I lived in Berkeley at the time, as yes the number of people on the streets that had been suddenly kicked out of long-term care facilities overwhelmed other public services, who were ill-equipped to provide anything more than crisis containment.
Teachers. Churches. Fire departments. Emergency rooms of hospitals. Police officers... God bless them all. God, what the Berkeley Police officers had to deal with in the 1980s...
(Then everyone got AIDS and died during the earthquake and the fire.)
My wife was a teacher at a day program for adults with severe developmental disabilities. A shoestring budget, subsistence wages, hard work. The program had been started out of necessity by an indomitable mother with a son who needed 24-hour care. Her son had his 21st birthday, and there was no longer a place for him in the public schools.
It's a horrifically expensive situation all around.
