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

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91–100 of 368 posts

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

#92
post #10

The sad part is how long such spending has gone on across the state. They're homeless because they're mentally ill, not because of the tautological nonsense of "they're homeless because they haven't a home". The mental illness is exceeded only by the stupidity of the policies. Instead of the singular focus on establishing state-paid housing, _requiring_ treatment for the chronically homeless is far overdue. The optio…

Not sure why you're being down voted, this is the most honest statement about so called "homelessness" in the united states. It is affordable housing advocates essentially leveraging the mentally ill while completely ignoring their plight.

America can build houses but free mental health care for all? It took Democrats 50 years to get the paltry affordable care act through.

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

#93
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before it went into people's pockets, so they could care for their families and improve their life conditions.

Exactly. Government stole it from tax payers to then act as a poorly run pseudo-charity, which is actually just a way for them to skim cream like mobsters while pretending to "do good." The foolish lap this up and immediately get defensive at anyone who proposes that, maybe, just maybe, politicians are lying to them and using their good nature against them. Maybe. So, we get a consistently declining standard of livin…

> Government stole it from tax payers

Actually, we agreed that it was a good idea and organized our government to carry it out, and we broadly support it.

> The foolish

Commenters and citizens who disagree with you are "foolish"? People can't possibly disagree with you for legitimate reasons? Is your opinion the standard by which we measure legitimacy? Lucky I met you!

> decaying urban centers

Urban centers have been doing well overall, absent the pandemic, though certainly, as with everywhere, there are problems.

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

#94
post #70

>The audit found 14% of the units build exceeded $700,000 each, and one project in pre-development is estimated to cost almost $837,000 per unit. It sounds like that "up to" in the title is doing a lot of work if 86% are below $700k. I would also like to throw in the added context that the median home price is roughly $915k[1]. Also be mindful whether we are discussing LA county or LA city. The article is about an LA…

I think this is a great point, but may still disagree with it.

To put it another way, we are taking people out of homelessness, and putting them in houses that are more expensive than 30-40% of units on the market. So the members of the program are getting a much worse deal than if they were just given money directly to pay rent.

The cost to house homeless shouldn't be slightly below median. Realistically, it should be in the 1th percentile.

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

#95

$837,000 is just the cost of the unit. If you are housing actual homeless, you MUST offer supportive services on-site or have some other types of supervision or these units are going to be trashed. You MUST budget for a lot of ongoing costs. I'd say $800K+ per unit + maybe $100K+/year for supportive services / maintenance etc? One question is, would that 800K + $100K/year go further somewhere else?

On the other hand, unless whoever ends up in the unit never has a family, stays in the unit the rest of their life, and the unit only lasts a single person's lifetime, it isn't going to house only one person.

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

#96
post #63

The sad part is how long such spending has gone on across the state. They're homeless because they're mentally ill, not because of the tautological nonsense of "they're homeless because they haven't a home". The mental illness is exceeded only by the stupidity of the policies. Instead of the singular focus on establishing state-paid housing, _requiring_ treatment for the chronically homeless is far overdue. The optio…

They're homeless because housing costs are absurd in California. There are mentally ill people all across the country, but few places have a housing crisis anything like that in California. Only a quarter of the homeless in California suffer from severe mental illness[1]. 1. https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2021-08-07/men...

California attracts homeless people because of its relatively temperate climate, lax policies on camps, and pays more than other states (recent interview guy said he was getting 800 cash plus 200 food stamps a month).

Back in June or July 2021, the governor invited the homeless to come to California with promises of free housing during a press tour.

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

#97

$837,000 is just the cost of the unit. If you are housing actual homeless, you MUST offer supportive services on-site or have some other types of supervision or these units are going to be trashed. You MUST budget for a lot of ongoing costs. I'd say $800K+ per unit + maybe $100K+/year for supportive services / maintenance etc? One question is, would that 800K + $100K/year go further somewhere else?

It's not the cost of the unit, per the article: 14% of the units build exceeded $700,000 each, and one project in pre-development is estimated to cost almost $837,000 per unit.

OK, so units may cost $837K. Is that all inclusive of all necessary services (maintenance, supportive services, utilities etc for the life of the unit)? Or are those going to be extra.

I ask because the housing department housing in SF is mind boggling expensive just to operate even after they did the build piece especially if you do all in costs vs revenue (ie, tax base is low -> govt owned often exempt and service needs are high from maintenance, policing, health response etc).

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

#98

In the last 50 years, cities across the country closed down over 1 million SROs ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy ) in an effort to remove slums or just neglect at increasing property value. There are now over half of a million homeless. It's honestly impressive the number is not more. For the 1.2 billion dollars they are spending, if all of the apartments were built to the spec of a roadside mote…

Basically, we’d be better off if the government had done nothing. Seems like that happens a lot.

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

#99
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One question is, would that 800K + $100K/year go further somewhere else? Where is that money going now? Who gets this money now and why would they give it up?

Before it went into people's pockets, so they could care for their families and improve their life conditions.

Are their life conditions improved by having homeless people all over the place?

There's a price to pay for living in an organized civil society, because people have learned the hard way that having an organized, civil society is better for their families and life conditions.

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

#100

:( this link is not available in Europe

At least you're important to them. Which is a nice sentiment, as they struggle to find a way to be in compliance with a three year old law. A law that just require them to respect the privacy of their visitors.
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