3 ms·

Serious question -- and hopefully it doesn't get bound up in useless left/right rhetoric -- but what is San Francisco doing wrong? They're clearly flush with c

Serious question -- and hopefully it doesn't get bound up in useless left/right rhetoric -- but what is San Francisco doing wrong? They're clearly flush with cash: The budget has grown by leaps and bounds despite a static population. I do realize that San Francisco imports the homeless problem from much of the rest of the country (nice weather, good people...if you're homeless it certainly seems better than NYC), and that has to have costs, but it seems like a city that should have gold-plated services.

s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
The homeless import is a myth, no studies back that claim. Most homeless are from the area and due to mental, housing, and drug issues.
- endorphone 7y ago
  I was careless with wording, but I don't mean that a bus-load of homeless people are ferried out to San Francisco. Instead that the weather, people, and connections has a drawn a lot of people with a very laissez-faire attitude towards life, and that invariably conflicts with raw capitalism in a way that can have negative outcomes. This loose attitude on life pretty much defined San Francisco for a couple of decades.
joshmaker 7y ago
I don't think that SF is better than NYC for the homeless. A big difference between SF and NYC is that NYC provides shelter for people that can't afford housing and SF does not. Only 5% of homeless people in NYC are unsheltered compared with 67% in the Bay Area. Legally, NYC is required to provide shelters for anyone who needs it, while SF shelters have waitlists of over a month. https://medium.com/@josefow/new-york-decided-to-end-street-homelessness-and-it-basically-succeeded-ab27f3ec5a65 https://medium.com/@josefow/new-york-decided-to-end-street-h... https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Bay-Area-homeless-unsheltered-67-percent-NYC-13757259.php https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Bay-Area-homeless-uns... https://sfpublicpress.org/news/homelessness/navigation/2017-06/shelter-wait-times-soar https://sfpublicpress.org/news/homelessness/navigation/2017-...
- dehrmann 7y ago
  I have no idea, but a lot of non-profits around the Tenderloin provide services to the homeless that might be harder to capture. There's also less urgency to shelter because it doesn't freeze.

s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago

The homeless import is a myth, no studies back that claim. Most homeless are from the area and due to mental, housing, and drug issues.

endorphone 7y ago
I was careless with wording, but I don't mean that a bus-load of homeless people are ferried out to San Francisco. Instead that the weather, people, and connections has a drawn a lot of people with a very laissez-faire attitude towards life, and that invariably conflicts with raw capitalism in a way that can have negative outcomes. This loose attitude on life pretty much defined San Francisco for a couple of decades.

joshmaker 7y ago

I don't think that SF is better than NYC for the homeless. A big difference between SF and NYC is that NYC provides shelter for people that can't afford housing and SF does not. Only 5% of homeless people in NYC are unsheltered compared with 67% in the Bay Area. Legally, NYC is required to provide shelters for anyone who needs it, while SF shelters have waitlists of over a month. https://medium.com/@josefow/new-york-decided-to-end-street-homelessness-and-it-basically-succeeded-ab27f3ec5a65 https://medium.com/@josefow/new-york-decided-to-end-street-h... https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Bay-Area-homeless-unsheltered-67-percent-NYC-13757259.php https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Bay-Area-homeless-uns... https://sfpublicpress.org/news/homelessness/navigation/2017-06/shelter-wait-times-soar https://sfpublicpress.org/news/homelessness/navigation/2017-...

dehrmann 7y ago
I have no idea, but a lot of non-profits around the Tenderloin provide services to the homeless that might be harder to capture. There's also less urgency to shelter because it doesn't freeze.