Opportunity Now with Tom Wolf & Irene Smith
Here is the four part series from Opportunity Now’s interview with Tom Wolf & Irene Smith.
We discuss immediate large scale shelters & Salvation Army successes, accountability, and prop 36.
Tom Wolf, formerly homeless and in recovery from heroin and fentanyl addiction, is an outspoken advocate — and sometimes critic — about California’s policies that have impacted homelessness. He also co-founded the California Peace Coalition and founded the Recovery Education Coalition.
Irene Smith — D3 Council candidate and head of Independent Leadership Group — has lived in downtown San Jose for 35 years and observed the worsening homelessness crisis since 2016. She is also a pro tem judge for Santa Clara County and has been a housing provider for 35 years.
Why large-scale community shelters make so much sense for SJ
“We will continue to play whack-a-mole with the great moral magnitude of our homelessness crisis — until we greatly increase shelter capacity. By orders of magnitude.” — Irene Smith part 1
Smith and Wolf: Where SJ and SF’s Housing First methodology went wrong
“There’s a middle ground. It’s not a choice between everyone living on the creek side and everyone getting a subsidized $1.1 million home. The interim solution is to immediately build sprung structures and start helping folks up the ladder of housing success.” Irene Smith part 2
Wolf and Smith: Why they’re so thumbs-up on the promises of Prop 36
“So the encampment wasn’t just a bunch of people down on their luck. 25% of the people in that alley were absconding from law enforcement.” Tom Wolf part 3
“We’ve blurred the line between helping and enabling.”
Tom Wolf on CARE courts: “Every human being is capable of recovery — I’m living proof of that. You have to want it, but you also need to be given the right set of tools to accomplish it.” part 4
