ENGL

Homelessness in Texas

Problem/Solution Proposal

(Picture of a homeless man lying on the sidewalk, with a man wearing a black suit cover the eyes of another man walking by the homeless man (Muhammad).)

Presented by: Student Name

December 4, 2016

Problem/Overview:

(Pie chart showing the different percentage of what causes homelessness in the state of Texas. Listing: loss of job 35%, bill higher than earning 15%, evicted by family member 13%, abuse at home 11%, incarcerated 11%, mental issues 10%, change of family statue 10%, drug abuse 9% (Rausch).)

There are countless reasons why someone might end up homeless. Some of those reasons could be job loss, domestic violence, mental illness, and addiction. According to Ana Rausch, the Senior Research Project Manager who works for an organization that studies homelessness in Houston, Texas, there are different types of homelessness which are situational, episodic, and chronic. Situational homelessness is when a person is forced to be homeless due to losing a job or the loss of the breadwinner. Episodic homelessness is when a person that gets out of homelessness for a short period of time but end up homeless again. This usually happens to people who have a drug addiction and attempt to stay clean from drugs but usually fall back into homelessness. Lastly, chronic homelessness is when a person lives on the street for long periods of time with no resources or people to help them (Rausch). The picture of the pie chart shows the ratio of reasons people become homeless and the largest percentage is loss of job.

(Picture of the united states, showing the population of homelessness in each state. The states that have the highest population is California, Washington, New York, Florida, and Texas (Henry 10).)

According to the annual assessment report to the congress on homelessness, this picture shows that in the state of Texas, as of 2014, there was an estimated report of 28,495 homeless people out of the 26.96 million people in Texas (Henry 8). It may not seem like a lot but those reported numbers are majority reports of people who go to shelters in Texas. Most people think that homelessness happens because people spend their money on drugs or alcohol. Therefore the government’s solution to homelessness is to spend taxpayers’ money towards healthcare for the homeless. According to “One Path, Many Destination” article written by the Administration of Housing Programs, the average cost for a city to spend on one homeless person is $40,000, due to shelters, healthcare, and jails. Unfortunately, all that money being spent toward the attempt to help the homeless are only catering to a small portion of what causes homelessness. Shelters may provide food and shelter but it also keeps the homelessness homeless due to the lack of chance of being able to find a job. Then the spending healthcare toward homelessness to help with drug addiction or mental illness is helpful but does not fix the problem of homelessness because it does not provide them a job or home ("One Path" 3).

Solution:

There is a solution to homelessness and it is to give homeless people a home, more specifically a tiny house. A tiny house is a house that is at a significantly smaller scale of a house. Since there are different types of homelessness, situational, episodic, and chronic, there should be different requirements in order for this solution to work.

An example of fixing chronic homelessness with tiny houses

In Austin, Texas a community called Community First is testing to fix chronic homelessness by building tiny houses. According to Eliza Weeks’ report, her article to Austinot claimed, Alan Graham made Community First and had a 27 Arce plan to build tiny houses and give it to the chronically homeless and disabled. Residents at the Community First pay rent, and rent price depends on the tiny house. This community has job opportunities for the residents such as having classes teaching how to locally trade and grow food. There is also a blacksmith forge, and an art studio therefore residents can learn to make items and sell it. This way the residents can learn to make an income for themselves (Weeks).

Make a community including situational and episodic homelessness

Community First is heading toward the right direction to reduce the numbers of homelessness but it only focuses on chronic homelessness. In order to get this to work for different types of homelessness, the community should offer more opportunities for situational and episodic homelessness. Since situational homelessness is temporary, there should be a program to help improve skills on getting hired for a job. This way it will be faster for them to find a job and be on their way. Then for episodic there should be a program included with the community to help them recover from addiction, therefore it will help prevent them from falling into homelessness repeatedly.

Getting the Texas government involved

By having the example of Community First and ideas to improve to help implement this idea throughout major cities in Texas, this idea must be presented to a senator. This way if the senator decided to write up a bill on these issues, the idea will then be in progress of whether or not the Texas government will be able to redirect the existing funds to homelessness and put it towards the idea of tiny housing.

Benefits:

Keeps homeless off the streets

By keeping the homeless off the streets, we can prevent homeless people from getting sick or being arrested. The homeless get sick on the streets because basic necessities for living can’t be provided to them by living on the street. Homeless people tend to struggle to maintain hygiene, find nutritional food or clean water, and a safe, comfortable place to sleep. Having to live in a condition with struggling to have the simple essentials to life leads to failure of health. In addition to not being able to have the basics, the homeless may turn to stealing in order to get food or a place to sleep. Sometimes, in serious cases homeless people find ways to get arrested and go to jail, just so they have a place to sleep and have food provided to them.

More cost effective