Rock Hill, SC’s 10 Year Plan to Respond to Homelessness was adopted in 2009 by the Rock Hill City Council. The plan provides a make-sense approach to truly help folks struggling with homelessness, housing instability and related life crisis. Little by little, over the past 10 years, our community of Rock Hill and York County have chipped away at trying to implement elements of the plan. The Positive: More people, churches, businesses, schools, community groups and local government leaders are aware of the problem of homelessness and are actively taking steps to help our neighbors in need. The Negative: Due to the lack of truly affordable housing for people with moderate and lower incomes in our community, homelessness has exponentially increased; especially since 2015 when housing costs began to sharply rise. With each increase in housing and utility costs, people who were just barely able to keep their housing bills paid can no longer afford the increased costs and fall out of housing. They become homeless. And once homeless, there is virtually no way out, because there is no housing being built that is truly affordable in their income. Continuing to address the elements of the plan to reduce homelessness must move beyond merely treating the symptom of homeless, to addressing the actual cause of homelessness: The lack of supply of truly affordable housing for folks making moderate and lower incomes.
Click here to go to the RH 10 Year Plan to Respond to Homelessness.
