{"id":3616,"date":"2014-02-26T07:41:42","date_gmt":"2014-02-26T12:41:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.une-sen.org\/press\/?p=3616"},"modified":"2018-06-18T11:47:08","modified_gmt":"2018-06-18T16:47:08","slug":"solving-homelessness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/?p=3616","title":{"rendered":"Solving Homelessness"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"solving_homelessness\"February 20 is Social Justice Day, and we thought it would be interesting to talk about one of the social justice issues facing many nations: the issue of homelessness. In Canada, 30,000 people are homeless<\/a> on any given night; of these, over 2,800 remain unsheltered, sleeping in cars, in parks or out on the street.<\/p>\n

Among those most at risk of homelessness are youth, aboriginal people and victims of domestic violence.<\/p>\n

During last year\u2019s National Conference on Ending Homelessness, Minister of State for Social Development Candice Bergen said<\/a> the Harper government is \u201ccommitted to working with our partners to address this complex issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s how homelessness is usually presented: a complex issue without an easy solution, without a 10-step plan. But could it be as simple as giving apartments to the homeless?<\/p>\n

Well, that\u2019s precisely what one of the most conservative states did \u2013 and they\u2019re on track to end homelessness by 2015. In just eight years, Utah has managed to reduce homelessness by a whopping 78 %.<\/a><\/p>\n

The program got its start in 2005, just a few years before the worst recession since the Great Depression. And yet, the program wasn\u2019t torpedoed in the name of austerity. In fact, despite the additional challenges posed by the economic downturn, it got amazing results.<\/p>\n

If your brain hasn\u2019t kablooey\u2019ed by now, you\u2019re probably wondering how exactly this works<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe model allows homeless citizens freedom in their use of the system. The homeless are given access to their own apartments, while the state provides job training and offer social services, including substance abuse programs, to help residents assimilate to a steady job and social life.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To house the homeless, the state initially drew<\/a> \u201c579 [units] from existing rental inventory, 952 from refurbished structures, and 683 [from] new construction\u201d. If the resident is able to land a steady job, 30% of their income<\/a> goes back into the state coffers as rent. If they can\u2019t, \u201cthey still get to keep their apartment<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s actually a cost-effective way of doing it,\u201d explained Ana Kasparian<\/a>, co-host of The Young Turks. \u201cThe annual cost of E.R. visits and jail stays for each homeless person is $16,670 per year<\/a>. They found out that if you provide them housing, it\u2019s actually much cheaper; the annual cost of providing an apartment and social worker for each homeless person is $11,000 per year.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re thinking this is only cost-effective because of the high cost of health care in the U.S., you\u2019d be wrong<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>The Wellesley Institute\u2019s Blueprint to End Homelessness (2007), Shapcott argues that the average monthly costs of housing people while they are homeless are $1,932 for a shelter bed, $4,333 for provincial jail, or $10,900 for a hospital bed. Compare this with the average monthly cost to the City of Toronto for rent supplements ($701) or social housing ($199.92).\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Turns out solving homelessness isn\u2019t as complex an issue as we keep being told by politicians. Investing in homelessness prevention and housing would not only cost taxpayers less, it would be the moral and ethical thing to do.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

February 20 is Social Justice Day, and we thought it would be interesting to talk about one of the social justice issues facing many nations: the issue of homelessness. In Canada, 30,000 people are homeless on any given night; of these, over 2,800 remain unsheltered, sleeping in cars, in parks or out on the street. … <\/p>\n

>> “Solving Homelessness”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3630,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7,12,19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3616"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3616"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3616\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3618,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3616\/revisions\/3618"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unesen.ca\/press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}