Hooray for the news that the Loaves and Fishes soup kitchen program, currently operating out of St. Michaels next to Baldwin Park, will soon close once organizers find another location. Some of the volunteers claim that because many of the program’s “clients” live nearby the soup kitchen should be located somewhere in downtown Concord.
This is a ridiculous suggestion.
The program is by all accounts disruptive and overrun by the detritus and anti-social behavior of the chronic homeless that the City of Concord and other enablers have foisted on homeowners and residents of downtown Concord for years beyond the acceptable use of the program. Now the consequences of this blind-eye policy have proliferated and spill into surrounding neighborhoods including squatters taking over vacant buildings in downtown Concord (2173 Mt Diablo Street), just steps away Todos Santos Park. First a free lunch…now free housing!
The City should stop pestering residents about RV parking and clean up the homeless mess in downtown Concord before it gets out of control. I don’t see the do-gooder neighbors around St. Bonnies or on St Francis across from Concord Park where Helen Allen used to live clamoring to have Loaves and Fishes move in so their neighborhoods can be trashed. Similarly, downtown can no longer afford to be Concord’s dumping ground.
Bill Gram-Reefer is Editor & Publisher of Halfway To Concord, founded in 2004. Halfway To Concord is the leading online source for community-driven political news, events, and opinion for Contra Costa County and the San Francisco East Bay.
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Here, here!!!
Thank you!! Thank you!! Thank you!!!