'We hurt those already hurting': why Los Angeles is failing on homelessness

[hunter]

4. This should be a federal issue, not a local one.

Homeless people land in the places where the weather and/or the local community isn't trying to kill them.

We can solve the homeless problem by building homes, and by improving access to mental health care and other social services. That would save money compared to the current situation, but it has to happen everywhere. Otherwise the homeless will migrate from places where housing and services are not available -- largely places with hostile NIMBYs -- and overwhelm local social services where they exist.

It's also a harmful notion that giving someone a shower, a haircut, and presentable clothing will magically make them employable. That's the "American Dream" isn't it? Unfortunately anyone who believes that will be severely disappointed. It's a hard reality that many homeless people are unemployable in our twenty-first century society and will require mildly supervised housing. Currently the very expensive alternative to that is jail and prison. We all suffer that in taxes and increased crime rates. It would be better to catch people before they go down that path.