From: Robert Wood <[email protected]>
Subject: homeless solutions strategies
Date: July 25, 2022 at 9:51:32 AM MDT
To: Ken Miyagishima <[email protected]>
Cc: Frances Escola <[email protected]>, David Chavez <[email protected]>, Kelly Bloomfield <[email protected]>, Sara Smith <[email protected]>
On the Unhoused
I am just reviewing San Diego’s Homeless Strategies and Solutions Department https://www.sandiego.gov/homelessness-strategies-and-solutionsand their 10 year plan. I find not one reference to the necessity of both voluntary and involuntary addiction treatment and mental health care and facilities that can, in the same manner, deal with the more common duality of many’s situation. No mention of crime either.
I can go on and on on this subject but feel no one in authority really has any desire to at least undermine the growth of this plague. It is not just here, it is national and worldwide in the developed nations. I have already offered a long term study from England and here is another from Ireland: https://www.feantsa.org/download/evaluation-33841354450836165903.pdf
The challenge I see is that without an efficient system to separate the actual ones that need help and will work to achieve desirable results we are just throwing them all in some arbitrary line with the belief that once given a roof we can sort them out later. Normally it is the one that complains the loudest or has the most elaborate victim story that gets served first. There must be a method that basically separates the wheat from the chaff before the whole crop is just tossed into some silo, as has been the standard result, to rot.
As I have mentioned many times, there must be systems that clearly identify those we can readily help and those that need to be removed from the streets, placing them into appropriate facilities whether that be jail, long term involuntary treatment programs with legal repercussions for not getting clean/sober and psychiatric facilities that can help the many with combined drug and mental health issues. The studies clearly show that the majority needing a roof actually need housing that is some form of incarceration, not a utopian vision of tiny homes for all which has not worked anywhere it has been attempted. Many of who we call homeless are not homeless at all as their desired home is on the street to do as they please and have their needs entirely taken care of for free. To them that is utopia. That reality must be accepted and integrated into any plan.
If looking for a firsthand interview on the subject I bet the two ladies that sit out everyday even in the sweltering heat in the Target parking lot might be a place to start.
Rob WoodMayors Homeless Task Force
