San Jose Homeless

Most people have been aware that there is a high incidence of mental illness and substance use disorders among the homeless.  Many people also know that homeless people tend to suffer from a lot of chronic diseases.  Some know that the average life expectancy for the homeless in America is about 45 years old. ...

When you think about foster care, what comes to mind?  Warm, loving families playing Monopoly by the hearth?  Creepy halfhearted inept caregivers who are in it for the money and are probably abusing the kids, who don’t buy them school supplies so they have to get them from Sleep Train donations? I have seen...

My name is Jim Kenny known in The Jungle as The Ambassador (The Jungle, formerly the country’s largest homeless encampment, was cleared by city officials in December 2014).  I spent in excess of 4 years down there! I was one of thousands in the financial market in Boston and New York that lost their...

There has been a significant buzz about the new cost of homelessness study released last month by Destination:Home.  It is described on their website as “The largest and most comprehensive body of information that has been assembled in the United States to analyze the public costs of homelessness.” I am really glad that someone...

San Jose’s District 3 councilman, Raul Peralez has authored a proposal to prevent section 8 renters discrimination.  The City of San Jose has provided a number of housing vouchers to homeless individuals that used to live in the “Jungle”, a huge homeless encampment on Story Road.  Even though the vouchers are enough to cover...

Every time I think I have homeless people figured out, I meet another homeless person who is the perfect counterexample for my latest theory. That is to say, the homeless are a complex and diverse people.  So why are people homeless? There are some factors, however, which are more common, at least among our...

Data from the biggest cities in the United States suggest that cities with higher median household income report fewer homeless shelter beds.  The San Jose/Santa Clara County area bottoms the chart with the highest median income and the fewest number of shelter beds per homeless person. One might conjecture that wealthier towns have more...