Vagrants messing up the city

THE EDITOR: As a concerned parent and citizen of this beautiful country of ours, I wish to appeal to the social services in this country. Criminals are not born overnight; they are produced. Notwithstanding the drug culture and other evils in today’s world, we should recruit more social workers rather than more policemen and more security guards, install more gates and bars etc. Social services should start in the primary schools, so as to ensure that children are being taken care of in the home, no physical nor sexual abuse. Counselling for parents, should it become necessary? We will therefore have better citizens, not that we expect perfection, but more productive teens and adults as a result of the prevention rather than cure method.

People require basic amenities — food and shelter. The government gives free education and the parents do their part. But we need to know that our children are given the nurturing that they need at home so that they would grow up to be better parents, thus ensuring that our society produces well-adjusted people now and in the future. Another factor I would like to highlight is the vagrancy problem, particularly in the city. These persons remove garbage from the cans and scatter it, making the city dirtier and more unsanitary. They relieve themselves anywhere and everywhere. I personally, have to cross the street sometimes to avoid running into some of them. They are increasing daily and sleep all over the city, leaving their “beds” all over and making the city disgusting. Can we have some system to put these persons where they can get the required help and shelter to make a positive contribution to society and also keep our city and country clean? I know we do not live in a perfect world but we can all try to make it a little better.

M RENWICK
Port-of-Spain