By Kaelin Rapport

This new brief highlights the punitive responses to homelessness, substance use, and mental health challenges—such as forced treatment, detention, and reduced housing assistance—perpetuate the historic failures that pushed people into institutions, prisons, and homelessness instead of care. Rather than criminalizing people in crisis, policymakers should invest in voluntary, community-based mental health services, supportive housing, peer-led care, crisis response alternatives, and other supports that protect dignity and meet people’s needs.

>>Read the full brief here.