By the 2020s, the American government – reacting to serious problems of homelessness and unemployment – created special Sanctuary Districts in most major cities.

teft · edit-2 3 months ago

By the 2020s, the American government – reacting to serious problems of homelessness and unemployment – created special Sanctuary Districts in most major cities.

@Keeponstalin · edit-2 3 months ago

Housing First is the correct way to reduce homelessness. The main cause of homelessness is being priced out of the housing market, because the vast majority of housing in America is entirely privatized. Plus most public housing in America is not done nor funded well, until our European counterparts.

Drug addiction is a symptom of late-stage homelessness, not a cause. The cause is almost always the private housing market pricing people out of affording even rent. In the US, housing is first and foremost an investment, not a necessity.

Numerous studies show that housing first participants experience higher levels of housing retention and use fewer emergency and criminal justice services, which produces cost savings in emergency department use, inpatient hospitalizations, and criminal justice system use.

https://www.pdx.edu/homelessness/housing-first

This has worked famously in Finland

Melllvar · 3 months ago

Housing First has been the policy in San Francisco since 2008, and state-wide since 2016.

@Keeponstalin · 3 months ago

No they haven’t. Shelters and Housing Lotterys are not Housing First. Housing First is free housing, like studio apartments, where homeless people can get stability in order to recover from addiction and join the job market.

https://sfplanning.org/housing Housing for All is going in the right direction, but Housing First is specifically important for addressing and reducing homeless.

Melllvar · 3 months ago

Welfare and Institutions Code 8255.

But it’s beside the point if the problem is with getting them to accept services in the first place.

@Keeponstalin · 3 months ago

Oh I see that now. Yeah you’re right that California has started Housing First. I looked into it but I couldn’t find any data about the results of the people who took part, only the overall data of the state of California which doesn’t really tell me how well the program itself is in California. The major difference between it done on a State level compared to on a national level like Finland is the amount of financial support and scope of implementation. Looking into it, I also noticed Finland has extensive access to many services for people that are utilizing Housing First, which wasn’t the case in California. Another major aspect is that Finland has significantly better access to affordable housing, especially with the amount of public housing available, bit also in the private market.

The root cause of homelessness has not been addressed in America like it has in Finland, so the amount of people becoming homeless is still increasing here in America.