Myths About Homelessness

The Women's National Housing and Homelessness Network (WNHHN) is drawing attention to the issue of how gender-diverse peopleThe research discussed in this post uses the term “gender-diverse” as a...

There are some awfully ugly human behaviours out there in the real world. There are also bad habits that foolhardy local councils of one stripe of another can stumble...

First there were the fingers. That got society counting all the way to ten. At which point counting-persons, with breathtaking audacity, added in the toes. Actually, this analogy for the...

Very few of us have the chance to work at an emergency shelter. If we did, we'd have a much better idea of what it is like to work...

An article in THE GEORGIA Straight explains the supposedly practical reasons that Homelessness Point In Time (PIT) counts are undertaken. The efforts are not necessarily backed by the bullet-proof...

There's a hint that author Tracy Kidder is worth a read, regardless of the subject. His name on the cover of his new book is as prominent as the...

The homeless are: unable to afford housing for their family afraid of being beaten to death on the street, or in a homeless shelter too lazy to work ...

The human right to adequate housing is a noble aspiration. And if communism and socialism have contributed nothing else to humanity, they have at least proven that determined governments...

Is it a case of America doing everything bigger and better, or is it a problem of Hawaii running out of road to send the homeless out of town...

Myths about homelessness are regularly featured in our posts. There are a set of these myths that are remarkably persistent. It seems important to us at affordablehousingaction.org to debunk...

The importance of pets to people who are homeless is well understood by some, and dismissed as an undeserved indulgence by others. Affordablehousingaction.org has voiced support for pets with...

"Here's a great idea, fellow council members. We can cure homelessness by making it a crime. Then we simply threaten the homeless with a suitable criminal behaviour, say 'illegal...

Lived Experience? Some decision-makers need more of it. Recently, there has been a considerable push for lived experience to back up government and homeless/housing support agencies by those advocated...

What's to know about unaffordable housing, homelessness, and the link between the two? A great deal, as we've been discovering ourselves at affordablehousingaction.org. With the cost of living soaring along...

AAHA! Fooled us with that name, didn't they? We were expecting a rabbit pulled from a hat and have instead latched on to a group of Canadian architects, designers and...

There's well-known a French expression that seems to sum up California's Homeless experience: "Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose." The more things change, the more they stay...

Medicine Hat in Alberta, Canada ended Chronic Homelessness in the city in 2021. There was national and international fanfare. What's to be learned from knowing that 'ending Chronic Homelessness'...

Worldwide, the endless stories of failed anti-homeless initiatives make us wonder at affordablehousingaction.org. Just what does it take to make self-righteous citizens and their accommodating city councils realize what a...

The harsh reality we all face in civilized countries: you can't opt out of the census — often not legally, anyway. And why should you want to? It's the...

What's the point-in-time count in your particular district? Conveniently, whatever it suits you to say it is. That's one possible answer to a necessarily haphazard, volunteer-rich process of lifting...

It is so convenient to adopt the conventional neighbourhood attitude to the homeless: they are all druggies with mental disorders and criminal habits. Not only that, they poop, too....

The hand that feeds our blog is, needless to say, the media outlets where we find many of the stories that we pass on to our readers. So why...

How quickly civilization fades in a deteriorating empire. Only a few decades ago, arguably the greatest country in the world could imagine a civilization without slums. To achieve it,...

Young and Homeless because of substance use mental health aging out of care mistreatment at home pure adventurism financial mismanagement relationship breakdown . . . . The list of possible...

The New Yorker Magazine is providing some free reads at the moment. Hopefully, you'll catch one before they close the window, because what follows is a fascinating story of...

A hopefully balanced opinion piece (if such a thing can exist) from Ohio's Akron Beacon Journal helps unscramble some thoughts about 'hands on' private activism as a means of...

For cities world-wide considering their options for dealing with persistent homelessness, the article linked below offers some useful comparative insights. It describes the efforts in two medium-large cities in...

In 2021, a famous international agency, UNICEF, stepped in to provide emergency food for students at a school in England. Why did this become necessary? At the time, the UK...

The John Howard Society of Ontario provides support to people who are affected by the criminal justice system. Their mandate also includes research and public education. The Society's report...

So what's the homeless score in Murderland? How many upstanding citizens have been done to death by homeless people — angry, drug-fueled and/or otherwise crazed? How many hapless homeless people have...

" . . . up there, coming to save the homeless! Is it a bird? A plane? No! It's a . . . word salad?" When it comes to solving...

At the beginning of the year, we published a post about the surprising prevalence of brain injuries among the homeless, based on research by Tiffany O'Connor at the Hamilton...

Media are reporting tent clearances all over the United States these days. Public support is crumbling for Housing First and similar programs that help people who are homeless to...

Honestly, in order to avoid dealing with homelessness, the decisions that city councils make sometimes truly beggar belief. Laugh? Cry? Both? So here's a contest of ideas that pits the...

Louis XV of France is credited with the flood warning in the title above. Today the saying is interpreted as a giant shrug. "After me comes the flood. But who...

Lived experience. Think about it for a moment. If you wanted to prevent homelessness, of which you had no direct knowledge, it would seem sensible to get advice from...

When we first encountered the following article, we almost dismissed it as a celebration of the obvious. Pretty much everyone has been told by now that chronic homelessness, characterized...

What can possibly be positive about cigarettes, alcohol and illegal drugs? For starters, though known to be potentially dangerous to human health, they are undeniably effective pit-props that shore...

A recent winter offer to buy and donate mini-shelters to the City of Montréal for protection of the homeless has been turned down. There was no joy in being...

Boondocking? What is it? Who does it? What has it got to do with homelessness? Some might argue that boondocking is homelessness, or at the very least, rootlessness. In America,...

Statistics South Africa (Stats SA), like all census organizations, is a passionate advocate for the importance of counting its citizens in as many ways possible. In the words of...

The movie 'Groundhog Day' immortalized a bad-attitude weatherman forced to live the same day over and over again until he learned more humanitarian behaviour. Echos of Groundhog Day could be...

When the U.S. Congress passed the McKinney-Vento Act in 1987, Black people were more likely to be homeless than white people. The Act, which was and is the framework...

Counting the homeless is problematic. The best attempts are point-in-time counts. Volunteers saturate a region on one night of the year (Like everybody else, people who are homeless are...

A life-ending threat to the homeless is a familiar one over large swaths of North America in the depths of winter: deadly cold. With homelessness on the increase as...

How Shall I Hate Thee? Let Me Criminalize The Ways. The American National Homelessness Law Center tracks the uncivil ways in which "civilized" society systematically brands activities that are essential for...

The number of single mothers becoming homeless in England is growing at an alarming rate, according to Shelter, a charity which supports people who are facing homelessness. Even though the...

Here's a short and depressing story that features a need for truly affordable housing viewed via costing alternatives. Like everywhere else in Canada, the District of Nipissing has its homeless. What...

People who are experiencing homelessness generally have no means of participating in social activities that can allow for identifying their numbers, needs and habits. They have no fixed address...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u08qmwGl90E&t=1s Try the above short video from the United Kingdom charity Shelter. Read more about its making at CREATIVE REVIEW: Shelter ad highlights the challenges faced by the homeless at Christmas

If COVID-19 has achieved one benefit for the homeless, it has brought hidden homelessness to light. Municipalities and regions have in the past been inclined to minimize the numbers...

It's hard not wonder about those poor souls locked in the illicit drug trade. If we are to take the City of Boston's word on things, we can imagine the...

The Republican Party of America over the last election cycle has grown fond of chewing on its own appendages and mortally wounding itself with easy-to-apply, fits-all-sizes insults to fellow...

There are many people who, to their credit, worry about the treatment of pets they encounter. They may well be particularly concerned about the pets they see connected in...

This is one of those life stories which, on the surface, connects a series of unlikely dots to produce an unthinkably absurd consequence. That consequence? A New York City...

There are some among us who are generally perceived as "inferior" human beings. The people who are homeless tend to fall into that category. Should such ideas about people...

The Women's National Housing & Homelessness Network has just released a new study that documents how housing and homelessness affects women, girls and gender diverse populations in Canada. This...

A charity in Dublin, Ireland has issued a call for a separate space to offer services to women who experience homelessness in that country. The organization, Merchants Quay Ireland...

One short letter to the editor plus a single photograph summarize the sad scope of current homelessness solutions everywhere. The photo, which is in the article below, is the "after"...

“We just moved 18 people off the side of the road . . . I don’t think we moved anybody into something that’s better.” This recent statement was made by...

illegitimi non carborundum is a pretend Latin saying which is famous for meaning, "Don't let the bastards grind you down." It's our advice to a Khaleel Seivwright, Toronto carpenter defying...

More experiments with giving money to people who are experiencing homelessness, this time in CaliforniaTry also: Lump Sum Payments Help People Who Are Homeless To Leave The Streets. The article...

How many homeless can dance on the head of a pin? This philosophical question about angels suits current homelessness practices in many cities. Bogus public relations spin-the-bottle exercises point...

Mary Kate Bacalao is the Director of External Affairs and Policy at Compass Family Services, an agency that supports families experiencing homelessness. In Shelterforce, she speaks about difficulties in...

Nothing but tatters remain of whatever modest humanitarian reputation Toronto has earned so far in its treatment of the homeless during the COVID pandemic. The cause: recent police-led California-style...

Why is California's lackadaisical approach to homelessness worth a worry to other jurisdictions as well as its own? Many other cities in North American and elsewhere have bumbled into the...

When filmmaker and Photographer Jason Cipparrone encountered his city's poverty in a long lineup at Toronto food bank, it was a new experience for him. Cipparrone was struck by...

Why have we written this post? Almost always we attempt to explain why, some of us doing so in a way that is precise and to the point, others a...

This post is part of a series about ways that people provide support to those who experience homelessness. The idea that "we treat everyone as kin" resonates through the...

The COVID-19 pandemic provides some unexpected examples of the importance of "lived experience" to the practical knowledge that legislators need to craft focused, practical, compassionate rules and legislation to...

How wonderfully Middle America! Iowa Girl Scouts bust a record for cookie sales! Impossible not to smile after reading about it. Almost, but not quite impossible. Hidden beneath this good...

Remember that clever saying? "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." How does this apply to governments with resident experts, contract experts, and the funds...

During the fall of 2019, people across England hit the streets to count the number of people who were homeless. The results were announced in November: 4,266 people. At...

There is new memorial in Kitchener, Ontario. It's not for a statesman or a celebrity. It's to remember and honour people who experience homelessness. At the dedication ceremony, one...

In the months leading up to COVID-19, two groups of researchers set out to investigate homelessness among women. The researchers were concerned that women's experiences were overlooked. Both groups...

In countries influenced by neo-liberalism, governments are dedicated to self-shrinking. Rather than constructing and "owning" public/social housing, rental assistance programs have become the order of the day for supporting...

Much of what affordablehousingaction.org publishes about social/public/council housing could in the US be considered palliative care for a dying industry and its long-suffering tenants. American public housing has been...

A recent report for the Australian Homeless Monitor attempts to find a prescription for future action by making sense of Australia's homelessness problem as it has evolved over the...

Somebody must be making potfuls of money in Vancouver, B.C. Why else is it second only to Hong Kong as the most unaffordable city in the world? Such a shame...

A recent article in Huffpost draws attention to a common yet frightening administrative technique for declaring a 'social success' when exactly the opposite is happening. Or, just as commonly,...

The evidence supporting Housing First continues to pile up. The Community Preventive Services Task Force in the U.S. compared results from studies of Housing First and Treatment First and have...

Great? We wish we could mean 'great' in some kind of 'light at the end of the tunnel' way. But we can't. Instead we're talking about a comprehensive article...

On one hand: CBS's Anderson Cooper does a so-called 'progressive' take on Seattle's homelessness crisis. "Rent Is Obscene Here": The Issues Forcing People In Seattle Onto The Street And on...

Einstein gets the nod for a popular definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over, but expecting different results. On the other hand, some aboriginal traditions suggest that...

Part two of a three part series on California's housing crisis published in the California Globe moves to Los Angeles to take a personal look at those most affected by the housing crisis — the homeless.

A widespread misconception about the nature of homelessness needs urgent correction. It is an understandable, and unfortunately highly convenient, misconception. It puts the focus on a small handful of...

An articulate, well reasoned, polite letter to the editor of Oregon Live neatly sums up the depths of wrong-headed, misinformed thinking about why the homeless need affordable housing. The reasoning is...

"Affordable Housing? How quaint. Of course. Only take it somewhere else. Otherwise I personally guarantee to shove your XXXX up your YYYY until you bleed buckets and scream for...

The Guardian has just published a story about Finland’s remarkable success in lowering the number of people who are homeless in the capital Helsinki. We’ve covered stories about Finland’s success...

In 2006, Malcolm Gladwell penned the story of Million Dollar Murray, a veteran who found home in the streets of Reno, Nevada. He also spent a good deal of...

A great many people believe that homelessness is characterized by the "street people" and "rough sleepers" who are encountered on occasional downtown trips. This is not the full scope...

A reasonably well dressed person walks purposefully past you on the street. Are they homeless? Why on earth would you think so? They aren't huddled in a doorway under a...

Like the meaning of 'affordable' housing, the meaning of 'homelessness' is frequently parsed or twisted by special interests (or by the ignorant) who wish to push one agenda or...

Everyone knows you can't bail out a sea. And yet, when it comes to homelessness, city councils behave like children on a beach staring at the water with a...