Michael Shellenberger's Solution for the Homeless Problem in California

I was homeless in a big city. At first I tried the shelter because it was winter. The shelter would kick you out at 6am rain, snow, or shine. You weren’t allowed back in until night time. The shelter was sooo nasty. People shitting on the floor in the showers and it was just plain nasty so I went to the streets. I stayed in trap houses or abandoned homes. I was on hard drugs. Eventually got arrested at the hospital due to a probation warrant. Being homeless was the worse part of my active addiction. Did my prison time, found a good woman who saved my life and stuck out the bad times. Now I’m a little over 2 years clean and happily married. Life is good you just have to do good things.

I've lived in downtown LA for about 15 years and the one thing I consistently think while walking through skid row is "these people could totally learn Python."

I was homeless for 8 months, broke into motel rooms and had a tent off of a bike trail by a creek, all due to my heroin addiction. Thank god for my family and for God, I ended up getting pregnant, found out in booking after getting arrested for a warrant, and the jail took me to treatment (methadone) and it saved my life. Had my son, he’s healthy and happy! I’ve remained in treatment and I’m slowly but surely getting off of methadone, but it has completely saved my life! I have a good job now, my son is in preschool, and I’ve been clean 4 1/2 years! But His dad (who also was a heroin addict, we used together) has been clean 4 years (he goes to methadone clinic with me) and works for the county and is a great dad to our son! There is hope! Make the choice to get better!!! There is another way and you just need to finally take that step to change your life!

As someone who lived in shelters for nearly 2 years, it’s the reappropriating funds. Most places want to look like they’re helping, but are doing the bare minimum and taking funds for themselves. They’re more interested in keeping the system like it is than actually helping people.

I worked Skid Row as an LAPD rookie in 1990. 32 years later, it’s worse. Really smart people figure out how to make a lot of money writing grants to solve this problem, get the grant money, and then don’t solve the problem. There’s a lot of money out there to be made not solving this problem, while convincing foundations you are.

I volunteered working with the homeless at a shelter in a very large city. The thing that surprised me and is rarely talked about are the number of homeless people with head/brain injuries or people released from a long hospital stay, 6months+ and lost their apartment and everything they owned or people who came to the big city for specialized out patient healthcare, chemotherapy etc and can't afford to rent a place to stay. Perhaps the saddest and fortunately rarest cases I saw at that shelter are seniors who lost a spouse, have no family and lose their apartment because they can no longer afford it on a single pension, and they are suffering from cognitive decline.

I was homeless for a COLD Canadian winter from Nov 2017 to March 2018. I was lucky that I still had a job and had a car so I was not forced to camp in a tent or anything like that. It was all due to losing a rent controlled apartment and being unable to find anything affordable in a short period of time. I outright refused to go to a shelter. The thing that encouraged me the most to get off the street was that it was NOT easy. It fully sucked and I was all alone in it. I could have taken all sorts of charity and handouts but I refused. I knew I could do it and all I needed was time. I almost lost my job when they found out and I pointed out that their behaviour was not conducive to actually helping me. I wound up just having to outright lie to them and tell them I found a place and I'll get my info to HR as soon as possible...blah blah blah. I did what I could to make use of the situation in that I had to be very careful with my diet...no fridge and cooking wasn't easy, I hit the gym every morning before work and this allowed me to shower and groom every day and i specifically put in effort to stay away from drugs or anything else that would just numb the pain and distract me from my situation. I let myself experience it and used it to change my situation. It was actually very amazing, and saddening, at just how many people tried to shame me for all of this. I pointed out that I had done something that NONE of them would have ever been able to do and through it all I discovered parts of myself I never knew even existed.

Well with the economy and stocks at where it is now, I'd be disappointed if people weren't making any error on their portfolio at this time, it was much easier to navigate during the bullrun, regardless I still see and read articles of people pulling over $225k by the weeks in trades, how come?

Being a former homless addict I will say the inconvenient truth. The only thing that helped me was putting alot of space and work between me and my drug of choice. Drugs are way to easy to get. If its in my face all the time I cannot avoid the absolutely overpowering desire to use. But if it involves even a small amount of work and inconvenience suddenly its so much easier to stay sober.

Have them all do podcasts.

During my time homeless in a wheelchair in Sacramento, 2017-18, I found an opening in senior living and thought I would be going home after losing mine of 15 years to rent doubling. 5 years later I'm still hurt and angry at the letter the senior complex sent. My request for housing was REFUSED because I was homeless and they could not verify a housed address! The trouble with ignorant policies is no one working within them bother to question or make rational changes, they just parrot them and say, "That's the way it is" before hanging up. I still cry with the retelling because they didn't care that I was cold, it was Winter, very afraid and had done nothing to deserve being thrown out with 200 other disabled seniors so rents could be raised.

Watching my little sister become homeless made me realize why people become homeless. Her drug addiction turned her into someone who would lie and steal from absolutely anyone. Especially the most caring of our family members. I stopped “helping” homeless people I meet after that.

This subject hits me personally. I have one brother who’s 27 and addicted to crack cocaine. And I have another brother who’s 24 and is schizophrenic and doesn’t take medication or treatment. They’re both homeless now cause of stealing and just plain out being disrespectful non stop to family members who’ve tried to help. I tell myself hey it’s over and just love them from a distance. But they’re my blood and it does bother me that I feel helpless.

I was homeless and have never been involved with drugs. I came from a dysfunctional family and when parents died had minimal support from other family. I did find work but mostly on a temporary basis and got me thru at times but it was never permanent and I wound up back on the streets. I'm in supported housing and now am on SSI so I have income again and am managing my life again. There are no easy answers but Newsom's plan to throw money at the problem will fail in the long run.

My uncle visited from out of state I took him to downtown San Diego, his mind was blown away by the number of tents and we were not even close to where most of the homeless are. He called my aunt just to tell her Texas "not his state but one he visited" had far fewer homeless and they were blown away by Texas homelessness. The trolley was recently finished since then my truck has been broken into three times and just last night my brother's rear window was smashed. We are not skidrow yet but closer and closer each day.

I actually work in homelessness outreach in San Bernardino county next to LA and what makes my program work is that we consistently follow up…case management is the key and that are program has multiple entities from behavioral health services to Sheriffs department working together

I would vote for anyone with a detailed, well-thought-out plan over those who have spent decades creating the problem and who want to maintain the status quo.

I'm so thankful that my landlords are renting me a place to live in at a reasonable rate . Inflation is uncomfortable but i'm thankful that my job pays for my life.

When I was a kid my mom worked for an organization that would find jobs for low income people, she would try to find connections with local businesses and pull whatever strings she could to help her people get hired, the other case managers would either do nothing all day or occasionally look in the Want Ads in the local paper- my mom quickly rose to be their senior grant writer- my point: the "case managers" for the low income are very low paying jobs and they attract low skill people that are just collecting a paycheck and don't care about what they're doing

The part about an assertive case manager is key. Having someone who knows how to get you the resources you need and honestly just someone for the addict to be accountable to is gonna be key to a successful recovery. A lot of these people don’t have anything Iike a community of people who they don’t want to fail, their community is dealers and other addicts.