A ghostly chant of "Bill of Rights, Bill of Rights" drifted out of a sidewalk tent as the United Nations monitor on extreme poverty walked the streets of skid row as part of a national tour investigating human rights conditions for the poorest U.S. citizens.
Philip Alston, an Australian and a New York University law professor, got a full taste of the epicenter of L.A. homelessness last week, passing by a shelter courtyard with dozens of people bedding down on the concrete because there was no room inside.
Alston was appointed by the U.N. human rights council as the special rapporteur on extreme poverty to investigate the plight of the most vulnerable people in the economic doldrums of the richest nation in the world
Los Angeles was the only two-day stop for Alston, who met privately with local government officials and civil rights lawyers, presided over a skid row town hall and walked its streets.
Alston said that because the United States — alone among big industrial nations — has consistently rejected access to housing and sanitation as essential human rights, he is probing whether economic disparities prevent poor people from exercising their full political and civil rights.
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