Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

LA pays $2600 per homeless tent, per month

npr.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 312 posts

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

#91

Post by mixmastamyk »

Tiktaalik wrote: post #83
dcolkitt wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> one big way to prevent this downward trend in quality of life is to build more cheap housing One pedantic quibble. It's not necessary to build cheap housing specifically. It's perfectly fine simply to build more housing of any type. Today's new expensive housing will indirectly create more cheap housing in the pre-existing housing stock, by pulling demand out of the market. Throughout all of American history, new h…

Yes but we have a crisis now which means that we need both regular market housing now and affordable housing now. We do not uh have the luxury of building luxury housing only then waiting 40 years for it to eventually become affordable.

Not what was said. A new building automatically makes the ten-year-old next door look shabby in comparison, and so on.

Still, we need to remove barriers that prevent middle-class housing from being built, such as parking minimums and other bureaucracy.

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

#92

Post by baby »

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…

Not just cheap housing, but housing aids (as a student I used to get a few hundred bucks every month for my rent in France) and free health insurance

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

#93

Post by 0xB31B1B »

dcolkitt wrote: post #78
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…

> one big way to prevent this downward trend in quality of life is to build more cheap housing One pedantic quibble. It's not necessary to build cheap housing specifically. It's perfectly fine simply to build more housing of any type. Today's new expensive housing will indirectly create more cheap housing in the pre-existing housing stock, by pulling demand out of the market. Throughout all of American history, new h…

Yea, 100% Agree. Fully supportive of all housing. I was specifically referring to SRO type housing or boarding houses which are currently illegal to build, but there is so much simple stuff to be done here anything helps.

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

#94

Post by stouset »

fakename11 wrote: post #47
yalogin wrote: post #13

Comparing this to regular rents is not really fair isn't it? Even if the government chooses to pay rent instead of providing this camp, getting landlord's to rent to a homeless person cannot be counted on. On top of that they still need to find work and food. Granted may be not a daunting task if the housing and security is taken care of.

Comparing this to the cost of rent is very fair. Other states don't pay these exorbitant costs and are fine.

Other states don’t have even remotely the number of homeless we do.

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

#95

Post by TchoBeer »

BobbyJo wrote: post #89
Tiktaalik wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but we have a crisis now which means that we need both regular market housing now and affordable housing now. We do not uh have the luxury of building luxury housing only then waiting 40 years for it to eventually become affordable.

Market housing creates affordable housing by displacing demand. No matter what kind of housing you build, as long as it gets built now it will lower prices now.

More luxery houses would lower prices for luxery housing, but not necessarily for affordable housing. I don't know how much those are competing markets

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

#96

Post by BayAreaEscapee »

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).

States have a unfavorable opinion of having another state's homeless population shipped to them. I'm aware that Nevada been sued several times by California cities for busing their homeless one-way to California.

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

#97

Post by pdx6 »

$2663/mo untaxed is a decent chunk of change. But let’s assume that is the cost to temporary house someone that has no other option. My question is, why is there no standardized process in California to address someone who is unhoused?

I like to say make the solution like the Apple Store in the sense that for 99% of people, there is a possible researched path to recovery, housing, and employment.

For $32k, 64k, 96k — 3 years, can we build a process using our modern knowledge of social work, psychology, addiction, etc. to get an individual back on their feet, or at least in a holding pattern with less misery?

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

#98

Post by mikepurvis »

BobbyJo wrote: post #89
Tiktaalik wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but we have a crisis now which means that we need both regular market housing now and affordable housing now. We do not uh have the luxury of building luxury housing only then waiting 40 years for it to eventually become affordable.

Market housing creates affordable housing by displacing demand. No matter what kind of housing you build, as long as it gets built now it will lower prices now.

That assumes there are market incentives to actually fill the housing that is built. What about when buildings of hundreds of luxury condos are built and they just sit empty, either owned by disinterested "investors" or unwilling to be sold for the market-directed price?

Someone who studied this in Toronto by overlaying nighttime photos to find units where the lights are literally never on: https://www.movesmartly.com/articles/condo-units-sitting-emp...

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

#99

Post by et-al »

dcolkitt wrote: post #78
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…

> one big way to prevent this downward trend in quality of life is to build more cheap housing One pedantic quibble. It's not necessary to build cheap housing specifically. It's perfectly fine simply to build more housing of any type. Today's new expensive housing will indirectly create more cheap housing in the pre-existing housing stock, by pulling demand out of the market. Throughout all of American history, new h…

I see you've read that CityObservatory article from a few years back [0].

Unfortunately as the Tiktaalik mentioned, we have a housing shortage now. So the trickle-down economics of luxury housing won't work for at least a generation.

Also, all the actual luxury housing that ends up being built is bought by wealthy investors buying their third or fourth property. Just look at the housing market in London.

> Throughout all of American history, new housing has almost exclusively been relatively expensive housing.

Eichlers and Craftsman homes were targeted squarely at the middle class of their time. Now in the Bay Area, the price of a "middle class" home is probably skewed to something around $1,000/sqft, but I don't know if middle class wages can actually afford that.

[0] - https://cityobservatory.org/how-luxury-housing-becomes-affor...

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

#100

Post by paulcole »

lightgreen wrote: post #70
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 part…

How much of this comment is based on data and how much is you extrapolating from a single person you know?

This article seems to suggest that giving out access to housing is in fact effective:

https://www.vox.com/2014/5/30/5764096/homeless-shelter-housi...

Post reply on HN