Now in his fourth decade of spreading the word across most of the world’s continents about “Housing First”, an approach to helping homeless people that has convinced governments and non-profits alike to see housing as a human right, Sam Tsemberis experienced a first.
He was censored by the US government.
In the 1990s, Tsemberis began developing a simple idea: people living on the street want, and should have, safe housing with no strings attached. When you add accessible mental health and addiction services and caring, consistent case management, most stay housed. His research would bear out the idea, showing that Housing First results in at least 85% of people staying housed 12 or 24 months later, depending on the study. These are higher rates than any other approach that’s been studied.
We’ve known about the Housing First initiative the world over for years. Housing First with needs based assistance works, it’s proven to work. we know it works. Addiction and Mental Health issues are symptoms of being homeless.
We know the solution to the “complex” issue of homelessness. We know how to fix it. There’s just no money to be made in doing so. So we won’t fix it even though we can.
Kinda like cancer, till the US pulled out of the WHO.
The problem is that homelessness is required under capitalism because it helps force us to work in conditions we would otherwise not stand for. This is why socialist nations have such low homelessness and high home ownership rates