The problem is that this issue is virtually ignored by every municipal employee within the city. Why not locate shelters and food kitchen in remote, abandoned business parks, then offer a tax credit to the owners of said business parks for the use? Many of the homeless leave the populated city centers to be near the shelters; abandoned buildings are used again. Related homeless services can be co-located for maximal effect.

We'd have less of a homeless problem if we enforced the rules already on the books: sit-lie ordinance; state code violations for possession of shopping carts; littering; loitering; public disturbance; indecent exposure; public endangerment; panhandling; walking out into traffic; riding Muni and BART without paying fatres; et al. The public clearly wants it, but the political will seems to be as present as Congress'.