It ’ s a vicious circle — a recurring nightmare for both the homeless and the government — in which obstinacy challenges incompetence .

On Jan . 24 , the Office of Homelessness and Poverty Prevention tore down a homeless encampment on Route 16 in Harmon and drove away the trespassers on private property . It wasn ’ t clear as of this writing where the occupants have been relocated , but some stragglers have stayed behind , guarding their crudely built tents . “ We are not homeless . This is our home and they are kicking us out of our home ,” one of the stragglers told me .

Simultaneously , the Office of the Attorney General staged a “ Panbuster Ticketing Operation ,” deploying a team to spot panhandlers on the streets . “ I detest lazy and disadvantaged people receiving handouts for long periods . It ’ s the working-class people who foot the bill for their handouts ,” Attorney General Douglas Moylan said .

The panbusters removed the panhandlers — “ suspects ,” they are called — from the streets and issued them tickets , which will be assessed and paid in court .

The Aggressive Panhandling Act of 2013 imposes a $ 250 fine for the first offense and $ 500 for any subsequent violations . Now check the ticketed panhandlers if their coffee jars collected $ 250 to pay the fine . Otherwise , they have to return to the streets to beg for more quarters and dimes to pay what

they supposedly owe the court . Unless they elude the panbusters , the street returnees would need to raise $ 500 more for this subsequent violation .

Panhandling cannot be legislated away . This law is just designed to punish the poor for being poor .

In a dystopian fashion , the AG ’ s office has also debuted its “ Panhandler Repellant ” stickers — Insert your emoji of choice here — that complement its infamous anti-panhandling billboard . “ They are for the public to stick onto the lower-left windshield of their cars to repel any panhandlers ,” according to Austin Fortuno at the AG ’ s office .

The OHAPP ’ s and AGO ’ s Jan . 24 twin operations were both live-streamed and pre-announced , as if there was a competition as to which team does a better job at fighting the poor .

These latest theatrical performances will not be the last .

As the number of homeless Guamanians has ramped up , so has the hostility toward them . They are vilified as “ an eyesore in this paradise ,” an aberration

of Guam ’ s idyllic image “ that drives the tourists away .”

Homelessness is a tragedy in and of itself , but we fail at addressing this crisis — even with $ 8 billion in federal windfall that flooded Guam during the Covid years .

The government talks about solving Guam ’ s homelessness crisis — from afar , inside the airconditioned room where they generate technocratic claptrap . Hence the lack of empathy and myopic solutions detached from the actual problem .

The government of Guam takes a backward approach , prioritizing clearing visible homelessness over addressing a systemic lack of housing options .

We recognize its complexity . Homelessness is not just about poverty ; rather , it ’ s a nexus of other factors including addiction , alcoholism , mental illness , which can ’ t be solved with bulldozers , panhandle repellant stickers or court tickets .

Clearing the homeless out of public sight will not eliminate homelessness . Criminalizing homelessness , or panhandling for that matter , only perpetuates the problem , creating a cycle of encampment demolition without addressing root causes .

Publisher / Editor-in-Chief Mar-Vic Cagurangan publisher @ pacificislandtimes . com

Contributing Writers Raquel Bagnol Ron Ricky Coloma Zaldy Dandan Kambes Kesolei Theodore Lewis Brian Manabat Joyce McClure Gabriel McCoard Jack Niedenthal Alex Rhowuniong Johanna Salinas Robert Underwwod Jayvee Vallejera Frank Whitman Aline Yamashita

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