Street homelessness has been a common and tragic sight in New York for decades. After years of studies, news articles, and political promises, our local, state and federal governments have failed to confront the systemic problems that cause street homelessness. Structural changes are needed.
First, we must understand the genesis of the problem. In the mid-20th century state mental hospitals did not provide needed treatment and were at best wholly inadequate, at worse brutal.
States instituted a policy of deinstitutionalization with the promise of community mental health care, including housing, for the tens of thousands of psychiatric patients who were discharged from, or never admitted to, state hospitals. But facing insufficient low-income housing, cities including New York discharged psychiatric patients and some wound up in single room occupancy buildings (SROs) with no mental health or other supportive services.
Soon, even this inadequate housing began disappearing due ,in part, to real estate development/gentrification and the former hospital patients became homeless. The development of New York’s shelter system helped some, yet many of the newly homeless tried, and quickly rejected, city shelters that were not safe or adequate. They resorted to living in the streets, parks and subways.
Street homelessness now has stretched into generations, caused by the failure to create low-income housing, with support services and needed community based mental health facilities. What now?
Last year, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in City of Grants Pass vs. Johnson that local governments could fine and arrest unhoused individuals who sleep in public places. The fact that there were no shelter or housing options available did not protect the homeless in Grants Pass from punishment. Governments throughout the country are destroying public encampments and developing new ways to hide, but not resolve, public homelessness.
New York’s governor and New York City’s mayor, paying lip service to the supportive housing remedies that would humanely end street homeless, instead seek to change mental health laws to make it easier for officials to involuntarily remove unhoused people living in public spaces to psychiatric facilities.
First, this is a mirage: the facilities needed do not exist to meet the need. Second, the proposal to loosen the mental health standard will only require that a person fails to meet basic survival needs such as food, clothing, housing and medical care before they can be involuntarily committed. The vague and overly broad standard may violate one’s 14th Amendment right to liberty. This approach should be rejected.
If viable options were created, i.e. low-income housing and the long-promised community mental health facilities, the overwhelming majority of people living on the streets would voluntarily seize the opportunity to be street homeless no more.
Here is how to reduce street homelessness:
Create volunteer street homeless advocacy teams that meet regularly with people experiencing homelessness in public places. Train the teams to talk with and listen and find out who they are and why they became homeless. Through engagement and conversation, gain trust. Find out if individuals are interested in leaving the streets voluntarily for better options — most are.
Require local, state and federal officials to guarantee to create adequate housing options that range from permanent affordable housing to temporary options such as single and double room placements in community nonprofit programs with supportive services, group homes and effective long-term psychiatric treatment facilities.
To augment the short supply of suitable housing, existing vacant government-owned buildings can be rehabilitated to accommodate the street unhoused temporarily. We should also explore the use of eminent domain wherein a state government can legally purchase privately owned vacant buildings, such as former hotels and motels. After acquisition, the government can transfer the property to established community nonprofit programs to meet the needs of the unhoused (housing, mental health, addiction, education, literacy programs, job training).
In New York City a successful Street Homeless Advocacy Project (SHAP) exists. It has the support of the mayor and the assistance of the Department of Homeless Services. During its 31-month existence volunteers from SHAP have assisted hundreds of people experiencing homelessness to voluntarily leave the streets and other public places. This one-on-one model of neighbor to neighbor can work anywhere. It’s a win for the unhoused. It’s a win for the community.
This approach can finally make a difference.
Siegel is a civil rights lawyer, and a former executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. Hayes is the president and CEO of the Community Healthcare Network. His litigation forced the right to shelter in New York. Both are among the co-founders of the New York Street Homeless Advocacy Project.
