We are angry today.  Angry and pissed off at this awful executive order from the White House that will criminalize homelessness and incentivize communities, states, and agencies to stop doing the things that we are doing and have already proven to work to end homelessness. Housing First with 24-hour supportive services works. Harm reduction approaches for substance use work. There are many other valuable services that ARE working that will now be abandoned.

More people will be arrested, our tax dollars – your money – will be spent to keep more people in jails and institutions. Anybody who knows anything about this complex work knows that this approach makes zero sense. It’s also incredibly cruel and will lead to decades of trauma, resulting in more generations of poverty for individuals and families struggling with homelessness.

Combined with the devastating cuts to Medicaid and SNAP, the latest executive order from the White House will only increase homelessness in Maine and the rest of the country. It will not reconnect people to their families and communities, it will not save money, and it will not save the lives of friends and family members who are going through tough times.

People are going through the hardest point in their lives when they’re homeless. When they are on the street or in encampments, sleeping in doorways or in crowded shelters, that’s the worst time of their lives. Now, we are choosing to add the threat of arrest and jail to this incredibly difficult time? And, adding a criminal record that will make it nearly impossible for individuals to ‘pull themselves up by their bootstraps.’

Nobody wants people living on our city streets, sleeping on the sidewalks, in bus shelters, or in doorways. But criminalizing homelessness only wastes our tax dollars, fails to end homelessness and disconnects unhoused people from critical services that effectively help them get housing, healthcare, and jobs.

There is enough money in this country to end homelessness. We can choose to have enough resources to compassionately support people who need help and are living outside. We can choose to treat people with dignity and respect and worthy of being our neighbors.

We know what we here at Preble Street choose to do.