I wish that we had the political backbone to implement this - from Raconteur Report. There is a lot at the site, I am excerpting the thesis and the solution:
What are those reasons?
1) They're batshit crazy, in ways that, until the mid- to late-1960s, would have seen them happily locked up for life in appropriate facilities in perpetuity. No small number for violent behavior and poor impulse control.
2) The don't take their psych meds for that, because those drugs make them feel "weird". (Normal people call that feeling "sanity", by no coincidence.)
3) They self-medicate with alcohol and drugs, because
a) it feels great! and
b) it gets the voices in their head too drunk or stoned to be intelligible for the people with too many personalities in their head already. Genius, right there.
4) Homeless shelters have rules, chiefest among them being no booze or dope, and if the batshit crazy alcohol/drug addicts who are most homeless forever could follow rules, quit alcohol and dope, and act civilized, they could hold down jobs and pay rent or mortgages like everyone not on the streets does since pretty much forever. But they can't, don't, and won't.
5) We've built them a hammock (not a safety net) as wide as the entire state of California to sleep in. Which last world-class stupidity is why they're overwhelmingly here: they drift westward until they hit the Pacific Ocean, and they can't go any farther, coupled with being mollycoddled here for fifty years by jackass do-gooder idiots, and an amenable climate, and voila. A gazillion homeless bums, and stacks of feces and needles as far as the eye can see.
6) Laws preventing this stopped being enforced, due to soft-hearted do-gooders in power, and soft-headed judges ruling that it must be so.
So you'll never solve the homelessness problem by subsidizing them, feeding them, and building them shelter, any more than you'll put out a fire by throwing on more gasoline.
And the solution:
Solving the problem is easy:
I) First offense for vagrancy: six months in a chain gang. In the summer, they'll spread asphalt and fill potholes in the desert. In the winter, they shovel snow on mountain passes. And when it rains, they're out in it picking up trash, filling sandbags, and shoveling mud, 24/7 until the sun comes out. Throw in green bologna sandwiches, MREs, and pink underwear, deny any time off for good behavior, so they do the full 180 days, and you're done.
Second offence: 364 days.
Third offense: Felony, and five years.
It's not funny once, and after twice, they'll leave for good, or stop getting picked up.
And we'll have the smoothest roads and the cleanest streets in the country.
II) Stop feeding them. Unless they work for it. From sunup to sundown. 30-minute breaks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but not until they've earned each meal. And no money for anything.
III) Anyone too disabled or decrepit to work does drug tests the entire time they're on public assistance. One drunk or drug positive, and they lose benefits for a month. Two times, and they lose a year. Three times, banned from assistance for life. Vagrant as a result? See #I.
If they can't shovel asphalt, they can mix concrete, or serve the meals. Medical exams to document ability or disability. No disability? Pick up a shovel, or starve. Dealer's choice.
IV) Any do-gooder agency or non-profit, religious or not, is free to do whatever they like in terms of food or shelter: on their own premises. Your circus, your monkeys. You feed homeless people, who become a blight on society, and the citizens and municipalities can sue for damages. Everything from public health to crime comes out of your wallet. Just like feeding stray cats that crap in your neighbors' open car.
Much much more at the site including links to other opinions. A great post.
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