Homelessness needs to be dealt with now

Hawaii can no longer wait before accelerating its outreach to the homeless.

Leadership in the state Legislature as well as Honolulu Hale must act immediately to implement an aggressive, comprehensive campaign giving the homeless options other than life on the streets.

In the short term, one of the options must be increasing the number of emergency shelters, especially for those whose illness or addictions create acute problems, for themselves as well as the community.

Such an effort also would begin relieving the visual blight that the campsites of the homeless create along thoroughfares in the urban center, especially in the tourist district of Waikiki. If there’s no relief soon for Hawaii’s visitors, currently being subjected to the sights of squalid encampments and the annoyance of panhandling, they won’t tolerate coming here for much longer.

Residents, meanwhile, should not have to tolerate losing access to clean public streets, parks and restrooms.

For those trying to live without shelter, the stark reality is that the streets are not safe. In the last six months Honolulu has witnessed the deaths of five homeless men. The most recent homicide victim was Scott MacMillan, a former chef who was down on his luck and died last week in a brutal stabbing.

The first step, one that should be taken by policymakers and the public alike, is to stop thinking about "the homeless" as a single class of people with the same needs. There are many variations of the homeless.

Some of them are the working poor or the newly jobless, many of them with families. These people need a bridge back to independence.

Some are new arrivals in Hawaii. Whether from the mainland or the Pacific, they need direction, including that the community won’t support the sidewalks and parks as places to set up camp.

But the most vulnerable, again, are those described as the "chronically homeless" — those suffering from mental and physical illnesses, including the dysfunction of substance abuse. Most important, this population is likely to grow, given the injuries suffered by many veterans of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Hawaii already has begun to grapple with the needs of homeless veterans, through the work of USVETS, the Institute for Human Services and other agencies, but more needs to be done:

» Lawmakers must move to expand funding for the Housing First program now underway by USVETS and IHS, a program targeting the chronically homeless, veterans and non-veterans alike. This funding could be provided through House Bill 519, held over from the last legislative session. Housing First helps the chronically homeless by providing subsidized housing first and then working with the person to resolve his or her other problems through counseling and treatment.

The strength of this approach has been proven in many cities. For example: Phoenix has successfully worked through its population of homeless veterans, which in 2011 were tallied at 222, placing all of them in its specially built "Victory House" complex.

Experts acknowledge that it’s more challenging developing such solutions in places where land and construction costs are high. The adaptation of existing structures must be pursued. Placement in existing apartment units was the goal of the city’s Housing First project, now stalled because the funding is tied up in the delayed sale of the city’s rental housing properties.

» Because the need is so critical now, it’s time to implement a quicker solution to house the homeless not accommodated by existing shelters. A coalition of government agencies and community groups has been surveying prospects in warehouses and other properties that could become available. There are also other adaptive strategies, converting containers and other structures for use as shelters. These ideas need to be enacted.

» The city should step up its enforcement of laws barring sleeping and camping on sidewalks, beyond the current "sweeps." That means, as suggested in a bill now before the City Council, police should be directed to help with the removal of items when they reappear on sidewalks after other city crews have left for the day.

But first there needs to be more places for the homeless to go, as the city clears its streets. Police should work more aggressively to enforce the laws, because that’s their job. But they will need to have more shelter options to hold out as alternatives to arrest and citation — and providing those is the job of city and state lawmakers.