Earlier quoted context omitted.
Solving community problems come with community sacrifices. I'm a big proponent of housing first, drug rehab second. It is exponentially harder to get clean without housing and a support network. Decriminalizing drug addiction is a good step in that direction IMO. I think another side of this coin though is we need to bring back institutionalization of mental health care. Implemented today it would be vastly different…
Housing first is effective for people who want our idea of a 'normal lifestyle' I think people in this thread are asking you to question your assumption- do you think every drug addict on the west coast wants to hold down a job and live our normal life?
People don't want to be drug addicts and live a poor existence to feed a habit. They have problems, they use the drugs to medicate or fit in, the problems compound with drug use, so they use more to deal with the problems more. They are also ostracized by communities which nobody likes as we are social creatures. The level of that social exclusion probably depends a lot on their current level of wealth. People like having shelter and their physical needs met and while they might not necessarily want normal either, I'd argue a big part of that is more that they have poor coping strategies and don't now how to cope with normal. There will always be people who don't fall into certain strategies for combating homelessness and drug addiction, but this is a much better approach than doing what amounts to nothing.