It’s cute that you think they’re trying to save money 😂
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Leaving them on the streets is also more expensive than housing them.
When they’re on the streets, it means the government must pay for emergency services, extra sanitation work, police are called more frequently, etc.
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Do you have a source for that? I can’t think of a more perfect rebuttal to people saying that we shouldn’t pay for their housing, but your claim is pretty bold, so being able to back it up with something would be good.
A chronically homeless person costs the tax payer an average of $35,578 per year. Costs on average are reduced by 49.5% when they are placed in supportive housing. Supportive housing costs on average $12,800, making the net savings roughly $4,800 per year.
http://endhomelessness.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Cost-Savings-from-PSH.pdf
Studies have shown that – in practice, and not just in theory – providing people experiencing chronic homelessness with permanent supportive housing saves taxpayers money.
https://www.npscoalition.org/post/fact-sheet-cost-of-homelessness
Without connections to the right types of care, they cycle in and out of hospital emergency departments and inpatient beds, detox programs, jails, prisons, and psychiatric institutions—all at high public expense. Some studies have found that leaving a person to remain chronically homeless costs taxpayers as much as $30,000 to $50,000 per year.
https://www.usich.gov/resources/uploads/asset_library/Ending_Chronic_Homelessness_in_2017.pdf
This obviously varies from state to state. But generally it is cheaper to fix the root of a problem (housing) than a symptom (emergency services), and that applies to homelessness.
But even if it wasn’t a better option from a purely cost/benefit analysis, the moral thing to do is to house the homeless. So no matter what, it is something we should be doing.
Of course it’s the moral thing, but some people would disagree, hence there being value in being able to prove it’s cheaper. Thanks, I’m saving your comment in case I need to prove this to someone else in the future :D
San Diego has entered the chat. I’m still fuming over that ban.
Oh fuck what happened in SD?
They passed a “camping ban” targeting the homeless. It passed the city council a month or two ago. I attended a bunch of protests, but couldn’t really do anything about it since I live in IB
Honestly not surprised. Back when I worked for the city the director of parks and rec would go on and on about “combating” homlessnes. No one seemed interested in prevention or help (this was up in north county tho) and if you asked they’d look at you like you were crazy
It’s not surprising, but it is disappointing. Mayor Gloria ran on a platform that specifically called out Faulkner for his unconstitutional attempts to ban homelessness, and he turns around and does this.
They’re making money on people being in jail of course.
And get slave labor!
If they didn’t want to be punished they shouldn’t have been poor.
(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻)
Hell at this point it’s that added with another nefarious reason. It’s because in places like the US homeless are on par with untouchables.
Our hierarchies are so segmented they may as well be castes: and that’s by design. If there’s a group as poor off as homeless individuals then it shows other “lower castes” that they better fall in line or get kicked down to their level.
Why not help these homeless individuals? Because it takes money away from the “top castes” money pile. It also takes away the threat of homelessness that the “upper castes” use to keep the “middle castes” in line.
That’s adorable. I assure you, it’s actually quite profitable.
It’s insane to think that the U.S. has private prisons. You have people interested in the incarceration of people.
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It’s a 10 billion dollar industry iirc.
It’s all that profit that makes prison more expensive than just putting them in housing.
Facts not every unhoused person wants to be housed. We need to address those issues as well if we want to confront the issue.
But just letting people have housing if they want would already massively help so many people.
The argument that because not all of them want a house so we shouldn’t do it, is literally just the perfect being the enemy of good.
I never said we shouldn’t do it. I said that some unhoused don’t want to be housed so the solution isn’t that simple.
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I think I’m missing something. How would offerring housing result in the visible homeless disappearing and not the invisible/“good” homeless? The housing is being offered to both, right?
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Oh okay, thanks. Yeah, it sucks to think about, but homelessness in general would probably be talked about a whole lot less if not for people’s own discomfort with seeing it—and there are probably both good and bad reasons for that. I think there are situations where a homeless person makes people uncomfortable because of their own behavior, and there are others where people are uncomfortable with homeless people just because they think they make the neighborhood unattractive or whatever. Those are both obviously very different, but they both fit into the category of visible homeless people and ‘reasons the general public cares about homelessness’; that is, like you said, self interest.
I agree that there’d be a whole lot less conversation about it if the only homeless people were those living in shelters, couch-hopping, or otherwise removed from the public eye, even if it were still just as common and people were generally aware of it. Take out the personal stake, and people just would care as much.
Which is upsetting to me because the amount of genuine problems caused by homeless people (overall; I’m not implying that all or most homeless people actively cause problems) is virtually nothing when compared to the problems that homeless people themselves deal with. People care about the homeless, but not, for the most part, because they care about the homeless.
Ugh, this sucks. Sorry for the wall of text. Tl;dr, I’m not disagreeing with you at all, just thinking out loud (with way too many words, sorry again).
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This is a non-issue. The solution IS that simple, actually. Give anyone who does want a home a home. If the others don’t want a home well that’s on them. Kinda throwing out the baby with the bathwater saying it’s not so easy because it won’t solve every problem for everyone.
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I’ll agree that it requires immense public buy in, that’s part of why I’m as passionate and emphatic about it as I am. For sure it’s going to require some changing minds.
When I said non-issue, I’m talking from the perspective of societal problems. A person who wants housing and does not have it is an issue regardless of how. A person who does not want housing and does not have housing is a non-issue. They’re living in a way I don’t necessarily think is best, but they’re living how they want.
As far as bussing goes, that’s just a shit practice by a shit group. Not really relevant to the broader discussion of solving homelessness. That NIMBY attitude is definitely part of the public buy in that needs to be addressed.
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it’s not that simple, the biggest argument is that the core of the problem that made someone homeless is still there.
if you made someone obese fit with swish-and-flick of a magic wand, they would end up fat again in a couple of years, because being fit is much more than just having muscles instead of fat.
I’m not saying that every homeless is in the same situation of course, but you have to fix the problem that let them spiral down before trying to fix the problem by just throwing money at it.
Edit: fixed the link, blame mobile
Housing first works vastly better than any other homelessness strategy we’ve implemented. Turns out, if you don’t have a safe place to rest and just live, you have a far harder time getting all the other issues resolved. Housing is the first step, not the end goal.
Hopefully I fixed the link, if not quick Google scholar search for housing first, first link
link is broken
Oof. Downside of Mobile I suppose. Let me see if I can fix it
Many of them “don’t want to be housed” because of all the strings attached to having housing. When you simply give people their own warm bed with a roof they’ll almost always use it.
Many don’t want to be housed because of extreme mental illness or PTSD.
What if I told you, unlike putting them in prisons, we’re not forcing people into houses, and just saying “here’s housing of you want it”? Would you change your tune? Because I think that’s what we’re talking about.
What type of ptsd makes you not want to live indoors
Escape route. Indoors too closed off. I dunno.
That’s some S tier talking-out-of-your-ass bullshit
The kind that makes you have incredibly violent responses when you are triggered. For some something simple like a motorcycle backfiring puts them right back into their war(s). That can get violent under the wrong circumstances.
And this relates to having a warm bed to sleep in… how?
Because most of these people live with other people whom they normally do not want to hurt.
Homeless people… “live with” other people… Something doesn’t add up, here.
Unless you’re counting the people walking by on the street as “housemates”.
So like the kind of thing you’re way more likely to encounter on the streets, and way less likely to be able to safely regulate without somewhere safe and private to go?
That’s going to entirely depend on the person
Sure, but risk mitigation is still a thing. You really think more people suffering PTSD flashbacks, especially to the point of aggression, are going to be better off in the streets than their own home?
Houses are only a small piece of the puzzle.
People are homeless for many different reasons. Mental health and drug addiction are two big ones. Then there are the handicapped, those that can’t hold down a job. Those that lost everything they had. And even those that just want to be homeless.
People look at the homeless population though their own biases. Their framing is that people want a house.
We could try and give a house to every one of these people and they wouldn’t all take it. Some would destroy it and return to being homeless, either maliciously or as.a byproduct of their mental illness.
We should house the ones we can, feed the ones we can, and treat the health of the ones we can. Those that want rehab should get it, but I don’t think every drug addict out there wants to be cured. We should provide showers and clean clothes.
We need to remove the stigma from the homeless.
We need to make it easier for businesses to hire the homeless.
And we could do all that, and more. And we’d still have homeless. We will always have homeless. There is no holistic solution that will magically house everyone.
It’s really easy for businesses to hire the homeless. They just don’t want to. What we need to do is give them incentives to hire them.
Also, if we’re going to house people we need to just do it. Just give them shelter period. No strings attached. At least for a while until other programs can get them on their feet. I’ve watched people try to navigate the system to get a real roof over their heads the “right way” and it feels like it’s just set up for them to inevitably fail. They have to jump through hoops, sometimes in really dehumanizing ways, and can lose it all again far too easily. The half assed nonsense we’ve mostly got going now is just fodder for small minded people to point at and say “see, they don’t even want help!”
Yea. Those that want it, give it to them. Making it contingent on being clean from drugs or whatever doesn’t work.
There never will be a one size fits all trick to lifting someone out of being homeless. If someone wants to be lifted up, we should do whatever we can do help them.
I’m just saying that there will never be a complete solve to homelessness. But we can solve homelessness for those that WANT to not be homeless.
I don’t think any realistic discussion about homelessness should be concerned with the minority of a minority of people who actively choose to be homeless. They’re already happy enough as they are, or are simply too far removed from society that, as long as they’re not causing actual problems, there IS no problem. Talking about people choosing to be homeless is almost a smoke screen to distract from actually talking about the problem.
The people who don’t want houses aren’t the issue. They can choose not to have one, fine. That’s on them. Housing first has been very successful in certain European countries and cities. A safe place to live is the FIRST step to solving all of those issues, not the pot at the end of the life improvement rainbow.
Just getting people who DO want to offer the street dramatically improves mental health issues, substance abuse issues, lessens their strain on healthcare systems, lowers crime rate… it’s the obvious first step.
Shelter is the biggest part of the problem. Everything else is just a smokescreen or a social service that would indeed be needed after they are housed.
I wouldn’t want to be housed either, if it came with a laundry list of stipulations, requirements, and more or less complete destruction of autonomy. I doubt anyone would turn down a free, no-questions-asked place to call a home. Somewhere safe to rest and begin working on the issues naturally.
Housing first tends to more or less solve, or drastically reduce, homelessness and all the associated negative things - crime, substance abuse, medical issues, etc. Turns out it’s easier to get all the other things sorted and get back to society when you have the bare minimum left.
Sure there will probably be a very small percentage of people who just… don’t want to. They’re actually happy doing their thing, and that’s not really a problem. But I’d strongly doubt it’s less than a tenth of a percent of the current homeless population.
Im not sure how large the number is only that in the decades I have volunteered with shelters that some exist.
Sure, some. And some people eat shit for fun, it’s a minority of a minority, and I’d put good money on that
Like I said I can’t say how big or small the number is. It isn’t the majority as most unhoused people are not chronically unhoused.
Then what’s the point of you saying some people don’t want houses? You said earlier you think they should have them, but you bring up that some don’t want them. Ok, we’re not talking about them. What point are you making?
But I’d strongly doubt it’s less than a tenth of a percent of the current homeless population.
Also by definition it’s 0% of the current homeless population who is unhappy being homeless.
I don’t know if you misspoke or if I’m just misreading it. I really hope you’re not making the “these people aren’t changing their circumstances so they must by definition be Happy in them” argument. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and ask for clarification because that’s a fuckin dumb argument lol
Because… getting housing often means losing the community support they get from other homeless. If you get a house, but lose your friends and support system and the people who (eg) go shopping for you, then how is that a win?
These people would happily be housed if it didn’t mean yanking them away from their community.
So the solution is to house entire homeless communities together and at the same time.
Single room apartments with communal cooking, recreation and bathing areas seem like the most cost effective and amicable solution. You could even convert old prisons so they aren’t dehumanizing.
Why would they lose their community? All their homeless friends also get free housing, probably in the same building or nearby. Their friends who did shopping and shit for them, there’s probably more reason than they’re homeless that they’re helping out. And if you’re referring to state or private institutions, there’s no reason not to keep those resources available.
Further, the former homeless now has more opportunities to form even better communities, and start standing on their own. It’s wins all the way around. Hell, it even ends up being CHEAPER for the average person, because crime tends to go down, medical expenses go down, etc.
That’s not how housing works. You answer the housing lottery, get in the queue, and eventually you get a house if you’re lucky. So when you look at a homeless community, it’s random who gets a house when.
Look up the podcast “according to need”. They talked with a bunch of homeless people and did a great analysis of the situation. It’s only like 5 or 6 episodes.
Right. That’s not how it works. Right now. There’s no reason it can’t work better. I could spitball ideas, but I’m not an expert, so anything I proposed would be full of holes. Off the top of my head, I could see initiatives to locate homeless communities, and building higher density dwellings somewhere central to them and the resources they’d need, with the intent to keep these communities as close as possible.
I’ll listen to that podcast for sure.
Oh yes. It’s the current approach that causes people to reject housing. I think those are some really good ideas for better options.
Facts not every unhoused person wants to be housed
Is that really true? Answer that first.
Then, if so, answer this: why? That’s an important question.
Do they just enjoy sleeping outside and being pissed on? Somehow I doubt it.
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None of these are a simple desire to be unhoused.
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Yes, they were. They were saying that for a majority, they simply don’t want a home.
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A large part of the problem is that many don’t want help.
Facts not every unhoused person wants to be housed
Housing first doesn’t have to interfere with any of that. A reasonable home will allow you to have a pet. They’ll need those support structures on the street or off, it wouldn’t make sense to cut them off. Anyone with a mental health issue is ONLY going to have a better time with a safe, private space they can call their own, and housing first means there’s no stipulation to getting off drugs, until you’re ready.
Redefine housing as the FIRST step and not the pot of gold at the end of the societal expectation rainbow, and you’ll get a lot further.
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Yeah? I don’t think I, of anyone else, proposed only housing ever.
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Then that’s not housing first lol. Housing first means just that, housing FIRST. Before anything else. It’s worked in some countries, off the top of my head Finland. People don’t just get clean without safety, security, privacy, and dignity, and those things are practically impossible to achieve on the streets.
This is one of those things that, yeah, actually. If we did the obvious, simple, humanitarian thing it’d work out to be drastically better for like, everyone except maybe the most well-off. The problem, as you alluded to, isn’t one of practicality but of politics.
Yes it is absolutely the case as I have seen in the thirty years I have volunteered with homeless shelters.
Typically it is PTSD that sometimes leads to violent responses that makes these people want to be unhoused. We have a lot of vets in my country, The USA, who aren’t getting the mental health care they need. Some of these people are on the streets because they do not trust themselves around loved ones.
So, you get my point. It isn’t just a desire to be on the street because they think it’s cool and fun.
I never said it was
It’s what you imply when you say they don’t want a home.
No it isn’t. That’s bullshit you are adding on your own.
Sure, it isn’t. “I don’t want to” doesn’t stand on its own. “I don’t want to live in a house” implies that they prefer living outside of one.
Yeah, actually, it is. Saying any significant fraction of the homeless population wants to be homeless is at BEST ignorant, and most likely a smoke screen to distract from the actual discussion. You’ve yet to provide any rebuttal than “I’ve seen homeless people who didn’t want housing!” And nothing supporting it.
Although at least in prison, they’ll at least get a chance to get some medical care. Housing them won’t help there. This is why we need universal healthcare.
You are way more likely to acquire an infection in prison (bacterial or viral) and have your health conditions ignored or downplayed than you are to get any real access to medical care.
I gave blood recently. One of the questions they ask you is have you been in jail or juvi recently. I assume for the reason you stated above. I.E. having been in jail makes your blood less desireable. Not sure if they’ll actually reject you, but they sure ask.
Might also be a more polite way to essentially ask the question “were you possibly raped in prison” as gay/anal sex is still something that prevents you from donating blood unless it’s with a clean long term partner.
Absolutely, the US needs universal healthcare. But not everyone on the internet is American. Tons of us live in places that already offer health care, but still have a long ways to go for helping the homeless.
A large part of the problem is that many don’t want help. Taking antipsychotics sucks in a huge way, as well as quitting most hard drugs. (these demographics account for ~80% of the chronically homeless)
Universal Healthcare won’t change much since you currently can’t force someone to take their meds or quit drugs.
Chronic homelessness is a problem that won’t be solved by throwing more housing or money at it. It’s a super nuanced problem that requires changes at a societal level to address (which won’t happen)
A lot of people seem to think the majority of homeless are those who are just down on their luck, but that’s just not true.
Having a stable home would already make it so much easier to quit drugs and improve their mental health. In addition, saying otherwise is the same as saying they don’t deserve a place to live because they have mental health issues/are addicted/whatever. That sucks. Everyone should have a home.
And this is assuming that people get addicted first and then become homeless, and not the other way around.
You have already been proved wrong on these lies.
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A large part of the problem is that many don’t want help
Take your own advice.
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Saying “a large part” is just weasling out of the fact that you want to say “all”, but realise you don’t have the evidence.
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Yeah indeed that explains the hilighted /fact/.
housing → just housing
prison → housing + clothing + medical + dential + psychological aid? + food + legal costs getting them into prison + legal aid + security + education + /basic/ recreation/entertainment (in some prisons)…
The meme tries to imply one cost prevents the other. Perhaps, but I guess I’m not instantly convinced. That’s not to say people shouldn’t be provided housing anyway just on humanitarian grounds. Housing is a human right (article 25).
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Sure, but I was focused on costs. In the US prisons are privatized. I wouldn’t be surprised if the private company running the prison charged for more healthcare than what they actually provide. Or if they charged the state a much higher amount than their actual cost. Prison privatization opens things up to all kinds of shenannigans.
Also worth noting that all the big banks in the US finance private prisons… which creates incentives to fill the prisons. So good idea for USians to boycott the listed banks.
Over 90% of incarcerated people are not in private prisons. They’re a problem for sure, but it isn’t every or even most prisons that are private. The problems with incarceration in the US can’t simply be blamed on private greed, they are primarily an outgrowth and continuation of slavery perpetuated by state governments and the federal government.
Just a nitpick - wanting slave labour can absolutely be blamed on greed.
I agree, but the primary beneficiary of modern incarceration is the state, not private interests.
You won’t hear me disagreeing :P
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I seem to recall reading somewhere that some homeless people would commit crimes so that they would be arrested and get free food and shelter.
Honestly, as a non-homeless person the prison situation is getting more appealing in certain ways.
Food, shelter, less expectations… Life is a fucking grind these days and it didn’t really used to be this way.
Always has been. You’re just getting older and getting more responsibilities
Lol… I’m not “getting more responsibilities”.
I’m almost 50 and have lived on my own and worked full time since I was 16.
Not in my area. They make so much money standing on busy corners that they prefer to be homeless. I watched one for 15 minutes get 8 donations. It was all cash, so a minimum $8 for 15 min, $32/hour, tax free. They are making more money outside Walmart than working inside Walmart.
Edit: It seams like a lot of people are mad that homeless people in my area are not committing crime so they can have a better life in jail.
I don’t know what to tell you. I never said they don’t need help or that they have a great life or that they earn enough to get by. I said they make more money than the people who work in the Walmart that they stand in front of. There are woods behind, and they all camp out back there. I have been back there, it is quite a set-up.
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Thank you for this. Just the simple fact of how low and humiliating it is to beg for money is enough to me… I always try to help the homeless when I can.
One thing that I have learned helps them is taking the time to have a conversation with someone that’s homeless. Treat them like everyone else… after getting put down day after day and treated like scum, having someone treat you like just another normal person can be extremely uplifting. Also helps one to see past the whole “They are just getting one over on the system” rhetoric.
My heart goes out to anyone who is experiencing homelessness… I wish we lived in a world where that wasn’t a thing. Hopefully one day it won’t be.
Good for them!
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The point is that they are not committing crime.
Yeah those greasy fat-cats standing on the same corner from sunrise to sunset, in the same clothes, unwashed, sleeping on a piece of cardboard, THEY are the real gangsters!
Makes me wonder, if they’re making that much money, why don’t you do the same?
Moral of the story: fuck Walmart!
But they aren’t making that at a consistent rate. Highly doubt it’s actually that in terms of average wage.
They are making more money outside Walmart than working inside Walmart.
That says more about wal-mart than it does about panhandlers.
assuming this is talking about the US
Putting homeless people in labour camps and treating them like slaves is unethical,
But if you throw them in prison first…
Yes, but why would we dismantle our free slavery system? /S (but not really)
Didn’t we ban prison labor we ant even using the free slave labor
It’s state dependent how much it’s Actually Slavery™ vs. Basically Slavery©, but prison labor is still very much a thing, sadly
Yeah, but it’s where that money goes that matters.
The types of homeless people who are best helped by “housing first” type aid are not the same ones getting arrested/going to prison. Homeless people aren’t some big monolithic group you can throw one solution at and have it work…
Even if you’re going to overly simplify things you’d at the very least have two groups; the “entrenched” group (more visible and what people think of when talking about homelessness), and “invisible” group (the ones where the factors causing their homelessness are mostly financial).
Yes, actually, they are. Most of the people getting arrested or causing problems are the ones who need housing the most. There is a near 0 chance to get any of that under control without safe and secure housing. First step is a home, and then they can start rebuilding. Ideally, we’ll implement some other social structures, like transportation, medical, counseling, and job aid off the top of my head, but that’s all downstream from housing.
Most problems with the homeless come from those who have something going on, either a mental or emotional episode, or a need they have that they cannot meet realistically, legally. Just having a safe space to have your episode, without judgement from every asshole coming down the street will drastically decrease the odds of a negative event occurring.
This also all applies to your invisible homeless group, why wouldn’t it? They’re homeless too, come get a home and get back on your feet.
This also all applies to your invisible homeless group, why wouldn’t it? They’re homeless too, come get a home and get back on your feet.
Absolutely it does! That’s why those are the people you specifically target with things like a housing-first approach or just straight up money because that’s all they need and can take it from there. I’m pretty sure they make up the majority of homeless as well so it can do a lot of good so the sooner we get on it the better. Check out this trial that was done in Vancouver for example that deliberately excludes the more entrenched people for that reason.
I think we’re agreeing, but aggressively at each other lol. For the record I’m all for including the more well-off homeless (that sounds weird to say) in any initiatives. I don’t think I agree with explicitly excluding the more entrenched, but both groups probably do need different resources, and so it’s not entirely as simple as just give em all cash or a house, but I think in both cases it’s the FIRST step to take.
Its hard to find housing for non homeless at the moment… When is the government going to start incentivizing starter homes?
lol never. Not enough profit in it and it lowers neighborhood average prices, ruining investment returns and reducing the potential profitability of mortgage-backed securities.
Too much money is now in housing for the prices to fall - they can’t afford it.
But does it make more profit for the shareholders?
Yeah, nah, didn’t think so. Try again, bleeding heart liberal communist America hater!
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Only for the government. It costs a lot for property owners.
Also for us citizens. It sucks losing downtowns to homeless and drug addicts. It’s shitty for everyone involved.
I’d rather pay for them to get treatment and help.
prison labor
Only because prison is privatized. Gulags are cheap as hell!
Just do what my town does. Pay to put them in a hotel where it’s $100 a night for tax payers, they don’t get a kitchen or space, but at least it doesn’t look like we’re giving free homes to them!
