{"id":14165,"date":"2020-03-06T09:00:56","date_gmt":"2020-03-06T14:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=14165"},"modified":"2022-10-09T07:04:07","modified_gmt":"2022-10-09T11:04:07","slug":"homeless-deaths-in-nyc-on-the-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/homeless-deaths-in-nyc-on-the-rise\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeless Deaths in NYC on the Rise"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><p><em>Four hundred four.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s the number of homeless people that died in New York City between July 2018 and June 2019. New York City\u2019s Department of Social Services recently released its report, and the numbers are tragic. Despite political promises to curb homelessness and a <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/nycs-five-year-plan-to-end-homelessness\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">five-year plan<\/a> to end long-term homeless in the city, there remains an incredible amount of work to be done.<\/p>\n<p>This is the largest amount of homeless deaths recorded since recordkeeping began in 2006. It marks a dramatic increase over the previous year. The top five causes of death were:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Drugs<\/li>\n<li>Heart disease<\/li>\n<li>Alcoholism<\/li>\n<li>Accidents<\/li>\n<li>Cancer<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Fifteen suicides were recorded. There were also 10 murders, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsws.org\/en\/articles\/2019\/10\/14\/home-o14.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">four during one night<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The DSS report estimated the number of homeless people living rough or in shelters at 70,000, meaning that 14% of America\u2019s homeless population resides within New York City limits. This number is increasing year over year, despite Mayor de Blasio\u2019s 2014 statement that \u201can ever-growing homeless population is unacceptable to the future of New York City. It will not happen under our watch.\u201d He wasn\u2019t the first well-intentioned mayor to overpromise and under-deliver. Unfortunately, he won\u2019t be the last.<\/p>\n<h3>Something Wrong in the Big Apple<\/h3>\n<blockquote class=\"shared\"><p>While some may cite drug-related deaths as an indictment against homeless people, it\u2019s important to note these deaths are on the rise across any number of demographics. Drug-related deaths are a human problem, not a homelessness problem.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Many experts cite the rise in fentanyl\u2014both its popularity and availability\u2014as a main contributing factor to the uptick in deaths. Back to New York City, Health + Hospitals, the city\u2019s public health system, describes the toll that the opioid crisis has taken this way:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe presence of fentanyl in the NYC drug supply has dramatically increased the number of overdose deaths, and fentanyl is now the most common drug involved in overdose deaths. You can now buy for $5 fentanyl more powerful than $50 worth of heroin would have been \u2026 more than 30 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA lack of affordable housing\u201d is a common refrain in conversations regarding homeless deaths. New York City is not above this criticism. As a report from the NY Times states, \u201ceven as the city is in the midst of record lows in crime and an economic surge, it feels less affordable than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mayor de Blasio pledges to legalize <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2019\/10\/23\/nyregion\/basements-queens-immigrants.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">basement apartments<\/a> in an effort to increase affordable\/available housing. But there remains an oceanic gulf between the city\u2019s richest and poorest residents.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn Manhattan, the homeless shelters are full and the luxury skyscrapers are vacant.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So begins a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/ideas\/archive\/2020\/01\/american-housing-has-gone-insane\/605005\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">damning report<\/a>\u00a0from The Atlantic on NYC\u2019s housing crisis. Luxury skyscrapers seemingly go up at the same rate as the city\u2019s homeless. The city loses 300 people every day as home ownership is far too often a dream rather than reality. The middle class is feeling squeezed. The lower class is getting crushed.<\/p>\n<h3>404\u2014Not Found<\/h3>\n<p>If that number sounds familiar, it\u2019s because you\u2019ve likely run across it before. Without getting too technical, Internet users that try to find a page that doesn\u2019t exist run into a splash such as the one found below. The address the user entered is wrong, or perhaps more frequently, there\u2019s a problem on the website itself. The latter is frustrating, and there\u2019s not much a user can do about it.<\/p>\n<p>For New York City\u2019s homeless, affordable housing can seem like a page not found. This isn\u2019t just a frustration\u2014life under-delivering on expectations. Four hundred four homeless people are now in every sense of the words not found. Anonymous in life, lost forever in death\u2014these were sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, parents, students with dreams of a better life. They were us. And now they\u2019re gone.<\/p>\n<p>We need to do better. Here\u2019s hoping that NYC\u2019s five-year plan to end homelessness meets expectations. <em><strong>Tens of thousands of people cannot afford for it not to.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Four hundred four. That\u2019s the number of homeless people that died in New York City between July 2018 and June 2019. New York City\u2019s Department of Social Services recently released its report, and the numbers are tragic. Despite political promises &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/homeless-deaths-in-nyc-on-the-rise\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":14166,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[256,591],"tags":[13902,253,13074,832,515,508,258,257,899],"coauthors":[9560],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14165"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14165"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14165\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19476,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14165\/revisions\/19476"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14165"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=14165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}