SEARCH FOR ANSWERS REBRANDING HOMELESSNESS WON’T END CRISIS
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n May 2019, I wrote my first article on the tragedy of homeless people living on our streets. The column was titled “Is Sacramento Dying?” It was based on the documentary film “Seattle Is Dying.” The film was produced by Seattle TV station KOMO in 2018. It begins with a bold thesis: This is about an idea. For a city that has run out of them. What if Seattle is dying? Can it ever recover?
CH By Cecily Hastings Publisher’s Desk
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The column was the most widely shared article on our website—shared thousands of times. Many readers feared our city was following Seattle’s course, driven by a lack of civic leadership. The response helped me recognize the inadequacy of Sacramento media coverage. Homeless problems were not being seriously discussed in 2019. At Inside, we vowed to publish news, viewpoints, ideas and solutions in every issue moving forward. To better understand why our streets were becoming crowded with tents and people living in vehicles, I read about the causes of homelessness and why current solutions fail to help and often make things worse. I spoke to elected officials and civic leaders. Sadly, I discovered the folly of some closed-minded elected officials and well-funded nonprofit executives. They were determined to follow the
same path that devastated other communities. Some of my questions: Why do people become homeless? Which interventions can prevent or resolve the problem? What strategies can address long-term, underlying causes? How do we protect neighborhoods and businesses? I learned the homeless population is heterogeneous. The easiest to help are the economically homeless—people evicted after losing jobs or family support. The hardest to help are drug addicts and people suffering mental health crises, often the result of drug use. Biennial efforts to count the local homeless population make it clear the numbers have exploded over the past decade, with no end in sight. As numbers increase, so do complexities. Some experts believe terminology can help clarify specific types of homelessness. People can experience
homelessness, but they are considered “sheltered” if they live in homeless shelters or transitional housing. I’ve noticed a shift in language, especially among progressives and advocates. Homeless people are called “the unhoused” or “persons without homes.” City Council member Katie Valenzuela recently referred to homeless people as her “unhoused constituents and neighbors.” In Western Europe, the word “homeless” is rarely used. Instead, people who live rough are called “street addicts.” Their encampments are “openair drug scenes.” This is important to note because Western Europe has been more successful in reducing its homeless problem than U.S. Pacific Coast cities. I recently read “San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities” by Michael Shellenberger. It should be required reading for anyone who cares about identifying the problems and finding
