Housing First – The best option for the homeless

There has been a movement in the low income housing segment called Housing First for some time now, but it is finally getting noticed and even better implemented on a nationwide scale.

Previously the homeless had to “earn” housing by in some manner getting ready, such as getting sober.  This represented a very large barrier to the homeless population in general.

Since it was determined that housing in and of itself is theraputic and that folks who are housed have better and quicker roads to recovery, Housing First was born.  Housing First means exactly what it implies which is you allow these folks access to housing even though they may not be “ready”.

I would like to direct you to the NPR.org site(http://www.npr.org/news/specials/housingfirst/?sc=emaf)  and their yearlong special reporting on this and other topics revolving around homelessness.

Below are other links on the topic for you to explore.

Beyond Shelter: http://www.beyondshelter.org/aaa_initiatives/ending_homelessness.shtml

A sudy released by HUD on the subject: http://www.huduser.org/publications/homeless/hsgfirst.html

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_first

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