Waleed Qureshi – Project 4(Revision 3)

Waleed Qureshi 

ENG 1121 

Prof. Carrie Hall 

05/16/2019 

 

Homelessness

Homelessness is a problem everyone is aware of. We have seen it in train stations, trains, outside of subways, sidewalks, etc. Nowadays we see homelessness so much that it has become regular to us. So much regular that when we see a homeless person we think nothing and just walk away, ignoring them.

Homelessness is like a negative that comes with a positive. For example some addictive drugs like cigarettes are actually used for treatment but if drugs like these are used regularly, you get addicted to them. This is similar to homelessness as when cities get developed, more people move in to the city. The technology is improved and people end up getting more resources but, the more resources a city or state gets, the taxes has to be increased and that is what happens. Along with the taxes the rent for housing also increases and we all know how expensive it is to get a house in New York.

This problem began by the time of 1980’s. Before that the people in New York were able to get housing easily and never had to worry about rent. Whenever someone came into crisis, they just moved to a housing that was more cheaper or something that suited them more, something that they were comfortable with but after 1980, housing started getting more expensive at a fast pace forcing people to go homeless. Since the housing never stopped getting more expensive and hence the amount of people going homeless has also increased.

Some causes of this problems are low wage and unemployment. Today about 8 million of extremely low waged households pay half of their monthly income towards their housing. This means that the person probably has anything to spare for their saving due to other expenses for example groceries and other bills that one has to pay to survive the conditions of this world of technology that we live in. If not for that, if something bad happens for example an accident or something, you need to use your savings to handle that crisis but what if you don’t have any money to take care of that crisis, that is where a person goes homeless.

The other problem is the unemployment. This relates almost completely to the low waged problem. When people are not able to pay for their expenses or rent with low wage, how are they going to survive if they are not even able get money to feed themselves because they don’t even have a job. They don’t have a source of income. If people have some savings, they will survive but what if they run out of it eventually causing them to go homeless.

Now as students we all have something supporting us, but someday we have to be independent so we will might face similar problems to these and we will have to get through them but for now think about how you would feel if you were in their shoes so all I ask of all my fellow students is to help them in any way you can.

 

Video:

tohuratun chowdhury

Name: Tohuratun Chowdhury

Class: Eng1121

Professor: hall

 

Research Memo: Statistics of homelessness in new york city

 

        Homelessness has been a problem all throughout history. Wherever there have been people, there has been a person that doesn’t have a home. In some cultures it is look on as a freeing existence; freeing yourself from worldly problems and possessions. But in our culture it is viewed upon, for the most part, as a problem to society. In New York City, it has the highest homeless populations in the country, as of September 2004 there were 36,727 people living in shelters and welfare hotels with thousands more on the streets. This is a large significant number of people, but yet the city of New York along with Mayor Bloomberg is trying to get legislation to eject single males and females from the shelters and force them onto the streets where they then become vagrants and can be arrested. This seems like no solution for the homelessness problem.

       

The number of people experiencing homelessness in New York City has been growing, according to an annual report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).HUD’s Annual Homeless Assessment Report for 2018, released this week, found that on a single night in Jan. 2018, a total of 552,830 people experienced homelessness across the country. New York City accounted for 78,676 of those people, or just over 14 percent of the nation’s homeless.Per last year’s HUD report, the city’s homeless population totaled 76,501, meaning homelessness in New York City increased 2.8 percent from 2017.

 

In March 2019, there were 63,029 homeless people, including 15,193 homeless families with 22,412 homeless children, sleeping each night in the New York City municipal shelter system. Families make up three-quarters of the homeless shelter population.Over the course of City fiscal year 2018, 133,284 different homeless men, women, and children slept in the New York City municipal shelter system. This includes over 45,600 different homeless New York City children.

 

Research shows that the primary cause of homelessness, particularly among families, is lack of affordable housing. Surveys of homeless families have identified the following major immediate, triggering causes of homelessness: eviction; doubled-up or severely overcrowded housing; domestic violence; job loss; and hazardous housing conditions. Compared to homeless families, homeless single adults have much higher rates of serious mental illness, addiction disorders, and other severe health problems.

 

Research shows that African-American and Latino New Yorkers are disproportionately affected by homelessness. Approximately 58 percent of New York City homeless shelter residents are African-American, 31 percent are Latino, 7 percent are white, less than 1 percent are Asian-American, and 3 percent are of unknown race.

Research Memo – Waleed Qureshi

Waleed Qureshi 

Prof Carrie Hall 

ENG 1121 

 

Research Memo: Causes of Homelessness 

 

In my research I have gained more insight on the causes of homelessness and the overall process of becoming homeless. Every city in the United States has some sort of homelessness involved in it no matter how much developed it may be, but that is the problem. The more a city is developed, the more chances it has for homelessness to increase.  

This is because when a city or state becomes more developed, obviously its taxes also increase and as you follow through, the rents of houses or apartments also increases and unfortunately some people are not able to put up with the increasing rates of the city. This includes housing. According to a source, in 1970s, the community had plenty affordable housing. This meant that even when an individual or a family faced a crisis, the family or the individual just moved to another location with similar price range but then by the middle of 1980s, the count of affordable houses started to decrease significantly and has not increased ever since. Instead it continued to rise and the population of the city which did not receive enough income began to come on the streets.  

Even today, 8 million extremely low-income households pay at least half of their income towards housing therefore putting them at the risk of homelessness if any unfortunate events were supposed to take place. This problem has continued to grow and even in New York city which is supposed to be the state with the highest population has not been able to avoid the problem of homelessness and about 75000 of its population is moving towards homelessness at an increasing pace just like other cities with high population due to high rent in the city. 

 Another reason for poverty is the lack of employment in a household. The equation is simple, and everyone knows it. The equation is that if you can’t bring money home, you got no money for rent and nobody is going to go easy on you and they will kick you out. As harsh as it may sound, unfortunately it is the truth. Even for myself I have heard this truth from my father. As I just explained, unemployment needs to decrease for homelessness to decrease.  

Another reason for homelessness that is like unemployment is low-wage. As explained earlier, extremely low waged households lose half of their income goes into paying the rent. This leaves half the income for food, bills, repairs and other purchases a man must make to keep his household together. 

 In a recent report by Early Intervention to Prevent Persistent Homelessness presented us with two of many reasons of homelessness which were low-wage workers and the ones who lose their jobs, and the youth who get into public assistance. Now according to the researchers, while majority of these groups are able to break free of the problem of homelessness quickly, but still 8 percent of these groups tend to stay homeless. 

 According to another survey. A random group sleeping on the street was selected and from them who were aged from twenty to fifty-six, five of them are unemployed, one is homeless, some of them were out of work for months and some just wanted to get into a new career. 

Research Memo

Brandon Ma

Each and everybody would need to work to earn some living to survive, and unfortunately not everybody has the same journey. Everyone was taught to go to school, and work hard to find a full time job to survive in the real world. Not everyone is fortunate enough and may experience many problems that impact an individual differently from everyone else in our society.

One of the many reasons that can lead people to going homelessness is gentrification. What I found out in my research was how the homeless can be impacted by personnel matters or even thing beyond an individual’s control.According to Vice News and HomeAid, a person who may have lost their full time job especially can affect their entire life. The mother of a daughter who was interviewed by Vice News, Danielle Williams, unfortunately lost her full time job and was unable to live in her apartment. She was eventually forced out of her home and is currently living in the van, one of the many people taking advantage of the safe parking program.

Currently our Mayor de Blasio, has implemented changes to help the homelessness in need. “homelessness has worsened, from 50,689 persons living in shelters at the time of Mayor de Blasio’s January 2014 inauguration to over 60,000 today”(NyDaily). He hasn’t help improved the situation of the rising homeless, however, he has attempted to improve and reduce the amount of people who may fall back into homelessness. He has improvised a “three plans to combat homelessness”(NyDaily) to combat homelessness by 2021. So by 2023, “Approximately 20 of the new shelters are to open each year for the next five years, with each community responsible for assuming shelters for its homeless “population(NyDaily) to help those in need in their perspective borough.

While there are many solutions out there, some notable ones in Vice News was this program that offers safe parking. If people have downgraded out of their apartments and have a car to sleep in, this would be a great place for people and be safe. In New York City, it will be very difficult because there aren’t too many free places to park your car for the night and it can be very dangerous. There are many places that have violence and safety can not be guarantee when you’re in sleeping in the city. Another solution is the HomeAid, an nonprofit organization, “builds and renovates multi-unit shelters for America’s temporarily homeless families and individuals”. These non-profit organizations also provides help especially in new york city where the public housing are so full, that many families or individuals are still waiting in line for an apartment from months to several years. Another solution would be more affordable housing for those who are unable to afford housing in our gentrifying neighborhoods such as “Manhattan and brooklyn”(NyDaily).

 

Work Cited

Gertler, Eric. “Combating Homelessness Today: Looking beyond Shelters – and Making It Easier to Get Housing .” Nydailynews.com, 26 Mar. 2017, www.nydailynews.com/opinion/smarter-battle-plan-homelessness-article-1.3008528.

Giraldo, Cassandra, et al. “California’s Housing Crisis Is so Bad People Are Living in Cars.” VICE News, VICE News, 6 Sept. 2018, news.vice.com/en_us/article/qvmgem/california-has-a-hidden-homelessness-crisis.

News, VICE. “The Hidden Homelessness Crisis In California (HBO).” YouTube, YouTube, 6 Sept. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wCHtOTxQak&t=20s.

Solutions, Blue Tangerine. HomeAid, www.homeaid.org/HomeAid-Stories/69/top-causes-of-homelessness.

 

 

 

For Thursday: Research Memos due

Hey everyone! For Tuesday, please post your research memo on OpenLab and also bring in a copy for EACH MEMBER OF YOUR GROUP.

The research memo is just 1.5-2 pages in which you summarize what you learned in your research. I’m not grading you on grammar or anything. Remember! Extra credit for groups that have interviews in their research.

For the memo please click two categories: “Community Problems” AND your group’s category

GROUPS:

  • Preventing college date rape (category: “preventing rape”)
  • Noise Pollution
  • On My Block
  • MTA: System fighters (category: “system fighters”– this is Shauntai, Ife and Josh.)
  • Living in NYC
  • Saviors of the MTA (category: “saviors” David, Pavel, Eric)
  • Homelessness