'The Lost and the Found' takes an intimate look at homelessness in San Francisco

Summary

NPR's Book of the Day: "The Lost and the Found" - A Deep Dive into Homelessness in San Francisco

Episode Title: The Lost and the Found
Host/Author: NPR
Release Date: May 14, 2025
Duration: Approximately 10 minutes
Featured Book: The Lost and the Found: A True Story of Homelessness, Found Family, and Second Chances by Kevin Fagan

---

Introduction to the Issue

Andrew Limbong sets the stage by highlighting the staggering statistics of poverty in the United States. “Let’s take one number, 36.8 million. That’s how many people lived in poverty in the United States in 2023, according to the latest census numbers” (00:02). This figure underscores the immense scale of poverty, which in turn exacerbates issues like homelessness, housing affordability, addiction, and mental health.

Kevin Fagan’s Journey and Motivation

Deepa Fernandez introduces Kevin Fagan, a seasoned reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle who has extensively covered homelessness. Fagan's commitment to this issue is deeply personal. He shares, “I was poor for a lot of my childhood and then I got tossed out of the house when I was 16...” (02:36). His own experiences living in an unfinished garage, sleeping in his car during college breaks, and later being a street singer internationally, provide him with firsthand insight into the struggles of homelessness.

The Stories of Rita and Tyson

Fagan's book focuses on two individuals, Rita and Tyson, whose lives encapsulate the complexities of chronic homelessness.

Rita's Descent

Rita's story begins with what appears to be a quintessential American upbringing. “She graduated high school and didn’t really know what to do with herself,” explains Deepa (04:00). Her marriage to a fisherman in Florida initially seemed stable, but substance abuse spiraled out of control following their divorce. Rita’s journey underscores how chronic homelessness is rarely a sudden event but the culmination of prolonged struggles with addiction, family breakdown, and systemic failures.

Tyson's Struggle

In contrast, Tyson hails from a wealthy suburb, Danville, California. Despite his privileged background, Tyson battles an undiagnosed bipolar condition. “He couldn’t stick with anything. His focus was not good...” (Deepa Fernandez, 05:42). His inability to manage his mental health led him into substance abuse, ultimately resulting in his homelessness. Tyson's story highlights that homelessness can affect individuals across different socioeconomic backgrounds, often rooted in mental health issues and inadequate support systems.

Systemic Failures and Policy Shortcomings

Fagan delves into the historical and policy-driven factors contributing to the homelessness crisis. “Back then, left over from the 70s, there was a pull down of mental institutions...” (Deepa Fernandez, 03:23). The deinstitutionalization movement without adequate community support led to an increase in homelessness. Further exacerbating the issue, the Reagan administration’s cuts to social services in the early 80s left a void that has never been adequately filled.

The Formation of a Chosen Family

Both Rita and Tyson found solace and survival through the establishment of "chosen families" on the streets. “They did find family, chosen family. It’s a survival mode for Rita...” (Deepa Fernandez, 06:46). These relationships provide emotional support and safety in an environment that is otherwise perilous, especially for women who face heightened risks of violence and exploitation.

The Complexity of Reintegrating into Society

Despite having supportive relatives and friends, Rita and Tyson struggled to return to stable living conditions. “When you’ve been on the streets for a long time...you get dug into your survival mode” (Deepa Fernandez, 07:26). The entrenched behaviors and dependency on street life make reintegration challenging, even with external support.

Proposed Solutions and Policy Recommendations

When questioned about potential solutions, Fagan emphasizes the need for substantial federal intervention. “It’s almost unsolvable unless we have a federal change of major import” (Deepa Fernandez, 08:52). He advocates for:

• Supportive Housing: Providing housing that includes counseling and support services to address underlying issues such as addiction and mental health.
• Street Counseling: Actively engaging with homeless individuals to offer assistance and encourage them to take advantage of available resources.
• Affordable Housing: Expanding affordable housing options to reduce the financial burden that contributes to homelessness.
• National Healthcare: Ensuring access to healthcare services to address mental health and addiction issues comprehensively.
• Economic Support: Creating pathways for individuals to earn a living wage without the necessity of holding multiple jobs just to afford rent.

Fagan argues that local solutions are insufficient and that a national framework is essential to address the root causes of homelessness effectively.

Conclusion

Kevin Fagan’s The Lost and the Found offers a poignant and comprehensive exploration of homelessness in San Francisco through the lives of Rita and Tyson. The book not only personalizes the struggles faced by the homeless but also critically examines the systemic failures that perpetuate this crisis. Fagan calls for significant policy reforms and federal action to create sustainable solutions, highlighting that addressing homelessness requires more than just local efforts—it demands a nationwide commitment to tackling poverty, mental health, and housing affordability.

---

Notable Quotes

• Andrew Limbong: “Let’s take one number, 36.8 million. That’s how many people lived in poverty in the United States in 2023” (00:02).
• Kevin Fagan: “It's almost unsolvable unless we have a federal change of major import” (08:52).
• Deepa Fernandez: “They did find family, chosen family. It’s a survival mode for Rita...” (06:46).

---

This summary encapsulates the essence of the episode, providing a comprehensive overview of the discussions, key insights, and proposed solutions regarding homelessness as presented in Kevin Fagan's book. It serves as an informative guide for listeners and those interested in understanding the multifaceted nature of homelessness in modern America.

Transcript

[Andrew Limbong]

Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbong. Let's take one number, 36.8 million. That's how many people lived in poverty in the United States in 2023, according to the latest census numbers. Now think about how big of a number that is. And even before we talk about housing affordability or addiction or mental health, you can already see why homelessness is such a big, intractable problem. For his book the Lost and the A True Story of Homelessness Found Family and Second Chances, reporter Kevin Fagan zooms in on the lives of two people to talk about that big impossible problem. Now, Fagan's been covering this issue for a long time, and in this interview with Here and Now's Deepa Fernandez, you can hear how frustrating it is that we as a country have yet to figure it out. That's coming up.

[NPR Sponsor]

This message comes from Schwab and at Schwab, how you invest is your choice, not theirs. That's why when it comes to managing your wealth, Schwab gives you more choices. You can invest and trade on your own. Plus get advice and more comprehensive wealth solutions to help meet your unique needs. With award winning service, low costs and transparent advice, you can manage your wealth your way at Schwab. Visit schwab.com to learn more.

[Synchrony Bank Sponsor]

This message is from Synchrony bank who.

[Deepa Fernandez]

Can help you get your do Nothing savings to work hard with their High Yield savings account.

[Synchrony Bank Sponsor]

Put your lazy savings to [e-mail] NPR member FDIC Homelessness is a deeply entrenched problem in the United States, and perhaps no journalist knows that better than Kevin Fagan. As a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, he embedded with the city's unhoused population, often sleeping next to them, piece of cardboard and becoming deeply involved in their lives. Now Kevin Fagan has retired and written a book about two of the unhoused people he profiled. It's called the Lost and the Found. Kevin Fagan joins us now. And Kevin, before we start, I want to be transparent with our audience. You and I work together at the Chronicle. I'm so happy to welcome you to the program. Thank you for joining us, Kevin.

[Deepa Fernandez]

Ah, thanks, Deepa. And it was wonderful working with you.

[Kevin Fagan]

Let's get to your book. Kevin, you've covered homelessness for decades and you came to it from a very personal angle. And you start your book by telling us all about that. You know what homelessness is like. Can you tell us?

[Deepa Fernandez]

Yeah, I was poor for a lot of my childhood and then I got tossed out of the house when I was 16, went and lived in a. An unfinished garage where I built furniture out of scrap wood and then wound up at San Jose State, which was great. I'd save up money and, you know, be in the dorms, but in vacations and semester breaks, I didn't have a home to go to, so I'd sleep in my car. And then after I graduated college, I was a street singer in Europe and Australia and New Zealand, sleeping in alleys and doorways.

[Kevin Fagan]

As a reporter, after you made it through all of that, Kevin, one of the things you were tasked with covering in the early 1980s was homelessness. When the population of unhoused people exploded. Why did that happen?

[Deepa Fernandez]

Back then, left over from the 70s, there was a pull down of mental institutions, for one, and that was really bad for the millennial community. The left had figured, hey, we have these great new psychotropic drugs. We can put people in board and care homes. And the right thought, great, great, we can save money. So off a whole lot of people went into board and care homes while the funding did not follow. And then in the early 80s, the Reagan administration decimated social service programs. And none of this, given my background, none of it was a mystery to me. So, you know, they say write what you know, so I leaned in on writing about that subject.

[Kevin Fagan]

Your book focuses on two people you met over the course of your reporting, and you stayed with them over years, decades even. Their names are Rita and Tyson. Let's start with Rita. It sounds as though she had kind of the all American life and upbringing. She was athletic, had lots of friends. She's beautiful. How does someone like Rita become homeless?

[Deepa Fernandez]

She graduated high school and didn't really know what to do with herself. Married a guy who was a great fisherman, and they lived in Florida, along the coastline, wound up in Key west living on boats. But she and her husband liked heroin. It got worse when they got divorced and they had four kids. By then, the responsibilities and the drugs and the choices of hanging out with the wrong people, picking the wrong boyfriends after her marriage just cascaded into this kind of rattling down the ladder of life. You know, most chronically homeless people don't just wind up there one day to the next. It's use up your family, your friends, your government aid, everything. And then, boom, you're on the bottom. And she wound up with a boyfriend who brought her out here to San Francisco and abandoned her. And pretty soon, she was chronically homeless in the streets.

[Kevin Fagan]

The other person you profile is Tyson he grew up right here in California. It's a wealthy suburb called Danville. It sounds as though he was smart, he made friends easily, he had every opportunity to succeed and, and in fact, his brother bar and did well in school, established a business, got married, had a child. Kevin. What made one brother succeed and the other end up on the streets?

[Deepa Fernandez]

Well, I think he had an underlying bipolar condition that was undiagnosed. And the family was, was loving and supportive. But as Tyson came out of high school and slid into college, he couldn't stick with anything. His, his focus was not good and he'd get frustrated. He wanted to succeed right away without paying dues is how his father described it. And those frustrations led him to leaning into partying and drugs. And he started to like cocaine a lot. Cocaine led eventually to heroin and fentanyl and meth. And again, like Rita, he rattled down that ladder using up family resources, friends, and then wound up in San Francisco chronically homeless.

[Kevin Fagan]

I wonder, you know, in the years that both Rita and Tyson were living on the streets, they formed strong ties with other unhoused people that, you know, even though they came from vibrant, strong families, it was almost like the people on the streets became their family.

[Deepa Fernandez]

They did found family, chosen family. It's a survival mode for Rita, especially as a woman in the streets. Women get raped, get taken advantage of. It's more hazardous for women than for men in general in the streets. So it's awful for both. You do not want to be chronically homeless.

[Kevin Fagan]

Yeah, I guess the, the confounding thing for those on the outside, Kevin, is that both Rita and Tyson had relatives and friends who cared so much about them, tried to get them off the street at points, but it's so complex that they weren't, it wasn't just an easy, you know, come home, we'll take care of you.

[Deepa Fernandez]

Why, when you've been on the streets for a long time, like both of these folks had been, you get dug into your survival mode. And of course, along the way they were in crisis and there was level of chaos to their lives. Rita stumbling her way to this little colony she wound up with in downtown called Homeless island. With Tyson stumbling his way into a loose group of friends who watched out for each other where he was a bit of a leader. And while you're doing that, your family is reaching out and saying, hey, you're going the wrong way, let us help. And drugs. The day to day hassle of staying alive just makes you so that you don't really want to listen but what worked for them eventually was that they got tired of that.

[Kevin Fagan]

I don't want to give away what happens to Rita or Tyson because literally your book is such a page turner. And Kevin, I was with you on that ride. There are really joyful moments in the. And there are really heartbreaking turns and twists. But I guess both their stories left me wondering what is the solution to this deep problem? I know you're not an elected official nor a policymaker, but, but you have the ear of, I mean, of people like Gavin Newsom, the, the California governor. I wonder what you see, Kevin, what do you tell these people in power about how to. What needs to change?

[Deepa Fernandez]

My take after all these years of covering it from policy standpoints and from the street, is it's almost unsolvable unless we have a federal change of major import. The pull downs in the 80s that the Reagan administration and the rightward trend of our country enacted were never made up for. And what we have is a bunch of band aids and localities and states trying to. To fill in. And for us, the best fill in as a state and a city and a county is supportive housing, which is housing that pulls people in off the streets and then surrounds them with counseling to help them get over the drug or mental or job, whatever problems that put them in the street. And street counseling, where you actively go out and enlist people to come inside, which is a tough argument, counterintuitive. A lot of people would think, you know, you think you'd go up to someone on the street and say, hey, we have a free place for you to live and we have counseling that'll help you rehab and stabilize your life. But people resist it because they're locked into their survival mode and they're fearful of the system. It's frustrating. 30% of the country, by most calculations that I trust is in some level of poverty, either right at poverty level or below. And that's why every one person that you take off the streets and San Francisco, four more take their place. What we need is affordable housing, national health care, a way for people to make a living and not have to have three jobs and still not afford rent. There's just such despair involved in being on the very bottom and, you know, expecting these localities to absolutely solve that. It's really expecting a lot.

[Synchrony Bank Sponsor]

Kevin Fagan's book is the Lost and the Found, A True Story of Homelessness, Found Family and Second Chances. Kevin, thank you so much.

[Deepa Fernandez]

Thanks, Deepa.

[NPR Sponsor]

This message comes from Jackson. Let's face it, retirement planning can be confusing. At Jackson we're working to make retirement clear for everyone, starting with you. Our easy to understand resources and user friendly digital tools help simplify your entire experience. You can have confidence in your retirement with clarity from Jackson. Seek the clarity you [e-mail] Jackson is short for Jackson Financial, Inc. Jackson National Life Insurance Co. Lansing, Michigan and Jackson National Life Insurance Co. Of New York purchased New York. This message comes from NPR. Sponsor 1Password Protect your digital life with 1Password if you're tired of family members constantly texting you for the passwords to streaming services, 1Password lets you securely share or remove access to logins access from any device anytime. One password lets you securely switch between iPhone, Android, Mac and PC with convenient features like autofill. For quick sign insert right now, get a free two week trial for you and your [e-mail] NPR.