Wednesday, January 31, 2024, 8:57 am | Randy Thomasson
Proposition 1 on California’s March 5, 2024 ballot is another deceptive Democrat Party scheme of imagery over substance that rejects tried-and-true solutions.
And “homeless housing” has already been an abject failure in California’s Democrat-controlled big cities because it’s “free housing without any requirements.” So no “change” required — no wonder transients flock to California. If the transient magnet of Prop. 1 passes, you can bet California will have more “homeless,” not less.
“Despite Spending $1.1 Billion, San Francisco Sees Its Homelessness Problems Spiral Out Of Control,” Hoover Institution, May 10, 2022 It is hard to imagine a more inhumane outcome than watching the train wreck of homelessness evolve in San Francisco, as the city spends billions on flawed policies that facilitate drug abuse and on badly designed systems to carry out those policies. But this is what happens when there is no accountability within government, and with voters who would prefer feeling good about electing progressive politicians to facing the reality of the awful mess that has been created by those they have elected.
California’s ruling Democrats don’t require transients to enter treatment-and-recovery programs as a condition of housing, so these costly programs fail:
“California homelessness: Where are the state’s billions going?,” CalMatters, May 22, 2023 The state keeps spending more to address the crisis, and the crisis keeps getting worse. So where, they ask, is all the money going? The state’s Interagency Council on Homelessness, a state body tasked with overseeing the state’s homelessness strategy and divvying up funding to local governments, issued a report detailing just how much the state has spent on the crisis between 2018 and 2021 — and what it’s gotten in return.
The answer to those questions, according to the report: The state has spent nearly $10 billion and provided services to more than 571,000 people, each year helping more people than the last. And despite all that, at the end of year three, the majority of those more than half a million Californians still didn’t end up with a roof over their heads. The number of unsheltered Californians continues to swell.
Presented at a three-hour joint committee hearing in the Assembly, the report has sent housing policy experts across the state into a twitter. Services for the homeless are so disjointed — split among nine state agencies, hundreds of county and municipal governments, nonprofits and charitable organizations — the 253-page document may be the first statistical birds-eye view of the state’s many-tentacled efforts.
But it also shows just how intractable the problem is. “One of the largest challenges facing the state is the inflow of new people into homelessness, even as efforts to help people experiencing homelessness expand,” the report reads. What the report did not address is how the state can spend its money more effectively. Nor was it asked to. The report comes at the request of the Legislature, which included an ask in its 2021 budget for a “comprehensive view of the homelessness response system,” not an audit nor a list of recommendations.
Why doesn’t permanent housing help people exit from homelessness? A simple reason is that it appears to attract more people from outside the homeless system, or keeps them in the homelessness system, because they are drawn to the promise of a permanent and usually rent-free room.
A recent economic analysis shows that cities have to build 10 PSH beds to remove a single homeless person from the street, since the vast majority of such units go to people who would not have been permanently homeless. Even the removal of that sole homeless individual from the streets seem to fade over time as more people enter the homelessness system.[4]
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Another reason Housing First doesn’t work is that it ignores that the major problems for the chronically homeless aren’t just lack of a home. A recent UCLA study found that more than 75% of this population have a serious mental illness, and 75% have a substance abuse problem, and the majority have both. These individuals are reluctant to accept assistance without mandates and requirements, and a house without such mandates will not encourage use of these services.[9]
There was once some hope that housing alone could help reduce drug use and mental health problems. Yet studies have now shown that simply providing people subsidized housing does not reduce drug use, and often encourages it, which makes sense because there is no mandated treatment in PSH and the free unit provides people with more money to pursue their habits.
More fact-based perspective:
“The ‘Housing First’ Approach Has Failed,” The Heritage Foundation, Aug. 4, 2020 Homelessness has gained national attention with the growth of public encampments and street disorder, particularly in West Coast cities. Over the past decade, the federal government has spent billions on “Housing First” programs, which provide permanent housing for the homeless without requiring sobriety or participation in treatment. Although Housing First programs demonstrate strong rates of short-term housing retention, they do not improve symptoms related to drug addiction, mental illness, and general well-being—and have not reduced overall rates of homelessness.
“To Fix Homelessness, Stop Fixating On Housing,” The Federalist, May 30, 2023 Cities and states, for their part, should stop releasing without bail or jail time drug addicts and mentally ill people who commit crimes, and they need to use the threat of punishment as a way to induce street criminals to accept treatment.
At its core, Prop. 1 is throwing more money away, will make California’s homeless population grow, and will make generations of Californians poorer with the multi-billions in bonds to pay back — all so presidential wannabe Gavin Newsom can say he’s “solved” the homeless problem. Defeat this thieving scam — vote NO on Prop. 1.
If any would not work, neither should he eat. — This is a just maxim, and universal nature inculcates it to man. If man will work, he may eat; if he do not work, he neither can eat, nor should he eat. The maxim is founded on these words of the Lord: In the sweat of thy brow thou shall eat bread. Industry is crowned with God’s blessing; idleness is loaded with his curse. This maxim was a proverb among the Jews. Men who can work, and will rather support themselves by begging, should not get one morsel of bread. It is a sin to minister to necessities that are merely artificial. Adam Clarke’s Bible Commentary on 2 Thessalonians 3:10
Friday, January 19, 2024, 9:15 am | Randy Thomasson
JANUARY 30 UPDATE:If you called, you and others helped stop this radical, pro-crime bill! AB 742 did not come up for an Assembly floor vote before adjournment of a brief floor session. And tomorrow (January 31), is the legislative deadline for two-year bills to pass their house of origin, and the Assembly isn’t meeting that day. So AB 742 is dead!
From policemag.com (1/25/24): Former police officer and K-9 unit member, Ronald Davis, says he’s puzzled by the push for this legislation. “Our dogs are there … because they help protect and defend,” he said. “Yes, they do bite people. But what the people trying to get this bill passed don’t tell you is how often they stop suspects with weapons who would have otherwise harmed an officer.”
He told the California Globe, “I don’t see how this can be passed. So many people came out against it last year, and unless they make big changes, it will entice no one else. People know how important police dogs are.”
Here’s our January 19 post with our anti-crime, pro-police-dog alert (again, thank you for following SaveCalifornia.com’s lead and calling — we knew this was a moral opportunity for reasonable Californians!):
Some Democrat Party politicians want to prohibit police dogs taking down criminal suspects. But you can help stop them — right now!
But first, to convince you that most two-year bills (bills that couldn’t pass last year) can be defeated this year, recognize and rejoice in the defeat of the invasive, pansy ban on pre-teen tackle football leagues:
Newsom – who knows he’s getting beat up nationally as being “too liberal” to be the Democrat Party nominee for president – is highly motivated to try to “improve” his image, in this case, to families nationwide who like youth tackle football.
What these radical Democrat bills show you – including the ones passed by California’s Democrat-Party-controlled State Legislature and signed by Democrat Party Gov. Gavin Newsom over the past several years – is that Democrat politicians have an insatiable lust to invade every space in order to control everyone and everything.
They are the anti-liberty party, otherwise known as New Communist Democrats and unconstitutional tyrants.
TAKE ACTION: And now, please oppose a pro-crime bill prohibiting the use of police dogs from helping police to apprehend criminal suspects.
AB 742 has until Jan. 31 to pass the Democrat-controlled State Assembly. This bad bill would prohibit unleashing police dogs to find or take down a suspect.
AB 742 is pro-crime because it stops the apprehending of criminal suspects. Because if a suspect is hiding from or running away from police, a police dog can find him and hold him.
Yet the “defund the police” Democrat Party politicians want to straitjacket police dogs and let criminal suspects get away. Police across America are shaking their heads over this.
The present danger is AB 742 is already on the Assembly floor, on the “inactive file,” where it’s been for more than 8 months. And it can be brought up for a vote any time the Democrat-controlled Assembly meets the remainder of this month.
PLEASE ACT NOW:Call and email your own state assemblymember. Tell him or her, “Oppose AB 742 — stop siding with criminals!” And yes, if your assemblymember’s voicemail is “on,” you can leave a weekend message.
For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same.The Bible, Romans 13:3
Monday, January 8, 2024, 1:31 pm | Randy Thomasson
Tell your friends who are Democrats that Democrat politicians in Sacramento and Washington, DC care more about illegal aliens than about you and your family.
What’s more, illegal aliens will also receive taxpayer-funded “sex changes,” thanks to Democrat Party Governor Gavin Newsom.
You see, operating without the authorization of any law, Newsom’s Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) recently (and quietly) implemented tax-funded so-called “gender affirming care,” which, according DHCS, “refers to treatment provided to address incongruence between a person’s gender assigned at birth and their gender identity.”
So, when Newsom & the Democrats this month began giving illegal aliens of all ages free health insurance via Medi-Cal (California’s “welfare” health insurance program), these Frankensteinian, irreversible surgeries are included.
Stop and think about it. When illegals get more “freebies,” can drive, vote, become cops, and everything else in California, you know that this favored status is no accident: Democrat Party politicians care more about illegal aliens than about you and your family. Tell your Democrat friends!
1. The native of a city, or an inhabitant who enjoys the freedom and privileges of the city in which he resides; the freeman of a city, as distinguished from a foreigner, or one not entitled to its franchises.
5. In the United States, a person, native or naturalized, who has the privilege of exercising the elective franchise, or the qualifications which enable him to vote for rulers, and to purchase and hold real estate.
If the citizens of the United States should not be free and happy, the fault will be entirely their own.
Definition of illegal alien: From former Arizona state senator Karen Johnson:
In its original language, the Bible used two different words to describe a “foreigner” and an “alien.” A “foreigner” was a person from another land (like a tourist or businessman) who was only in the country temporarily, but with permission. An “alien” was a person from another land who planned to take up residence, again with the permission of the host country.
In his book, Dr. Hoffmeier describes a famous tomb scene dating to the 19th century B.C. which shows workers entering Egyptian territory. One carries a permit in his hand. The writing on the permit is clearly visible, noting the date (1862 B.C.) and the number of foreign workers who were allowed to enter to work in Egypt. Other ancient documents describe both successful and failed attempts to secure the border and restrictions that frontier border guards placed on foreigners entering Egypt. There is much archaeological evidence, according to Dr. Hoffmeier, to document that a foreigner in the ancient Middle East needed permission to travel across borders from one country to another.
When Abraham’s great-grandson, Joseph, the son of Jacob, wanted to bring his father and brothers to Egypt during another great famine in their land, he had to get permission from Pharoah. Even though he held a high position in Pharoah’s court, Joseph himself was not Egyptian. He was a guest in the land … a foreigner.
The bottom line is that amnesty proponents are simply incorrect when they quote the Bible to support comprehensive immigration reform. The Biblical admonition to “Welcome the stranger” is not a call for welcoming illegal aliens. It’s a call to welcome immigrants who follow the law.
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