Skids Drug Abuse

Addiction, violence, unemployment, prevalent mental and physical illness, unsanitary spaces, and various other social issues are commonplace in East Hastings, Vancouver, the skids if you will; these conditions are mainly the result of homelessness in the area as those without shelter are more likely to do the following: become addicted to drugs, become subject to violence, commit violence, become unemployed, live in unsanitary spaces such on the sidewalk, become mentally ill, and et cetera. These factors combine to form a vicious cycle of low standards of living for the homeless in the skids. Thus, in order to truly eradicate or, at least, alleviate the severity of these issues, it is paramount that reducing the number of homeless people on

In the case of drug abuse, the law prohibits drug use and considers it a crime. While it is logical to prohibit the general population from using substances that are detrimental to one’s health and societal output/GDP, the fact is that when we consider the homeless’ drug abuse as a crime the result is higher numbers of incarceration and crimes as opposed to lower long term usage of drugs. A similar example is when the U.S. congress places a prohibition on alcohol in the 1920’s. In the end, “congress recognized that prohibition had failed to stop drinking and had increased prison population and crime rate” (David Boaz, CATO Institute, USA, 1999). So while it does not help reduce the number of drug use, it actually exacerbates the problem since “the long federal experiment in the prohibition of marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and other drugs has given us unprecedented crime and corruption combined with a manifest failure to stop the use of drugs or reduce their availability to children” (David Boaz, CATO Institute, USA,

Housing First is a relatively new social policy that emphasizes the importance of stable housing before anything else as the solution to homelessness. Housing First is different from the traditional public housing ideology because the traditional concept utilizes a system of transitional housing; it moves the homeless from the streets to public shelters, then from public shelters to transitional housing programs, and lastly, from transitional housing programs to independent housing (usually in apartments). Furthermore, the traditional approach has transitional checkups on the homelessness’ issues such as drug abuse in order to determine whether or not they are ready for the next stage in transitional housing. Meanwhile, the Housing First programs only consider issues with the homeless individual or household after having provided independent shelter, thus the name. The idea was first used in New York to help the chronically homeless and has now spread to various first-world countries such as Australia, France, and Finland. Housing First uses a selection of housing options such as Rent Supplement, Congregate Housing, and Convertible lease. The Rent Supplement approach allows homeless individuals/households to live in private rental buildings or secondary spaces in another’s home, all the while receiving a rent subsidy paid for by the government or community programs. Secondly, there is the Congregate