by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist
Poor Alabama has really been wallowing in the news as of late. National Public Radio has just run a multi-part piece on the city of Tuscaloosa's re-segregation of its public schools, a sad commentary on the Supreme Court's abandonment of the notion that separate schools are not equal schools - and that government will no longer insure that schools are integrated. Places like Alabama and Tuscaloosa are now free to return to the fine educational standards of the George Wallace era - a time when everybody knew their place.
But it is a story out of the town of Oneonta, Alabama, that really frosts the cake. There, in Oneonta, a Christian minister by the name of Rick Wood (of The Lord's House of Prayer) has been behaving in a Christ-like manner, and the good citizens who run the town are sick and tired of it. Pastor Wood has been driving around in his pick-up truck and giving hotdogs and bottled water to the homeless.
The city recently passed an ordinance requiring food trucks to buy a license - which could be as much as $500 - and they informed Pastor Wood that he would be required to purchase one of those licenses. That ordinance has shut down the pastor's effort to feed the homeless - at least for the time being. (This cause is just too good for some person or group not to step forward write a check.)
The article where I saw this story referenced a town in Florida which has recently passed an ordinance that banned the use of blankets by homeless residents.
Other communities are also getting very creative in coming up with ways to get rid of the homeless. Hawaii, for instance, was buying them one-way cruise ship tickets to the mainland. New York City used to bus theirs away from the city when big conventions came to town. By the time the ill-used street dwellers found their way back into the city, the conventioneers would be long gone.
(Maybe that's why the Second Coming hasn't happened yet. Jesus got here early, but then froze - or starved - to death while sleeping on a park bench.
Somebody's gonna have a lot of explaining to do come Judgement Day!
Citizen Journalist
Poor Alabama has really been wallowing in the news as of late. National Public Radio has just run a multi-part piece on the city of Tuscaloosa's re-segregation of its public schools, a sad commentary on the Supreme Court's abandonment of the notion that separate schools are not equal schools - and that government will no longer insure that schools are integrated. Places like Alabama and Tuscaloosa are now free to return to the fine educational standards of the George Wallace era - a time when everybody knew their place.
But it is a story out of the town of Oneonta, Alabama, that really frosts the cake. There, in Oneonta, a Christian minister by the name of Rick Wood (of The Lord's House of Prayer) has been behaving in a Christ-like manner, and the good citizens who run the town are sick and tired of it. Pastor Wood has been driving around in his pick-up truck and giving hotdogs and bottled water to the homeless.
The city recently passed an ordinance requiring food trucks to buy a license - which could be as much as $500 - and they informed Pastor Wood that he would be required to purchase one of those licenses. That ordinance has shut down the pastor's effort to feed the homeless - at least for the time being. (This cause is just too good for some person or group not to step forward write a check.)
The article where I saw this story referenced a town in Florida which has recently passed an ordinance that banned the use of blankets by homeless residents.
Other communities are also getting very creative in coming up with ways to get rid of the homeless. Hawaii, for instance, was buying them one-way cruise ship tickets to the mainland. New York City used to bus theirs away from the city when big conventions came to town. By the time the ill-used street dwellers found their way back into the city, the conventioneers would be long gone.
(Maybe that's why the Second Coming hasn't happened yet. Jesus got here early, but then froze - or starved - to death while sleeping on a park bench.
Somebody's gonna have a lot of explaining to do come Judgement Day!
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