Democrat States Have A Large Homeless Problem

On December 27th, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) released its annual report on homelessness. Unfortunately, homelessness reached an all-time high in our country. 

According to the Wall Street Journal, homelessness increased by 18% last year and has increased by 36% since 2019. Interestingly, statistics show that the largest increase in homelessness comes from “blue” Democrat states. 

California had a 23% increase in homelessness from 2019-2023. The increase in New York was 71% and  Illinois had a 153% increase. 

Texas had just an 8% increase in homelessness during the same period and Florida had just a 10% increase. In life you get what you pay for and the “blue” states spend huge amounts of money providing aid and shelter for the homeless. Surprise! Surprise! These states continue to have more homeless people. These blue states also attract more non-governmental agencies (NGAs) that “help the homeless.” These NGAs receive hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to help with homelessness. They get paid more if there are more homeless people. They have no incentive to reduce the homeless population and their policies actually help increase the homeless population.

Much of the repeat homelessness is with individuals who have mental illness or drug abuse issues. Florida and Texas have prosecuted drug possession and public disorder incidents which allows them to steer the arrested homeless person towards actual treatment for the underlying issue. 

The “blue” states don’t prosecute homeless people who break the law and therefore they have no bargaining power to push the homeless towards treatment for their underlying issues.

Blue states like California know how to spend taxpayer dollars on the homeless issue without obtaining a beneficial outcome. California spent $24 billion over the past 5 years trying to reduce homelessness. Guess what, there are more homeless people in California than when they started spending the money. 

For our Manatee Democrat readers: spending more money on helping the homeless without prosecuting the lawbreakers, accomplishes NOTHING except employing Democrat social workers.