A new report from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development says California is the worst in the nation when it comes to caring for the homeless, with 64 percent of the homeless sleeping outside and the rest in some sort of shelter. Managing editor Tami Roleff says that while the numbers of homeless are decreasing in other parts of the country, they are increasing in California…
The Federal Department of Housing and Urban Development says California needs to do a much better job of caring for the homeless, because almost two-thirds are sleeping outside with no shelter. Researchers reported that during a snapshot in time in January of this year, California has 21 percent of the country’s homeless population, or almost 116,000 people. Jennifer Friedenbach with the Coalition on Homelessness in San Francisco says Sacramento has paid zero attention to the problem.
“We have very little investment by the state in this issue. They fund a very tiny amount of money toward emergency shelter.”
Across the country, the number of individuals experiencing chronic homelessness declined by 31 percent, or almost 23,000 people, between 2010 and 2015. Friedenbach attributes that to a big federal push after the recession to find housing for homeless families with children. She says the state is being shortsighted by leaving the problem up to cash-strapped cities and counties.
“Human beings are not meant to live outdoors. Their health deteriorates, and so we incur large amounts of money in our health care system that would be much cheaper just to house people.”
In San Bernardino County, the board of supervisors allocated almost $250,00 in October to help homeless veterans. The county has found housing for 224 out of 401 veterans identified as homeless, and is working to find housing for the remaining 177 homeless veterans by the end of the year.
