I was homeless for 8 years and a good portion of that I lived in my car
What I wouldn’t have given to have a safe place to park each night during that time
It’s better than a tent, but not by much
Honestly, this is a lot better / more hopeful than other stories. These people are doing far better than the homeless in tents. In winter.
Like these poor people: https://www.startribune.com/minneapolis-nenookaasi-homeless-encampment-packs-up-and-moves-three-blocks-south/600332431/
the land is being developed, and crime was getting out of control. and they only had to move three blocks to a different one, supplied by the city. to cite the very article you posted:
There were more than 100 emergency calls for drug use, sex acts, theft, vandalism and unresponsive people in and around the camp. A number of neighboring American Indian nonprofit organizations urged the city to close it.
it’s a little more nuanced than mean people kicking out poor defenseless citizens.
I agree that the situation in the article is complicated and that these homeless people were not exactly saints.
My point above is that these homeless people living in tents in an empty lot in January are worse off than the homeless people in the article that OP references. Those homeless people live in cars in a protected lot which I think is a big improvement from tent life.
tru. at least it’s been a pretty mild winter in mn so far, fingers crossed.
I’m not big on people supplying hard drugs, and theft often goes with threat of violence and trauma, but the criminalization of drug addiction, human sexuality when homeless, and whatever “unresponsive people” specifically refers to… yeah, I’m gonna say that there’s a lot less nuance than you might prefer.
theft and vandalism? don’t conflate the issue this isn’t about the cruel treatment of the addicted. it’s about keeping the law abiding citizens safe. empathy has been granted for years, this didn’t happen overnight. coupled with the fact that there were calls for closure from non profit organizations… maybe read the article
Is jesus f***ing christ incest?
More likely masturbation
I think step one is universal healthcare. For many reasons that we all are familiar with by now. (being tied to a job that has income limitations because you need the healthcare(ish) it provides, becoming bankrupted by healthcare costs, getting kicked out of your housing due to medical costs)
The revolutionary silver bullet to begin increasing housing availability is to eliminate the ability to depreciate assets via the tax code if they are single family detached homes. Many of these rentals are already fully depreciated and will remain rentals. But recently purchased (within 10 yrs.) rentals will likely be sold and importantly they will not be purchased by ‘investors’. That shift will provide a flood of homes into the market which will apply downward pressure on prices. More people being able to afford to purchase those homes will free up rental availability, thus applying downward pressure on rental affordability.
Now that only addresses single family homes; there remains multifamily housing to be addressed which will be more complex. A robust government regulatory agency for housing is not something we currently have in the usa, obviously. (see picture) Reforms of those regulatory bodies are needed whereby penalties they assess would have actual teeth. I imagine penalties that remove ownership. I also imagine the countless tax incentives used in constructing and rehabilitating these structures being negotiated quite differently, to include public ownership.
Just a few thoughts here; I haven’t all the answers. I’m curious when the last housing project was built in the usa.
We didn’t make big cars because we wanted to drive big cars. We knew we’d need them as small homes.
We call them outdoor people.