Only 10%? That’s preposterous.
In general yes 10% is way too low. Maybe a source will be provided backing it up for CA. It would seem to vary depending exactly you define the homeless and where.
It ties in with the climate and ‘homelessness-friendly’ public policy differences. The less favorable the winter weather and less accommodating local govts are to people living on the street, presumably the less likely it is people without mental health and substance issues would do it.
Also as mentioned by others ‘homeless friendly’ isn’t so easy to define. Some places seem fine with people living on the street and creating a nuisance and danger to others. This is the stereotype at least of some big west coast cities’ approach (not only in CA) but may not be entirely fair. Other places just don’t allow that, with the aim of encouraging the homeless to move elsewhere and become somebody else’s problem. This is the stereotype at least held by some who like the big west coast city approach. But another approach is to be strict about prohibiting some people creating a nuisance or danger to other people going about their legitimate business on the streets (whether the offenders have homes or not) but aim to provide alternatives to those who don’t have homes. It’s hard to easily categorize the actual reality just from general hearsay of a city’s reputation or casual impression as a visitor. And the weather also affects the basic moral calculus, whether you remove people from the street to not necessarily ‘nice’ shelters if they might literally die otherwise on a frigid night, v. if the weather is consistently survivable outdoors.
How does one scam their way to wealth? Do you have any pointers for those of us who would like to be wealthy? :dubious:
Yeah, I think people outside California forget how big the state actually is. The city of Los Angeles alone has more people than the entire state of Kansas (4 million vs. around 3 million).
A little more on this. My church is one of a number of volunteer locations that participates in a homeless shelter system (DuPage PADS) in suburban Chicago.
In this case, “shelter” isn’t one single building, open 24/7. The shelters that are run by PADS vary from night to night (the churches are on a scheduled rotation). They open up at 6pm for families, and 7pm for individuals, but then close up at 7am the next morning. Because they take families first (and because each location has limited space), it’s entirely possible to be turned away for lack of space, particularly if you’re an individual, or if you arrive late.
Note that the hours of these shelters mean that occupants have to find other places to be / stay during the day.
And, if you’re a registered sex offender, or convicted of a violent felony, they won’t take you at all.
Of course, this isn’t necessarily how it’s done everywhere, but it’s an example of how a homeless shelter may not be available 24/7, and may not be available at all for some people.
I’m curious, how do they know? Do they run background checks?
This, I don’t know for certain, but I know that PADS always has an actual employee at the evening’s shelter site, as people arrive (most of the people who staff the shelter each evening are volunteers from the host church), and that PADS employee works to “register” first-time guests. They require an ID when they do that registration, and it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that they’re able to run the ID against the relevant databases.
the idea that poor people are fine because they get what they need at a free clinic or the ER is as believable as the happy homeless people you talk about.
Sorry, that wasn’t clearly stated. It’s about 10% who are irredeemably homeless, because of drugs/alcohol, mental illness and/or incarceration. (That was the figure I heard from a homeless advocacy group in Southern California about their data, though I think it could have risen since then.)
Obviously the rest of the homeless are not untouched by these plights, but they either cycle out of and back into homelessness, or they cycle out and stay out. In other words, about 70% - 80% of the homeless could, in theory, at least, be relieved. The rest either choose homelessness, or are essentially not capable of becoming self-sufficient.
“Living” in a homeless shelter? Have they changed that much since I was on the streets? I remember standing in a long line for hours waiting for the doors to open at six, not being able to leave that line for hours lest I lose my space(which did wonders for any job searching I might want to do, btw), possibly getting in(and if I didn’t, it was far too late to get in at any other shelter that might exist close enough to walk to), milling around a large room and possibly given some donated food, then being given a mattress to sleep on and a blanket in that large room with a room full of people little know and trust less…only to be woken up at 7am and being told to leave.
The closest general shelter if you are in Overland Park, Kansas is over twelve miles away from Overland Park.
Way to care for your homeless, second most populous city in Kansas.
Thanks, but I already know about that one plus some others.
Some shelters are sort of secret because they might house women who are escaping an abusive relationship.
Others might be a word of mouth thing where they know of people who have an extra room who sometimes put people up.
No, your description matches up fairly closely both with my experience in them and what I’ve heard from others who had to use them. They are not places you “live in,” they are places where you can take temporary shelter, if you’re lucky enough to get a spot.