In a sense the city has set up a two tier system of enforcement - cite those that can pay, don’t for those that can’t unless the crime is violent. This includes bail levels for the same crime, most drugged out tweakers are caught and released where a working stiff will have a hefty bail amount to deal with.
The problem can be more easily solved by helping those who are local and sending those who aren’t back to where they are from (or a system to charge the originating towns).
Really? How would sending them back work? Establish an "internal passport" system for the US so immigration from Iowa to California would perhaps require someone to provide address to the proper authorities? They have a system like that in China.
And yeah, there is a reason people don't want to be homeless in Iowa in the winter.
Edit: and yeah, what you describe is so much "tolerance" as what happens when the legal system can't afford to jail every single homeless person. So really, you sort of need to actually solve the problem which indeed can't be just put on local governments.
There are no cities "tolerant of homelessness" though there may be cities less tolerant than others.
If you think that tolerance is a source of the problem, do you imagine an intolerance race as the solution? I mean, as far as I can tell, the intolerance race is already happening and it's only making America more awful all around. Constant police harassment is the norm as a means of dealing with homelessness nearly everywhere - given that it's essentially illegal to live without a home in the US.
And even with an intolerance race, cities with nice weather are going to be at a disadvantage. If no cities offer services, it's still nicer to be rousted from the side of the road at 3:00 am from a place with nice weather and pleasant views.
So, instead of viscous, mean-spirit carping, perhaps we could think about how to actually solve this problem.