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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Wednesday, December 10, 2003

EDITORIAL
Build more housing for Hawai'i's poor

If affordable housing is key to mitigating the homeless problem, then plans for 240 low-income rental apartments at 'Ewa Villages are good news indeed.

In this real estate boom, too many affordable rentals have been converted to market-value condominiums, which has contributed to a rental crunch.

So we're encouraged that nonprofit affordable housing developer Hui Kauhale Inc. is moving forward with the second of three plantation villages being revitalized under a city initiative.

But it's not enough.

Affordable housing is crucial to reversing the trend in chronic homelessness. This population soaks up the lion's share of indigent services and rarely gets off the streets permanently.

Under a promising concept known as "housing first," or supportive housing, these people can be placed in apartments and provided with recovery and employment help.

But to make supportive housing work, we need more affordable rental units such as the 'Ewa Villages development. And they need to be built throughout O'ahu, not just clustered on the Leeward side.

Sure, there'll be NIMBY resistance to Section 8 housing. But would you rather have homeless encampments in your back yard? That's the direction things are going here in paradise.