As a California native, I know Kentucky should not replicate its homeless policies | Opinion
Living in California for the first 24 years of my life, I had a front row seat to watch the Golden State’s decline. This year I gave up hope that my state would ever see any positive change, picked up my life and moved to Kentucky, where I hoped I would find more common sense policies.
I hadn’t even been here for a full day before I learned about a bill that’s making its way through the legislature that proves those hopes were well founded. House Bill 5, the Safer Kentucky Act, which was passed by the House of Representatives last week, would make “unlawful camping” a criminal offense, punishable as a misdemeanor. Essentially, the bill would make it possible and necessary for law enforcement to enforce laws currently on the books that ban camping.
The bill, of course, was met with backlash from Democrats and Kentucky’s homeless coalition — parroting the same language used to ruin my native land. “It really does come down to whether we treat people like human beings or not,” said Adrienne Bush, Executive Director of the Homeless & Housing Coalition of Kentucky.
Take it from this Californian expat: Enforcing laws that keep human beings from living on the streets is the most compassionate thing you can do.
Over the years, the California legislature has funneled billions of dollars into “solutions” to the homelessness crisis, and the problem only ever increased. Kentucky is taking the best steps to avoid a similar future.
Disturbingly, WKYT’s coverage of this bill reminds me of California news. While the station did cover polling from the Cicero Institute revealing that a majority of Kentucky residents do actually want cities to enforce the bans on street camping, most of their stories feature interviews both the Homeless and Housing Coalition of Kentucky and the ACLU of Kentucky.
People should pay more attention to the polling data. Cicero’s 2023 Homeless Poll found that all sides of political affiliation in Kentucky are deeply worried about the state of homelessness in Kentucky.
76% of Kentuckians believed homeless people do not have a right to set up camp on the street, and a whopping 86%, across party lines, believed it was more compassionate to place them in shelters.
The majority opinion of Cicero’s polling reflects former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner’s opinion: “It is simply not acceptable for people to live on the streets. It is not good for them, and it is not good for the city,” and that is the common sense approach. Under Turner’s leadership, Houston’s homelessness population has dropped 54% since 2011.
It’s not compassionate to allow people to live on the streets. Compassion would encourage people to get off the street and get help — whether that be through mental health treatment, drug rehabilitation, or job training offered in shelters.
Decriminalization in the West Coast resulted in entire blocks of public street camping, obstructing entire sidewalks. Lexington, Louisville, and Frankfort do not need the same picture of uncontrolled homelessness that has become commonplace in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Sacramento.
According to the poll, 56% of Kentucky respondents understand that encampments are a threat to public safety, and they are. Homeless encampments create dangerous biohazards due to the lack of proper waste disposal and overcrowding. Kentuckians should not have to worry about the potential public health crisis similar to Flea Borne Typhus, currently considered “endemic” in California and “growing” according to the CDC. Allowing these vulnerable populations to remain unsheltered and at risk of contracting rare disease is frankly cruel.
The Homeless and Housing Coalition of Kentucky (HHCK) agrees with polled Kentucky voters that we need to prioritize reducing unsheltered housing. However, HHCK’s 2024 State Advocacy Agenda completely ignores what polled Kentuckians say is the biggest factors causing homelessness: Drug and alcohol addiction (33%) and Mental Illness (21%).
We’ve seen what happens when you ignore the root causes of homelessness. It looks like California. I do not want that to happen here.
Nick Ortiz moved from Riverside, California, to Lexington, Kentucky, in January 2024. He is the Brand Manager for Young Voices, a non-profit helping young professionals break into cultural and policy commentary.
