The Homeless Industrial Complex

There is a cabal of government/non profits, government agencies and unions to steal billions of dollars from taxpayers.  The more we spend, the more homeless we have—and the richer the non profits get, the more high paid government employees and the bigger the union bank accounts.

“For a long time, I’ve resisted using the term “homeless industrial complex” because it’s pejorative and cynical. I preferred to believe the  ineffective relationship between government housing agencies, their non-profit contractors, and political leaders was based on a combination of organizational inertia, inept management, and political ideology. But the more I read and the more I’ve learned, I’ve come to the grudging realization that there really is—intentionally or not—a network of mutually supportive programs that do a better job of justifying each other’s existence than they do getting people off the street.” 

Help the homeless, not the grifters and con artists.

Opinion: The Homeless Industrial Complex

Tim Campbell, Westside Current,  1/24/23 

For a long time, I’ve resisted using the term “homeless industrial complex” because it’s pejorative and cynical. I preferred to believe the  ineffective relationship between government housing agencies, their non-profit contractors, and political leaders was based on a combination of organizational inertia, inept management, and political ideology. But the more I read and the more I’ve learned, I’ve come to the grudging realization that there really is—intentionally or not—a network of mutually supportive programs that do a better job of justifying each other’s existence than they do getting people off the street.  The latest example is this news item:

LAHSA, the agency that’s supposed to hold its contractors accountable for their performance, just hired the director of St, Joseph’s as its new CEO, at a salary $30,000 more than the president of the United States. St. Joseph’s is one of the largest benefactors of government contracts for homelessness programs, and now its boss is in charge of writing the County’s checks. 

If you’re concerned about the obvious failures of current City and County homeless programs, Dr. Adams’ appointment should frighten the heck out of you.  Expect LAHSA and its cohorts to continue its dismal track record by:

·     Insisting housing construction is the only solution to homelessness, a policy that’s resulted in an “unacceptably slow” rate of building (per the City Controller) at costs far above market. And a policy that has cost the City and County more than $150 million in lost HUD funding in six years.

Calling its programs successful when it can offer no verifiable evidence any of its programs has achieved substantial progress in reducing homelessness.

·     Calling the homelessness crisis a housing problem while ignoring the very real effects of substance abuse and mental illness among the homeless community. 

·      More semantics. Faced with widespread program failures, the Homeless Industrial Complex has turned to rephrasing the problem.  Illegally parked RV’s become “homes”.  Tent encampments become “communities”.  It’s much easier to defend letting someone stay in their “home” than explaining why you can’t clear an encampment. 

The City of Los Angeles has 40% of the County’s population but 60% of its homeless.  Advocates would like us to believe it’s a housing affordability problem, but housing in Long Beach or El Segundo is just as expensive as it is in L.A.—more so in some cases. Those cities are also constrained by the Boise decision, yet they don’t have large and growing encampments protected by the agencies that are supposed to be clearing them and sheltering their inhabitants.

The only logical explanation for the City’s failure to address the homeless crisis in the presence of a system that supports failure.  I’m not talking about some shadowy conspiracy theory: the Homeless Industrial Complex is right in front of us every day.  It’s made up political ideologues who frame the crisis as one of economic injustice (while using the homeless themselves as convenient symbols of that injustice, rather than individual human beings); the ideologues in turn support—and are activated by– a vast array of nonprofits that rake in millions of taxpayers dollars using the most inefficient system possible for providing services (driving around looking for people instead of establishing centralized service shelters); and public agencies and leaders who fear upsetting the vociferous self-appointed advocates who will shout down and drown out anyone with alternative approaches. 

Unless we support leaders who are willing to hold these agencies accountable and ignore the screaming, the homeless crisis will continue, and probably grow, as more money is pumped into a continually failing system.