Community courts and the homeless: Do these programs make a difference?

Portugal has gone perhaps the farthest in decriminalizing drug use. It hasn't stopped drug usage, but it has reduced deaths, the spread of H.I.V., drug crime, and imprisonment.

Assertive community treatment teams working through outreach-centered programs in Maricopa County have become an industry standard for treating those with persistent and severe mental illnesses who have recently been incarcerated. They provide a long-term approach, aiming to halt a cycle of incarceration and hospitalization by focusing on underlying issues such as what caused the police interaction and incarceration.

A new restorative justice court in a Chicago neighborhood shows promise in bringing healing to the community through having defendants repair harm they’ve done and reintegrate into the community. It has support from key members of the criminal justice system but it faces funding issues and getting buyin from the community. Some argue restorative justice cannot operate effectively within the existing criminal justice system.

In Colorado, four communities are piloting a program that offers low-level drug or prostitution offenders an alternative to prison. This program, known as Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion, matches the offender with a case manager who in turn connects them with treatment and training resources.

As an alternative to traditional courts, community courts provide resources to those experiencing homelessness. Fines and jail time are often the punishment in traditional courts for those charged with trespassing or loitering, but community courts provide services that help people find housing, jobs, health care, and even offer mobile showers, food stamp assistance, and mental health care. While the long-term data are lacking and don't offer a clear picture of recidivism rates, community courts do provide a better quality of life for those living on the streets.

The New Leaf project ran a controlled trial to test the power of direct cash transfers with people experiencing homelessness. Fifty people were given a one-time cash payment of $7,500, which roughly equaled the sum of government income assistance spread out across the year. The impact was measured over 12 months and found that people in the cash group moved into stable housing faster, spent fewer days homeless, and saved more money. The organization found the lump sum, rather than monthly increments, allowed people to make decisions about how they could move their lives forward aimed at stabilization.

Disseminating correct HIV information to the public can be difficult but an HIV prevention program for the homeless has used artificial intelligence to select 'influencers' who are more likely to spread information. These individuals help to extend information through their social networks, resulting in more and accurate information reaching the public.

A Mumbai school located in a remodeled shipping container meets kids on the street where they are at. Signal School results from a collaborative effort between the city and a non-profit, and focuses on bringing education to migrant children, so that they are less likely to be forced into child labor or street begging. Signal School does more than just teach, it also provides meals, works with families to change the cultural perspective that education is an amenity for the privileged, and helps migrant families find permanent housing.

Although Eugene, Oregon's long-running, successful CAHOOTS program serves as one model for the new Portland Street Response, a more relevant model can be found in Denver's STAR program. Like CAHOOTS, STAR responds to mental-health and other crisis calls with medics and counselors rather than police officers. But Denver's size, demographics, and homelessness make it much more analogous to Portland. In STAR's first six months, it handled nearly 750 calls without a single arrest. Both STAR and PSR are starting small, so more resources are needed if the pilot projects succeed.

Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association Canada and Humanity First Canada teamed up to transform a bus into a mobile shelter for the homeless, complete with 20 beds, a kitchenette, a bathroom, internet, and more. The program is called Shelter Bus and, since launching in December 2019, has served over 1,000 people and reaches up to 50 people a day. The bus has been described as "heaven" by some guests, and they are now planning to have 3 buses by the next year.