After reading the February 7 article entitled, " Homeless Day Center to Open in Downtown Santa Barbara ," I wanted to first congratulate Barbara Andersen on her dogged fight to bring a day center to downtown Santa Barbara. Her perseverance will undoubtedly directly benefit hundreds of Santa Barbara residents. I, however, found the sentiment expressed in the last paragraph of the article troubling.
Anderson is quoted as saying, “ … there will be fewer La-Z-Boys … It’s going to be really housing focused. We accept people where they’re at, but we may give them a little nudge.” Within this statement there seems to be two ideas implied: first that making the experience of homelessness too comfortable will disincentivize individuals from moving to housing and second that the barrier to entering housing is personal will — in need of only a “nudge.” I would argue that both these ideas are, at best, objectively false.
Homelessness is a traumatic event, one that repeats every day for many in our community. The statistics on the effect of homelessness on physical and mental health, exposure to violence — especially sexual violence — and vast shortening of life expectancy, show homelessness to be a devastating experience. Providing those experiencing homelessness a bit of respite, even in a recliner, is not going outweigh these horrors. Imagining so is absurd.