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Vancouver tried the same thing. The made a policy of eradicating homelessness by X date and the city bought up SROs to put them in and other housing options. T

Vancouver tried the same thing. The made a policy of eradicating homelessness by X date and the city bought up SROs to put them in and other housing options. The problem is once the rest of Canada's homeless heard about this they came in droves, often given one way bus tickets by police, so it's impossible to solve chronic homelessness without some kind of national effort. Utah this strategy works because there isn't a flood of people going there like they are San Francisco or LA's Skid Row. It would be great if governments could have some kind of yearly conference to compare data and strategies to figure out what works/doesn't work at scale.

brilliantcode 10y ago
Homelessness is a serious problem in Vancouver. Just walking along granville st., aka "entertainment district" (hard to NOT be snarky here too many awful memories) there's vagabond population along the sidewalk in front of luxury shops. They commit crimes because they are mentally ill and take drugs. They aggressively pan handle even while leeching off our generous social programs while the middle class can't even find proper homes. Worse, people support the population by pretending to be generous but in reality self serving their own ego to be perceived as a "nice & empathetic human". Pan handlers know this very well and exploit it. Even getting pissy and whiny when you refuse to give change. It's like they feel entitled to free money and too strung out to even put an effort in it. I've given money to street performers and people hustling. These homeless population in Vancouver are mostly drug addicts and broken humans who are unable to help themselves. They will buy drugs with the money you give them with high certainty. It's seriously putting inconvenience to the rest of the city and you are absolutely right that the rest of Canada's homeless population are given a one way greyhound ticket to Vancouver. I refuse to pay taxes towards people who have no desire to change their situation and instead feel entitled and constantly leeching off the backs of hard working folks who are also struggling. When the housing market collapses in Vancouver, the city is going to have a tough time forcefully relocating the homeless population.
3JPLW 10y ago
That's precisely what NACo — the National Association of (US) Counties — does. They have initiatives on both data driven justice[1] and housing[2]. 1. http://www.naco.org/resources/programs-and-services/data-driven-justice http://www.naco.org/resources/programs-and-services/data-dri... 2. http://www.naco.org/news/roof-of-their-own http://www.naco.org/news/roof-of-their-own
analyst74 10y ago
Medicine Hat tried the same thing, and it seems to have worked pretty well. Maybe we don't have to go all-in or nothing, but start with less desirable cities.

brilliantcode 10y ago

Homelessness is a serious problem in Vancouver. Just walking along granville st., aka "entertainment district" (hard to NOT be snarky here too many awful memories) there's vagabond population along the sidewalk in front of luxury shops. They commit crimes because they are mentally ill and take drugs. They aggressively pan handle even while leeching off our generous social programs while the middle class can't even find proper homes. Worse, people support the population by pretending to be generous but in reality self serving their own ego to be perceived as a "nice & empathetic human". Pan handlers know this very well and exploit it. Even getting pissy and whiny when you refuse to give change. It's like they feel entitled to free money and too strung out to even put an effort in it. I've given money to street performers and people hustling. These homeless population in Vancouver are mostly drug addicts and broken humans who are unable to help themselves. They will buy drugs with the money you give them with high certainty. It's seriously putting inconvenience to the rest of the city and you are absolutely right that the rest of Canada's homeless population are given a one way greyhound ticket to Vancouver. I refuse to pay taxes towards people who have no desire to change their situation and instead feel entitled and constantly leeching off the backs of hard working folks who are also struggling. When the housing market collapses in Vancouver, the city is going to have a tough time forcefully relocating the homeless population.

3JPLW 10y ago

That's precisely what NACo — the National Association of (US) Counties — does. They have initiatives on both data driven justice[1] and housing[2]. 1. http://www.naco.org/resources/programs-and-services/data-driven-justice http://www.naco.org/resources/programs-and-services/data-dri... 2. http://www.naco.org/news/roof-of-their-own http://www.naco.org/news/roof-of-their-own

analyst74 10y ago

Medicine Hat tried the same thing, and it seems to have worked pretty well. Maybe we don't have to go all-in or nothing, but start with less desirable cities.