A Tale of Two Crises
Local Homelessness Policy during Covid-19
Laura Kettel (Aarhus University)
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the situation of people experiencing homelessness and what communities could do to protect this vulnerable subpopulation emerged as an area of particular concern. People experiencing homelessness are both less likely to be able to self-isolate or quarantine (Edwards and Ott 2021) and more likely to suffer a severe case of COVID-19 due to underlying health conditions (Perri, Dosani, and Hwang 2020; Baggett et al. 2020). In addition, local mitigation efforts in response to the pandemic may have negative, unintended consequences for the population experiencing homelessness (Nichols and Mays 2021; Perri, Dosani, and Hwang 2020; N. M. Rodriguez et al. 2021).
To date, data on local responses to this issue is limited. A systematic assessment of community responses to homelessness during the pandemic provides insights into potential measures for future public health crises and reveals patterns that highlight barriers at the local level and the capacity of federal systems to manage such crises. This study aims to address these gaps. I collect new local data on measures put in place and analyze the response implemented in 254 communities across the U.S., as well as emerging spatial patterns.
I find that communities across the United States implemented a wide range of measures. While some of those measures, including the distribution of personal protective equipment and the provision of additional temporary shelter, often through housing people in hotels or motels, were implemented virtually everywhere, other measures only appeared in select jurisdictions. For instance, about 39% of communities installed infrastructure to improve sanitation. This included setting up handwashing stations, mobile showers, portable toilets, and garbage disposal facilities, mainly in or near homeless encampments. Given that business closures and limits on public space access made it difficult for people experiencing homelessness to maintain hygiene, these facilities played a crucial role in preventing the virus's spread. Testing for COVID-19 was available in 44% of the communities studied, either through on-site facilities, testing at shelters or encampments, or transportation to testing locations. Vaccination efforts were less widespread, with only 28% of communities providing vaccinations on-site or transportation to vaccination sites.
In addition, individual communities took further steps to extend care, including adjusting food delivery methods to ensure continued access to meals, opening daytime centers for warmth and services, and offering solar chargers to keep phones and other devices powered. Some communities responded to the pandemic by suspending the enforcement of laws that criminalize behaviors associated with homelessness, such as camping in public. These punitive approaches to homelessness are a prominent feature of the governance of public space in communities across the U.S. (Robinson 2019), and have been shown to reproduce hardship, create additional barriers for people experiencing homelessness, and increase costs related to law enforcement and healthcare (Robinson 2019, NHLC 2019). Of the communities in the sample, 11% implemented supported campsites or committed to not disband existing camps during the pandemic. Taken together, the study shows that many communities took innovative steps to protect the population experiencing homelessness during the pandemic.
At the same time, the data also show that there were significant differences in the types and extent of support provided across different communities. Examining the correlations between the type of response a community implemented and community characteristics, I find that local context, rather than federal guidance, shaped the local response for people experiencing homelessness. Variation in local responses was driven by local characteristics, leading to uneven outcomes across jurisdictions. More affluent, larger, and less conservative communities, as well as those where both homelessness and COVID-19 were particularly pressing issues, were more likely to take extensive actions. These patterns reflect broader trends in how local governments handle homelessness (Willison 2021) and map onto the broader pandemic response in the United States (Coglianese 2022; Birkland et al. 2021; Agnew 2022; Huberfeld et al. 2020). This study, therefore, highlights the challenges faced by federal systems in effectively responding to interjurisdictional crises.
Read the full UAR article here.
References
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NHLC. 2019. ‘Housing Not Handcuffs: Ending the Criminalization of Homelessness in U.S. Cities. National Homelessness Law Center.’ Homelesslaw.Org. https://homelesslaw.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/HOUSING-NOT HANDCUFFS- 2019-FINAL.pdf.
Nichols, Gabrielle, and Max Mays. 2021. ‘Supporting and Protecting Residents Experiencing Homelessness in the Nation’s Largest Cities during COVID-19’. Journal of Public Health Management and Practice 27 (1): S57–62.
Perri, Melissa, Naheed Dosani, and Stephen W Hwang. 2020. ‘COVID-19 and People Experiencing Homelessness: Challenges and Mitigation Strategies’. Cmaj 192 (26): E716–19.
Robinson, Tony. 2019. ‘No Right to Rest: Police Enforcement Patterns and Quality of Life Consequences of the Criminalization of Homelessness’. Urban Affairs Review 55 (1): 41–73. https://doi.org/10.1177/1078087417690833.
Rodriguez, Natalia M, Alexa M Lahey, Justin J MacNeill, Rebecca G Martinez, Nina E Teo, and Yumary Ruiz. 2021. ‘Homelessness during COVID-19: Challenges, Responses, and Lessons Learned from Homeless Service Providers in Tippecanoe County, Indiana’. BMC Public Health 21 (1): 1–10.
Willison, Charley E. 2021. Ungoverned and Out of Sight: Public Health and the Political Crisis of Homelessness in the United States. Oxford University Press.
Laura Kettel is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Political Science at Aarhus University. Her research focuses on local political economy, spatial inequality, and the politics of housing and homelessness. She received her PhD in political science from Freie University Berlin.