#Housing First | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

chronicallycouchbound · 4 months

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Wet shelters save lives. If someone is forced to freeze to death in their car because they’re not allowed in the local dry shelter because they’re under the influence, you are enabling their death.

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sordidamok · 28 days

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I work in a homeless shelter, so this isn't a surprise to me.

Homelessness in USA is the direct result of capitalism. There are solutions - providing people with housing is an obvious one - but the problem can't be solved overnight. And it can't be solved when the super-rich are hoarding mountains of money and the rest of us are barely scraping by.

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unbidden-yidden · 8 months

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And as a follow up to that previous post: I really think that a lot of the anti-homeless stuff that governments do is a combination of NIMBY and "but what will the tourists and gentrifiers think!" to try and make it so miserable for them there that they'll just leave and be homeless somewhere else.

But! I think an overlooked, er, benefit? (side-bonus?) to the ruling class that I don't see talked about much of having a visible and deeply ostracized class of people who are outside of most of the social systems that the rest of us live within, is that they are sort of a permanent reminder and warning to anyone who doesn't play by the rules: hey. This could be you. This is you if you don't follow every work rule and get fired and can't get another job and run out of resources and support network (do you really have that anyway? would your friends and/or family really take you in if it came down to it?) and the social net has been totally eroded and so now here you are! On the street! Possibly for awhile, possibly forever.

And like basically what I'm trying to say is that as a society, we *need* to help the people who are currently being victimized by this system first and foremost because they are people and no one deserves that, but also because if everyone knew that there were options and could feel sure that their community would take care of them, how much braver would we be? If we took that threat away completely?

#housing first #housing is a human right

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etakeh · 4 months

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I think most of us already know this, but in case you need it over the holidays as proof to your more annoying relatives.

If you really want to find out what kind of person they are, ask them, "where are they supposed to go? Just walk off a pier into the ocean?"

I asked my sister that a couple years ago, and she paused for way too long before she changed the subject.

#housing #housing first #homelessness #houselessness #Finland #imagine treating people as if they are people

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jinx-rants · 9 months

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We don’t talk enough about how deeply evil and dystopian homelessness is.

Imagine living in a society with enough housing, food, clothing to make sure everyone’s basic needs are met and we just…don’t?

Mainstream liberal discourse has started to shift away from placing blame on unhoused people themselves, but still somehow treat the entire phenomenon as some tragic accident? Instead of shifting the blame to where it truly belongs, the intentional choices of politicians and capitalists, who choose every day NOT to end homelessness.

Homelessness exists as a threat.

A threat to the working class. A promise that if we don’t let ourselves be exploited, that if we don’t sell our labour to enrich the capitalist class while we barely survive, that we will end up on the street, and society at large is FINE WITH THAT.

HOMELESSNESS EXISTS AS A THREAT.

#capitalism #homelessness #housing first #anti capitalism #socialism #fuck the rich #dystopia #America is a dystopia

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bemusedlybespectacled · 2 years

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thinking about opposition to housing first measures and like, I literally cannot think of any oppositional argument, even a conservative one, that makes any sense other than "I think poor people deserve to suffer"

like, ignoring the fact that it's cheaper than the usual state of affairs (homeless shelters and whatnot). ignoring the fact that it's way easier to get a job when you have an address and a shower and place to keep clothes, and it's easier to treat mental illness when you're not sleep-deprived and on constant high alert, and it's easier to get sober when drugs and alcohol are not the only tiny fleeting sources of joy you might have. like, that's approaching it from the perspective of "let's treat homeless people like human beings," and we know that a lot of people aren't on the same page with that argument.

so, okay, let's look at it in the most coldhearted, abstract way possible. you don't like how tent cities look? you don't like being bothered by people begging on the streets? you don't want anyone sleeping in public? giving people housing is a good way of avoiding that. like, it would literally hide the problem. can't have any homeless people ruining your aesthetic if you give all of them homes!

if everyone has a home, then they have a bathroom of their own and don't need to use the one at the starbucks with a lock on it. they have a bed of their own and don't need to sleep on a park bench or at the library. they don't need to beg for enough money to afford the fee at the homeless shelter (because, yeah, a lot of homeless shelters charge you money for the privilege of living there). you will literally never have to see them again!

#personal #politics #homelessness #housing first

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gwydionmisha · 3 months

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youtube

Finland Solved Homelessness: Here's How (Spoiler: It's More Than Housing First)

#Finland #Homelessness #Housing First #Social Services #Youtube

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radcare · 6 months

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Seattle/ King County, This is an important ballot measure, Nov 7th marks election day, so if anything else please vote in favor of our unhoused and/or instably housed neighbors. While not perfect removing funding would be worse.

PS - You do not need a home address to vote here. DM or check link & # below for more info.

KingCounty.gov/elections

206-296-8683

Lastly, we all know we are in late stage capitalism and everything sucks. Nihilism is dominant feelz. We must also remember the rich and diverse fights for the right to vote. For privileged people it is a responsibility.

For those who choose to exist outside the system, namely Indigenous, US Colonized, peoples, it is indicative of colonization to be coherced to vote by the left which further reinforces colonization.

#please vote #radcare #rad care #seattle #houselessness #unhoused #housing first #homeless #king county #vote

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progressive-politico · 1 year

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Corporate landlords are a major factor in the skyrocketing housing costs for working and middle class families. We need to rein in Wall Street’s housing buyout and make it easier for Americans to buy a home.

#leftist #capitalismsucks #bernie sanders #taxtherich #justice democrats #landlords are parasites #fuck landlords #livingwage #fightfor15 #raisethewage #unionstrong #housing is a human right #housing first

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melanieaycockdesigns · 7 months

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SERVING VS. HELPING 2/3

Housing First: A Human-Centered Solution to Homelessness

From our $2,000/month city apartments, its easy to follow the commonly-held narrative that our unhoused neighbors must first address the root causes of their situation before finding shelter. The Housing First approach, however, flips this paradigm on its head. The method recognizes that people must first have access to a safe shelter before they can stabilize, improve their health, or increase their income. After all, how are you supposed to stay sober when you don't have a place to sleep?

Housing First is ultimately a result of empathetic, human-centered design. It recognizes that individuals are unique and have different needs. The support is longterm and service-based, as opposed to quick-fix top-down handouts. And it works! Read here how Houston was able to reduce its homelessness rate by 55% by fully and consistently using this approach.

#design leadership #human centered design #serving #helping #housing first

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aquitainequeen · 1 year

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Homelessness has long been accepted as an inevitable fact of modern city life. But now a strikingly simple policy, first put forward by a psychologist in the 1990s, is making a dramatic impact in helping to all-but eradicate rough sleeping in cities around the world. The crux of the policy? Simply provide homes to people, without any preconditions. Then provide support tailored to their needs.

Since the US city of Houston adopted it a decade ago – when it had the sixth largest homeless population in the country – the number of people sleeping rough has dropped by 63 per cent. Utah in the US, and Vienna in Austria, have seen similarly transformative results. Helsinki in Finland is on track to entirely eradicate street homelessness by 2025.

These figures are particularly notable given that they are outliers among a much bleaker picture. Since the financial crash of 2008, homelessness has risen exponentially across the western world. In Britain, it has increased by 165 per cent since 2010.

While politicians in places like Hungary and the city of Tennessee in the US have responded by criminalising rough sleeping – resulting in a ballooning of their prison populations – others have taken a more radically progressive approach.

Called Housing First, the policy does exactly what it says on the tin: provides homes to people without preconditions, then wraparound support tailored to their needs. It sounds almost childishly simple, yet it is antithetical to the status quo. Most local authorities in the US and the UK operate what is known as the staircase model. Unlike Housing First, staircase expects people to be sober, engaging with support services, seeking employment, and have completed courses on managing a tenancy. Only then can one be considered housing ready.

Housing First is the brainchild of Dr Sam Tsemberis, a clinical psychologist who came up with the idea in 1992 after he saw patients he’d treated at Bellevue psychiatric hospital roaming New York City’s streets.

Since Houston first trialled it in 2012, they have moved more than 25,000 people from tents and park benches into houses. When they began, it would have taken a homeless veteran (one of the categories tracked by the government) 720 days and 76 bureaucratic steps to move from the streets into housing. Today the wait is just 32 days.

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manogirl · 1 year

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Housing First

The other day I reblogged something about homelessness, and mentioned Housing First, so I just want to talk about that for a hot second before I forget, because I think a lot of people don't know what that means, and it's a VERY SPECIFIC philosophy on how to help people who find themselves homeless for various reasons.

See, in America, we think that if you are neurodivergent, mentally ill, or have an addiction, you should be punished. And if that punishment takes the form of homelessness, welp, that's too bad but what can you do? You've gotta be punished somehow. One of the ways this manifests is that IF you're, say, addicted to alcohol, we'll tell you that we really want to give you a studio apartment, but you have to get off the sauce first. Or if you're say, schizophrenic, well, you may not like what the meds do to you, but you gotta get on them before you can have a roof over your head.

Housing First says: Fuck that. Let's give people places to stay, no conditions attached, and THEN start to wrap the services around that, if they're wanted. But mostly, let's just get people into housing and see how that works for them.

Newsflash: it works for them. People who get housing with no conditions are safer. Their lives are measurably better. And cities and states save oodles of money (if you give a shit about that; I do not. I would give people housing even if it cost the city and state MORE money), the cops are called less, hospital emergency rooms have fewer people taking up space that don't need to be there, and in general, things are better.

And maybe some of those people go on to stabilize in some way. Maybe they don't? BUT WHO CARES? Every. single. human. being. deserves. housing. Regardless of health or mind or trauma or whatever the fuck it is that's impeding their ability to find housing.

In conclusion: HOUSING FIRST. UBI. SUPPORT HUMAN DIGNITY.

#housing first #UBI #inherent human dignity

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infinitemonkeytheory · 2 years

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Shelter in place (Pluralistic)

America has a terrible, accelerating homelessness problem. Many of us share this problem – obviously, people without houses have the worst of it. But no one benefits from mass homelessness – it is a stain on the human soul to live among people who are unsheltered.

However, there is an answer to the problem of people lacking homes, one with a strong evidentiary basis, which costs significantly less than dealing with the crises of homelessness: give homes to people who don't have them. It's called Housing First, and it works:

https://endhomelessness.org/resource/housing-first/

But Housing First has a fatal flaw: it merely helps people without homes find them. It does not generate excess profits for a highly concentrated sector. No one profiteers off Housing First, and so there is no well-funded lobby to promote it.

However, there is a highly concentrated industry with sky-high profits and a powerful lobbying arm that has its own proposal for ending homelessness. It's the private prison industry, and its proposal is to make homelessness illegal and then put all the homeless people in private prisons:

https://invisiblepeople.tv/private-prisons-for-homeless-criminalization/

A wave of laws criminalizing homelessness has come before American statehouses, and behind them is a deep-pocketed astroturf campaign run by The Cicero Institute, a "libertarian" think-tank that has widely shopped model legislation called the "Reducing Street Homelessness Act."

Under the proposal, anyone caught sleeping on the streets would be liable to imprisonment. Further, homeless people judged to have mental health issues by police officers would be either imprisoned or locked up in mental heath facilities. As Kayla Robbins writes for Invisible People, such a law would substantially raise the stakes for any homeless person seeking help from police or other services – if they decide you look "mentally ill," they could lock you up indefinitely.

[X]

#pluralistic #cory doctorow #Shelter is a human necessity and a human right #Housing First #we're about to permanently imprison thousands of homeless people at enormous public expense

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kp777 · 9 months

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Jan. 17, 2022 article in CalMatters

#california #homelessness #housing first #supportive housing #mental health #drug addiction #calmatters

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bananarchy4ever · 1 year

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Repost from @defund604network's instagram account. Graphic by Whess Harman. Info below.

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Callout for International Solidarity | Week of Action April 21-29 2023

/WHAT/ We are asking folks to autonomously organize solidarity actions in your own communities & let us know: encampmentsolidarity(AT)gmail.com.

We will be putting together a list of ALL solidarity actions in the coming days.

/OUR DEMANDS/ - No Displacement on Stolen Land - Stop the Sweeps / End Bylaw Raids - Homes Not Cops

Week of action begins Friday April 21, with a #StopTheSweeps action in so-called Victoria. More details via @mr.georgejim

/WHY/ #StopTheSweeps Coalition & supporters call for international solidarity in the struggle against colonial state-led displacement. We hope to see multiple cities across Turtle Island show up in care and solidarity with unhoused community members, while continuing to demand an end to inhumane practices of encampment evictions and sweeps.

Actions call on community members to take care of each other in the face of state abandonment. Actions call on all levels of govt to cease ongoing colonial dispossession, to end constant police surveillance and the enforcement of inhumane bylaws in encampments & to immediately respond to the urgent need for safe, autonomous, accessible public housing.

You can begin with material support and a willingness to learn and contribute to #MutualAid. We must show up for those that are criminalized and displaced by our cities.

/BACKGROUND/ Hastings Tent City in the #DTES of so-called Vancouver, has been a site of unhoused community and solidarity the past year in the face of ongoing state-led displacement.

On April 5 & 6, Hastings Tent City was raided by an occupying army of the #VPD & and city workers. Police-led decampment shut down multiple city blocks, restricted access to essential health services, and systematically stole homes and belongings.

The city has not offered dignified housing for those they are evicting, and admits that there is not even adequate shelter space. In the weeks since, the city and cops have continued to wage war on the poor and attempted to “reset behaviour” through daily intimidation & militarized sweeps.

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intergalacticgoose · 1 year

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Hello everyone!

So, since I’m newish to Tumblr, I thought I’d do a quick introduction post.

I’m a writer in my (rapidly-growing) hometown.

I want to curate a lovely space, so I started this account to share beautiful, illuminating things I find across the digital realm.

This account, and my principles are:

Pro-choice (abortion is healthcare)

Pro-union

Pro-abolition

LGBTQ+

Trans liberation (TERFs, get a goddamn hobby and step off)

Celebrate diverse bodies

Climate Justice

Anti-racist

Anti-xenophobia

Anti-fascist

Anti-capital punishment

Sex work is work

End gun violence

Disability justice

Indigenous justice

Housing first

Love over violence

Our liberation is collective, as is our struggle. It is in the interest of the ruling powers to divide us, and view our fellow marginalized community members as enemies. By pitting us against each other, the ruling class, that wretched machine for white supremacy misogyny, capitalism, and colonialism, continue their destruction of the planet and the genocide of our most vulnerable unabated.

Only when we are able to build power as a community, recognize that the material for one does not mean the loss and oppression of another, and dedicate ourselves to building a world where labor and productivity is not the rent we pay for basic human rights and dignity, are we able to work towards a world that lives up to the principles of equal rights and liberty.

I also love vintage sweaters, coffee, and lifting heavy things.

Welcome 🌱

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