Today’s Solutions: May 16, 2026

Homelessness is a major problem across America, but hardly anywhere is it as shocking as in San Francisco. Despite having the most millionaires per square mile, the city also has thousands of homeless residents, most of which coming from San Francisco originally and having a job before winding up on the streets. The city has tried many initiatives to combat the problem, but hardly anything has managed to make a difference. For that reason, Marc Benioff, the billionaire founder of enterprise software behemoth Salesforce, and his wife, Lynne, are donating $30 million to the University of California, San Francisco, to fund a new research initiative that will identify the root causes of, and find evidence-based solutions for ending homelessness. The new program called the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative will be part of the UCSF Center for Vulnerable Populations, a research center. The pledge, to be paid out over five years, will create a resource for policymakers and community leaders around the country working to address homelessness. The initiative will conduct new research as well as curate and organize research already available on homelessness in a searchable digital library. It will also hold regular meetings between academic experts and people who have personally experienced homelessness to further discourse and research. The overall goal is to get to the root of homelessness so it can be solved in a pragmatic, effective manner.

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