Tag: homelessness

California’s Broke Medicaid Program Has Been Spending on … Homeless Housing

Medi-Cal, the State of California’s version of Medicaid, has been spending on extraneous programs such as housing while running up a deficit so extreme that the state has had to borrow over $6 billion to save it.

As Breitbart News reported last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration had to seek $6 billion in loans to keep the program from collapsing, partly due to the cost of covering illegal aliens, which he did last year.

Now, CalMatters.org reveals that the federal government is cracking down on Medi-Cal and other Medicaid providers that have been using money to support “rent assistance” and “medically tailored meals”:

In 2022, California made sweeping changes to its Medi-Cal program that reimagined what health care could look like for some of the state’s poorest and sickest residents by covering services from housing to healthy food. But the future of that program, known as CalAIM, could be at risk under the Trump administration.

…

The moves align with a narrower vision of Medicaid espoused by newly confirmed Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services head Dr. Mehmet Oz, who said during his swearing-in ceremony that Medicaid spending was crowding out spending on education and other services in states with the federal government “paying most of the bill.”

“This one really bothers me. There are states who are using Medicaid — Medicaid dollars for people who are vulnerable — for services that are not medical,” Oz said.

President Joe Biden allowed California and other states to “experiment” with Medicaid funding — and California spent itself into near-insolvency. The Trump administration is cracking down, insisting that Medicaid spending be restricted to medical expenses — not items like housing for indigent patients.

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Southern California mayor’s twisted plan to wipe out homeless people sparks widespread condemnation

A Southern California mayor has sparked mass condemnation after revealing he’d give homeless residents ‘all the fentanyl they want’ in an effort to wipe them out.

R. Rex Parris, the mayor of Lancaster, made the remarks in front of stunned residents and councilmembers at a city council meeting earlier in the year but footage of his speech has just emerged.

Huge swathes of California have been gripped by a fentanyl crisis as the highly addictive and deadly drug becomes more accessible and affordable on the streets.

Just a tiny, two milligrams dose of the drug is enough to kill a human.  

Most of California is also in the grips of a housing crisis, as home costs soar and new developments stagnate – made exponentially worse by the devastating bushfires which tore through Los Angeles in January.

The Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count registered as many as 6,672 people experiencing homelessness in Lancaster and its surrounding areas in 2024.

Asked about his vision to tackle the crisis, the 73-year-old Republican mayor did not mince his words.

‘What I want to do is give them free fentanyl,’ Parris told the February 25 meeting, to the bewilderment of everybody else in the room.

‘I mean, that’s what I want to do. I want to give them all the fentanyl they want.’ 

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National Guard Deployed to Albuquerque, New Mexico as Crime Crisis Skyrockets

Albuquerque, New Mexico, is turning to the National Guard for support as crime continues to surge in the state’s largest city. The move comes after local law enforcement requested help dealing with what officials describe as an unrelenting public safety crisis — including violent crime, rampant drug use and a growing homeless population.

Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham approved the deployment of between 60 and 70 National Guard troops in response to an emergency request from Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina. Troops will begin arriving in May and are expected to remain in the city for six months to a year, depending on conditions on the ground.

Albuquerque, home to over a quarter of New Mexico’s population, has been overwhelmed by crime in recent years. Central Avenue — a stretch of the historic Route 66 — has become a hotspot for illegal activity, open-air drug markets and homeless encampments, the Daily Mail reports. 

Locals have dubbed the area “The War Zone,” a label that has gained national attention following a visit from YouTuber Nick Johnson, who described the neighborhood as “the most frightful in America” to his 1.1 million followers.

Although the National Guard will assist local authorities, guardsmen will not be performing active police duties, nor will they be armed or in uniform. According to reports, including from the Albuquerque Journal, the troops will wear plain polo shirts and be assigned to tasks such as courthouse and airport security. 

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Affluent New Jersey city considers controversial ordinance that would fine or jail homeless people for sleeping outside

A tony New Jersey city is considering approving a controversial new ordinance that would fine or jail homeless people found sleeping in public spaces.

Summit Councilman Jamel Boyer, a Republican, introduced the ordinance last Tuesday, claiming it serves to “preserve the safe and accessible use of public property for all residents, pedestrians and businesses.”

The ordinance in Summit would prohibit the homeless from camping in public areas, including parks, sidewalks, alleyways, and benches.

If approved, anyone found violating the ordinance would face a fine of up to $2,000 “and/or imprisonment or community service for a term not to exceed ninety days,” the order says.

A similar ordinance was presented in Morristown, NJ, in February but was struck down following massive backlash from the community and advocacy groups, NJ.com reported.

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London council chiefs spend £140million to send homeless people out of the capital by snapping up hundreds of properties in deprived areas elsewhere in England

Councils in London have spent more than £140million snapping up homes outside the city to relocate homeless people.  

Local authorities in the capital have acquired more than 850 properties across England since 2017, with many in the most deprived areas of the east and southeast of the country, The Guardian reported. 

Bizarrely, some London councils have already bought properties in the Midlands and are planning to send some people as far as Liverpool and the northeast. 

Officials identified 704 people living on the streets of the capital between October and December last year – a 26 per cent rise on the previous year.

Meanwhile, a total of 4,612 individuals were found to be sleeping rough, a five per cent increase on the year before.

People are deemed to be living on the streets if they have had been seen rough sleeping on several occasions over a period of three weeks or more. 

In order to deal with the scope of the problem, and faced with an extreme shortage of social housing and skyrocketing private rents, more than a dozen local authorities – and the housing companies they partially own – have invested heavily in property outside of London’s boundaries. 

The non-London residences are used to house homeless individuals or families either as temporary emergency accommodation or permanently as a privately rented home. 

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Los Angeles cannot track money spent on homeless programs, independent audit finds

  • An independent audit commissioned by a federal judge raised serious concerns about how Los Angeles city and county are handling the billions of taxpayer dollars spent on the homelessness crisis. 

Sergio Moreno’s business sits in the heart of Skid Row, where he sees homeless people overdosing on drugs. 

“There were days we’d see two to three overdoses,” he said. 

The things Moreno has witnessed made him suspicious on how the city has managed the response to the homeless crisis. 

“It’s not dollars we’re talking about,” he said. “Those dollars translate into people’s lives.”

His feelings have been heightened following the independent audit released on Thursday. It claims that Los Angeles city and county leaders cannot account for the billions of taxpayer dollars spent on the homeless crisis last year. The LA Alliance for Human Rights pressed for a series of audits in recent years. 

“It’s heartbreaking,” said Elizabeth Mitchell, an attorney for LA Alliance for Human Rights. “It’s atrocious. It’s immoral. It’s unjustified. But, what it is not, is surprising.”

Many of the problems identified were at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, known as LAHSA. 

The auditors said the agency’s paper trail was so poor that tracking the $2.5 billion spent last year was nearly impossible. 

“It is an actual infrastructure disaster,” Mitchell said. “The truth is everybody is in charge and nobody is in charge. There are no checks and balances.”

The office of LA County Supervisor Linsey Horvath called for accountability, results and an end to this “nightmare.”

“This audit is another reminder of what we already know – the current homelessness services system is broken,” she said in a statement. “We need accountability and results right now, which is why I’m proceeding with the creation of a consolidated County department that will end this nightmare.”

The president of the Downtown LA Neighborhood Council believes there are other record-keeping problems. 

“Even the homeless count is not accurate,” Claudia Olviveira said. “Nothing is accurate and based on data.”

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REPORT: City of Portland, Oregon Suffering a Rise in Cases of Dysentery

The horrible disease of Dysentery is on the rise in the city of Portland, Oregon. How gross.

You can probably draw a straight line between this and the city’s large homeless population and the practice of using city streets as a public restroom.

It’s an important reminder that homelessness is a multi-faceted issue, and one of the things it affects is public health.

KOIN News reports:

Dysentery cases rise in Portland metro area, health department reports

Dysentery is on the rise in the Portland metro area, according to recent data released by the Multnomah County Health Department.

Also known as shigellosis, dysentery is a highly contagious bacterial disease that can cause fever, cramps, vomiting and diarrhea. It is spread very easily from person to person when someone gets fecal matter from an infected person into their mouth, health officials say.

According to the health department, two types of Shigella typically circulate in Oregon. Although both strains can cause severe diarrhea, officials are not seeing the strain which can cause more severe or fatal illness. However, they note the strains circulating in Multnomah County are resistant to several antibiotics.

Shigella cases have been rising in Multnomah County since 2012, officials said. But health department data on dysentery cases collected by the county from 2017-2024 shows a marked increase in the number of cases between 2023 and 2024. Further, January 2025 showed 40 cases reported.

The report goes on to state that almost 60 percent of recent cases are connected to the homeless population.

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California City Addresses Homeless Issue by Passing Sweeping Ban on Camping on Public Property

Homeless camps have been an ongoing problem for cities across the country for several years now, particularly in California.

In Fremont, the city council has addressed the problem by passing a sweeping bill which bans camping on all public property. It’s the sort of measure you could never imagine passing in Los Angeles, which has a massive problem with homelessness.

The Fremont ban acknowledges the fact that when you have homeless people camping out on sidewalks, it interferes with the lives of everyone else who lives in the city.

FOX News reported:

California city passes sweeping homeless encampment ban on all public property

A California city passed one of the nation’s strictest anti-homeless encampment ordinances to combat the ongoing crisis.

The Fremont City Council voted 6-1 Tuesday night in favor of the law which bans camping on any public property “including any street, sidewalk, park, open space, waterway, or banks of a waterway or any private property not designated and equipped for such camping” as well as “any land designated as a high fire risk area.”

“The purpose of this chapter is to maintain streets, parks and other public and private areas within the city in a clean, sanitary and accessible condition and to adequately protect the health, safety and public welfare of the community, while recognizing that, subject to reasonable conditions, camping and camp facilities associated with special events can be beneficial to the cultural and educational climate in the city,” the ordinance read.

It continued, “The use of streets and public areas within the city for camping purposes or for storage of personal property interferes with the rights of the public to use these areas for which they were intended.

The terms of the ban are pretty serious by California standards.

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Seattle Public Schools Sees Alarming 20% Spike In Student Homelessness After 30% Rise Last Year

Seattle Public Schools is seeing an alarming rise in the number of its students experiencing homelessness. 

As of October, the district reported 2,235 students experiencing homelessness since the school year began, a nearly 20% increase from last year’s 30% rise, KUOW/NPR reported. 

Homelessness has reached record levels nationwide, according to a recent HUD report. In Washington state, over 41,000 students experienced homelessness during the 2023-24 school year, a nearly 15% increase.

Jenny Allen, a McKinney-Vento support worker in Seattle, said rising costs and limited affordable housing are straining families, while the district has seen a rise in immigrants and refugees, particularly from South America.

The KUOW/NPR report said that at Dunlap Elementary, Rogers Greene, an eight-year veteran supporting unhoused students, now assists a growing number of families fleeing conflicts in countries like Ukraine and Afghanistan.

“I can’t imagine. You’re just dropped somewhere and then figure it out — figure out the language, figure out how you’re going to live, where you’re going to live, how you’re going to eat. It’s survival. So it’s important for us to have those connections, relationships, and work through the language barrier,” he said. 

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Homeless crisis in America GETTING WORSE as government continues to spend hundreds of billions on foreign aid

Homelessness in the United States has hit a record high, with over 770,000 people experiencing homelessness on a single night in January 2024, according to the 2024 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report released by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

This represents an alarming 18 percent increase from the previous year, and the actual number may be even higher because the report undercounts the true number of homeless individuals.

This crisis is particularly devastating for families with children, who saw a staggering 39 percent increase in homelessness, leaving nearly 150,000 children without stable housing. In contrast, the report shows a 55 percent reduction in veteran homelessness since 2009, with an eight percent decrease from 2023. (Related: Study finds home ownership in California has become increasingly unattainable due to disparities between wages and housing prices.)

This development is notable because of how it is contrasted with how much the United States has spent on other programs, such as foreign aid.

To date, the U.S. has provided about $310 billion in economic and military support to Israel and another $106 billion in assistance to Ukraine. These staggering numbers raise serious questions about the government’s priorities and its ability to address domestic issues like homelessness.

The report highlights that certain demographics are disproportionately affected by homelessness. Black people make up around 32 percent of the homeless population, despite comprising only 12 percent of the U.S. population. Veterans, who have seen the most progress in reducing homelessness, are a notable exception. The decline in veteran homelessness is attributed to targeted programs and efforts to quickly house homeless veterans.

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