Stop Trying

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 People have been "trying" to help the homeless for decades. There was even a War on Poverty, but that didn't seem to get very far. Let me tell you what "trying" looks like:

Trying is packed shelters with no transition to stable housing.

Trying is a five-dollar-a-night, bedbug- and cockroach-infested flop house. 

Trying is leaving homeless veterans to fend for themselves.

Trying is walking past tents all over the downtown sidewalks.

That's trying.

Now, why don't we actually do something, since trying isn't working? I know the problem is money. So why not provide some kind of incentive for developers to create some low-income housing? Something that balances out the money they get for more expensive apartments that would sit empty, anyway, since nobody can afford them.

Also, a note about "anti-homeless architecture." It is used to refer to those arms in the middle of bus benches and bolts imbedded in the concrete around doorways to make it uncomfortable or impossible to sleep there. That's not anti-homeless, that's anti-human architecture. Real "anti-homeless architecture" is affordable housing. 

Remember, you are never two good months away from being a billionaire, but you are probably two or three bad months away from sleeping in one of those tents on the sidewalk. Have some empathy.

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