unsheltered homelessness

This month on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” Vice President JD Vance discussed Israel, Jeffrey Epstein, and aliens, topics that have lit up public conversation. Largely overlooked, however, were his thought-provoking remarks about America’s homelessness crisis, which highlight the harmful results of present policies in some of our largest cities and the need to enact new policies that prioritize restoring lives. Vance recalled attending an office Christmas party near Skid Row, the notorious 50-block area in downtown Los Angeles overcome by homelessness, illicit drug use, and crime. He described armed security and “gigantic walls” protecting the party. He told Joe Rogan that it reminded him of visiting the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. “Crazy wealth and status and privilege on the Read More ›

San Francisco has experienced a dramatic 22 percent drop in unsheltered homelessness since 2024, while San Jose has seen a 23 percent decline since 2019. Streets are cleaner, and open drug scenes in San Francisco are noticeably smaller. Fewer RVs are parked near waterways in San Jose. What these two cities are doing differently than Los Angeles and Seattle can be summarized in two words: accountability and recovery. Often, when we think of the homeless, we imagine someone sleeping rough on the street, or perhaps in an RV or a car. But homelessness is defined in several ways. If you’re sleeping in a shelter, a car, or an RV, you’re sheltered homeless. If you’re in jail, you’re homeless. And depending Read More ›

Gavin Newsom stood before the cameras in early March and once again blamed local governments for the state’s spiraling homelessness crisis. “No more excuses,” he thundered, threatening to strip funding from counties he claims are underperforming while promising to redirect “every damn penny” to those “getting things done.” Newsom is once again attempting to shift blame for California’s homelessness crisis — the very crisis he has repeatedly pledged to solve, including his 2021 vow to end family homelessness within five years. Since 2017, homelessness in California has surged by more than 40 percent — from roughly 134,000 people to nearly 187,000 in 2024 — despite an estimated $30 billion in spending he authorized. His latest tirade against counties ignores the Read More ›

With Christmas coming, I’m taking a timeout from my usual columnizing to send greetings to Tony, a homeless man in Colorado. He is 67 years old and may be sleeping in a North Face sleeping bag within an abandoned 144-square-foot wooden structure adjacent to a cemetery. (His summer bed has been a picnic bench about a third of a mile from a Safeway/Starbucks.) Tony was born in Japan to a military dad. His family subsequently moved to Florida and then Arvada, a northwest suburb of Denver with a population that’s soared from 50,000 in 1970 to 124,000 now. When Tony was 16, he had some issues with his parents “just because I’m me,” and they sent him to a foster Read More ›