No Place to Call Home

On July 24, the president of the United States signed “Ending Crime and Disorder“, an Executive Order (EO) which attempts to make it easier for states and localities to criminalize individuals experiencing homelessness and to force them into involuntary treatment by instructing federal departments to prioritize federal grants for states that implement harmful, ineffective, and costly policies to address homelessness, such as bans on encampments, increased use of law enforcement, and the forced institutionalization of people experiencing homelessness. The Executive Order comes as the homeless and unhoused population is at its highest, as housing costs continue to escalate, and the latest jobs report shows a stall in the growth of employment. Employers are hiring fewer people.

The EO claims: “The overwhelming majority of these individuals are addicted to drugs, have a mental health condition, or both. Nearly two-thirds of homeless individuals report having regularly used hard drugs like methamphetamines, cocaine, or opioids in their lifetimes. An equally large share of homeless individuals reported suffering from mental health conditions.” While there are members of the homeless population who have substance abuse and/or mental health challenges, these are not the experiences of the entire homeless and unhoused population. Nor is this population solely responsible for “crime and disorder.” It is disingenuous to opine that incarcerating and institutionalizing the homeless population will end crime and disorder.

A primary assumption is that homelessness results from addiction or mental health conditions and ignores the contributing economic factors and escalating cost of living experienced by populations across the country. The order amplifies concerns for those needing assistance who will be exposed to greater risk and harm, with the possibility of forced institutionalization or incarceration. The criminalization and forced institutionalization of the homeless does not in any way affect the root causes of escalating homelessness.

Traveling in any major city in the United States, it is hard to miss people who are living on the streets. Yet, homelessness is not relegated to those who are visibly living on the streets, nor is it an urban issue. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) defines experiences of homelessness as lacking a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence with four identified categories of homelessness: literally homeless, imminent risk of homelessness, homeless under other federal statutes and fleeing/attempting to flee domestic violence. Many of the nation’s homeless have jobs, some more than one, and there are individuals and families living within the four identified categories.

This Executive Order adds one more group of people to the numbers feeding the growing for-profit prison complex in the United States. While the former president issued Executive Order on Reforming Our Incarceration System to Eliminate the Use of Privately Operated Criminal Detention Facilities in January 2021 banning the use of private prisons, the current president’s executive order Initial Recession of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions revoked almost 80 presidential actions with one stroke of the pen. The reversal of the Biden Executive Order has reopened the doors to private prisons which are now receiving immigrants and will receive the homeless.

The National Alliance of End Homelessness states: “Homelessness is one of America’s most visible yet least understood challenges. It affects people from all walks of life who struggle due to economic hardship, lack of affordable housing, or other systemic barriers. The reality is that most people are forced into homelessness by circumstances beyond their control. The solutions lie in systemic changes, not quick fixes.” Solutions for the problem are needed even as the number of individuals living without permanent or fixed housing continues to escalate. This latest Executive Order is not a solution to homelessness.

Homelessness continues to increase across the US for a variety of reasons. The rise in homelessness in 2024 can be attributed to the nation’s worsening shortage of affordable housing, stagnant wages that have not kept up with increased housing costs, the effects of increased inflation over the past few years, and the ending of many pandemic-era benefits and protections that helped keep individual and families stably housed. Lack of social safety nets, increases in natural disasters and increased immigration are also identified as contributing factors to the increase in homelessness.

Social safety nets are programs that provide support for individuals during times of economic hardship. These include Medicaid, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) – programs which support the most financially vulnerable populations. With predictions of job losses, loss of revenue to states, and reduction in services in the wake of the passage of the budget reconciliation bill the numbers of people experiencing hardship will continue to increase.

In December 2024, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development released The 2024 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report (AHAR) to Congress (Part 1). The 103-page report provided an annual estimate of homelessness in the United States from 2023 to 2024, noting an 18% increase in the homeless population. Among the key findings in the report:

• The number of people experiencing homelessness on a single night in 2024 was the highest ever recorded with a total of 771,480 people – or 23 of every 10,000 people in the US experiencing homelessness.
• Nearly all populations reached record levels in 2024 – families with children, individuals, individuals with patterns of chronic homelessness, people staying in unsheltered locations, people staying in sheltered locations, and unaccompanied youth.
• People in families with children had the largest single increase in homelessness.
• Nearly 150,000 children experienced homelessness on a single night in 2024.
• Veterans were the only population to report continued decline in homelessness.
• About one in every five people experience homelessness in 2024 was 55 years or older.
• People who identify as Black, African American or African continue to be overrepresented among the population experiencing homelessness.

Communities of faith have long participated in providing shelters and housing options for those needing housing. People of faith are providing programs and services that support the needs of vulnerable individuals and are attempting to address the root causes in their communities. As houses of worship are considering what to do with buildings and land as membership declines, and while many are using spaces to address the need for housing in their communities, more programs and services are needed. Congregations are re-thinking how they use the spaces they occupy to accommodate the social challenges in their communities. Low income and affordable housing projects are being provided by churches across the country, these options will need to be prioritized as individuals continue to be priced out of communities they once called home.

Advocacy also needs to continue as vulnerable communities continue to be targeted and threatened by government policies which are increasing the rates of incarceration and are funding private prisons. The commitment to care and provide for the “least of these” is at the fore for people of faith.

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