Dec 28, 2018, 12:43pm

Climate Change Is Already Helping To Drive Up Homelessness

Erik Sherman
The devastating ‘camp’ fire in Paradise has almost completely destroyed the town in Northern California. Six weeks after the flame inferno, the state of emergency still prevails.

We already can reasonably expect that climate change will increase gentrification in the future, as people with money who get pushed by rising seas on the coasts seek replacement housing further inland.

But climate change is already causing housing problems. It helps increase homelessness.

Earlier in December, the Department of Housing and Urban Development released its annual report on homelessness, this year called The 2018 Annual Homeless Assessment Report (AHAR) to Congress. Here’s a summary paragraph:

Homelessness increased (though modestly) for the second year in a row. The number of homeless people on a single night increased by 0.3 percent between 2017 and 2018. The increase reflects declines in the number of people staying in emergency shelters and transitional housing programs being offset by increases in the number of people staying in unsheltered locations. Between 2017 and 2018, the unsheltered population increased by two percent (or 4,300 people).

By the way, HUD issued a press release with the headline, “HUD reports homelessness unchanged in U.S. in 2018 with notable declines among veterans and families with children”.

That’s a contradiction to the quote from the report above.

Anyway, back to reality. The question is why, at a time when the economy is supposedly doing so well, an increasing number of people find themselves without a permanent home. One reason is that, as often discussed here, the economy concentrated benefits upward. Those who had got. Which is not true.

Another reason is the ongoing upward march of rental housing costs. More U.S. households are renting their home than in the last 50 years. That has helped create a growing rent burden that threatens financial security for millions.

Falling into homelessness is much easier to happen than often supposed, as millions have found. Buckling under the weight of the financial burden can be one reason. But there are others. As the HUD report noted, close to 1% of the homeless counted in January when the agency takes its sample were in shelters for people displaced by national disasters, whether Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Maria, and Nate, western wildfires, or some other storm or event. And many of these events showed greater destructive power tied to climate change.

We are in the early stages of seeing effects from climate change and already there is evidence of weather driving people from homes. For a more recent example not included in the count, look at the Camp Fire disaster in northern California. In 11 days, wildfires destroyed almost 14,000 residences. A one-day count can miss many people who have lost their housing.

The numbers of homeless likely will only go up due to climate change. And when you don’t have a home, you have a hard time keeping a job, raising a family, and building wealth.

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I do not agree with the above article.

In my opinion, the cleaning of under brush in all areas, especially forests, would help.  Also, this business of having controlled burns is a farce.  It is a danger to any community because of nature against man.  Thinking man can control a fire is also a joke.  Also during the Harvey storm, it has been proven in court that this was a man-made disaster by allowing the government to flood some of the  homes which they now realize was a terrible mistake.

It is time to be sensible about any fire.  When it starts – put the damn fire out and quit experimenting and “playing around” with the fire.   The old adage is – IF  YOU PLAY WITH FIRE YOU ARE GONNA GET BURNED.

And saying that homelessness will go up due to climate change is not true.  We have always had people “living on the streets” because they want to.  In earlier days they were called bums and begged for money and food.

With the amount of donated cash given to charitable organizations in the U.S. every year and churches who furnish housing, money,  and food to the homeless in the U.S. and all of the foreign aid supplied to the world – and the U.S. has a homeless population – I smell a rat.

The homelessness was created  by the Obama Democrats to denigrate the country and reduce the standard of  living.  Why – because that is what Democrats do – they want to create a lower under-class to match the world.

Notice all of the homelessness is propagated under the auspices of the Democratic Party – Los Angles, CA; Chicago, IL; New York, NY; Houston, TX, and San Francisco, CA.  They relish in the joys of trash and makes the politicians like Pelosi and Schumer feel superior.

Pelosi and Schumer forget the U.S. is the “bread basket” of the world.  How much of this foreign aid is money-laundered back into their pocket books?  An investigation is needed.

Plain and simple.

kommonsentsjane