Our friends at the San Francisco Public Press have published a piece by Rob Waters on how homeless residents are moved outside of the city — at least for a while.
A San Francisco initiative to help homeless families find affordable apartments and assist them in paying the rent is sending most of them out of the city because of the high cost of housing. The families are moving to Oakland, Richmond, Vallejo and, increasingly, to the edges of the Bay Area and beyond, such as Stockton or Sacramento.
The multimillion-dollar subsidy program, called Rapid Rehousing, has helped hundreds of families regain their footing after an eviction, job loss or other crisis left them homeless, and for many families it has worked: They stabilize and remain housed after their rent assistance runs out.
But one year after their subsidies end, some families end up homeless again, and the whereabouts of hundreds of other families are unknown because they lose contact with their service providers. As a result, it is difficult to gauge the long-term success of the program, a Public Press review of data has found. READ MORE