Category Archives: Homelessness

Nearly $1 Million to House Each Derelict

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Liberals attempt to solve the homelessness problem by throwing other people’s money at it. This incentivizes homelessness, which is why it has reached crisis levels in parts of the country controlled by liberals. Given that they pour across the open boarder, the supply of potential homeless people is infinite. In contrast, the supply of other people’s money is limited — especially when you consider how inefficiently liberals spend it:

A $1.2 billion program intended to quickly build housing for Los Angeles’ sprawling homeless population is moving too slowly while costs are spiking, with one project under development expected to hit as much as $837,000 for each housing unit, a city audit disclosed Wednesday.

About 1,200 units have been completed since voters approved the spending in 2016, which was then a centerpiece in a strategy intended to get thousands of people off the streets.

Big Government caused the homelessness crisis by enabling the lifestyle; by disincentivizing work and personal responsibility; by shackling the economy with excessive taxes and regulations that reduce employment; by allowing devastating drugs to flow across the border and using taxpayer money to encourage their use; and by making housing prohibitively expensive through inflation and (especially in California) envirofascist lunacy. At the risk of stating the obvious, the solution to homelessness is not more Big Government.

Admittedly, government could make itself useful by closing the border and locking up the floridly insane. But constructive measures are not on the agenda.

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom … has budgeted record sums to combat homelessness… The state is providing roughly $12 billion on homelessness programs over two years. …

When [Mayor Eric ] Garcetti took office in 2013, the city was spending about $10 million treating homelessness. The budget he signed last year included about $1 billion.

Consequently, homelessness is skyrocketing. Yet the fools in charge learn nothing.

Mayor Eric Garcetti says the project is coming along fine, “producing more units than promised, at a lower cost than expected.” Homeless advocates shriek that the money already wasted represents only a drop in the bucket.

The problem will continue to get worse until the San Andreas Fault mercifully steps in to put moonbat-infested coastal California out of its misery.

On a tip from Henry.

Moonbats Turn Austin Into Skid Row

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How do you turn a thriving city, which has experienced explosive growth mainly due to being located in the business-friendly state of Texas, into a drug-infested refugee camp? Simple: add moonbattery. The easiest method is to vote for Democrats:

On a tip from ABC of the ANC.

San Francisco Homeless Tents Cost $5,121 per Month

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San Francisco is among the worst cities in the country for homelessness. It costs a fortune to create a crisis on this scale. When it comes to wasting other people’s money, no one beats San Francisco liberals, who are spending over $5,000 per month per tent to maintain villages of derelicts.

If you want more of something, you subsidize it. Via KTLA:

San Francisco is paying $16.1 million to feed and house people in tent villages as the city struggles with a swelling homeless population. …

The 262 tents currently house more than 300 people, with some vacancies. The villages also provide access to bathrooms, meals and 24-hour security…

The residents are not provided with butlers, although they ought to be, for $5,121 per month per tent. Most people pay much less for their mortgages.

These days, paying people $147 per day (based on 300 people) to be homeless is nothing:

The funding is only a fraction of the more than $300 million the city spends annually on homeless services, and the average cost per night is less than what the city pays under a program to shelter homeless people in hotels…

However, the tent city is more controversial, because it is not eligible for federal reimbursement. It is better to waste money belonging to people far away in other parts of the country, who won’t see what it is being spent on when they step in the consequences.

On a tip from Brian Brandt. Hat tip: Hot Air.

Homeless Advocates Commandeer Hotel

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We will know that civilization is on the verge of collapsing completely when property rights are ignored. From Fife, a suburb of Tacoma, Washington:

On Christmas Eve, a homeless advocacy group booked 16 rooms at the Travelodge Motel at 3518 Pacific Hwy. E. and paid for one night.

But now, the group told the motel’s manager they have no plans to check out, or to pay the bill. …

[V]olunteers from Tacoma Housing Now brought in food and supplies for more than 40 homeless people now occupying the 16 rooms…

The derelicts are cold and poor. Some of them have diseases. Therefore, they have a right to commandeer someone else’s property, in accordance with progressive ideology.

But motel manager Shawn Randhawa, told Fife Police and the City Manager, the motel is a struggling small family business with 10 employees, which was already devastated by the pandemic. When he was told the group refused to pay for their rooms, he told the city manager he may have to pull the plug on the entire business.

One less capitalist to exploit the masses!

“They may have to close up shop because with no revenues coming in, with their margins where they are, they may have to close operations,” said Fife City Manager Hyun Kim. “So, I’m trying to buy some time. It starts with conversations with both sides.”

The occupiers refuse to settle for anything less than permanent free shelter.

Why don’t the police remove the trespassers? This isn’t nearby Seattle, after all.

Fife Police Chief Peter Fisher told KIRO 7 the group is clearly committing theft and criminal trespassing, but the owner has not asked for the group to be forcibly removed.

In the current climate of media-endorsed leftist terrorism (a.k.a. mostly peaceful protests), he may be trying to avoid the place getting burned down.

Why would anyone build a new hotel in a world where the building would only be seized by thugs in the name of moonbattery?

On a tip from R F.

New York City Houses the Homeless in Luxury Hotels

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There is no end to the moonbattery that has been facilitated by Wuhan coronavirus, including the expansion of housing the homeless in luxury hotels in New York City:

[A]t least 139 hotels are deemed home to people experiencing homelessness – a sharp rise from the estimated 40 hotels that were used in place of shelters prior to the outbreak of the global pandemic this year. Around 13,000 individuals are believed to be living in such hotels across some of the five boroughs, with most of them transferred from various shelters.

About 20% of NYC hotels are now used as homeless shelters.

Congratulate yourself on your generosity:

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) agreed to foot at least 75% of the costs of the rooms…

That means you, federal taxpayers. The rest is on New York taxpayers, helping to explain why they have been fleeing the city and the state.

How much money are we talking about?

In 2018, the city spent $364 million on contracts for emergency homeless housing – according to publicly available data – with the invoices ranging anywhere between $150 to $400 per night depending on hotel and location, excluding the cost of meals, social services and other medical and substance abuse-related assistance.

For the money, a high time is had by everybody. Well, maybe not everybody.

A 2018 review by the Department of Investigation also found that “prostitution, drug use, and violence occurred at dozens of hotels that New York City used as shelters for homeless families last year.”

Then there are the pedophiles.

According to a recent New York Post report, the city moved at least six convicted pedophiles – still on parole – into an opulent hotel on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, a mere block from an elementary school playground and thus an apparent violation of state law.

The police are limited in how much they can help. The NYPD’s homeless outreach unit was defunded this year, probably as part of de Blasio’s $1 billion war on police.

On a tip from Chuck A.