Skid Row Housing Trust provides
homes for people who need homes the most. We provide apartments
for people who are homeless, including many people who are
disabled and have lived on the streets for many years. Our
homes are called “Permanent
Supportive Housing.” Permanent supportive housing combines
housing that is affordable with on-site supportive services.
By providing homeless men and women with their own homes and
the support to overcome the many causes of homelessness the
Trust ensures that our residents have the opportunity to end
their homelessness for good.
Myth: Permanent supportive housing is a magnet for homelessness.
Fact: Many community residents are concerned that permanent
supportive housing in their community will become a magnet
for homeless individuals, thus increasing homelessness in
the community. In reality permanent supportive housing reduces
the number of individuals on the street by providing permanent
housing. Additionally, permanent supportive housing is often
so well managed that it reduces the number of homeless individuals
spending time on the streets around the development. Permanent
supportive housing often replaces a blighted property with
a beautiful and well managed new building. Many communities
report a reduction in visible homelessness and an increase
in property values after a permanent supportive housing building
is completed in their community.
Myth: Permanent supportive housing is similar to shelter.
Fact: Permanent supportive housing is the opposite of shelter.
Homeless shelters provide a bed and emergency services for
individuals experiencing homelessness. These services are
provided for free, but for a very limited time. When an individual
reaches the maximum stay in a homeless shelter they often
end up back on the streets and without services.
In contrast permanent supportive housing is permanent housing
connected to on-going services. Residents of permanent supportive
housing sign a lease, live in their own private apartment,
and pay rent the same as any tenant in any apartment building.
The only differences from market rate apartments are that the
resident of permanent supportive housing is only asked to pay
30% of their income in rent and has access to on-site supportive
services to assist them in staying in their housing.
Myth: Permanent supportive housing is public housing.
Fact: The federal government built its last public housing
project in the 1970s. While there is debate about the effectiveness
of public housing, there is a general consensus that these
projects were often badly designed and badly managed. In
response to the ongoing need for subsidized housing the federal
government turned to the private sector. Low income tax credits
and tax exempt bonds provided the incentive and resources
needed for the nonprofit community to begin building affordable
housing in the 1980s. Unlike public housing, affordable housing
is designed, built, and operated by community organizations
that understand the unique needs of the community better
than the federal government. Community organizations also
have an ongoing commitment to maintaining safe and beautiful
buildings. As a result, affordable housing is much smaller
in scale than public housing, blends into the community better,
is designed better, is safer, and is often undistinguishable
from market rate apartment buildings.
Myth: People are homeless because they
don’t want to
work.
Fact: Homelessness is caused by two major factors: poverty
and systems failures, not laziness. In recent years we have
come to understand that many of the systems put in place to
protect our most vulnerable citizens are broken. The health
care, mental health, child protective services, public education,
and criminal justice systems have failed to effectively serve
the individuals who need these services the most. As a result,
the majority of individuals experiencing homeless were either
previously in the foster care or the criminal justice systems,
and/or suffer from a severe mental illness or chronic physical
disability.
Additionally, individuals experiencing homelessness suffer
from extreme poverty, and often lived in poverty for a long
time before becoming homeless. This is a particular problem
in Los Angeles where there is a large percentage of individuals
and families living in poverty, very high housing costs, and
a large gap between the wages those in the lower income strata
earn and the cost of that housing. The gap between incomes
and the cost of housing is so large that even a full-time job
is not enough to get off the streets, or prevent an individual
or family from becoming homeless. A household needs to earn
$30 per hour to afford the average apartment rent of $1,567
per month in the Los Angeles/Orange County region.
Myth: Homeless people are dangerous and criminals.
Fact: Poverty does not make an individual dangerous or a criminal.
Individuals experiencing homelessness first, and foremost,
suffer from a lack of the resources needed to provide themselves
shelter. In general individuals experiencing homeless are
victims of crime far more often than they are the perpetrators
of crime. Additionally, the majority of crimes that are perpetrated
by individuals experiencing homeless are petty crimes such
as shoplifting, loitering, and trespassing.
Myth: The concentration of homelessness
in Skid Row is the result of a “containment policy.”
Fact: There are 88,000 homeless individuals in Los Angeles
County, and the high majority of these individuals live outside
of Skid Row. For the few thousand individuals who are homeless
in Skid Row, their homelessness is the result of poverty and
systems failure.
Skid Row has been the neighborhood of last resort for the
low income population of Los Angeles for over a hundred years.
While a de-concentration of social services in Skid Row would
better serve the homeless in other parts of the region, it
would not end homelessness for the few thousand individuals
experiencing homelessness in Skid Row. The only solution to
end homelessness in Skid Row is to prevent homelessness (address
the economic factors and systems failures that cause homelessness)
and provide permanent housing that meets the economic, health,
and social needs of those individuals who are currently without
a home.
Myth: The best thing for Skid Row would be to raze the entire
community.
Fact: While incredible poverty and suffering are experienced
within the 50-block area of Skid Row, there is also incredible
hope, resilience, and strength within these 50-blocks. As a
region, city, and community our goal needs to be to end the
poverty and suffering disproportionately experienced by the
residents of Skid Row. Our goal should not be to simply spread
that poverty and suffering across the region. The challenge
for policy makers, urban planners, and the general public is
to lift the residents of Skid Row out of poverty, not simply
replace the residents with individuals with higher incomes.
Myth: Law enforcement is the best way to get people off the
streets.
Fact: Homelessness is not a crime, and it is a violation of
civil and human rights to arrest an individual for being poor.
Additionally, arresting individuals experiencing homelessness
simply prolongs homelessness, costs taxpayers thousands of
dollars, and makes it more difficult for that homeless individual
to rebuild their life. Countless studies from across the country
have shown that it is more cost-effective and humane to provide
permanent supportive housing than to arrest homeless individuals.
The most well known of these studies found that it cost taxpayers
2% less, or $995 per year less, to provide permanent housing
and services to a homeless individual versus leaving that individual
on the street to cycle through the criminal justice system,
shelters, and hospital emergency rooms.
Myth: Permanent supportive housing brings property values
down.
Fact: Affordable housing and permanent supportive housing often
brings property values up. Brand new, beautiful buildings are
often the catalyst for lower income neighborhoods to “turn
around.” Many affordable housing and permanent supportive
housing developers often find that after building one or two
new buildings in a neighborhood they can no longer afford to
build in that same neighborhood due to raising property values!
Myth: Permanent supportive housing is too expensive to be
a real solution to homelessness.
Fact: As mentioned above, numerous studies from across the
country have found that permanent supportive housing is cheaper
than simply leaving individuals to live on the streets. While
building a new building and providing ongoing services is not
cheap, if local, state, and federal governments redirected
the taxpayer dollars that fund emergency room visits, shelter
stays, and the jailing of homeless individuals it would be
easy to fund thousands of permanent supportive housing units.
Additionally, the federal low income tax credit and tax exempt
bond programs leverage millions in private investment for these
developments. Permanent supportive housing is not only a proven
solution to ending homelessness, it is a cost effective solution.
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