Hands to the Homeless

160,000 people counted as homeless in the state of California as of 2020. Without a place to lay their heads, without a place that has four walls to call home. As of 2020, 66,000 people were counted as homeless in the LA area out of a population of nearly 4 million people and climbing. This number has seen fluctuation, but continues to give Los Angeles the second place title for the largest homeless population in the world. Without a doubt, the homelessness issue in LA is a problem, yet it is no simple fix as there is a complex system of factors that are behind this issue. As many of us strive to avoid this issue in it’s entirety, there requires a hefty amount of knowledge to be placed on our backs if we have any sort of hope in fixing this problem. he only issue? There weren’t enough housing units available to meet the population needs, hence leaving people homeless which continues to be the underlying issue: not enough housing to meet the population. But we can’t just build enough houses to put everyone in if only it were that simple, but factors such as cost, time, and mental wellbeing of the homeless all come into play. For example, many homeless people prefer not to seek shelter for their mental health. This provides great debate on whether we should or should not remove homeless encampments. The county of Los Angeles has watched their streets and communities change from a place of enjoyment, a place to raise families to being riddled with homelessness, with tents lining the streets, residents sleeping on the beach, going to the bathroom wherever they please, and leaving trash and junk as a breadcrumb trail to find their way back home. Many strategies have been put in place to attempt to relieve this problem, measures that have been supported as well as criticized. People call attempts to remove the homeless encampments good, beneficial for the safety and wellbeing of the community, while others seek to call them uncompassionate and cruel. Attempts to provide temporary housing in multiple places throughout the county have been hit with roadblocks due to cost and inadequate funding. With no clear answers or path, everytime officials seem to make a move forward, they go three steps back. We must acknowledge our active efforts to help this crisis and put our best foot forward in how we educate ourselves as well as how we think about this problem. Therefore, I argue in favor of the removal of homeless encampments which would prove effective for our public safety, helping the homeless, changinging how we view the homelessness issue, and allowing the implementation for a series of strategies providing relief on all ends in terms of housing, cost, and mental wellbeing.

First and foremost, we must understand the effectiveness of removing these homeless encampments for the safety of the public and of the homeless. The issue of homelessness dates back many years where Los Angeles served as home for an increasingly growing population amidst the Great Depression which has allowed the city to become “the epicenter of this crisis” (Dillon 26:40). The encampments which once started as small have grown to line the streets of Los Angeles.  Tents of all color and materials, some makeshift from tarps, are visible from almost every part of the city. Spilling out from these encampments is endless random objects and things all making something of a home for these people. An example is one many of us probably know of, Skid Row, an infamous 54-block town in Los Angeles is known by many as a place to avoid as it is “an ideal congregating spot for hobos, aimless trail riders, transient workers, and people running away from past lives” (Union Rescue Mission para. 6). Taking the city by storm, these very encampments are the reason for much danger in the area. Venice Beach, a popular beach spot for homeless people, continues to make headlines often under tainted names as  “Skeletal remains found in search for missing women during homeless camp cleanup on LA’s Venice Beach” hit the Independent on July 18, 2021. From these, violence has continued to ensue at the hands of these homeless encampments time and time again. According to ABC7 News reports, 24 crimes occurred per day in 2021 that involved the homeless that are on police record (Flay et. al 1). President and CEO of Union Rescue Mission on Skid Row argues that by leaving people on the streets in concentrated masses “it does become kind of a survival of the fittest mentality, where there is violence towards one another” (1). This kind of violence created by homeless encampments suggests the effective reasoning for moving them off the street and into shelter. When this violence is so common - car break ins, assaults, even murder it has an after effect on the citizens in the community causing them to take major precautions in their ventures on the streets of Los Angeles with even the most simple tasks becoming harder. As these tents overflow into the street  “children walking to school are forced into a busy street to avoid tents crossing sidewalks'' (Melley 1). Daily life for passersby becomes altered by the issue of homelessness. By removing these encampments, we are able to minimize violence in the environment, proving effective for the safety of the public as well as those in the encampments. 

Changing how we view the homelessness issue and realizing their issue is also our issue is critical to building the effective argument for the removal of homelessness encampments. Many of us don’t get involved in making efforts to help the homeless or the issue of homeless encampments because our first thought when we hear the word homeless is simply words like dirty, gross, or scary. We formulate our understanding of what it means to be homeless as “a result of our own experiences of homelessness, or those of family members we know..through direct encounters with homeless youth when we see them on the streets, panhandling, or hanging around” (Gaetz, 2009). However, it is critical to change our mindset of who homeless people actually are because at the end of the day they are still people, just like us. Yet, we have been so conditioned to have nothing but negative connotations when we think about homeless people. Our only thoughts center on what they are going to do to us, not what we can do for them or how they get to the point they are in? Very rarely do people find time to acknowledge how these people got to the point they are at, nor do they acknowledge that we could all be in their shoes at any moment. I remember growing up my parents would tell me we could be in their very situation any moment, so it’s not adequate to look down upon people who could one day be your neighbors; that there is more to the person on the street than just the label of them not having a home and then the stereotype that follows along of them being dirty, gross, or dangerous. While it is true violence does occur amongst these encampments, we must understand why. These people are fighting for what they do not have and for what they need. Many of them are crippled by drug addiction or mental illness, many coming back from war and are not in the right state of mind. We must change our outlook on homelessness to make effective efforts into fixing the issue. Many of us avoid the problem thinking that if we do it will simply go away. We turned a blind eye to things we think are taboo to talk about, that we feel uncomfortable addressing. People shift into a reality thinking that if they avoid the issue then it's not there, then “ that Los Angeles has tackled it’s homelessness challenge, at least until they stand up, and LA’s greatest failure is spread out before” (Lopez 3). But, the reality is yes there are homeless encampments on our beaches, in our cities. Thousands. People are dying on the streets because they have nowhere else to go. Nothing will change until we change our outlooks on this issue of homelessness. By understanding the realities of homeless people, by understanding they need to be off the streets to receive the adequate help they require, we are able to then humanize the issue by putting real faces, real members of our community behind this real problem , in which we can then formulate effective solutions.

Implementing a series of cost-friendly strategies covered with relief on all ends in terms of housing, rehab, and funding is necessary to the removal of homeless encampments. By removing homeless encampments, it is necessary to take further steps to take care of the homeless and bring them into shelter, getting them better to eventually be able to return to society as functioning members of the community. There have been many failed attempts from our politicians to address the homeless issue, trying to remove them off the streets and into housing. However, these efforts always fall short due to various reasons: cost, time, funding, or the reluctance to follow suit. One of the biggest efforts, Project Roomkey, had a plan to rent 12 hotels with 13, 500 rooms. Yet, cost came in as a severe issue halting the project due to budget officials having blamed the “slow reimbursement process on a lack of available staffers able to do the extensive paperwork” (Oreskes and Smith 3). There seem to be some excuses always coming into play, which means we need people who are 100% committed to solving this issue of homelessness. We need officials who will be able to fill out the “extensive paperwork” (Oreskes and Smith 3) without giving up, we need people who are able to budget for this crisis in a way that we will not run out of funding. We must include relief not just housing, but be able to provide psychological treatment, therapy, rehab for those in encampments that need it or who are hesitant to leave the streets. This will support these individuals in positive efforts in hope they can return to society as contributing members of society with jobs and in housing that protects, but also supports them. 

All in all the issue of homelessness is vast in Los Angeles and there are many key factors that come into play with the crisis. It is not just removing encampments that are good or bad, or homeless are good or bad, but about how we look at the crisis, how we take action, and how we include strategies that are human but provide relief on all ends to support those in encampments but to also keep our society safe. 

Accreditation to the Following:

Dillon, Liam & Tobias, Manuela, “Gimme Shelter: The California Housing Crisis Podcast.”

Soundcloud, 29 June 2021. https://soundcloud.com/matt-levin-4/californias-eviction-protections-and-homelessness-in-los-angeles-explained

Lopez, Steve. “Column: Their Venice Home Feels Unsafe. They Blame Public Officials, Not

Homeless Angelenos.” LA Times, 5 June 2021. 

Massie, Graeme. “Skeletal Remains Found in Search for Missing Woman during Homeless

Camp Cleanup on LA's Venice Beach.” The Independent, Independent Digital News and Media, 18 July 2021, www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/skeletal-remains-woman-venice-beach-la-b1886258.html.
Melley, Brian. “Los Angeles Passes Measure Limiting Homeless Encampments.” LA Time, 1

July 2021. 

Oreskes, Benjamin, and Dakota Smith. “L.A. County Won't Expand Program to Shelter

Homeless People in Hotels.” LA Times, 5 Mar. 2021. 

“What Is Really Going on with Homeless Crime?” ABC7 Los Angeles,

abc7.com/feature/homeless-crime-los-angeles-data-response/10827722/. 

“What Is Skid Row?” Union Rescue Mission, urm.org/about/faqs/about-skid-row/.