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negativewishingwell t1_j07kqmm wrote

Seems like a wildly unconstitutional limit on private property rights.

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Or0b0ur0s t1_j07ucse wrote

You find tons and tons of these, admittedly covering pretty small neighborhoods only, around colleges & universities all over the country. It comes from both local residents not wanting "frat houses" of drunken college students whooping it up next door - and, more often than not, using the parking all up - and the schools going along with it so as to better leverage their high-profit-margin residence halls, making them more attractive since you either use them or live much further away, outside the ordinance.

I've never heard of one successfully applying to an entire town before, but they are absolutely on the books in some places.

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negativewishingwell t1_j0885ie wrote

Yeah I figure JT is trying to protect their reputation as a nice quaint town to get tourist money, so they’ll do whatever they think they can to make it hard for poor people to live there. There are definitely some occupancy regulations they can put in place, but these go way too far and the group that should be most pissed off about it is landlords.

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DroDameron t1_j09axu5 wrote

JT stole their name from Jim Thorpe and stole his remains from his family by bribing his third wife. Fuck that town.

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gladysk t1_j09idwt wrote

I just placed a hold on David Maraniss’ book, Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe. Have you read it?

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DroDameron t1_j09jszi wrote

No but it sounds like a good one. He seemed like one helluva guy and love that he stood proud and represented us as an American despite America not really caring much for Native Americans.

Always inspiring to see people like that, like Black Americans in the Civil War and WW1.. instead of blaming their circumstances and using them as an excuse to do nothing, they rise above them and fight for the world they want to see.

And in spite of his actions, they took away his achievements because he made a $25 a week playing baseball.. took 100 years to give him his medals back. It was said many other people did it too, but they used fake names. Thorpe chose to not hide it and was punished.

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ItsjustJim621 t1_j0azy0i wrote

That whole town is built on a lie. The closest to that town he even got was Palmerton….if you’re going up that way from the Lehigh valley and you get to Palmerton, you just wanna turn the fuck around too…

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HogwartsKate t1_j0bsf93 wrote

History: the town was called Mauck Chunk, a native american name. JT ‘s 3rd wife shopped around the US for a town and if they changed its name in honour of JT she would give them his remains-ie burial plot for Thorpe. They agreed. Nothing was stolen. Nothing bribed. His wife was legit. married to him and wanted him honored forever. Mauck Chunk did not want Asa Packers Lehigh University built there bc of drunken college kids. So it thrives barely as s tourist attraction. With an added train ride. Its a nice scenic town with a long history from the Molly Maguires to Jim Thorpe.

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DroDameron t1_j0bu9zj wrote

Yeah I definitely don't fault the wife or the town, it was an unfortunate situation that he died broke. I just think when the family asked for the body back, they should have honored that request. My boss was telling me when he was there in the 90s, the grave was over grown and not well taken care of, but I can't speak for that nowadays.

Stolen probably the wrong word, like you said, legitimately acquired, just under crappy circumstances. The family definitely considers it stolen though.

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moravian t1_j0cef5j wrote

For clarification, it's not Mauck Chunk but Mauch Chunk.

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negativewishingwell t1_j09devm wrote

I’ve never been there I just know it’s a popular day trip for yuppies.

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DroDameron t1_j09dmue wrote

Something you, Jim Thorpe and I have in common 🤣

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felldestroyed t1_j08mhum wrote

The south is famous for its brothel laws (ie- no more than 5 people unrelated at one residence). It's only applied civilly for evictions though.

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smibrandon t1_j0aa2v0 wrote

Baltimore, MD used to have a law on the books that the ratio of women to stoves in a house couldn't be more than 4:1 (or something like that)

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truethatson t1_j0a9a7l wrote

They had a similar law on the books in the Virginia town I went to school in, and it was BS. For one, we didn’t even have a Greek system and it was pretty far from a “party school.” Most of the homes around campus could comfortably house 4 people and on part time jobs it basically took 4 people to afford it, a fact the various landlords in town were well aware of. So they just had 3 people on the lease and couldn’t care less whether or not a 4th person lived there. With rent prices being what they are now this is just another way to unnecessarily punish people simply for being of lesser means, and it’s pretty disgraceful.

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LowNo5584 t1_j07t7we wrote

I think it is a regulatory violation done I don't remember property right defined in the Constitution.

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crab_races t1_j07g0bf wrote

"...only 'functional families' could live in a home together."

Depending on the definition of 'functional,' I'm not sure many existing families qualify. Mine sure didn't.

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Atrocious_1 t1_j07ltu8 wrote

It would probably prohibit at least 40% of living situations in Jim Thorpe

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SuggestAPhotoProject t1_j07buv5 wrote

The party of small government and personal freedom wants to legislate who you can live with.

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saintofhate OP t1_j07d3y3 wrote

Well don't you know we have to protect those poor landlords who have property that is unrented because six people are renting their one property that's too goddamn much.

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AlaskaDark t1_j07mws7 wrote

Lol and it's no ones fault except for the tenants. Poor landlords. /s

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Zenith2017 t1_j07on6b wrote

The little old disabled lady next door who had no heat for 3 weeks in January should have just got some more electric blankets. Trying to mooch off hardworking landlords smh. They're not gonna be able to pay for their own home renovations without the profit from the housing that they provide to their lucky tenants

/S

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AlaskaDark t1_j07q9jp wrote

It really is disgusting. Everyone up the food chain so worried about getting all these profits and meanwhile the tenant is usually the one struggling with finances and just wants to at least be able to live in a home without worrying about eviction or getting their heat/electric shut off ....

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MeEvilBob t1_j07xowc wrote

They lost the ability to legislate who you can marry so this is their next move.

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frugal_masturbater t1_j08tkc9 wrote

Did they?

I thought the law that just passed forces states to recognize marriages that were performed in any other state.

Once Obergefell v. Hodges falls, and I will bet good money that it will (sadly!), many states fall back on their ban on same-sex marriage.

And then we're back to having to marry in a different state if it's same-sex.

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Ancient_Kapnobatai t1_j07l0cs wrote

Wtf the Golden Girls wouldn't have been able to live together under this.

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dtmfadvice t1_j08daxk wrote

They actually had an episode about that, the city council tried to force them to stop being roommates.

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RevHenryMagoo t1_j082xfj wrote

The Golden Girls had a parade of random, libidinous men coming and going at all hours of the day and night. Clearly not suitable for a family neighborhood.

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PayEmmy t1_j09ev64 wrote

Because people who live in family neighborhoods shouldn't have sex?

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Hib3rnian t1_j07hyg9 wrote

So they'll require an ancestry.com print to confirm legitimacy I suppose?

..get the Fuck outta here with this shit. 😆 Someone's looking for a good suing..

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Crawlerado t1_j07m3cj wrote

This was called the “you plus two” law back in my college town in Colorado. The law originally came about to keep the Mexican immigrant field workers down and was easily extended to students and other working class poor.

Shit law from shit people.

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MunchyMcCrunchy t1_j07bdsv wrote

Good old anti-brothel laws.

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HeyZuesHChrist t1_j07o3d2 wrote

Not to mention “living in sin” which imagine is motivation for this as well.

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Brianeric t1_j07ewby wrote

WTF?!?! Where are we, Iran??

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Or0b0ur0s t1_j07uup9 wrote

If you think about it, Iran got the way it is today the exact same way we're seeing it happen here. That is, American "conservatives" (i.e. fascist plutocrats) in power messed around with the government for their own profit, until it broke badly enough that the local right-wing fringe got angry enough to take it from them by force.

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Allemaengel t1_j07ljtb wrote

I'm not surprised.

I live just a few miles out of JT and the borough operates like a shit show compared to what it could be. The borough council president seems in over his head whenever he gives our local news on Blue Ridge Cable 23 News an interview. Not only that but they have bigger fish to fry than that.

Needing a new public works building. Water system upgrades. Insufficient storm water system. Of course the glorious parking problem for residents on Broadway issue. Dirt bikes illegally riding the Switchback Trail. The new Kresge sign that somehow got approved crazy overly-illuminating everything on the east side, the Fall Foliage Festival getting too big gridlocking traffic. Working with Mahoning to figure out the Flagstaff redevelopment without more than a hundred likely Airbns way up a too narrow road for that.

And etc. & so on.

Remember, these are the guys who bought the idiotic fight with Blue Mountain and Reading Railroad over retroactively collecting an entertainment tax on the tourist train they had ignored collecting for years only to have the RR call their bluff cancelling the train only to quietly cut a deal no one knows about behind the scenes to bring it back.

But no, they have to focus on an unnecessary roommate zoning ordinance because they're bored with no issues to solve.

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MeEvilBob t1_j07y32g wrote

This ordinance is important to them because it makes it harder for immigrants to settle in the area, which is what this is all about in the first place. This is classic racist republican fuckery right here

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Libsoccer20 t1_j08bfm5 wrote

Is Jim Thorpe Republican now? It was always very blue when I lived there... (My family immigrated to Jim Thorpe in the 1800s.)

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Allemaengel t1_j08edjn wrote

Carbon County as a whole is solidly Republican but I think parts of JT borough is as Democratic as the county generally gets.

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Libsoccer20 t1_j08h7cd wrote

That's exactly what I remember is the borough was solid blue.

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ell0bo t1_j08db1j wrote

Well, things have changed in rural PA since the 1800s.

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shadowstar36 t1_j0ca8s6 wrote

Why do you have to bring politics and especially identity politics into this? . It's so tiring with the..,. " everyone is racist, sexist, bigots,.. Blah blah blah"... That world view can't be fun, it's so negative, and really wasn't a thing until 2014.

Sorry but the world doesn't work like that. It's not all black and white. There are legit reasons why they would do that before pushing out boogieman conspiracy theories of "dats racsssist"... Lol. If there was proof, then that would be different.

This was most likely due to their bad parking situation. Recently they made the whole place permit only parking. When I was there as a visitor and asked a store owner why they did that, they freaked at me. Like how dare I voice complaints about their parking. Apparently they don't want tourists to park on the streets as it's very limited. Instead of blasting some of the mountain away and creating new parking lots, they make crazy laws like this. Has nothing to do with Republicans or racism. Also not all Republicans are racist and not all democrats arent. Most people aren't racist and there can be racists people in every ethnicity.

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MeEvilBob t1_j0cxlpg wrote

Why do I have to bring up politics when talking about a purely political issue?

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DonBoy30 t1_j086apn wrote

as a millennial, I wouldn't have been able to live in my 20's if not for living with roommates.

just one more factor as to how Carbon County pushes out the young and educated.

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Mor_Tearach t1_j0bdyut wrote

It's why a ton of formerly nice old towns have very ( very ) few young people left. They move away, educated or not because those towns become kinda ' ruled ' by a few rich old guys passing nutso ordinances .

One near us ( shall remain unnamed ) has some insane curfew, kids can't be out- as in walking on the dam sidewalk much less hanging out anywhere public after I think 9 ? May be 8 ? And please no one reply " But drugs! " " But vandalism! ". Drugs are there, of course they are- because simply everythingggg that used to keep kids engaged and positive has closed. Dealers know that- and happily provide a solution to depressed young people with almost no hope it's going to get better. The ones who can get out leave.

Place looks like a movie set, " cue deserted street in rapidly fading historic coal town ". After the apocalypse.

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DonBoy30 t1_j0bmy1i wrote

yea, it seems like municipal politics are almost exclusively ran by the greedy car dealership owner trope, or the motivated scout master dad who has no understanding of how government works.

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Mor_Tearach t1_j0gravw wrote

Who are also somehow elected to the school board for decades- not sure a lot of us understand how much power are gifted school districts. It's pretty crazy.

Had one state rep office ( which shall remain nameless ) tell us " Basically school districts are like little kingdoms, they can do anything they want ". Found that to be true.

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EarlyWormGetsTheWorm t1_j09l3m7 wrote

Same. The only reason I was able to afford to go to college was there was 5 of us guys sharing a 3 bedroom house. House only had 1 shower too. House was disgusting but great memories. Screw this law.

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laurajodonnell t1_j07nrzw wrote

"Functional families"

Welp. If that was the requirement for people living together, my family would have been separated ages ago!

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Genkiotoko t1_j07jcpr wrote

There's no way this law wouldn't be struck down for violating first and fourteenth amendments.

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phins420 t1_j07qivc wrote

Hahahaahahhahahah what a fucking joke

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EmiliusReturns t1_j07tddh wrote

If I own the property, fuck off. If a landlord owns the property, that should be the landlord’s decision as the owner to set the rules of the property as long as they aren’t violating fire/safety/discrimination laws. You’re gonna tell them they’re only allowed to rent to single individuals or full families? Expect to see LLs push back on that. As they should.

Talk about government overreach. Not to mention privacy concerns. What business is it of anyone else’s who I’m living with?

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LurkersWillLurk t1_j07loaw wrote

Zoning and land use planning needs to be made at a higher level of government than the petty tyrants who run municipalities

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OccasionallyImmortal t1_j07me9x wrote

Petty tyrants at any level shouldn't be running things. Putting it at a higher level puts planning in the hands of people who cannot know the needs of smaller communities and are no less likely to be petty.

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shadowstar36 t1_j0cb33e wrote

Yep, people who say put it on higher level of gov. aren't thinking about it in common sense terms, but with ideological lenses. Lenses most people are tired of, imo. How anyone woudk want to be controlled by on high is crazy. Imagine they had the power to make laws like that, then what. At least with smaller localities you can move.

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chemgeek_2 t1_j07lav7 wrote

There is no way this could possibly pass even the smallest legal challenge. Legislating who you live with or who you spend your days with is dystopian, hyper-religious bullshit, and only happens in authortarian theocracies. FFS.

The idea that someone thought to try to slip this into an ordinance tells you all you need to know about that/those person(s).

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Lilthotdawg t1_j07t8fz wrote

If you have TikTok her name is root_witch and she streams meetings live too. She is awesome so give her a follow!

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blue_no_red_ahhhhhhh t1_j089m9t wrote

Jessica is on TikTok under rootwitch, and she is really level headed despite the witch thing. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Not a Seinfeld joke. 😎. She has the citizenry in mind and they fight her at every turn.

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TheWorldInMySilence t1_j07k22r wrote

Those with wealth, power and position attempting to solidify their own segregated community....

by secretly and legally shutting down limited housing options needed for people's very survival, but only for those with already fewer options and those who are struggling financially.

Good she saw it and addressed it. Don't pass that bs.

Discrimination is still here in 2023. SMH

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shadowstar36 t1_j0cbphp wrote

It probably has nothing to do with what you think it is. This is all about parking and crowds. They recently made parking permit only. The people living there are very mad when people park on the street.

Also Jim Thorpe is a rich persons tourist trap. You aren't going to find any affordable houses there to begin with. People struggling are better off going somewhere else as some of the residents are fing rude.

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beeps-n-boops t1_j0mj493 wrote

> They recently made parking permit only. The people living there are very mad when people park on the street.

The last time I was in JT, probably well over 10 years ago, we lucked into a parking spot right on Broadway. Got out of the car, and first thing I see is a large sign in the front window of the house we parked in front of: TOURISTS GO HOME! YOU ARE NOT WELCOME!

And that wasn't the only one I saw.

I did end up buying a small painting at one of the folk art shops, but outside of that we didn't spend any money in town, since they clearly didn't want any revenue from "outsiders". And we've never gone back, as they made us (and our money) feel so unwelcome.

Fuck 'em.

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SyzygySynergy t1_j07ssj6 wrote

"Functional Families"

The sad thing about this is, there are a lot of people out there that will tell you that "blood ties" are worthless in a lot of cases. It's why there are such jokes as, "my family puts the fun in dysfunctional." Sure, some families are great, but the amount of divorce, separation, familial chaos, domestic violence, etc can honestly speak for itself. A lot of times, "blood family" and family "by marriage", amounts nothing in comparison to what a lot of us refer to as "found family" or the "family of our own choosing".

Not allowing people to live with whom they want as well as whom may help not only then but the overall community is asinine. At a time when money is what it is, prices are what they are, homelessness is what it is, social injustices run rampant, and people are tired from four years of living in a pandemic, things like this are just going to make things worse and shows how little care that overseers bearing power have for the common people. This is ridiculous.

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Chuck1705 t1_j084l7z wrote

More big brother tactics from local governments.

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in_Need_of_peace t1_j087tew wrote

Jim Thorpe - visit for the ambiance, stay for the incest

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CL-MotoTech t1_j07xkrh wrote

Jim Thorpe is struggling to deal with the property grab that has resulted from the NYC and surround exodus. Basically they are out of real estate. This is just a byproduct. I’m not passing judgement, I’m just saying that is the cause.

Source: real estate sales have dramatically stopped there as property is all bought up.

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Flimsy-Lie-1471 t1_j085cnd wrote

Can’t wait to find out what the definition of “functional family “ is.

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Competitive-Tree-608 t1_j09reiq wrote

Why cant they just regulate how many people can live in a building? I thought there were regulations depending on bathrooms and bedrooms to determine the amount of people that should live somwhere? Maybe im thinking of rental property rules? They could apply this though

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GracieThunders t1_j0b6tzg wrote

Exactly the focus should on overcrowding, not who is related to who, anything else is social engineering

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Flimsy-Lie-1471 t1_j085d50 wrote

Can’t wait to find out what the definition of “functional family “ is.

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Lance_lake t1_j08737q wrote

As long as fire zoning laws apply (20 people in a one bedroom in not a good idea), then I don't see where it's their business how many people are there and their relation to each other.

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Dramatic-Party-1384 t1_j08bf0s wrote

I've been watching her tiktoks, and she's fighting the good fight

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[deleted] t1_j08xn6l wrote

Welcome to the 1930’s

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spencerprs t1_j09opdz wrote

When I went to college in central PA there were no sorority houses, only fraternity houses. When I asked why I was told because it was a "brothel law". I didn't know what that meant until it was dumbed down to "whore house law". Oh.

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LowNo5584 t1_j07thm3 wrote

THIS IS A PROPOSED LAW THAT THE COUNSELBER IS DISAGREEING WITH. She's right. It's bullshit.

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jonkoTHEslug t1_j08qzsr wrote

That town is run like garbage. They can't even take care of snow in the winter.

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sx70forlifexx t1_j09jiqq wrote

Yet another scummy little town acting scummy and stupid

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RustedRelics t1_j0a1v8z wrote

Very bold leadership from the borough manager (mayor) in having no comment “because it’s only in draft form”. I guess she is utterly unable to see what a bad idea this is conceptually and practically.

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beeps-n-boops t1_j0mjc9d wrote

Guarantee this ordinance is the brainchild of someone in the "less government intervention in our lives" party.

It's all smoke & mirrors with those chucklefucks.

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SBRH33 t1_j08mv13 wrote

There is nothing worse than living next door to a parry house.

But it sounds like this a little more racist considering its quaint old Jim Thorpe.

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Lazy-Clock7316 t1_j090769 wrote

yeah, no. that's not a thing. not in this country. yet, at least.

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saintofhate OP t1_j092tla wrote

We've had similar laws before, check out anti brothel laws.

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tehmlem t1_j090lji wrote

Oh, that giant sploosh sound I heard was all the landlords ejaculating at once

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Fit_Awareness6752 t1_j09bbvn wrote

Seems to me like they're just trying to keep gay couples from living together

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shadowstar36 t1_j0c7b8x wrote

Jim Thorpe has gone downhill. Last time I was there, a few months back, they had no where to park. You used to be able to park on the street or up past the businesses and walk. It's all now permit only. No visitor parking. Had to go to some over crowded parking lot at the bottom of the hill, across the train tracks, that didn't have an attendant to pay or machine. Had to download a special app and jump through hoops. By the time we parked and got to the store it was about to close with 5 minutes left, they refused to serve us, but served two kids who came after us, awhich they told us they new them... Wtf.. . . As apparently they all like to close up at 5pm. So that left us with one bar to go to, and nothing else, luckily we seen something that had extended hours but it was not what we expected.

Also a lot of the people were rude. My gf wanted to see Harry Potter cafe. They were open after hours, and we thought we lucked out. We waited in line only for the barista telling us she couldn't serve us, to come back in 30 minutes because she was going on break. Sorry you don't go on break when you have a line full of people. I was so pissed. We were the last in line and waited for 20 minutes. Bitch looked at us like we were weird for not blending in. Then I realized that the place wasn't really about Harry Potter it was a weird lgbt poetry club as all the patrons had colored hair and pride flag patches. Almost no Harry Potter stuff besides names of the drinks. We would of stayed and had some drinks, but not with a rude entitled bitch of a barrista saying to us "the customer isn't important".

Yeah, I used to love Jim Thorpe, but not anymore. It doesn't surprise me they would pull something like this. They are very weird with the parking. It's like maybe make more parking lots, dig out the mountain for it, oh and don't close everything at 5pm. Nowhere else closes up everything so early.

−2

Electrical-Wish-519 t1_j07od59 wrote

Let me take a different perspective here. A lot of areas do this to make it so you can’t convert houses to apartments and put a bunch of wardens of the state into those houses. The rent goes to the landlords who neglect the tenants and they end up walking around town and stealing from stores, etc.

−13

gslavik t1_j083gas wrote

> The rent goes to the landlords who neglect the tenants and they end up walking around town and stealing from stores, etc.

This makes it sound as if landlords are caretakers of people renting from them ...

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Electrical-Wish-519 t1_j0875jq wrote

A lot of times they are. There are foundations that get state funding to pay for living expenses. People involved in the foundation pay rent to themselves in homes they bought and don’t do a great job of looking after the people they’re wards of.

−4

gslavik t1_j087nti wrote

> looking after the people they’re wards of.

Should that say "guardians of"?

Are you referring to minors and adults (who cannot take care of themselves)? I think that it would be a different relation ship from renter/landlord.

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Electrical-Wish-519 t1_j08myeq wrote

Yes. Guardians of. And yes I’m talking about this scenario where people can’t take care of themselves. They often get neglected and can be a disturbance to the town, so the towns pass these ordinances like the one above to keep them from happening in their community.

Not weighing in if it’s right or wrong, just that it’s not always evil landlords trying to squeeze renters, though I’m sure that’s certainly a scenario that happens

0

gslavik t1_j08scph wrote

Your argument makes sense. The "landlords who neglect the tenants" part threw me off what you were trying to get across.

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feelsgoodman666 t1_j08nhht wrote

Sounds like an issue with these “foundations” and how they administer their “care” - what does that have to do with zoning individuals out of being able to rent apartments? I don’t see any benefit to this other than classic nimby nonsense

1

felldestroyed t1_j08vwg8 wrote

I'm fairly certain you're referencing group homes. This would be covered under anti-discrimination laws provided by both the Civil Rights Act and federal funding mandates from the federal government. Most states also have state statutes that prevent discrimination of long term care facilities - like group homes.

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Electrical-Wish-519 t1_j092i4z wrote

Which is why they are very vague around the reasoning for the ordinance. Can’t come out and say it without having a case in front of a federal court

1