The Crisis of the Mentally Ill Homeless

Sonoma County is dealing with an ever growing crisis in regards to dealing with an ever expanding scope of homeless, a considerable percentage of whom, are mentally ill. Due to a lack of care for a majority of those who are considered to be mentally ill, large numbers of them are homeless, or transition to become homeless as a result. Furthermore, the lack of facilities to assist the mentally ill homeless mean that the only areas to provide any sort of care are our jails or hospitals, areas in which are not designed to house or assist those with any mental illness at any capacity, thus draining our resources with nobody winning as a result. The mentally ill homeless, who have nowhere to go, go back to the jails, are released, then return, creating a revolving door problem that must be solved.