Published on Feb 8, 2014
PROVIDED BY FACEBOOK.COM/CNNNEXT
"In eight years, Utah has quietly reduced homelessness by 78 percent, and is on track to end homelessness by 2015.
How did Utah accomplish this? Simple.
Utah solved homelessness by giving people homes.
In 2005, Utah figured out that the annual cost of E.R.
visits and jail stays for homeless people was about $16,670 per person, compared to $11,000 to provide each homeless person with an apartment and a social worker.
So, the state began giving away apartments, with no strings attached.
Each participant in Utah's Housing First program also gets a caseworker to help them become self-sufficient, but they keep the apartment even if they fail.
The program has been so successful that other states are hoping to achieve similar results with programs modeled on Utah's.
It sounds like Utah borrowed a page from Homes Not Handcuffs, the 2009 report by The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty and The National Coalition for the Homeless.
Using a 2004 survey and anecdotal evidence from activists, the report concluded that permanent housing for the homeless is cheaper than criminalization.
Housing is not only more human, it's economical."* Cenk Uygur, Ana Kasparian, Ben Mankiewicz and Jimmy Dore (The Jimmy Dore Show) break it down.
