[seanmcdirmid]

Homeless services can’t discriminate based on previous residency, they aren’t even allowed to ask. HUD has some residency requirements, but they are only loosely enforced. A lifelong resident of SF are often competing for the same resources with ex-cons who just got off the bus after being released from prison in Texas given only an open bus ticket.

That being said, a resident of SF has many more other ways of avoiding the streets (and still be considered unhoused) vs that ex-con, so the numbers are going to be lopsided if we are just counting the visible homeless problem.

[fragmede]

That's weird. I learned just last week that Palo Alto requires proof that you ever lived in Palo Alto with a piece of mail before they'll let you into their shelter. Also their shelter has bunk cots. not bunk beds, bunk cots, so the bottom person is inches away from the top person.

[seanmcdirmid]

According to https://www.asaints.org/outreach/hotel-de-zink/, that is Palo Alto’s only homeless shelter and it doesn’t mention a residency requirement. It also doesn’t have the bunks you are referring to.

[fragmede]

They have a 6 week waiting list.

The place with the bunk cots is WeHOPE.

[seanmcdirmid]

East Palo Alto is not the same as Palo Alto at all. I can definitely believe that is at least feasible then, although they do not list a residency requirement on their website. The only requirement is:

Must have a referral from a San Mateo County, or Santa Clara County Partner Organization to receive shelter.

[fragmede]

They may be legally distinct, but we can agree that they're physically adjacent, and thus for someone who's unhoused in the Bay Area, they're both options on where to live. I don't think an invisible line that anybody can cross without any sort of border control really that important a distinction here.

[seanmcdirmid]

I would never call them the same. East Palo Alto is much much poorer than Palo Alto; I think I would be laughed at when I was living in San Mateo if I ever tried to pass off a location in East Palo Alto as being in Palo Alto. One is full of Stanford kids and rich people, the other is full of poor people. Highway 101 isn’t a very invisible line.