,000 homeless people. Tom Abrahams reports at ABC Houston about Bobby and Amanda Herring:
"We come out here and provide a hot meal every single night and a lot of love to go with it," Bobby Herring said."It's just so much about the relationship," Amanda Herring said. "We love them. They love us. These are our friends; they've been home with us."
They say they fed 50 to 100 people every night of the week -- first at an empty loading dock and then under a bridge. But two weeks ago, they were told to stop.
"We were told that we had to have health permits to continue serving," Amanda Herring said.
The city told them they needed permits and that the food had to be cooked in a certified kitchen.
"We just have one set of rules for public feeding and whether you have money or you don't have money, you need to comply with the same set of rules," said Kathy Barton with the City of Houston Health Department.
The idea being that food not cooked in a certified kitchen could make people sick, which is all the worse for someone who is homeless.
"Low-income people and people who are homeless are the most susceptible to food-borne illness and least capable of dealing with that kind of illness," Barton said.
The Herrings aren't sure what to do. Their meals are cooked in people's homes.
"We're not trying to break any laws. We want to comply with the city. We want to work with the city because we believe this is in addition to the city of Houston," Bobby Herring said.
So until they work something out, they'll be coming downtown empty-handed.
I'm sure the homeless will be much less endangered eating out of restaurant dumpsters. Yay, government! Protecting people from a full stomach!
Because virtually *all* cases of food borne illnesses haven't already come from 'approved' kitchens!
The health of the homeless would only be improved, if they weren't being fed by 'approved' kitchens.
There are some who call me 'Tim?' at January 16, 2011 1:00 AM
I would have a thought that the only major city in the U.S. not to have a zoning ordinance would have shown a little more common sense than this.
I guess that goes to show that common sense isn't all that common.
gharkness at January 16, 2011 4:54 AM
Tim - That's a very good point, actually.
brian at January 16, 2011 7:35 AM
Hey, how are our masters supposed to build in us the proper attitude of dependence and fealty if citizens insist on cutting government out of the aid loop?
Cousin Dave at January 16, 2011 7:59 AM
So, the food can still be distrubed. They'll just have to use the same system that gets cocaine to the same hobos. When the world grinds to a halt because the power structures are more concerned with maintaining power than with doing their original job, it's time to step outside the system and be criminals.
In a primitive world, we cook food and share it.
In a modern world we organise for efficient cooking and sharing of food.
In a post-modern world the Dept of Health seeks to maintain the monopoly of resturants to cook and share food.
A post-post-modern man will cook food and share it.
vermindust at January 16, 2011 8:04 AM
Consistency check:
If you give money to single moms based on the number of children they have, then they...?
If you feed a million starving Ethiopians and don't teach them to feed themselves, then you get...?
If you feed the homeless so that they do not have to feed themselves, then they...?
-----
"A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." This is because the single death can be personalized, embraced emotionally. That doesn't mean the solution is the one that makes you feel good immediately.
There is outrage because regulators, who were specifically asked for in legislation to protect consumers, are actually doing the job they were chartered to do. There should be, instead, embarrassment, in that voters didn't recognize what they were asking for.
But asking a taxpayer to admit he missed something, or was wrong, is impossible. Someone else must always be to blame.
Meanwhile, the problem is not whether the State or individuals feed the homeless. It is that the homeless are there in the first place, and then it is in the assumption that they must be fed.
Radwaste at January 16, 2011 8:50 AM
This is happening because the government is doing its best effort to get dependents.
This is the same thing that has happened to church and social organizations running orphanages -- the government replaced them with Child Services and foster parents. (Anyone who has had a close look at the foster parent system knows its a racket.)
Food banks are coming back -- but the whole food stamp system exists because the social/church system was beaten up by the government.
The government wants to classify, control, and require you to look to them for your existence. Not be an independent person.
But that is my opinion.
Jim P. at January 16, 2011 8:58 AM
It seems like their ought to be a workaround to avoid this. I mean, churches have potlucks for their congregants all the time, and no one inspects them. Why not have a potluck and invite the homeless?
Patrick at January 16, 2011 4:02 PM
I thought something like this had appeared before.
This stuff is licensed simply because if it is not, consumer protections are defeated by the simple expedient of the provider claiming to not be selling anything.
Radwaste at January 16, 2011 4:13 PM
These government cockroaches suck! Like Amy implied, the dumpsters are soooooooo much more sanitary than home-cooked food. /MUCHO SARCASMO
mpetrie98 at January 16, 2011 7:47 PM
"The government wants to classify, control, and require you to look to them for your existence."
That or the government just wants to make sure you have that third sink full of blue rinse water. Maybe I read too many blogs railing at cops shutting down lemonade stands but I find it surprising that the need for a permit or four came as a surprise to these guys.
smurfy at January 17, 2011 1:32 PM
If you need a permit to give away free food to the homeless, the n how much longer will it be that you need a permit to give your freinds food when they come over for a dinner party
lujlp at January 17, 2011 4:50 PM
If you feed a million starving Ethiopians and don't teach them to feed themselves, then you get...?
Bad example Radwaste. Presuming you're referring to the famine that the 80s Live Aid concert was supposed to help, you should properly refer to them as Etritreans who were starving - they have their own country now - and although there were serious localised crop failures, the main causes of the problem were stupid government agricultural policies and intentional blockades of food to starve out the rebels. Food ran pretty short at times during the civil war, but never enough to stop the army from getting fed. They knew how to feed their population, they just didn't feel like it.
Ltw at January 18, 2011 3:00 AM
So it was government intervention that caused the famine in Ethiopia - which sort of reinforces the point of the original post. Government getting in the way of helping people in need.
I'd like to point out for anyone who is aware of this stuff that I know the current Eritrean government is not exactly a huge improvement. But in the 80s they were getting whipped like a red-headed stepchild.
Ltw at January 18, 2011 3:11 AM
Personally, I think all this kind of charity should be done privately - the government should not be handing out money for anything, nor should they be regulating it in any way.
We're doing it wrong.
Daghain at January 18, 2011 1:00 PM
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