[QUOTE="~Zen~, ] I guess the situation in California can best be summed up by this quote from Senator Steven Bradford: "We had a slew of people that came forward to tell us about what we shouldn’t be doing,” he said. “But what the hell should we be doing? Because right now we’re not doing anything.”[/QUOTE] ........................................................................................................................................................................................ Well they are spending plenty on doing nothing. 24 Billion in homeless spending in the last 5 years in California alone. re-printed ( Stolen from the WSJ ) California has spent $24 billion to combat homelessness over the last five years—and what did it get for its money? More homelessness, according to a new state audit that should embarrass Sacramento and infuriate taxpayers. The Legislature charged state auditor Grant Parks with reviewing the state’s homeless spending as the numbers camping on streets rise. Alas, his report this week concludes that the state “lacks current information on the ongoing costs and outcomes of its homelessness programs.” The agency in charge “has not consistently tracked and evaluated the State’s efforts to prevent and end homelessness,” he adds. Translation: California has been wasting billions of dollars to no good effect. According to the audit, 181,399 people were homeless at some point in 2023, up from 118,552 in 2013 and 151,278 in 2019. “To address this ongoing crisis, nine state agencies have collectively spent billions of dollars in state funding over the past five years administering at least 30 programs dedicated to preventing and ending homelessness,” Mr. Parks writes. Yet he found that only two programs “appear” to be “cost-effective.” Emphasize “appear.” One program converted existing buildings such as hotels into homeless housing at a $144,000 cost per unit. This was less expensive than the $380,000 to $570,000 per unit it cost to build new affordable housing in 2019. But there’s little evidence that the program kept people off the streets. Another program provided financial assistance to people who were deemed at risk of homelessness, which cost about $12,000 to $20,000 per household. The auditor found this was less expensive than the $30,000 to $50,000 a year that each homeless person costs taxpayers, including public safety and healthcare. But getting the mentally ill and drug-addicted homeless into treatment and jobs is surely the most cost-effective solution. Progressives oppose the tough love required of both. They prefer pushing more money into housing that doesn’t address the dysfunction of the homeless. Don’t expect Gov. Gavin Newsom’s $6.4 billion bond for homelessness that voters barely approved last month to change anything.
The motivation is easy to understand. One needn't be a history major to know you get more of what you subsidize and less of what you tax.
In normal times, according to economists, it takes 30% of a person's income to pay for housing (rent, mortgage). But in this country today, economists tell us, it is taking an average of 40% of a person's income to pay for housing. The fact is many low income people do not earn enough to pay 40% of their income for housing and still have enough left over to pay other bills and still live a stable life. The same applies to single mothers. Homeless shelters give priority to single mothers which leaves many single people without children, both men and women, homeless. Once a person loses a roof over their head, it's not long before they are unemployed, if they even had a job to start with. In my area just a few years ago, almost all homeless people were men, usually alcoholics or drug addicts who couldn't hold a job. But in just the past couple of years I have noticed as many homeless women as men. I think a major reason for this change is that homeless shelters give priority to women with children thereby consigning single women to the streets.
It's sad. Too many people didn't foresee the price of eliminating mean tweets making everything so expensive and the toll it would take on the working class. Though as for single motherhood it's been encouraged by subsidization for at least six decades. It's mind blowing how people turn a blind eye to destructive policies that have been sold as "compassionate". Very sad, both for the foolishness of destructive policy being implemented in the first place and for the inevitable increasing devastating effects that result.
Most of the homeless problem is much different than you might think. It has more to do with mental illnesses most of the time. Please bear with me here before you all pile on. My uncle was very wealthy back when he was younger. He had multiple physical therapy clinics that he owned and managed. One day he was out on his boat with his three kids and two step kids. He got too close to shore and the boat capsized. One of his step kids drowned that day. He could not forgive himself. Subsequently he got divorced and lost his businesses and eventually everything he owned. He was living on rooftops of abandoned buildings on the streets of Los Angeles. Eventually one day he met a woman that was ministering to the homeless. He ended up helping her give out food to them and blankets and socks/clothes etc. They ended up falling in love and married. I can tell you from a direct experience and from their own testimony that the majority of the homeless have in fact mental illness. Whether it be from a traumatic event like ptsd from a war, or some other tragedy they have suffered or heavy drugs. Or, they were just born that way. That makes up 95% of the homeless population. Many of them are even offered shelter but will not take it. It is just a fact. They do need help, but low income housing is not necessarily the help they need. They need someone to care about them, and they need something to care for themselves. They need to find a way to again care about themselves as well. It is a long process for sure.
I feel like much of the problem results from people not taking family responsibility seriously. Be it parents too busy working and socializing and catering to themselves to care for their own children, parents who feel they'll be better off parting ways with their children's other parent, lack of proper discipline, or some other circumstance that ends up with the lack of a true loving bond among family members. It creates the feeling that everyone's on their own, focusing on their own journeys and not concerned with the others. Many young homeless people report having not seen their parent(s) nor sibling(s) for years. How depressing is that? Many others report having left their kids behind or never having kids. How did family values get destroyed among so many people? The homeless situation in Latin America looks a lot smaller. Is that because of great government programs that feed and house and care for them? Of course not! Because that's not a thing there which actually contributes to combating homelessness. Because family values are strong, and they realize that their members could end up on the street suffering, the main objective is to create strong family bonds and take care of each other. Throughout life. Teach the children life skills. Listen to and show respect to the older members at all times. Behave to coexist. Know that there's a God watching and you can't hide. Obviously that's not everybody, you gotcher malandros, but overall they have a saner society. And I'd speculate that strong family values due to a lack of government safety net plays a major role.
It’s a very complex issue…. the concentration of wealth in the hands of the very few already rich and their families and it’s been getting worse since RR “aw shucks” clip-clipped into town. a flood of addicting drugs. Guess who got rich on pushing opioid pain killers. And the governments not putting every cent of alcohol and legal marijuana taxes back into treatment. I know for a fact that treatment works but it’s not cheap. Progressives support treatment. crappy religious practices calling addiction and homelessness “a moral failure “ and tying donations of shelter and sustenance to believing a specific way The class message in society that no homeless shelters or non traditional families or other races don’t belong in my neighborhood. And this is just a start. Predatory capitalism has created a lot of issues and more capitalism most assuredly is not a sane solution. Oh yeah it might hep of T went to prison for his criminal behavior…..
Yep, the talking points of those with no solution. (And secretly want it to continue apparently) It's complicated... It's Republicans... It's businesses... It's the rich... It's capitalism... It's religion... It's people wanting freedom... It's people wanting safety... It's people wanting to excel... It's a strong economy and military... Basically everything they failed at, and don't want to see others succeed at. It's a conscious or subconscious effort to bring others down in the name of "fair". And let's send our political rivals to jail who don't believe in tearing down everything that good people prior struggled to build. I'd say views like those are often the result of self absorbed parents and a captured school system of employees putting pay, benefits, and facilities over the teaching of children.
I recently read that something like 2/3 of Americans are one or two missed paychecks away from homelessness. I know I am. Sometimes, it doesn't even take a tragedy
Is that why they're flocking here from the failed dictatorships that seem to be so prevalent down there?
There is that point. Freedom from just about everything else also... no power bill, etc. but living on the streets is expensive in many other ways. I don't believe homelessness equates to financial freedom, but there is freedom of sorts.
