“Being that both homelessness and addiction are heavily linked with poverty, it’s important that people can afford our solutions. This project will appeal to compassion in others and resist against treating these issues as ‘business as usual’. The nature of these issues are deeply unsustainable so the challenge will be in finding a solution that not only works for the time being, but can last well into the future.”
Low-Cost
Substance-Use Recovery
Recently, an experiment to decriminalize all drugs in Oregon failed, not because of the lack of deterrence for drug use but because of the lack of available resources and direction towards those resources. One of the most common reasons why rehab centers fail addicts is that they are unavailable to them because of high cost. Programs like Medicaid can help with MAT treatment at these places, but substance abuse counseling is not currently recognized as a need under Medicare, making it more difficult for addicts to access.
Housing
Nobody is homeless on purpose; shelter is a basic necessity of life, and if a person is living on the streets, chances are they do not have the financial resources available to them to find shelter elsewhere. Low-cost housing networks like Tiny Homes or inpatient rehabs are a good way to address this issue.
Humanizing
Substance-Use Recovery
One of the major flaws with modern approaches to Substance Abuse is that people often miss the very human aspect of addiction. People will not always make the best choices for themselves and others, and judgement or punitive action is often a more harmful response than helpful.
Housing
Homelessness is not just an awful life circumstance, but it is also criminal in many cities. People can face jail time for having nowhere else to go, and most cities in the United States have implemented anti-homeless infrastructure, including benches that you cannot lay down on and walls that are painful to lean against.
Resilient
Substance-Use Recovery
The greatest struggle a recovering addict faces is the possibility of relapse. Safety Nets must be in place for people who need to go through the process of recovery as many times as they need so that they can live without Substance-Use Disorder for the rest of their lives.
Housing
While inpatient treatment is a very good way to tackle the lack of shelter for individuals short-term, stable, permanent housing should be the end goal for everyone.
– Sources –
- Jennie Stephens. 2020. Introduction Introduction – Alternative Formats . Diversifying Power: Why We Need Antiracist, Feminist Leadership on Climate and Energy. Island Press
- Movement Generation. 2017. From Banks and Tanks to Cooperation and Caring – A Strategic Framework for a Just Transition