Government Enabling Defined

Our society depends upon government agencies to look after and manage support programs for the homeless living on the streets. County social service agencies provide enough EBT food and cash benefits to eligible individuals to help sustain life, a few cities have offered access to empty lots to camp out, and a few cities have even spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to build “tiny home” complexes to shelter minimal numbers in need. Obvious by their actions, government entities do not understand the homeless problem, and their attempts to fix the problem has only enabled street life, helping only the individuals who desire to stay on the streets.

To provide solutions to the homeless problem, we must first understand who these people are and then understand a single solution will not work. The homeless can be divided into three different classes:

Class 1: On the streets by negative circumstances. The lack of job skills and employment, drug and alcohol addiction, and the lack of or lose of family/friend support forces individuals and families to live on the streets. Once on the streets, the lack of resources and support makes it nearly impossible to recover to normal life.

Class 2: On the streets by physical and/or mental illness. These individuals that lack support often end up living on the streets. Society lacks the resources and support system to care for these people that causes worsening conditions and even death. Its common to see a combination of class 1 and class 2 individuals as street life is prolonged.

Class 3: On the streets by choice. These individuals enjoy the freedom of not having to work and expect other people to care for them. They do not respect the rights of others and can be defined as “bums”. These people mingle with class 1 and class 2 individuals and take the free ride on the backs of people in need. Many people in society look down on the homeless due to class 3 individuals and government agencies seem to prioritize aid to the homeless based on resistance to help class 3 mentality.

The only successful solution to the homeless problem is to provide shelter, food, and rehabilitation services to class 1 and 2 individuals as a gateway to normal life or acceptance to long-term programs, and to eliminate access to street life to class 3 individuals. The 1BED4ALL project has developed a self-sustainable homeless rehabilitation facility concept that would lift people-in-need off the streets onto a path to normal life. Class 3 individuals would be welcome to participate but many will reject such a facility’s structure and choose to leave. If the living on public streets and land became illegal, these people would be forced to leave the area or adapt to jail life. Such a solution would help people-in-need and earn the acceptance of society’s majority.

Many could say that the cost to provide shelter, food, and rehabilitation services to class 1 and 2 individuals would be too expensive and unrealistic. Well, the fact of the matter is that such facilities would be able to operate using existing benefits offered to the homeless, and ensure benefits, such as Medi-Cal, are sustained through facility participation.

Society also needs to change the mentality of how our government agencies deal with the homeless. The country of Finland’s homeless program has been successful because government social workers are placed in the buildings housing the homeless. This ensures that people in need have access to services which help them rehabilitate.

Social workers need to be relocated to these pay-to-stay rehabilitation facilities, along with easy access to other agencies, such as the US Social Security Office and Veteran Affairs. The attitude of “you must come here”, “you must have an appointment”, and “all your paperwork must be in order” to receive benefits must be changed. Every person we do not help, will stay on the streets and probably become physically and/or mentally ill, costing the taxpayers in long-term medical treatments, or even death.

A pay-to-stay homeless rehabilitation facility in which the residents have proper, real-time access to social services could provide the following services, even at a 70% paid occupancy rate:

1.    Dorm-style housing with restrooms and showers

2.    Breakfast, lunch and dinner

3.    Laundry services

4.    Medical and dental services

5.    Mental health and group therapy

6.    Access to Social Services

7.    Drug rehabilitation

8.    Computer/Internet access

9.    Transportation services

10.  Pet vet and care services

11.  Family services

12.  Access to a mailing address

13.  Barber services

14.  Police and security protection

15.  Storage for belongings

To recap: We can provide the homeless with full-service shelter and rehabilitation services at no additional cost to the taxpayer, utilizing existing social service benefits. ZERO ADDITIONAL FUNDS ARE NEEDED!

Now for the hard part! To provide all these services, we’ll need well designed facilities. The Governor of California has recently said he wants to spend over 1 billion dollars to fix the homeless problem in California. Many other politicians are suggesting the use of old government buildings to house the homeless, buildings not designed to house large groups of people that could cause safety and logistical concerns.

Yes, the current state of the homeless problem will require society to provide housing, which is going to cost us all a lot of money. The best solution would be to build well-designed facilities from the ground up. Such facilities would handle dorm-style living and food service amenities to efficiently feed large groups of people logistically at low costs. Retrofitting old buildings to meet the requirements to provide all the services listed above would probably cost more than building a well-designed facility from the ground up, obviously in areas where property is available. Areas such as San Francisco, would have the requirement to retrofit and such work would have to be well-designed.

The 1BED4ALL project has developed a 464-bed facility with an estimated build cost of 3 million dollars and a 928-bed facility with an estimated build cost of 4 million dollars. The Facility Build & Operational Overview details our research, estimated costs and feasibility of the monthly self-sustainable operations.

The 1BED4ALL project is also developing a facility management software application that will allow shelters to provide important rehabilitation services with ease and automate the EBT and other government billing interfaces.

Converting free shelters to pay-to-stay facilities could be the fastest way to get help to the homeless. We could provide training to these shelters, manage the program, and provide the software needed to make such facilities successful.

The 1BED4ALL Solution to the Problem in California

We suggest that California adopt a “pay-to-stay” homeless rehabilitation facility program in which shelters that agree to provide all the services discussed in this plan, would be granted access to bill resident EBT cards $12 a night.

Converting Free Shelters

1Bed4All proposes that the state allow us to manage the “pay-to-stay” program in which we would provide training, program compliance auditing and facility management software to participating shelters. Conversions would be the quickest way to start rehabilitating the homeless. It would also allow such shelters to grow, helping to get people off the streets as quickly as possible.

Building New Facilities

1Bed4All also proposes that the state fund the project to build pay-to-stay facilities throughout the state. The cost to build a 928-bed facility is approximately 4 million dollars. If there are 90,000 homeless people living on the streets, we would need to build 97 facilities at the cost of 388 million dollars.

For every 4 million dollars, we can rehabilitate 928 people at a time, forever.

County Participation

1Bed4all would require the corporation of county governments to make this solution possible. Social services would have to ensure facility residents receive $6 a day ($183 a month) for EBT food and $6 a day ($183 a month) for EBT cash. It would also be important that resident Medi-Cal applications were processed in a timely manner. We would strongly suggest that participating counties relocate appropriate staffing to the facilities.

Also, to be able to build facilities for 4 million dollars, land would need to be donated for use. Utilizing unused asphalt parking lots owned by counties or the state would be perfect for these facility builds.

Stop Wasting, Start Fixing!