#Homelessness follows disaster, trauma & loss - health, environmental, economic, interpersonal disasters...

Immediately or slowly over time.

We’re seeing so many front page examples of how homelessness happens: wildfire, hurricane, pandemic, job loss, eviction... 1/6

Have heard 3 times in as many days the claim that there’s something fundamentally different btwn the “newly homeless” & those already experiencing it (the so-called “chronically homeless”). BS.

Homelessness isn’t a characteristic (even as some are more likely experience it) 2/6

The only things “chronic” about homelessness are the public policies & structural racism that produce it and allow it to persist.

Absent access to housing, health care, income & support, the only difference between the “newly” & “chronically” homeless is this:

Time.

3/6

More individuals and families are experiencing or will soon experience homelessness following disaster - many for the first time. Those with resources, connections, health insurance & generational wealth will recover from the loss & trauma of it. Some quickly. 4/6

Those who are already residentially unstable, unemployed, working jobs that don’t pay livable wages, ill and without health insurance — disproportionately Black & Brown people — will face trauma upon trauma upon trauma, including & resulting from long-term homelessness. 5/6

So what do we do? We must resist dichotomization between “us” and “them.” We must invest in rent relief. We must build affordable housing. We must strengthen safety nets. We must recognize housing & health care as fundamental human rights. 6/6