Trust me, I have no illusions about life and the homeless. In fact I just posted a piece on thanklessness on www.homelessinabbotsford.com

But the harsh reality, the unpalatable truth for many, is that it is far cheaper and ultimately more productive to house and deal with the homeless.

If you know any smokers and have watched people struggle trying to quit you have watched addiction in action. Do you think smokers started out thinking I want to be addicted to nicotine? No, they smoked to be cool, to control weight, to bug their parents etc….. They gave no thought to becoming an addict. They are just luck that the substance they are addicted to is legal and causes only limited physical and mental impairment.

Addiction is not the question here. Well, except to the extent that it is a “button pushing” issue for many and the cold hard facts of dealing with addiction and the cost of addiction get lost under peoples reaction to their buttons being pushed on addiction. People get stuck in the “I won’t help them bums!” and fail to see, or perhaps that is accept, that helping is cheaper than not helping,

It is just both cheaper and more effective in helping the addict to provide housing (of a sort, I am not speaking of luxurious accommodations) and support. As I say it is one of the great ironies that it would save money to house and help the homeless as opposed to having them on the streets and as I noted if you jail them your cost triples or more.

The other point is that this approach has a much higher success rate in helping addicts get into long term recovery so that not only do you get the huge cost savings when (most) get back to work but you get them contributing their taxes to help pay for the next bunch of idiots to slide into addiction.

But for me the real advantage is that as part of this housing and support we would put in place the housing and support systems for those who are not capable of helping them selves. Some of those you see sitting around the park looking stoned are no such thing, they are just not all there or capable of looking out for themselves and “normal people” avoid them so who else can they hang out with who will not judge them.

I volunteer with the Special Olympics and there are disturbing number of homeless who the only difference between them and people in Special O is that someone was/is there to help the people in Special O while those on the street had/have no one to fight for them.