Jonathan Choe: President Trump left with no choice but to intervene in failed homelessness strategies

Seattle and many other major cities across the country have long embraced two failed strategies to address homelessness: “housing first” and “harm reduction.” Thankfully, a new executive order issued by President Donald Trump last month seeks to scrap both of these policies and finally end the disorder that has plagued America’s streets.

The executive order has independent journalist and Discovery Institute Senior Fellow Jonathan Choe singing the president’s praises.

“The record homelessness, the record drug overdose deaths on the streets—the current plan is just not working, and that’s why the Trump administration had to move in,” Choe told The Jason Rantz Show on Seattle Red 770 AM.

Charting a new course

Discovery Institute has long advocated for an end to the housing first and harm reduction models—and when you look around Seattle, it’s easy to see why. In fact, Choe says he’s never seen any government successfully implement these two strategies.

“If it’s a single mom who just lost a job and needs a six-month to a one-year bridge to get back on her feet, that makes sense for housing first,” said Choe. “But when you use this as a one-size-fits-all for the chronically homeless—the people you see on the streets of Seattle, 12th and Jackson, downtown San Francisco, Portland— it’s not going to work.”

Housing first is a strategy of placing homeless in subsidized housing without conditions and then addressing the underlying causes of their homelessness. While services to help them are offered, however, they’re usually not compelled to enter them, leaving them in permanent supportive housing. Harm reduction offers clean drug paraphernalia to addicts in order to keep them alive long enough to seek treatment. But they’re merely enabled with treatment seldom meaningfully offered.

Choe notes that you know the new directive from the Trump Administration is effective because those that have profited off the homelessness crisis are the most worried.

“I’m seeing the players in the homeless industrial complex—the DESCs, the Plymouth Housings—being genuinely concerned that they’re going to lose major funding,” says Choe.

Hitting them where it hurts

In a state like Washington, there’s a fear that King County will simply absorb the hit in federal funding and continue to pursue these failed policies. Choe, however, remains hopeful that these federal cuts will be a big enough cudgel to make state and local governments fall in line.

“These federal cuts will be substantial for anyone who decides to go down this road alone without the federal government…There is a choice: either pivot away from Housing First and Harm Reduction and go to treatment and detox first, or else you’re on your own,” said an optimistic Choe.

Listen to the full conversation with Choe below.

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