Their disappointment is understandable. This program was frankly one of the very best resources ever established to help those who otherwise really have "nuthin comin" in the way of help when they begin the spiral into homelessness.
Here's the problem: if you're on the brink of homelessness or just wound up on the bricks recently (recently in this context is "within the last year"), and prior to that you had lived a "normal" existence of work, on-time rent/mortgage and utility payments, and no history of arrests, mental illness and/or substance abuse, well, you were (and once again are) screwed.
This is because that big ol safety net we keep hearing about, the one that supposedly had benefits so good that we produced a nation of welfare queens who drove around in gold Cadillacs and bought filet mignon with their food stamps, doesn't actually exist. See, these "entitlement" programs have long ago been cut to bare bones, if they;'ve been fortunate enough to survive at all, and resources are prioritized for delivery to "the most vulnerable" and those who are most expensive to communities while living on the streets (see "Million Dollar Murray").
As such, the meager funds directed to agencies that attempt to provide services to those experiencing homelessness are almost wholly restricted to those experiencing "chronic homelessness." The defining characteristics of chronic homelessness are established by the office of Housing and Urban Development and while other federal, state and local agencies sometimes have slightly modified versions of this definition, for the most part only those meeting the following description are eligible to receive assistance from most agencies:
"In general, a chronically homeless person is an unaccompanied disabled individual who has been continuously homeless for over one year."This definition worked, at least in part, to ensure damned scarce resources were being applied to those who needed it most, whether that need was based on the likelihood of the individual dying on the streets within the next year if left "as is," or based instead upon how much it was costing a community to leave a person homeless while he/she racked up thousands of dollars of costs associated with being homeless.
But when the economy tanked and the housing crisis struck, new faces began showing up at agencies that provided assistance. These were people who often sat across from the case manager in disbelief that they had actually fallen to the point that they were asking for help and facing eviction, or were now living with friends or family due to their deteriorating financial situation. This "new face of homelessness" was precipitated by the economic decline and subsequent job losses that permeated communities everywhere, and this is a trend that continues today.
But agencies weren't ready for these folks. We were (and once again, are) set up to work with the chronically homeless. We had absolutely nothing to give them beyond a referral to the local social service office or a faith-based organization that might help with a food box and a one-time payment of an overdue utility bill or a month's worth of rent.
For a great many who tried to obtain this help, the hoops to jump through were huge, embarrassing and humiliating, especially for those who had, until very recently, always paid their own way.
Many's the time clients in my office broke down in tears, crying their eyes out and always - ALWAYS - shocked, stunned and in complete disbelief that they'd plummeted to this position in their lives. Worse, when I had to tell them I couldn't do anything for them, they became angry.and were justifiably righteously indignant that they'd been lied to about the scope and benefit availability of our national "safety nets.'
They escalated to "enraged" when they realized that they'd been paying taxes for decades and now, when they needed help from the very system they'd been supporting each paycheck with their hard earned dollars, that system had essentially shat in their hat, handed it back to them and then humiliated them further by forcing them to wait until they were completely impoverished, destitute and had gone crazy with worry and hopelessness before they could get some help.
HPRP was a godsend for people who fit this bill, and trust me when I tell you that these folks were pouring through our doors in a flood of devastated humanity beyond our comprehension. Entire families, couples, couples expecting, single men and women, all who needed just a tiny bit of support while they found another job, or made arrangements to go elsewhere, these were the people who, without that help would so seriously exacerbate their conditions that to climb out of the morass would be next to impossible.
And that is the real problem for many of the new faces of homelessness. It's already a bad situation when they walk through the door because they've tried desperately to hang on. Their rents or mortgages are several months behind, as are their utility bills and they now have shutoff notices. They've exhausted their savings, cashed out their retirement portfolios, are facing repossession of their vehicles (if it hasn't happened already), and their phones have long ago been shut off or suspended due to nonpayment. As they crash onto the streets, all these bills and delinquencies now conspire against them on credit reports, job interviews and housing options.
All this could have been avoided, or at least mitigated, by rapid action at the beginning of the precipitating event, and this is where HPRP stepped in. So when I claim that the program dollars were a godsend to those who were eligible, I'm not kidding.
It's highly unlikely, in this time of budget cuts and misplaced priorities on what is important to focus upon by our federal, state and local governments, that we will see another program like HPRP coming anytime soon.
That is really a disaster of national proportions, because so many who could have been helped with a small level of resources will now require massive resources to extricate from homelessness. When it's all said and done, we as a nation will have spent exponentially more than we should have because we use bandaids instead of performing surgeries, and we place the bandaids on so late in the process that they're barely helpful for most people.
This pennywise, pound foolish, approach is an offensive disgrace to the dignity, morals and ethics of our nation, not to mention a serious case of skewed priorities on the part of our elected officials.
We can make a difference by choosing who represents us far more carefully than we have in the past.
Unfortunately, until that time comes, the suffering is going to be prolonged, expensive and very very difficult to end...
Homeless fund cuts
By BERTRAND M. GUTIERREZ
| Winston-Salem Journal
Published: July 08, 2011
Ricky Fernandez, a 54-year-old Army veteran, was homeless last year, living temporarily with a stepdaughter because unpaid utility bills were blocking him from getting a place of his own.
This year, he is renting a two-bedroom house in eastern Winston-Salem.But the federal program that helped him get the house is about to run out of money, despite the fact that it is the most successful at helping local individuals beat homelessness, nonprofit officials say.
God knows where I would have been or what would have happened to me" without the program, Fernandez said.The Homeless Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing program – funded through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and executed by local nonprofit organizations – helped Fernandez move in by paying off his bills and putting down utility and rent deposits, he said.
By next summer, though, funding for the program will end because it was part of the federal stimulus package.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 included $1.5 billion for a Homelessness Prevention Fund. The city received nearly $1.75 million – or more than $748,000 from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and about $1 million from the state – from the fund, said Tim West, the city's housing development program supervisor.
The money went to such nonprofit organizations as the Career Connections & Prosperity Center, which helped Fernandez move into his home. The program started in December 2009. Between then and the end of March, 164 households containing 335 people have been served, West said.
"Those are people who have been diverted from shelters," West said. "It's been a great tool, but in the future we're going to need to find something like it.
"The program focuses on keeping people in housing and away from shelters. It also seeks to address what's keeping people out of housing, such as unpaid utility bills, said Andrea Kurtz, director of the 10 Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness, an initiative started in 2006 by the city and Forsyth County and backed by the United Way of Forsyth County.
"Often, it's just a matter of back rent or that the person has lost a job and can't afford the apartment they're renting. If we can help people get past that, we can keep them away from a shelter," she said. The federal program is the most successful one in Forsyth County at helping individuals beat homelessness, according to statistics released by Kurtz at a public meeting last week of the Ten Year Plan Commission.
The average length of stay for an individual in a shelter is 243 days, according to the latest statistics. In contrast, the average length of stay for an individual going through the prevention program is 75. Those statistics include three years of surveys, Kurtz said.Though the source of money was temporary, officials with the Homeless Council seemed optimistic that the program will continue. David Harold, chairman of the Homeless Council, said he hopes that the council can find a way to continue funding the program.Next month, the council will discuss how to keep it running.
