There is some degree of sense here, but only if they embrace the idea from the position of cost savings to taxpayers.
To start with the dregs. Severe, chronic, homeless alcoholics are stupidly expensive to taxpayers, and despite endless efforts to break them out of alcoholism, it seldom works. But Seattle tried an experiment which worked.
Instead of trying to reform alcoholics, it put them in a refurbished old motel. They had a nurse there for any medical needs, and I believe they even got a social agency to provide them with food. And just by being off the street, it saved millions of dollars in ER, paramedic and police costs in the first year alone.
Totally unexpectedly, the alcoholics started drinking less, which I guess was an added bonus. It was even suggested that this system could be improved by letting them self-serve free grain alcohol and mixers, so they wouldn’t have to beg at all, but that was seen as too much.
The “high-end” homeless are families who are just temporarily homeless, and who get maximum public sympathy and support. The biggest help to them is having a “public boarding school for the poor” for their kids, which helps the parents find work, and earn enough money to get a deposit on an apartment, pay off some debts, etc., while not having to monitor, feed and care for their children. This can halve the time they spend being homeless.
The “less sympathetic adult homeless” are the majority that remain. They are often a combination of problems, drug and alcohol, psychiatric, and just general failure. This is probably the hardest group to help, because they generally don’t want help.
Finally there are the “young homeless”, often runaways, who are terrified of government, which they see in an even worse light than do conservatives. Oddly enough, some have severe claustrophobia, and find it intensely difficult to sleep indoors. Others have a “traveler” mindset, and migrate either with the weather, or to where they can find their peers.
Many of these are what are called “blanks”, who reject any form of identification, and do not want to belong to any system at all, for fear of control and persecution by the police and government. They try to live within the black economy, where everything is done for cash or trade. They are usually voluntary homeless, and only a perhaps 20% or less of them remain that way into adulthood.
The most effective means of approaching young homeless is done by churches, who are much more effective in helping them than is government. Especially very young runaways from extremely abusive families who know that if they are captured by the police, they will be returned to their families, where they face brutality, rape and even death.
Some of these children are effectively raised by a congregation as unofficial foster parents, who lavish loving care on them, give them a good education, even eventually sending them to college. No real name for this, but heaven must surely approve.
From what I know about homelessness, is that yes, people are often homeless by choice.
If they go to say a shelter run by a Christian/religious/service organization. Hell even government-run, they have rules. As in no smoking, no drugs, no drinking.
That's fine for someone down on their luck, but for a hard-core addict/alcoholic, they are not going to play by those rules. They'd prefer to sleep outside if they can continue to use.
One of my favorite documentaries is called Dark Days. It talks about the tunnel people of NYC who live underground. These people live in hand built shanties, have tapped the electricity, and water lines, and basically live off the grid, drinking and drugging themselves silly.
But oh, what a dangerous place.
They've got their rules, and talk about some extremely freakish human beings. Some folks never leave, they stay down there for years.