Homelessness in America

4 Pages 1118 Words

Homelessness in America is one of the biggest political issues in America today. It occurs in every city in America. Homelessness has increased dramatically over the past ten to fifteen years. Many communities have doubled or tripled their shelter capacity in order to respond to increasing homelessness (NCH). Homeless men, women, and especially families are growing rapidly with the growing population. It seems that the problem is unsolvable in our society today. America is making changes to help the homeless get back on their feet.

“HOMELESS” DEFINED
Advocates civilized the use of the word “homeless” in the late 1970s, intending it as a non-stigmatizing way of referring to the street-dwelling poor and their counterparts in shelters. Faintly outdated itself, the term seemed well suited to a kind of poverty that had virtually vanished from the American landscape nearly four decades earlier. As the full dimensions of the problem have come into sharper focus, however, it is becoming clear that the term is showing signs of strain.
In the Stewart B. McKinney Homeless Assistance Act of 1987, the legislation which created a series of targeted homeless assistance programs, the Federal Government defined “homeless” to mean:
(1) An individual who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate night-time residence;
(2) An individual who has a primary night-time residence that is:
a. A supervised publicly or privately operated shelter designed to provide temporary living accommodations (including welfare hotels, congregate shelters, and transitional housing for the mentally ill),
b. An institution that provides a temporary residence for individuals intended to be institutionalized, or,
c. A public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings.
(3) This term does not include any individual imprisoned or otherwise detained under an Act of Congress or State law.
Pe...