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Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

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Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#31

Post by sevenf0ur »

nimbius wrote: post #17

the fact that any housing is getting built is frankly a refreshing turn of events. for people unfamiliar with los angeles, is very much a city of landed gentry. republican legislation designed to curtail rising taxes for elderly residents 40 years ago wound up creating a cloistered elite of land-owners that pay nearly nothing in tax and resist any attempt to create additional housing. They coast on a bubble of six-fi…

Liberal policies is why Los Angles has been dealing with a homeless crisis for so long. Spending $837,000 to build a single studio to house a single homeless person seems insane to most of the country.

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#32

Post by rmason »

Do you realize that you could give that homeless person a first class ticket to Detroit? Put them up in a hotel until an abandoned house could be totally rebuilt for them. Pay their electricity, water, heating costs and taxes for the next ten years and still save California taxpayers $600,000!

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#33

Post by mistrial9 »

the_optimist wrote: post #25

The primary measure of success in the last two generations in the United States has been an ability to combine plausible incompetence and graft, while remaining protected under a banner of nouveau political theory. Los Angeles has a tremendous pool of talent in this regard, perhaps some of the best in the world. Areas which are very obviously less afflicted include areas of 'Los Angeles County' outside of --and quite…

I have seen events unfold at the School Board level which stretch the imagination -- a combination of poker face, herd mentality, deniability and secrets keeping, and unending, years long funding cycles. BUT "the primary measure of success in the last two generations" is just snark, since there has been lots of success in other ways. The problems here are bad though, since some kind of natural selection has resulted in people and processess that are very hard to get rid of, even while flatly and objectively failing in plain view.

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#34

Post by antihero »

rmason wrote: post #32

Do you realize that you could give that homeless person a first class ticket to Detroit? Put them up in a hotel until an abandoned house could be totally rebuilt for them. Pay their electricity, water, heating costs and taxes for the next ten years and still save California taxpayers $600,000!

Yes but would they want to go?

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#35

Post by jeffbee »

daenz wrote: post #21

Is there any way to fix incentives with government contracts, so that the product that is purchased is the lowest price for the highest quality? In the free market, there are generally incentives for that because companies have a brand, and if you deliver poor quality, consumers eventually catch on, your brand suffers, and you lose business to your competitors. How does this work in the government? Where is the disin…

It's largely illegal in California to have any criteria for selecting contractors based on anything other than lowest bid. This is because historically cronyism was a worse problem than poor quality.

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#36

Post by jseliger »

L.A. is fighting against CEQA, Prop 13, and its own bureaucracy and process: https://seliger.com/2017/08/30/l-digs-hole-slowly-economics-....

If we're actually going to do something substantial about homelessness, we need to focus on abundance, not scarcity, and supply-side progressivism: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/19/opinion/supply-side-progr...

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#37

Post by kjkjadksj »

the_optimist wrote: post #25

The primary measure of success in the last two generations in the United States has been an ability to combine plausible incompetence and graft, while remaining protected under a banner of nouveau political theory. Los Angeles has a tremendous pool of talent in this regard, perhaps some of the best in the world. Areas which are very obviously less afflicted include areas of 'Los Angeles County' outside of --and quite…

Wildly superior in the physical realization of governance? Please. The reason why you don’t see homeless in these places is their policy is to use their police to force these people into LA. Go to venice and note how the tents stop immediately at the border with santa monica, and no its not because everyone who sets up in santa monica gets put into a shelter.

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#38

Post by logicalmonster »

kerneloftruth wrote: post #12
lisper wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They're homeless because they're mentally ill Some but not all. There are many disparate causes of homelessness and mental illness is just one of them. > _requiring_ treatment for the chronically homeless That is hard to implement in a free country.

"That is hard to implement in a free country" The past 2 years proves that entirely untrue.

> Requiring medical treatments

> Free country

That choice is a radio button, not a checkbox. Can't have both.

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#39

Post by mikeg8 »

I'm finishing construction next month an 1,100 sq/ft single family home in the north bay area; a very high cost-of-living region. We started construction in Sept 2021, after an intentional delay of a couple months to let lumber prices drop after peaking in May-June. My home will be built for about $350k (less land acquisition). I'm acting as contractor and have connections in the industry so very few can build at my cost. BUT, When I see numbers in articles like this ($837k ea), after dealing with pandemic construction pricing myself, it's painfully obvious there is a terrible lack of cost-control. This is not a sustainable solution. And scapegoating on the pandemic is not helpful.

I'm convinced most government agencies cannot manage this type construction in an affordable way, including my home county of Sonoma where we are spending $250k - $350k per homeless person to house them in refurbished hotel rooms (remodeling, not new construction).

I don't know what the solution is, but I have become convinced that local governments cannot build their way out of this. We have to come up with something better.

Re: Los Angeles is spending up to $837k to house a single homeless person

#40

Post by mmoche »

throwaway1777 wrote: post #19
lisper wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? How?

We required everyone to get COVID treatment. (Especially in california)

Not only was it not "required," nearly 30% of the state of California remains short of full vaccination and restrictions are dropping daily.

You can demand an end to "mandates" and public health emergencies, but you must then applaud when those things end.

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