Author: Abha Bhattarai and Rachel Siegel Source: The Washington Post Publication Date: July 3, 2022 | 8:00 a.m. EDT Link: Inflation is making homelessness worse
Stephan: You would think that cities and towns would realize that homeless people are an enormous drain on local resources, and that low cost housing was not only the most compassionate and humane strategy, it was also the cheapest option. But no, American culture punishes people in dozens of ways for being poor, and we all pay a huge price economically and socially because of that.
Sabrina Barger-Turner and her older son, Aiden Turner, 13, go through her to-do list on June 30 in Abingdon, Md. She was unable to pick up prints she had ordered from the Abingdon Public Library because they asked for a library card number, for which she is not eligible. Print sales are one of Barger-Turner’s sources of income. Credit: Maansi Srivastava / The Washington Post
The sheriffs arrived at 6 a.m. in early June to tell Josanne English what she already knew: She was being evicted.
She’d lost her job as a project manager near Sacramento in April, then fell behind on rent as $6-a-gallon gas and higher costs for food and utilities depleted her monthly budget. By the time she lost her home two months later, she owed $9,160 in rent and late fees, and her bank account was nearing zero.
She received $1,300 in housing assistance from the county, but that didn’t go very far in an area where the average asking rent has ballooned to nearly $2,800 a month. After a week in a hotel, […]
