Could you live in a truck for a year or more?

Student lives in his car to clear up credit card debt.

The Urgent Need for Affordable Housing

The solution - affordable housing.

Los Angeles needs to provide their constituents with affordable housing.

If you live in Los Angeles and have not noticed, we have a dire homelessness issue that needs to be rectified. Los Angeles is the capitol of homelessness. We have to create an effective remedy to decrease homelessness in our country, specifically in Los Angeles. There are thousand of homeless men, women, and children living on Skid Row every night.

This past spring, I conducted an ethnographic study of this sub-group at one of the nationally known rescue missions located on Skid Row in the city of Los Angeles.There, I found that there are several individuals who are making a difference in their life to escape the social stigma of laziness and as people who are drug abusers, or have a serious mental illness. These types of stigmas are generally applied to people who are homeless. However, I witnessed people in drug rehabilitation programs who were working, going to school, and giving back to their community through volunteerism.

For example, Chris, a 36 year old Caucasian male from Kentucky, and I had a conversation about his current status as a member of the shelter. He was working full time, and going to school full time at Los Angeles Trade Tech, to become a gourmet cook. The shelter saved the majority of the money from his paychecks, so that way when Chris was done with his time in the program, he would be able to afford to rent an apartment. However, there are little affordable housing units in Los Angeles. People like Chris need to have something to look forward to and not end up back on the streets because he can’t afford the high cost to live in Los Angeles.

The shelters provide a positive opportunity for homeless people to start over and make a difference in their life. However, the homeless issue does not go away by concentrating a strip of homeless shelters on Skid Row.

The problem is more prevalent then people ought to know. For example, the homelessness issue creates a huge financial burden on our nation's tax payers who pay millions of dollars each year in public services that specifically benefit the homeless.

Clean up Los Angeles. Clean up the national homelessness issue. LosAngeles has one the largest numbers of homeless individuals living in the city on the West coast. A major contribution to the homelessness issue is the problem with unaffordable housing. Unfortunately, many people are only a couple of paychecks from ending up on the streets.

Providing more affordable housing will help decrease a large number of homelessness.We hear many politicians talk about how the issue of homelessness is of utter importance, but we do not see any results or solutions to the problem.We need to pressure politicians to prove that they are taking action to solving homelessness in America.

We need less talk and more action.

Largest Homeless Population in the West

Downtown L.A. has the largest homeless population in the West. Actavists and Academics discuss what the city is doing to address this societal issue. Thousands of homeless men, women, and children live on the streets each night, but specifically concentrated higher levels of individuals sleep on Skid Row. Talking is great; however, action is greater! There needs to be more action. We have not seen that much of a positive change, but what we have seen is patient dumpings. We have to stop turning a blind eye and push are local Congressmen and women to step up their game plan or we will make them step down. I am tired of living in one of the most richest countries in the world and having to see every single day people begging for food, money, and acohol. These people need our help. Of course it is easy to turn a blind eye and pretend that homeless people do not exist, but they do. If we can travel thousands of miles outside of America to help educate and shelter people in least developed countries and developing countries, then we can try a little harder to help our own people who are starving on the streets each night.

Struggling in the Streets

Imagine.

Your outside, it’s cold, dark, and raining. If you are not in a homeless shelter and are homeless this can be pretty bad. However, if you do not fit any of these descriptions you are probably fortunate enough to have a roof over your head.

If you live in Los Angeles and haven’t noticed - we have a dire homelessness issue.

Los Angeles is the capitol of Homelessness. We need to create an effective remedy to decrease homelessness in our country, specifically Los Angeles.

There are thousand of homeless men, women, and children living on Skid Row every night.

This past spring, I conducted an ethnographic study of this sub-group at one of the nationally known rescue missions located on Skid Row in the city of Los Angeles.

I found that there are several individuals who are making a difference in their life to escape the social stigma of laziness and as people who are drug abusers, or have a serious mental illness. These types of stigmas are generally applied to people who are homeless. However, I witnessed people in drug rehabilitation programs who were working, going to school, and giving back to their community through volunteerism.

The shelters provide a positive opportunity for homeless people to start over and make a difference in their life. However, the homeless issue does not go away by concentrating a strip of homeless shelters on Skid Row.

The problem is more prevalent then people ought to know. For example, the Homelessness issue creates a huge financial burden on our nation’s tax payers who pay millions of dollars each year in public services that specifically benefit the homeless.

Clean up Los Angeles. Clean up the national homelessness issue. Los Angeles has one of the largest numbers of homeless individuals living in the city. A major contribution to the homelessness issue is the problem with unaffordable housing. Unfortunately, many people are only a couple of paychecks from ending up on the streets.

Providing more affordable housing will help decrease a large number of homelessness.
We hear many politicians talk about how the issue of homelessness is of utter importance, but we do not see any results or solutions to the problem.

We need to pressure politicians to prove that they are taking action to solving Homelessness in America.