Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Today there’s a war against Housing First and supportive housing, often fueled by people and organizations pushing criminalization and a punitive response to homelessness, which we know will only make homelessness worse. These people have access to the same evidence we do. They just refuse to look at it with an honest and open mind, or they intentionally misrepresent the data to push their agenda of criminalization.
When Julián Castro was mayor of San Antonio, I was very critical of him because he supported Robert Marbut’s reward and punishment model. I have huge respect for Julián. Not only did he sit down with me and have a candid conversation about this on Homeless Unfiltered, he shared how once he got to HUD as Secretary, he looked at the evidence, saw what was working and what wasn’t, and changed his mind.
If other people would do the same. Honestly look at the evidence. Stop the misinformation. Work to fix what’s broken instead of tearing down a model that’s proven to work. We could have real impact in ending homelessness.
This war against Housing First is unproductive, and it hurts all of us.
Watch or listen to the full conversation on the Homeless Unfiltered podcast, wherever you get your pods, or visit invisiblepeople.tv/podcast.
Today there’s a war against Housing First and supportive housing, often fueled by people and organizations pushing criminalization and a punitive response to homelessness, which we know will only make homelessness worse. These people have access to the same evidence we do. They just refuse to look at it with an honest and open mind, or they intentionally misrepresent the data to push their agenda of criminalization.
When Julián Castro was mayor of San Antonio, I was very critical of him because he supported Robert Marbut’s reward and punishment model. I have huge respect for Julián. Not only did he sit down with me and have a candid conversation about this on Homeless Unfiltered, he shared how once he got to HUD as Secretary, he looked at the evidence, saw what was working and what wasn’t, and changed his mind.
If other people would do the same. Honestly look at the evidence. Stop the misinformation. Work to fix what’s broken instead of tearing down a model that’s proven to work. We could have real impact in ending homelessness.
This war against Housing First is unproductive, and it hurts all of us.
Watch or listen to the full conversation on the Homeless Unfiltered podcast, wherever you get your pods, or visit invisiblepeople.tv/podcast.
