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LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

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Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#61

Post by paxys »

sjg007 wrote: post #24
narrator wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as the local government has tons of money doing nothing in their budget, they are going to find a way to spend it, and they're not going to care if they overpay because what else are they going to spend it on? In coastal California, the rule is never ever give that money back by lowering taxes. Taxes only go up. If there's too much money being generated by the taxes to spend, start spending it on homelessness…

What's the solution then? Utah built apartments for everyone. That seems to have worked.

You don't even have to build housing specifically for the homeless. You don't have to build BMR or affordable housing. Just build more housing, period, and the problem will eventually solve itself.

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#62

Post by spoonjim »

0xB31B1B wrote: post #57

Posting this because most people in HN have a warped view of what homelessness is, especially in california. First of all, when most people think homeless they think "fentanyl addict out of his mind living in squalor" and while there are certainly a bunch of those people in the homeless population, they aren't even a majority of the homeless. In general, about 2/3 of the homeless are transiently homeless. They will b…

Whenever I see someone who is quite clearly very recently homeless I give them as much money as I can afford to, like $50-100, because I feel like it can get them out of homelessness. When I see someone completely out of their mind I don’t feel like anything I can do will make a material difference, just get them different levels of stoned for the next 3 hours.

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#63

Post by morpheuskafka »

Monthly rent for a furnished apartment at my university (i.e. already overpriced and in demand) is $1049.

Why not buy these people a ticket and a year's prepaid rent to somewhere with a much, much cheaper cost of living. It would save the city money and these people would have a real place to live (i.e. not homeless anymore, instead of homeless in a tent).

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#64

Post by visualradio »

vineyardmike wrote: post #58
narrator wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as the local government has tons of money doing nothing in their budget, they are going to find a way to spend it, and they're not going to care if they overpay because what else are they going to spend it on? In coastal California, the rule is never ever give that money back by lowering taxes. Taxes only go up. If there's too much money being generated by the taxes to spend, start spending it on homelessness…

>more homeless people show up to take advantage of the great services. I've never heard of homeless searching for the best place too be homeless! Is there a source for this?

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/06/us/homeless-population.ht...

"Where Does California’s Homeless Population Come From?"

> As the data shows us, most of the homeless people you pass on the streets every day are in fact Californians. Some may have rented an apartment or once owned a home in your neighborhood.

> Several years ago, L.A.H.S.A. added a question to its homeless survey that captured how long a person had been in Los Angeles and where they became homeless. The resulting data dispelled the idea that the homeless population was largely made up of people from out of state.

> “The vast majority fell into homelessness in L.A. County,” Mr. Lynn said.

> L.A.H.S.A.’s 2019 homeless count found that 64 percent of the 58,936 Los Angeles County residents experiencing homelessness had lived in the city for more than 10 years. Less than a fifth (18 percent) said they had lived out of state before becoming homeless.

> In Los Angeles, a renter earning minimum wage ($13.25 an hour) would need to work 79 hours per week to afford a one-bedroom apartment.

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#65

Post by other_herbert »

vineyardmike wrote: post #58
narrator wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as the local government has tons of money doing nothing in their budget, they are going to find a way to spend it, and they're not going to care if they overpay because what else are they going to spend it on? In coastal California, the rule is never ever give that money back by lowering taxes. Taxes only go up. If there's too much money being generated by the taxes to spend, start spending it on homelessness…

>more homeless people show up to take advantage of the great services. I've never heard of homeless searching for the best place too be homeless! Is there a source for this?

Sounds like LA just advertised themselves as pretty high on the list

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#66

Post by [deleted] »

sida wrote: post #46
darth_avocado wrote: post #35

I think the main takeaway here is government, as usual, thinking short term and spending more money on bandaid solutions. Yes, the $2600 gets you services, meals, sanitation and staffing. But in reality, you can get a decent 1BR apartment for $1500 that is waaay bigger than a tent, sanitation for free since it is an apartment, and have almost $1000 for groceries left over. And, you can fit more people in the apartmen…

As a landlord, I would definitely not rent to this program though. I mean, would you? But yes looking at this, the program cost is indeed insanely high

[deleted]

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#67

Post by 0xB31B1B »

spoonjim wrote: post #62
0xB31B1B wrote: post #57

Posting this because most people in HN have a warped view of what homelessness is, especially in california. First of all, when most people think homeless they think "fentanyl addict out of his mind living in squalor" and while there are certainly a bunch of those people in the homeless population, they aren't even a majority of the homeless. In general, about 2/3 of the homeless are transiently homeless. They will b…

Whenever I see someone who is quite clearly very recently homeless I give them as much money as I can afford to, like $50-100, because I feel like it can get them out of homelessness. When I see someone completely out of their mind I don’t feel like anything I can do will make a material difference, just get them different levels of stoned for the next 3 hours.

the crazy thing is that there are a ton of "recently homeless" folks you encounter in your daily life without even knowing it. Something like 10% of the cal state university students are homeless. My wife is a doc in the ER and deals with a bunch of folks who are going through these issues. Many retail workers, service workers etc are homeless, shower at the gym, and have been living in their car or friends couches for the past few months and will probably find a place to live in the next few months.

Re: LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

#70

Post by lightgreen »

morpheuskafka wrote: post #63

Monthly rent for a furnished apartment at my university (i.e. already overpriced and in demand) is $1049. Why not buy these people a ticket and a year's prepaid rent to somewhere with a much, much cheaper cost of living. It would save the city money and these people would have a real place to live (i.e. not homeless anymore, instead of homeless in a tent).

Problems with homeless is deeper than finding a place to sleep. For example, some homeless people voluntarily choose to sleep on the street even when they have homes (like one man I knew who refused to go home after his wife death after many years of struggling with cancer). Some people would destroy that property that would be given to them, and will be thrown out by the building administration. Homelessness is partially mental health problem, it cannot be solved just by handing out free apartments.
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