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> I’m not sure what the right answer is, but asking people who are used to rough and tumble life outside to then behave civilly indoors with zero tolerance seem

by bnralt 2y ago

> I’m not sure what the right answer is, but asking people who are used to rough and tumble life outside to then behave civilly indoors with zero tolerance seems…set for failure? This is true, and that's why housing first is a terrible policy (I've seen it fail spectacularly first hand). Many of these people simply can't take care of themselves, and putting them in free apartments doesn't fix their situation, but it does make life miserable for long-term residents. All while being extremely expensive. > Maybe they go maybe they don’t Here they have frequent wellness checks. It doesn't solve anything. This shouldn't be a surprise - someone who's incapable of living civilly when given a free apartment likely isn't going to be a person who's going to put the time and effort into mental health classes.

vidarh 2y ago
You seem to be assuming a specific version of housing first that is by no means the only option, and then dismissing the concept as a whole on that basis.
- bnralt 2y ago
  My "specific version" is the version used by government agencies, which specifically states that the government is giving people free permanent housing without requiring prerequisites. HUD[1]: "Housing First is an approach to quickly and successfully connect individuals and families experiencing homelessness to permanent housing without preconditions and barriers to entry, such as sobriety, treatment or service participation requirements." California Department of Housing and Community Development[2]: "Housing First is an approach to serving people experiencing homelessness that recognizes a homeless person must first be able to access a decent, safe place to live, that does not limit length of stay (permanent housing)...Under the Housing First approach, anyone experiencing homelessness should be connected to a permanent home as quickly as possible, and programs should remove barriers to accessing the housing, like requirements for sobriety or absence of criminal history." [1] https://files.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/Housing-First-Permanent-Supportive-Housing-Brief.pdf https://files.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/Housing-F... [2] https://www.hcd.ca.gov/grants-funding/active-funding/docs/housing-first-fact-sheet.pdf https://www.hcd.ca.gov/grants-funding/active-funding/docs/ho...
  - vidarh 2y ago
    The versions used by US government agencies. Presumably you're aware that's not the only option, as your last comment before the one above was on a thread about the Finnish approach, which has found it to be cheaper and to act as a gateway to get people other help.
    - kjkjadksj 2y ago
      The finnish approach isn’t on the same scale as the number of homeless people in the US and is hard to apply.
      - johnnyanmac 2y ago
        Well we spent more time ignoring the issue. Of course we need to climb more to get out. I don't think "but it's hard" is a good mentality when it comes to solving hard problems.
        vidarh 2y ago
        It's not even "but it is hard", but the perennial excuse of "scale", as if the US isn't split in states, and cities, and counties. This comes up so often when someone don't want to acknowledge a solution that works elsewhere (everything from trains to, well, this), and ignoring that you don't need to solve the entire problem everywhere at once to make things better. If this was some super-costly policy that needed a big apparatus around it, then they'd have a point, but e.g. in Finland, one estimate is that it costs them up to 9,600 euro a year less to house a person first vs. leaving them homeless. As such, just starting to provide some housing units and gradually grow it would be a win for every local government with a homeless person. It only starts to become a challenge if a few local governments reaches such a level of provision that it attracts homeless people from surrounding areas that don't do anything themselves, but that's not a reason not to start. Sometimes it feels like US taxpayers wants the government to burn money if the alternative is to do something that might help other people with it.
      - vidarh 2y ago
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by bnralt 2y ago

vidarh 2y ago

You seem to be assuming a specific version of housing first that is by no means the only option, and then dismissing the concept as a whole on that basis.

bnralt 2y ago
My "specific version" is the version used by government agencies, which specifically states that the government is giving people free permanent housing without requiring prerequisites. HUD[1]: "Housing First is an approach to quickly and successfully connect individuals and families experiencing homelessness to permanent housing without preconditions and barriers to entry, such as sobriety, treatment or service participation requirements." California Department of Housing and Community Development[2]: "Housing First is an approach to serving people experiencing homelessness that recognizes a homeless person must first be able to access a decent, safe place to live, that does not limit length of stay (permanent housing)...Under the Housing First approach, anyone experiencing homelessness should be connected to a permanent home as quickly as possible, and programs should remove barriers to accessing the housing, like requirements for sobriety or absence of criminal history." [1] https://files.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/Housing-First-Permanent-Supportive-Housing-Brief.pdf https://files.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/Housing-F... [2] https://www.hcd.ca.gov/grants-funding/active-funding/docs/housing-first-fact-sheet.pdf https://www.hcd.ca.gov/grants-funding/active-funding/docs/ho...
- vidarh 2y ago
  The versions used by US government agencies. Presumably you're aware that's not the only option, as your last comment before the one above was on a thread about the Finnish approach, which has found it to be cheaper and to act as a gateway to get people other help.
  - kjkjadksj 2y ago
    The finnish approach isn’t on the same scale as the number of homeless people in the US and is hard to apply.
    - johnnyanmac 2y ago
      Well we spent more time ignoring the issue. Of course we need to climb more to get out. I don't think "but it's hard" is a good mentality when it comes to solving hard problems.
      - vidarh 2y ago
        It's not even "but it is hard", but the perennial excuse of "scale", as if the US isn't split in states, and cities, and counties. This comes up so often when someone don't want to acknowledge a solution that works elsewhere (everything from trains to, well, this), and ignoring that you don't need to solve the entire problem everywhere at once to make things better. If this was some super-costly policy that needed a big apparatus around it, then they'd have a point, but e.g. in Finland, one estimate is that it costs them up to 9,600 euro a year less to house a person first vs. leaving them homeless. As such, just starting to provide some housing units and gradually grow it would be a win for every local government with a homeless person. It only starts to become a challenge if a few local governments reaches such a level of provision that it attracts homeless people from surrounding areas that don't do anything themselves, but that's not a reason not to start. Sometimes it feels like US taxpayers wants the government to burn money if the alternative is to do something that might help other people with it.
    - vidarh 2y ago
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