Homelessness has recently risen rapidly in cities where the cost of rent has also recently risen rapidly.

So is it that other cities are suddenly shipping over way more people, or is it a predominantly local problem caused by rapidly rising rent that can no longer be afforded?

We have cities where existing residents can no longer afford housing that are actively seeking to attract more business to move in, and with that create more competition for housing and higher population. You can't fix the results of housing cost inflation if you keep the upward pressure on the cost - you just will be spending more of your money chasing the upwardly-moving property prices your other policies are causing!

This is a common enough misrepresentation of the sources of homelessness that it's imperative that you stop spreading it.

71% of San Francisco's homeless used to have homes in the city, it is likely a similar proportion elsewhere.

http://sfist.com/2016/02/11/71_of_sf_homeless_once_had_homes...

These studies always sound dubious, just like the misrepresentations that you are pointing out. First, they are just surveying a population that is incredibly difficult to survey. Second, they don't look into what they meant by having a home, was it just crashing at a friend's house? Were they ever employed at all in the city? Where were they born, where did they grow up?

Cities act as a catchment for the rural areas around them: you can't really be homeless in Ellensburg or Aberdeen or Walla Walla (with no social services), but you can be homeless in Seattle or Spokane. A lot of kids on the street near UW in Seattle (aka ave rats) hail as far away as Montana. When I was working in downtown Seattle, many of the homeless that came around were Native Americans from various regions in the PNW.

And ya, people do wind up homeless after they move to the big city, but often for reasons back home (they lost their support network and couldn't stay solvent). Anyways, you can't fix the homeless problem in individual cities without also fixing it in the surrounding regions, or even the nation. People are mobile, they will be attracted to the best deal.

>These studies always sound dubious, just like the misrepresentations that you are pointing out.

So are you suggesting we base our understanding of this problem on anecdotes?

The problem I have with that is that the anecdotes that you present are constructed to support the idea that there is nothing to be done, that we must simply accept that homelessness is too big a problem to be solved or even quantified. I refuse to accept that conclusion, and support efforts to understand the problem rationally.

http://hsh.sfgov.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/San-Francisc...

I get it, dodgy surveys trump anecdotes. However, these surveys turn in a reality that is so far divorced to what people are experiencing that they are hard to take seriously, check out:

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/king-coun...

> The records show that more than 8,000 clients listed their last ZIP code as 98104, which covers Pioneer Square and downtown. That’s about 25 percent of all clients who gave King County ZIP codes. Putnam says clients sometimes list ZIP codes for the shelters where they last stayed or the neighborhood where they’d been seeking services.

Ya, the data is really noisy.

And do you really think the big cities can solve this problem on their own without regional support? Its like saying they can solve healthcare on their own, or any other country-wide problem.

>And do you really think the big cities can solve this problem on their own without regional support?

Absolutely agree with you here. I think regional, even national initiatives are the real way to tackle this. Cities, as you correctly point out, bear the brunt of homelessness' impact. I don't think they can solve this alone.

There is hope that states can act. California just passed a $4 billion bond for housing veterans[1]. I hope the political will can be carried nationally, but have little faith in the current administration. They've already acted negligently, putting people using the GI housing benefit at risk[2]. I hope they face real blowback from this, but it's only one in a litany of scandals and failures at that level.

1. https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_1,_Housing_Pr...

2. https://www.npr.org/2018/11/17/668953517/computer-glitch-lea...

It's not a misconception because it happens on a large scale. Note I'm not arguing that it is all homeless or even a majority, but clearly increasing support for the homeless will draw homeless people there from other, less capable areas. Here is a discussion about a church in Amarillo that paid for 1200 one-way bus tickets to get homeless out of their city: https://old.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/5a0pdi/homeless_get...

Why is it a problem when poor people want to move in but not rich people?

Does some homeless dude from Boise degrade Austin any more or less than some programmer from SF? Both are seeking what they think is a going to be a better life. Both are ever so slightly changing the character of their destination by showing up.

>Why is it a problem when poor people want to move in but not rich people?

Because they are a drain on the local economy, often have mental and/or substance abuse issues, and live outside. Is that a real question? You can't honestly protray most homeless people as free spirits painting on the sidewalk and "living their best life".

Why is it a problem when a stranger breaks into your house and raids your fridge but not when you invite a close friend over for a meal?

Both are seeking what they think is a going to be a meal. Both are ever so slightly changing the character of their destination by showing up.

The programmers are raiding the housing supply. The homeless aren't.

Ok yeah you're right then. That makes it a fair comparison. I'll remember that when I see someone passed out in the subway with a needle in their arm as I walk by with my kids.