The Los Angeles Hoarders

In March of 2020, at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic and when the population was asked to stay home, thousands of Angelenos thronged the supermarkets and took all the toilet paper.

I remember the images of full carts, enough for several years. This and other items such as water bottles disappeared from the counters.

They left nothing for the others.

I remembered those images of I gather this week. An anonymous elderly lady of 90 and her son, for years hoarded trash on their property in the downtown Koreatown neighborhood.

When the interior of the house was insufficient, they occupied the patios with boxes, cardboard, junk packages from which they refused to get rid of; mountains of items reached a height of 10 feet.

AND for years his neighbors denounced this source of infection and ugliness. They pleaded and threatened. To no avail.

Finally, a team from the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health entered her home and got the lady to allow her property to be cleaned.

They removed 14 trucks of accumulated garbage.

Accumulating garbage to the ceiling is not a right guaranteed in the Constitution, just as it is not a right to resist vaccination, when it hurts others.

In the media, we spread the word shocking images of the house.

Consequently, similar cases were reported in other parts of the county.

A man in Reseda for years accumulated among other items of 40 to 50 skeletons of cars, mostly trucks, in different stages of deterioration.

A neighbor sadly tells how rats and cockroaches from that property invade his.

Apparently, when they ordered the owner to take charge of the garbage, he sued the city ​​and other neighbors, representing himself.

The case is being handled by the City’s Department of Building and Safety (LADBS), said Councilman Bob Blumenfeld, in whose district is the property, and “is currently moving forward.”

Across from that house, at Grover Cleveland High School on Vanalden Street, 3, 115 students are exposed to unsanitary conditions. And, we add, to an expression of the worst possible citizenship under the guise of individual rights.

The situation apparently will not change, says to the camera Rick Chambers, a reporter for Channel 5.

In a county guide they ask for understanding and patience with the elderly who hoard. They suggest contacting the Department of Mental Health at 1 (213) 351 – 7284. The website 211 la.org offers contacts to aid programs.

Excessive hoarding of garbage, furniture, boxes or objects is illegal, as it is a “public nuisance (nuisance)”, according to the California Penal Code 372 and 373 to PC. It is a misdemeanor and carries a sentence of up to six months in jail in a county jail.

I read that hoarding things like this is the symptom of a mental illness, exacerbated by loneliness .

A psychologist tells me that they can be cases of obsessive-compulsive disorder, usually preceded by a severe trauma in which they give meaning to things.

I think it is more than that, that it is the ultimate consequence of the incessant, relentless pressure to buy, to accumulate things.

It is a social evil.

And contagious.