Amsterdam to create 'scum villages'

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Amsterdam is to create "Scum villages" where nuisance neighbours and anti-social tenants will be exiled from the city and rehoused in caravans or containers with "minimal services" under constant police supervision.

The plan echoes a proposal from Geert Wilders, the leader of a populist Dutch Right-wing party

Holland's capital already has a special hit squad of municipal officials to identify the worst offenders for a compulsory six month course in how to behave.

Social housing problem families or tenants who do not show an improvement or refuse to go to the special units face eviction and homelessness.

Eberhard van der Laan, Amsterdam's Labour mayor, has tabled the £810,000 plan to tackle 13,000 complaints of anti-social behaviour every year. He complained that long-term harassment often leads to law abiding tenants, rather than their nuisance neighbours, being driven out.

"This is the world turned upside down," the mayor said at the weekend.

The project also involves setting up a special hotline and system for victims to report their problems to the authorities.

More on the story here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...719247/Amsterdam-to-create-scum-villages.html



I know my thoughts on this, but I'd be interested in what others think. Good idea? Bad idea?
 
Isn't this just like apartheid, but instead of color it's on social behavior?

I'm having a hard time accepting this as a Dutch policy.
 
This is nothing like apartheid. Apartheid was against innocent people. This is basically an extention of prison, for those who can't act like normal citizens.
 
Only major problem I can think of at the moment with this will be children. Those born in a "scum village" have a bleak outlook right from the off. Although, would it be any different to being born on a council estate ?

I'm sure there'l be a barrage of comments condemning it so I'l reserve full judgement until I've seen some of the reasons for not doing this, but at the moment, I can't say as though I disagree with it.
 
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I thought the Netherlands already had a scum village? Isn't that Utrecht?

I kid, I kid. It's an interesting idea, but forcing people to move is a pretty heavy handed tactic. Then again, what else can we do to curb bad behaviour?
 
Liquid
I thought the Netherlands already had a scum village? Isn't that Utrecht?

I kid, I kid. It's an interesting idea, but forcing people to move is a pretty heavy handed tactic. Then again, what else can we do to curb bad behaviour?
Click to expand...

Force them to watch Gangnam Style non-stop?
 
No, those who eat gravy and biscuits three times a day seem to enjoy that. Small wonder it's YouTube's most popular video.
 
Rutger Hauer.

Ontkommen uit Amsterdam would be my guess at a translated tite...
 
I'm not going to say anything too right wing because I'll probably get ridiculed for it but I will say that it's a pretty good idea for a peaceful country.
 
My question here is what their definition of "nuisance neighbors and anti-social tenants" would be. I am sure that people would abuse the hotline to its full extent to get people that they don't care for out of their lives.

This just isn't right.
 
Lissa
Amsterdam is to create "Scum villages" where nuisance neighbours and anti-social tenants will be exiled from the city and rehoused in caravans or containers with "minimal services" under constant police supervision.

The plan echoes a proposal from Geert Wilders, the leader of a populist Dutch Right-wing party
Click to expand...

That's where I could see potential problems arising.
 
FireEmblem10
My question here is what their definition of "nuisance neighbors and anti-social tenants" would be. I am sure that people would abuse the hotline to its full extent to get people that they don't care for out of their lives.

This just isn't right.
Click to expand...


Due process. Investigation and proof required. 👍
 
We have these in england, they are called council estates. Full of (pretty much all) chavs, teenage parents and generally people without jobs.
 
Liquid
Rutger Hauer.

Ontkommen uit Amsterdam would be my guess at a translated tite...
Click to expand...

Actually It'd be better translated as Ontsnappen uit Amsterdam, but it's pretty close.

What I think of this, I'm not sure about it. I mean, I hate asocial people, but to force them to move? I just don't know.
 
I have more than a little familiarity with the local municipal community housing provider. It costs more than $2000 per working adult in this community to maintain the public housing inventory, and that's just upkeep and rent subsidies and doesn't include the capital or finance cost of new construction. The average rent revenue per unit is 10-15% of the market rate. Most of the stock is poorly maintained (relative to a privately owned property, relative to many countries in the world, they are palaces), and what money they do spend on large projects is quite often wasted on meaningless or unnecessary work, or replacement of perfectly (or nearly so) functioning, but appearance wise, aging infrastructure.

One example of waste would be spending more than $500, 000 recently, replacing underground storm drain lines in just one housing complex, that were functioning nearly perfectly for 40 years, because the money was in the budget and had to be spent. On top of this, the current building standard for the municipality is to encourage homeowners to run their eaves lines onto the ground so that majority of the water soaks into the soil, rather than overburdening an aging storm drainage infrastructure. In fact, there is a program in place that pays homeowners to redirect their downspouts onto the ground as opposed to directly into the sewer system as this money was spent doing.

Another example would be installing a water heating system in a single family dwelling that included the following:

1. A solar heated pre-heating system, that allowed water to be pumped up to the roof to be heated by the sun in the summer.
2. A new tankless water heater system that instantly heats the water, eliminating the need for a water tank, which constantly loses tiny amounts of heat through conduction.
3. A brand new 100 gallon heated water tank, to go with the tankless water heating system that doesn't require a water tank. Single family homes are typically equipped with 60 gallon tanks maximum.
4 A copper coil system that wraps around the main waste pipe, designed to capture heat from water used elsewhere in the house. These systems work best with thin copper waste pipes which conduct heat most effectively. The pipes in this home are thick ABS plastic and unless you are running a long hot shower, they do not conduct heat to the outsdie of the drain pipe.

$110,000 - Market value of the house
$50,000 - Total cost of this upgrade:
$15-20 - Average monthly expenditure on heating water per household that this upgrade is designed to reduce.
$5-10 - Potential monthly savings.

In my experience with hundeds or thousands of people dependent on public housing I've come to the conclusion that there are basically two types of people in public housing, transitional and permanent. Transitionals are those that are down on their luck, single mom's quite often, lost a job, went bankrupt etc. Sometimes all they can afford, temporarily, is assisted public housing but they do not intend to stay, and generally don't. My best guess is they make up less than 10% of people in public housing.

90% or more are there for life and will never leave. Many are seniors on fixed incomes and can't afford a market rent, but many more are young and able bodied, and completely capable of finding work and getting out of public housing, but for their own reasons, have chosen not to or are incapable, usually by attitude and/or tempermant, of holding a job of any kind, doing something legal.

Something needs to be done in the next 10-20 years to address the exponentially growing cost of Public Housing, and the burden it places on the working taxpayer. Costs need to be trimmed and we need to take a hard look at whether it's our responsibility to provide for life, at 10-15% of market rent, the size of living accomodations that many young working families could not afford to purchase for themselves.

Is a "ghetto" the answer? I don't know about that, but I do think it's a reasonable alternative to look at shrinking the size of individual units available to "lifers" in order to reduce costs, making some kind of participation in upkeep and maintenance mandatory for those physically capable of doing so, and also requriing a larger contribution in terms of % of income.

I also think it's time to take a look at what one might call "bare subsistance" type of housing as opposed to providing a growing percentage of the population with the type of housing that working families cannot afford to purchase for themselves or must work long and hard hours to afford to rent from someone else.
 

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