Resource Center

The Supreme Court ruling in City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson, lets lawmakers impose fines and jail time on people experiencing homelessness who are sleeping outside. This decision will provide more clarity to state and local leaders about legal steps they can take to clear out encampments. However, advocates say that the ruling will enable lawmakers to effectively criminalize the state of being unhoused.  Margot Kushel, MD, director of the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative, said, "It's expensive, it's inhumane, and actually there are real solutions that do work."

In the state of California, the three major utility companies, have nearly doubled electricity rates over the last decade. With growing increase in energy demands, the rising utility costs are pushing families already at the margins to the brink of homelessness. Many people are forced to making an impossible choice. Margot Kushel, MD, director of the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative, said, "I think recognizing energy insecurity as a contributor to this crisis, this is the next frontier that we need to really worry about."

Following is a statement by Dr. Margot Kushel, MD, Director of the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative (BHHI) at the University of California, San Francisco on the 2023 Annual Homeless Assessment Report, released today by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

A record number of seniors are burdened by high housing costs. A new report from University's Joint Center for Housing Studies sounds the alarm as the US population ages rapidly. The number of seniors who will qualify for federal housing subsidies will continue to grow. The report also notes that more people over the age of 50 are losing housing for the first time. Margot Kushel, MD, director of the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative, said, "Increasingly, the story of homelessness among adults is going to be older adults living in poverty, who are spending what should be their retirement years in the streets."

California passed the Community Assistance, Recovery, and Empowerment (CARE) Act in 2022 to provide behavioral health and housing services to individuals with psychotic spectrum and schizophrenia disorders who are deemed unable to care for themselves. This policy brief from the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative at UCSF and the California Policy Lab uses anonymized data to estimate how many San Franciscans in a database of individuals who have contact with the urgent and emergent care system may be eligible for referral to CARE Court and describe their service needs.

People with multiple, complex health and housing needs frequently receive fragmented care because the providing systems operate independently. The California Policy Lab at UC Berkeley and the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative worked with partners in San Francisco’s public health and criminal legal systems to link together ten years of data from the physical health, behavioral health, housing, and criminal legal sectors.

Recently the demographic characteristics of people experiencing individual homelessness have changed; more individuals over the age of 50 are experiencing homelessness. BHHI researchers examined the motivations for and challenges of older adults experiencing homelessness staying with or moving in with family or friends. Researchers found barriers to stay such as feelings of shame and concerns about burdening the hosts. Findings suggest that family members and friends may play an important role in supporting older adults experiencing homelessness.

In the United States there has been a simultaneous rise of mass incarceration and homelessness. Both of these phenomena are driven by the same structural factors, housing being the most important. Researchers present evidence-based approaches to improve housing strategies for reentry populations, prevent homelessness among those in community supervision, and rehouse members of the reentry community experiencing homelessness.

In this cross-sectional study, researchers studied the association between residential relocation and health outcomes in people who inject drugs (PWID). PWID are at an increased risk of low socioeconomic status and homelessness. Researchers found that any residential movement in the past 30 days was associated with increased odds of bad health outcomes.

The homeless population is aging and adults who experience homelessness for the first time in older age are more likely to progress to chronic homelessness. To prevent or delay homelessness, many people live temporarily live with family or friends. In this qualitative study of homeless older adults, researchers conducted 46 semi-structured interviews. They found that structural barriers to family and friends providing housing for temporary or permanent exits from homelessness included housing regulations, geographic and transportation challenges, and environments inconducive to older adults.