How San Francisco’s Homeless Problem Could Be More Heartwarming And Less Heartbreaking

On a recent Friday near Lake Merced, about 250 residents gathered at the Olympic Club on Skyline Boulevard for a peculiar reason — to celebrate small victories in the utterly frustrating battle against San Francisco homelessness.

The occasion was the annual fundraising breakfast for the Welcome Home Project (welcomehomesf.org) — an innovative public-private partnership that provides families moving from homelessness to housing with an extensive care package filled with the necessities of home.

On a macro level, of course, San Francisco’s homelessness response has been a complete disaster.  Billions of dollars spent.  Little progress.  A problem that only gets worse. If you ask city leaders, residents, area non-profits, and even homeless community members, it’s tough to find those who believe we’re on the right track.

But at a micro level, the picture is different.  Welcome Home Project supports about 400 San Francisco families every year.  More than just a statistic, that’s 400 unique moments of pure joy and gratitude as families set foot in their new homes for the first time, open their care packages, and begin a hopeful new life.

So why the dichotomy?

While city leaders have been quick to form commissions, file legal briefs, or devise big-budget solutions, few have taken the time to accurately assess these four key dimensions of the homelessness problem.

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Dimension 1:  Preventing homelessness vs. Reversing homelessness

Does San Francisco have a cohesive plan to prevent homelessness?  It doesn’t appear so, even though preventing homelessness from the beginning is the easiest, fastest, and most cost-effective way to have an immediate impact — typically pennies on the dollar compared to trying to support someone who is already homeless.

According to UCSF’s Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative, which interviewed more than 3,000 homeless individuals statewide, only about 1 in 3 homeless individuals had sought help to prevent homelessness when they were at risk, and the vast majority would only have needed $300 to $500 per month in temporary rental subsidies to stay housed — an outcome that would have also saved taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars per person in annual support service costs.

Better outcomes at a lower cost?  Where is the plan again?

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Dimension 2:  Housing surplus vs. Housing shortage

Whether a city has a housing surplus or housing shortage has a tremendous impact on which homelessness solutions can work.

In cities like San Francisco with a housing shortage, so-called “Housing First” policies suddenly become “Housing Way Later” plans because of the long wait until permanent housing becomes available — the exact opposite of the policy’s intent.

Add to the mix the enormous bureaucracy, expense, and time investment needed to construct affordable housing projects — in San Francisco, that’s about four years and more than $700,000 per unit, according to the Bay Area Council Economic Institute — and you’ve got the fertile ground for the kind of financial waste and corruption that has plagued our city for decades.

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Dimension 3:  Temporary housing vs. Permanent housing

While potential solutions to homelessness need a mix of temporary housing initiatives that address current symptoms and permanent housing solutions that can address root causes, San Francisco's political dynamic and budgetary realities have usually pitted one against the other.

As permanent housing advocates gained attention, resources were diverted from shelters and other interim housing to build large-scale housing projects. The City’s shelter capacity was further weakened as resources shifted away from traditional emergency shelters and toward shelters with crisis clinics and sobering centers — which are much more difficult and costly to open and run.

Do we have the will to re-center on temporary housing solutions even as we pursue more agile and less costly permanent housing?  Any long-term housing solution must address the real root cause — the lack of housing supply — by incentivizing private developers to quickly build or adapt new residential housing and push down housing costs.

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Dimension 4:  Transitional homelessness vs. Chronic homelessness

Transitional homelessness is typically caused by a major life change or catastrophic event — such as job loss, a health condition, divorce, domestic abuse, or another personal or family crisis.  Being laser-focused on sheltering this person quickly — so they are in a more conducive environment to reverse the negative event — is a clear goal with measurable results that are proven to work.

But for chronic homelessness that’s likely caused by a complex long-term health issue, mental health condition, or addiction, just providing shelter won’t be enough — and can even exacerbate the situation if other support services and people aren’t also concurrently put in place.

This bifurcation has tripped up many well-intentioned policymakers:  Because the solution for transitional homelessness is the exact opposite of the solution for chronic homelessness, any one-size-fits-all approach that doesn’t delineate between the two is destined to fail.

Back at the Olympic Club, under the backdrop of festive holiday cheer, the buzzing crowd picked up their name tags, posed near the Christmas tree, and dropped off their care package contributions — items like pots, pans, toys for the kids, and other traditional housewarming-type gifts.

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For at least one day, such a heartbreaking issue had a heartwarming feel.

Why does it have to be this way?

The answer:  It doesn’t.

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