Local Experts Push Back on Criminalizing Homelessness

"The solution to homelessness is still housing"

By Ren Brabenec | Sept. 27, 2025

On July 24, the Trump Administration issued an Executive Order titled “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets.” While the EO is not law, it does provide instructions on how the current administration wants communities, healthcare providers, housing organizations, and law enforcement agencies to address America’s homelessness crisis.

In summary, the EO calls for an institutionalization and incarceration-first approach, rather than the housing-first model previously used. Critics say the EO does not take into account how soaring housing costs, coupled with wage stagnation, are driving homelessness (more on that later), nor does it offer more funding for mental health and substance use disorder treatment, conditions that often go hand-in-hand with chronic homelessness.

While local leaders who work to address homelessness are ready to adjust their models in accordance with the current administration as needed to continue receiving federal funding, experts are voicing concern over the gap between the EO’s language and what actually works to end homelessness.

Housing Remains No. 1

Ashley Halladay-Schmandt is the director of Northwest Michigan Coalition to End Homelessness, an organization that focuses on continuums of care in Antrim, Benzie, Grand Traverse, Kalkaska, and Leelanau counties.

Continuums of care (CoCs), are defined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development as programs that, “quickly rehouse homeless individuals, families, persons fleeing domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking, and youth while minimizing the trauma and dislocation caused by homelessness; promote access to and effective utilization of mainstream programs by homeless individuals and families; and optimize self-sufficiency among those experiencing homelessness.”

The first draft of the Trump Administration’s “Big Beautiful Bill” called for a revocation of all funding for CoCs, but Halladay-Schmandt says constituent pressure on elected officials earlier this year was enough to remove that clause and ensure organizations like hers could continue operating.

Though homelessness is a complicated problem, Halladay-Schmandt says the core objective of solving it still has to be getting the unhoused into homes.

“Being unhoused [and finding housing] doesn’t look the same for everyone,” she says. “Most people we serve will leave homelessness within the first year of coming into contact with our organization. But some are chronically homeless. Some will require a comprehensive array of interventions to help them create better lives for themselves and the communities they live in.”

Halladay-Schmandt says housing is still the critical first step because it is next to impossible for the people to overcome other challenges they sometimes face (unemployment, substance use disorders, abuse, mental health crises) while unhoused. The coalition also focuses on connecting people with doctors, substance use treatment, and whatever other support they may need to get their lives back.

Today’s Housing Market Exacerbates Homelessness

While the coalition is ready to help find housing, sometimes it just does not exist.

“The affordable housing crisis in northwest Michigan is the No. 1 driver of homelessness in our community,” Halladay-Schmandt says. “It’s both the availability of housing and the cost. When the stock is very low and the cost is very high, you’re going to see more homelessness than you otherwise would.”

Halladay-Schmandt pointed us to research done by Housing North, a local nonprofit that focuses on eliminating barriers to affordable housing in northwest Michigan. According to a report published by the nonprofit in 2023, the vacancy rate for affordable housing in the region is nearly zero.

“We’re working on programs with the city and county to incentivize developers to set aside units for people experiencing homelessness,” says Halladay-Schmandt, previewing a task force that’s creating a multi-pronged solution for homelessness.

“But that’s not easy,” she adds. “Land is expensive, building costs are high, and affordable housing often needs to be subsidized, so we need support from elected officials at all levels of government to generate the funding needed to make that happen.”

When it comes to funding, studies show that housing the homeless is more affordable than institutionalizing or incarcerating them. In Colorado, a study of formerly unhoused people served by community-based mental health provider WellPower found that getting people into supportive housing saved taxpayers more than $3,700 per person per year in costs such as jail and police time. The study found that 77 percent of people who were given housing remained in that housing three years later.

The Brookings Institution arrived at similar conclusions. In their study, they found New York City incarceration costs are around $1,414 per day, whereas housing an unhoused person costs about $68 per day. A similar finding was reached in Seminole County, Florida. And on a national level, incarcerating one person for one year costs approximately $33,000. For comparison, the cost to house them ranges from $8,500 to $20,000, depending on the level of services needed.

Other Evidence-Based Interventions May Also Be on the Chopping Block

Speaking of other services, it’s important to note that the unhoused often require a comprehensive range of services to permanently transition them from being homeless to housed. But not everyone experiences homelessness because of addiction or mental health.

“It’s not true that all, or even a majority, of those who are without a home also struggle with a substance use disorder,” says Paula Lipinski, CEO of Addiction Treatment Services. “Most people who are unhoused experience homelessness on a more fleeting level, where they are in and out of homelessness due to economic conditions. However, it is true that the minority subset of this demographic, those who struggle with chronic homelessness, often have mental and/or substance use disorders. They often require comprehensive interventions to address their situation.”

We reached out to Lipinski because within that same executive order on homelessness, the administration states: “Ensure that discretionary grants issued by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration for substance use disorder prevention, treatment, and recovery fund evidence-based programs and do not fund programs that fail to achieve adequate outcomes, including so-called ‘harm reduction’ or ‘safe consumption’ efforts that only facilitate illegal drug use and its attendant harm.”

We brought up the subject of harm reduction early on in our talk with Lipinski.

“Harm reduction is not a method of condoning drug use,” Lipinski says. “It’s meeting people where they are in order to keep them alive and help them get ready for treatment. It’s reducing ER visits and community spread of disease through safe syringe programs, safe use sites, naloxone, and Narcan. It’s establishing touchpoints and contact with the individual. The more we can work with the individual by reducing the harm they’re experiencing, the more likely we can keep them alive to receive treatment.”

To Lipinski, the Trump EO is coming at homelessness from a public safety perspective, with multiple lines from the EO castigating cities for their tent encampments and the fact that some residents allegedly don’t feel safe to walk their own streets anymore. “I agree that public safety is important,” Lipinski says.

“But punitive measures like involuntary institutionalization and incarceration for the unhoused are not effective,” she adds. “Providing housing, performing harm reduction interventions, and providing treatment, on the other hand, work together. It’s all about safety nets and saving lives. Harm reduction keeps people alive long enough to choose treatment. Harm reduction is a balance of accountability and compassion.”

A First-of-Its-Kind Task Force

According to the Northwest Michigan Coalition to End Homelessness, the Traverse City area had 265 unhoused people as of 2024, up from 257 in 2023. To create permanent housing solutions for that population, the organization partnered with Traverse City, Grand Traverse County, and Rotary Charities in May to form the Housing and Homelessness Task Force, a collaborative, community-wide initiative designed to create a long-term, effective, and coordinated response to homelessness.

“This is not just about temporary fixes—it’s about lasting solutions,” says Halladay-Schmandt, a member of the task force’s leadership team. “Our region has the expertise, the compassion, and the community will to end homelessness. This task force gives us a unified structure to develop the plan to make it happen.”

The task force will focus its work through September 2025. During that time, specialized work groups will “assess gaps in current systems, identify effective strategies from other communities, and develop an actionable plan tailored to the unique needs of northwest Michigan.” According to Halladay-Schmandt, the work groups will focus on three areas: strengthening the safety net to prevent homelessness, improving emergency shelter and crisis response systems, and expanding long-term housing solutions.

Lipinski voices optimism for the task force. “For most who experience it, homelessness is a complicated life crisis with multiple factors influencing it,” she says. “Therefore, it requires a comprehensive spate of interventions and solutions. No one organization can fix the problem on their own. That’s why we’re all coming together.”

“What kind of community do we want to be?” Halladay-Schmandt pondered in closing.

“I keep coming back to that. This is our community. We can quite literally shape it however we want. Who is this community for? Do we want to be inclusive and welcoming? Do we want to grow with the changing needs of our population? No matter what happens at the federal level, we still have the ability to make policy changes and funding decisions that directly impact people in our community for the better.”

How You Can Get Involved

Both Halladay-Schmandt and Lipinski outline community asks from their organizations:

1) Advocate. Halladay-Schmandt reminds us again that, had it not been for constituents pressuring legislators, the Big Beautiful Bill may have removed all funding for CoCs like the Northwest Michigan Coalition to End Homelessness.

2) Talk to local leaders. Per Halladay-Schmandt, city, county, and state leaders usually respond well to one-on-one discussions and efforts to raise awareness about the homelessness issue.

3) Get educated. To Lipinski, much like substance use disorder, there is stigma surrounding homelessness. A big part of overcoming the problem is learning about it, separating fact from fiction, and seeing the inherent value in all humans, regardless of their housing status.

4) Support funding measures. Lipinski says recent funding shortfalls at the federal level have made it more challenging for local organizations to provide needed services to the unhoused community.

5) Back affordable housing initiatives. Both Halladay-Schmandt and Lipinski emphasize the sheer magnitude of unavailable housing as a significant factor influencing homelessness Up North. “It’s not complicated,” Lipinski says. “If housing stock is unaffordable or unavailable, homelessness will worsen.”