Who Should Be In Charge?

As I follow the various elected and appointed officials and non profit organizations in Oregon tasked with solving the homeless crisis, it has occurred to me that the current leadership style doesn't seem up for the job. Too slow. Too conventional. Too soft. Too many cooks in the kitchen. Too bureaucratic. No awareness that we are in a crisis. Tired, hackneyed phrasing. Ad nauseam op eds dead with jargon. No accountability. No Harry Truman mentality. As I wrote months ago in this newsletter, a Czar of some kind probably should have been appointed long ago in Oregon to oversee all efforts. That initiative should have originated with the Governor, but oh well. It's still not too late, but now all the fiefdoms have have become entrenched and fortified, and as a result, we have no statewide plan. Leave it up to the bigger cities and wealthier counties and farm most or all of it in rural Oregon out to churches and non profits or local jails. True, the Legislature recently allocated $400 million for alleviating the homeless crisis, but again, who do we want to implement it on the ground and right away?

Not too long ago, I brainstormed a list of potential leadership styles that might better address the homeless crisis. This was not an idle exercise. What kind of leadership would it take to get things moving?

Here they are, for your consideration.

Perry Mason

Atticus Finch

Eleanor Roosevelt

Henry Kaiser

LBJ (minus handling of the Vietnam War)

FDR

Herbert Hoover (pre Presidency)

Harriet Tubman

George Marshall

Tom McCall

The Federation (Star Trek reference)

Longshoremen

Bill Belichik

Jack Ramsay (circa 1976-77)

General (not President) Grant

General Sherman (specifically the March to the Sea)

Harvey Milk

Noah (pre boarding the Ark)

Martin Luther King

NASA (Apollo Mission glory years)

The Black Panthers

The Three Stooges (This is not meant as a joke. I recently watched one of their film shorts where they successfully rallied to find housing and medical care for a homeless sister and brother during the Depression.)

Amazon

Sears Roebuck (first half century of operation)

Apple (Steve Jobs era, where he yells and humiliates underlings)

My Family

The Roman Empire (the Republic era)

Disney

Clara Barton