On Dec. 1, the city of Wheeling withdrew its only legal encampment zone’s exempt status, continuing to employ restrictive actions against people suffering from homelessness. As updates continue to emerge about Wheeling’s homelessness issue, it is safe to say: encampment bans do not solve the issue of homelessness. It only makes the path to escaping homelessness even harder through criminalization.

Because one in three people experiencing homelessness have substance abuse issues and two-thirds of those people have a history of drug or alcohol abuse, barriers to accessing housing and obtaining permanent housing can be extremely difficult. Although the city may continue to employ actions that criminalize homelessness, investing in more harm reduction tactics that allow unhoused individuals t

See Full Page