Alcoholics costing less
The controversial home for “unrecoverable alcoholics” at 1811 Eastlake shows up in the news about once a year, usually in a story about how it’s all working out better than the skeptics had hoped. Today is no exception, since a study has come out announcing that the home saved taxpayers about $4 million over a year.
“Researchers followed 95 chronically homeless alcoholics, who, before moving into the home, had run up a taxpayer bill of $8.2 million in hospitalizations, emergency services, jail time and sobering center visits.
After one year of being in the program, the same group cost taxpayers only $4 million, the study found. Each resident also drank less the longer they lived in the home, and their toll on publicly funded programs decreased as time went on[pi].”
It seems to be a pretty simple equation: people drink more and use up more emergency resources when they are homeless and scared and less when they have a safe place to be. The county funded it reluctantly, but will hopefully continue to do so more enthusiastically now that it is paying off.
SPECIAL EVENT: “Breakfast with Champions”: Tomorrow morning, at 7:30 AM, Dr Mary Francis Berry, former chair of the US Civil Rights Commission, will be at the Westin Hotel to discuss her new book, And Justice For All: The United States Commission on Civil Rights and the Continuing Struggle for Freedom in America. Presented by the King County Bar Foundation and Elliott Bay Books.
