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Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

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Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#181

Post by epistasis »

throwaway19937 wrote: post #90
nostrebored wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that people in the U.S. so often only see homelessness through the lens of where they live. Homelessness is a unique problem in each city. For example, the west coast has favorable weather and a history of being a destination for people after they are released from prisons or mental facilities. In cities on the east coast there is more leftist-narrative style homelessness: people who were depending on…

The west coast also has the 9th circuit's Martin v. Boise decision ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_v._Boise ). It prevents criminalizing public camping unless there's shelter space for everyone. This is impossible given the number of homeless people so we're stuck with encampments everywhere.

I think it's exceptionally possible to build enough shelter space, and adequate funds for most large cities. However what makes it possible is the people who object to construction of new shelter space, who oppose the creation of safe parking spaces, and the creation even of encampments with basic services.

IMHO the impulse to keep people out of their city and their neighborhood results in encampments and generally worse conditions both for those with and without houses.

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#182

Post by mulmen »

vineyardmike wrote: post #177
mulmen wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When all of the available shelters are full this is not a relevant question. It is relevant when we are talking about building more housing. Why build something if people won't use it? > Near transit so people that can't afford a car can get around. There's not a shortage of underutilized land in west coast cities. Underutilized land near transit ? What do you do about the NIMBYs? > no, none of those situations are…

Ohh come on! Yes, some of these questions are relevant, theoretically . > Why build something if people won't use it? We know some people will use it since the ones already built are full. If we look at other cities - eg. NYC we see the ratio sheltered to unsheltered are different from SF. The difference? Availability of shelter. SF has hundreds of beds and thousands of homeless. Surely a few hundred more beds would…

You seem to be interpreting "what do you do with people who won't stay in shelters" as "we should not build more shelters", which is not an argument that is being made. I am simply asking what do you do with the people who don't want to stay in shelters? What can we do for them?

I do not believe that we should ignore any group of homeless just because there is a simple solution for some of it.

Maybe there is an argument for building different types of shelters. Maybe some of them are not voluntary. Maybe some allow drugs and some do not.

There is no one-size-fits-all answer here. Pretending this is simple is doing a disservice to everyone involved.

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#183

Post by epistasis »

zz865 wrote: post #100
cheriot wrote: post #9

We're a country of 350,000,000 people. Leaving 500,000 outside simply because municipalities don't want them around is inexcusable. Solution in two parts 1. Make it legal to build homes where people live (looking at you California, specifically LA, SF, SV) 2. Build dorm style shelters for anyone that would otherwise sleep outside There's complicating issues like not enough addiction treatment and mental health facili…

> Make it legal to build homes where people live (looking at you California, specifically LA, SF, SV) Sorry this is BS. Better solution is move people to where the homes are. Lots of cheap empty houses in America, just not on California beaches. Yeah I'd rather live in a tent on Venice beach than a run down house in Ohio too, but homeless dont have a right to live anywhere.

The only way I would ever support this is if the people who say "no more people after me, this place was perfect when I moved into my current place" pay for the complete construction costs of the née places elsewhere.

Everybody moved at some point, whether it was when they were born and they stayed in the same house their entire life, or when they moved out from their parents house, or when they moved out of the studio apartment after getting married and settled down.

If people want to keep others away, they need to pay for that privilege. Otherwise they are just leaches on society.

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#184

Post by MeinBlutIstBlau »

paxys wrote: post #126
MeinBlutIstBlau wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And also make homelessness a crime. But conveniently they push you toward places that help with people on the verge of homelessness. All things combined with yours that these coastal places do not. If people are threatened with jail for being a vagrant, they'll eventually take the path of least resistance and get a job.

> If people are threatened with jail for being a vagrant, they'll eventually take the path of least resistance and get a job. More like they'll take the path of least resistance and go to the next town.

Solves the problem of the people who wanted to minimize homelessness in their area didn't it?

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#185

Post by mulmen »

cheriot wrote: post #160
mulmen wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the thoughtful response. Telling NIMBYs to take a hike isn’t simple. How do you actually achieve that? The question is not if we have enough shelter space. The question is if there are homeless who do not want shelter space. In other words do we have another problem to focus on in parallel .

California had a lot of success with Project Home Key that acquired existing hotels and converts them to supportive housing. It worked well because it was quick and often required only one vote by local authorities. In contrast, building new shelters is too easy to drag out and kill with a thousand paper cuts. Some SF Supervisors have spent years saying they want a homeless shelter in their district, but just can't f…

Being a resident of Seattle I'm not thrilled about the state of Washington making decisions about what happens in my city. I can get behind something like gating funding based on results but I'm not thrilled about the state dictating how the city spends money. I could also get behind the idea of a state-owned-and-operated shelter network which happens to have locations in cities. But in general I have a preference toward local government having responsibility where possible.

I'm not opposed to building more shelters. But it's not a complete solution. So what is the rest of the solution?

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#186

Post by epistasis »

refurb wrote: post #174
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And just like building bigger highways induces demand so will building more shelters in SF. "Induced demand" is a fallacy. The demand isn't induced, it was there the whole time and being suppressed by high prices (or, in case of highways, congestion). If there is very high demand, the amount of supply needed to satisfy it is equally high, but that is by no means the same as being infinite and impossible to do. Ther…

Induced demand is not a fallacy. And we’re not building housing here we’re building shelters.

Induced demand for housing is a fallacy. There's only a very very small range of living space that people want.

Induced demand for highways definitely is not a fallacy. People can go from needing zero highway miles a day, up to 60-90 highway miles a day, depending on where they live. This sort of range is an order of magnitude higher than what could potentially be induced by having access to, say, cheaper construction methods.

In fact, for housing, the opposite seems to occur. When there are more people in an area, people tend to take up less individual space. It's only when people live far away from anything that they seems to expand to 1000+ square feet/person.

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#187

Post by pseudalopex »

vineyardmike wrote: post #179
pseudalopex wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are jobs concentrated specific places or all over? Where do transit lines run? Where are other services located?

In many cities, the transit is hub-spoke from downtown (which is mostly offices), so not a lot of opportunities. > Are their jobs concentrated elsewhere? Knowledge worker jobs are concentrated downtown, and jobs that are likely to look favorably upon someone homeless are probably not concentrated in any one area.

Not a lot of opportunities for what?

It sounds like it would be more difficult for homeless people to travel from or to anywhere else on average.

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#188

Post by mulmen »

vineyardmike wrote: post #178
mulmen wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t doubt we need more space now. Vacancies in shelters would suggest we created too much supply, which would be a waste of resources. I prefer to take the approach of understanding the current needs and working to address all of those needs.

> I prefer to take the approach of understanding the current needs and working to address all of those needs. So what is your proposed solution?

I asked up-thread if dorm style housing should have restrictions. That's a genuine question. I don't have the answers.

It is not acceptable that we have any number of people sleeping on the street. I realize we can't simply prohibit that. But if we are going to reclaim our public spaces we need solutions that work for everyone. There is never going to be one simple solution to that.

So yeah, build more housing. But what kind? Some of it should simply be affordable housing for gainfully employed people. Some should be dorm style for emergency stays. Some should have a focus on rehab. Some should have a focus on finding employment. There's probably a need for a mix. But we definitely need some places that are safe for vulnerable populations which have more restrictions and different resources than low-barrier-to-entry based shelters or housing.

Should we try to put addicts on a rehab path? Are we willing to ignore that problem to solve homelessness? I don't know. I think it's worth having a conversation.

It's complicated and messy and unclear.

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#189

Post by [deleted] »

jseliger wrote: post #108
AlexandrB wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy it. In Toronto, there are new condo buildings going up seemingly on every block, but there are still 10,000 homeless[1]. The inconvenient truth is that building low-income housing is not very profitable and no entity driven by the profit motive wants to do it. The margins on luxury condos are much better. [1] https://www.fredvictor.org/facts-about-homelessness-in-toron...

See https://fullstackeconomics.com/how-luxury-apartment-building... for the empirical research refuting that point and agreeing with the basic supply-demand issue. The issue in Toronto is not just the anecdotal "new condo buildings" but how much housing Toronto has built per capita for the last several decades, which is almost certainly "too little." See the link in my original post to data from Tokyo, which is one o…

[deleted]

Re: Breakdown of data on homeless populations across the U.S.

#190

Post by atweiden »

jseliger wrote: post #108
AlexandrB wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy it. In Toronto, there are new condo buildings going up seemingly on every block, but there are still 10,000 homeless[1]. The inconvenient truth is that building low-income housing is not very profitable and no entity driven by the profit motive wants to do it. The margins on luxury condos are much better. [1] https://www.fredvictor.org/facts-about-homelessness-in-toron...

See https://fullstackeconomics.com/how-luxury-apartment-building... for the empirical research refuting that point and agreeing with the basic supply-demand issue. The issue in Toronto is not just the anecdotal "new condo buildings" but how much housing Toronto has built per capita for the last several decades, which is almost certainly "too little." See the link in my original post to data from Tokyo, which is one o…

> See [...] for the empirical research refuting that point and agreeing with the basic supply-demand issue

The issue I have with this analysis is where does it end? For example, if you assume most people eventually want to live in a townhome or similar, packing people in like sardines in the name of housing affordability is a kick-the-can solution. The unstated assumption of these researchers is it’s perfectly fine for every major urban area to morph into Hong Kong given a long enough time frame.

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