zlacker

>>NaOH+(OP)
Almost 20 years ago I spent two years trying to get a homeless person off the street and made a movie about it:

https://graceofgodmovie.com/

It's an incredibly complicated problem, but if there is one message I can share it is this: homeless people are, first and foremost, people. They span the full range of human experience (the main subject of my movie had a masters degree in psychology) and there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Homelessness is not one problem, it is a symptom of at least half a dozen different problems, all of which need different solutions. (And, BTW, some homeless people voluntarily choose the lifestyle. It's definitely a minority, but it's not zero.)

>>lisper+RI
Yea, I'm a regular HN reader and I've been stuck on the street for going on 7 years. Used to be commended for persevering against the odds and the like, as a child and young programmer at 15 onward, home owner at 22.

I've left SF and landed in a college town in Sac Valley last year. Rent is $750/mo here. Been working in a kitchen for a year. Am I housed yet? Nope. Just gotta save a few thousand dollars. I have about the same amount of bills as a housed person, between gym + storage + take out food + car insurance.

But then the social aspect, my old relatives and network need to distance themselves from me. Any kind of old reference or something, non starter.

I will beat this. I only keep posting here on these threads because as you say, we span the full range of human existence. I like to think I'll use my approach as a template to help others. Get out of the big metro and into a peaceful place with cheap rent and lots of opportunity, yadda yadda.

Cheers.

>>harlan+Xh1
> Get out of the big metro and into a peaceful place with cheap rent and lots of opportunity

This always comes to mind when I see folks on the street here in NYC/Brooklyn. Is it too simple a solution? Is a dense metro better in some ways?

>>wnolen+yM1
You just need to remember that homeless people have most of the same constraints and ties to location that you do. Everyone grew up somewhere, a lot of homeless people had relatively "normal" lives before the street and most have some connections lingering from that time.

So they probably still have family connections there, friends, maybe a church or AA group, case worker, friendly coffee shop owner, etc. They aren't any more eager to break these ties than you would be.

>>giraff+tP1
I think it's hard to imagine someone who prefers homelessness to living somewhere cheap. I understand there's a lot of nuance and for the majority of homeless folks, $750 rent isn't necessarily more realistic than the $3000 rent I remember in NYC, but for the people for whom cheap living _is_ a viable option, I'm struggling to believe that their AA group or a friendly coffee shop owner are their reasoning for choosing NYC over a highway town outside of Rochester.

I actually think it's a bit infantilizing to suggest that any otherwise capable person would choose sleeping on the streets or in shelters over a basement apartment in a cheap, boring town.

Speaking personally, I'd prefer living in quite literally any town in the entire country if it meant a roof over my head.