Blog

Homelessness seems to be everywhere right now. Nightly news, daily papers, emails and on the streets. Photos of people on the streets, in tent camps and in food kitchens. It would appear that this is a sudden, unexpected social issue. It is not. Homelessness has been a part of our society for generations, originally identified in the 1870s.

In the 1950s & 1960s, homelessness declined so significantly that researchers were predicting it would disappear by 1970. Instead, during the 1980s the economic recession, dramatic federal housing program cutbacks and deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill skyrocketed the numbers. The top causes of homelessness among families were: (1) lack of affordable housing, (2) unemployment, (3) poverty, and (4) low wages, in that order....

more