Not good for van dwellers

[Qxxx]

How can you throw so much money at something and the issue clearly still keeps getting worse and worse?

Yeah, you hit the nail on the head. How can this be? As you sound like someone interested, you might check out this page which is "pure facts" ... (but don't be getting political in your responses or the mods will delete all the posts).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_programs_in_the_United_States

 

[Qxxx]

Homes for rats, but none for humans?

Well the article does say she started with 2 pet rats, but they were boy and girl, and did the usual boy and girl thing. Must be a lesson somewheres.

 

[Qxxx]

I have found plenty of animals that I enjoy watching in their natural habitat taking care of themselves much more rewarding, even though several have tried to move in! LOL!!!

If you had been like Edward Abbey living in Moab, you'd have had a nest of pet rattlesnakes living under your trailer. Helps keep the rat population down. Win-win.

 

[bullfrog]

As a matter of fact I do. Every once and a while they move under the ice machines to stay warm around the compressors, along with some nice Black Widow spiders. You wouldn't believe the number of tourists that let us know our ice machine is making a funny noise! The worst biting insect we have here is the scientifically engineered Tamarisk beetle that only live a few seasons.

 

[maki2]

She was not thinking right. All she needed to do was caravan with a crazy cat lady and the problem would have been solved.

 

[jacqueg]

Homes for rats, but none for humans?

It's a lot easier to house a rat than a human!

Unless you're thinking of humans of the rat variety?

 

[jacqueg]

@Qxxx

I will admit, I'd not looked into these numbers, but your post inspired me to do so. From what I can tell, the numbers you're presenting are correct. And the "nothing is being done about this" stance I had was wrong, at least in the case of California. Now I'm sitting here thinking this is an extremely complex issue that I really cant wrap my mind around. How can you throw so much money at something and the issue clearly still keeps getting worse and worse? 90 billion seems more than plenty to house, clothe and feed 130,000 people per year. But obviously those aren't the results. I'm at a loss here and all I can say is the system is failing. We need a new one, I'm sure 99% of the mentally stable homeless would much rather not be.

IMNSHO, it's because when they throw the money, much of it gets thrown at developers. Most of the time, neither the homeless agencies nor the municipality thinks in terms of a safe, well-regulated place to park a tiny house or a FEMA trailer, let alone vehicle dwellings. They are looking at ordinary apartments or houses, which as any resident of a growing city knows are already out of reach for many folks and it's going to get worse. Because it takes time to site and permit them, and then time to bring them up to code and/or build them.

The best place to house most houseless people is near an economy with jobs and support services. Many, if not most, houseless people do have incomes. Just not enough to afford rent.

 

[wayne49]

There is a need to address the reasons why people are "homeless".

 

[Qxxx]

There is a need to address the reasons why people are "homeless".

These issues are a bit much for us to handle. A search of the word "homelessness" brought up something like 160 threads on this forum where it's already been mentioned.

This page on the web indicates about 40M people in the US live in "poverty", according to some arbitrary definition of what it takes to live on. But a nontrivial number by any accounting.
https://www.povertyusa.org/facts

We ain't gonna do much about it here, except maybe help a few people learn to live with less.