SF analysis: PSH launches aggressive spiral of more homelessness, more gov't spending
Sanjana Friedman pokes a hole in Housing First's idea that subsidizing Permanent Supportive Housing reduces homelessness. Instead, since there's no behavioral requirements (including getting sober) or stay limits (yep, they really do mean “permanent”), unhoused people fighting addictions and mental illness stay in, and even flock to, SF to pursue dangerous lifestyles. From Pirate Wires.
As it turns out, most of that $672 million [allotted this year by SF to its Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing] does not fund temporary shelter and care for people on the city’s streets. The majority — 56 percent in this year’s budget — is spent on permanent supportive housing (PSH): single-occupancy units that the city indefinitely subsidizes for those it believes would otherwise be homeless. Leased and maintained at enormous cost to taxpayers, PSH units underpin San Francisco’s dysfunctional ‘Housing First’ approach to homelessness, which prioritizes connecting people on the streets with permanent homes over providing them with temporary support. Since San Francisco places no sobriety requirements or maximum income cutoffs on this housing, and tenants need only certify that they would otherwise be homeless through third-party or self-declaration, PSH is, in effect, permanent for all who choose to stay — irrespective of participation in rehabilitation or job training programs.
But San Francisco cannot build or lease new homes fast enough to house the influx of new homeless migrants drawn to the city either for the temperate weather and lax drug laws, or for the promise of a subsidized home. As these new applicants crowd the lengthy housing waitlist, vying for units with low turnover rates, the city spends increasing sums on ‘resolving’ its homelessness crisis — which in this case means providing more permanent supportive housing. This increased spending, in turn, reinforces the perverse incentives drawing people to the city in the first place. Now, San Francisco faces a forecast budget deficit and, for the first time in a quarter-century, a shrinking tax base — a ticking time bomb for its homeless policy. How long will SF be able to sustain its runaway spending on homelessness? What will happen to people on the streets and in supportive housing when the money runs out?
Contrary to popular narrative, it is not true that most people sleeping on San Francisco’s streets are from the city. In fact, the overwhelming majority are not originally from San Francisco, and most seem to have arrived quite recently....
Once settled in San Francisco, these homeless transplants are free to take advantage of the city’s lax drug laws, vast apparatus of homeless support services, and federally imposed injunction against clearing encampments, while they decide whether to apply for housing or remain on the streets.
This article originally appeared in Pirate Wires. Read the whole thing here.
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