Cities repeatedly brand modest outreach efforts as novel solutions to visible street homelessness, using compassionate language to repackage long‑standing, ineffective practices. Those programs absorb funding and media attention while avoiding harder policy choices like housing supply, enforcement, or mandated treatment.
— Recognizing outreach as performative explains why visible homelessness persists despite large budgets and reframes debates about policy accountability, spending priorities, and urban governance.
Heather Mac Donald
2026.03.23
100% relevant
The article critiques New York’s WARM outreach program and the New York Times coverage that portrays it as a pioneering approach—an example of the ritualized rollout of identical outreach programs.
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