Quote Originally Posted by razz View Post
Back decades, there used to be homes with rooms to rent and meals provided or a home with rooms to rent sort of like a motel room. Where have these all gone? i know I rented a room when at university with a hot plate, a mini fridge and a shared bathroom. It worked and was affordable. Where do people go with minimal funds? Are all homeless people unemployed or low in funds? unhealthy or having mental issues or drug issues? It strikes me as a very complex issue for each community to deal with. To date, I have seen no clear sense of direction in managing the situation or are there examples of successful management?
I actually just finished reading a book on this exact topic. "Living Downtown: The History of Residential Hotels in the United States." Long story short, there used to lots of low end housing opportunities, from rooming and boarding houses like you mention to single room occupancy hotels that rented cheap rooms by the week or month. But over the past 100 years concerted public policy (at least in the US, but probably in Canada too) eliminated most of these low end housing options because they were considered a menace to morals and such. Things like zoning laws and minimum size requirements for residential units all played a part.