Tim Riley

A 2022 estimate of the number of people in Sacramento County that experience homelessness at any time during a year is between 16,500 and 20,000. An estimate of the number of people in Sacramento County that experience homelessness on any given night is 9,300. Roughly 1,300 shelter beds are available and typically full. The waitlist exceeds 2,300. Sacramento County spent $177.5 million in 2022-2023 and $220 million in 2023-2024 on the homeless problem. However, the homeless problem never goes away.

The solution to Sacramento County's homeless problem is free housing. Moreover, the long-term solution is employability. In order to be employable, a homeless person must become clean, groomed, dressed, healthy, and educated. How does the Sacramento community transform a class of people on a mass scale?

Sacramento County needs to redirect the annual $220 million homeless line-item to fund Sacramento Dorms. Sacramento Dorms needs a block or two of real estate. The Sacramento Dorms building needs to be big enough to have 5,000 rooms, 10x8 square-feet big. The rooms will not have an electrical outlet -- only an overhead light. The furnishings in each room will be a:

1. closet
2. bed
3. dresser
4. bookcase
5. desk
6. chair
7. manual typewriter

The Sacramento Dorms reception area will be staffed 24/7/365. Upon registering, all of the tenant's possessions that won't fit in a duffle bag will be thrown into a dumpster. Any shopping cart will be collected and returned to its rightful store. After registering, the tenant will be directed to the quartermaster.

Sacramento Dorms will have a 24/7/365 quartermaster facility and staff. The staff will issue for free the essentials that Target now locks up, including:

1. set of casual clothes
2. pair casual shoes
3. duffle bag with toiletry kit
4. pillow
5. linen set
6. box of laundry detergent
7. school kit containing a:
   • writing method book
   • arithmetic method book
   • touch typing method book
   • dictionary
   • 3-ring binder
   • notebook paper
   • typing paper
   • ruler
   • pencil
   • eraser

All tenants will have to sign away their fourth amendment right to privacy. All of the dorms are subject to search. Anything not stored away, excluding personal papers, will be discarded. Also, any contraband, even if stored away, will be discarded.

Each floor will be a single gender and will have communal bathrooms, showers, and a laundry room.

Sacramento Dorms will have a 24/7/365 cafeteria serving free soup, fruit, vegetables, bread, and tomato juice.

Sacramento Dorms will have a book repository to offer free books that teach:

1. writing
2. arithmetic
3. bookkeeping
4. computer programming

Sacramento Dorms will have a computer lab. Every tenant is encouraged to learn to generate cash-based financial statements and write computer programs.

Sacramento Dorms will make our homeless community clean, groomed, dressed, healthy, and relatively educated. To become fully educated, Sacramento County needs a line-item in its $8.8 billion budget to fund the nearby Sacramento Community College. Sacramento Community College also needs a block or two of real estate. It should offer:

1. free tuition
2. free books
3. easy enrollment
4. difficult graduation

Sacramento Community College should provide a lifetime learning experience with high standards. The standard to pass a course should be an A or B. If a student earns a C or less, then that's okay. The next attempt at the class should be better.

Sacramento Dorms and Sacramento Community College are the long-term homeless solution. All of the other programs that have come and gone throughout the years have wasted tax dollars on only the symptoms of homelessness. The root cause of homelessness is a lack of employability in our technology-based economy.

The Sacramento Dorms cafereria will display a banner on a wall that says, "There's no such thing as a free lunch. Thank you taxpayers." The Sacramento Dorms reception area will display a banner on a wall that says, "Never, never, ever give up."