Faith Works 2-16-19
Jeff Gill
Why are there poor people?
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Whoever oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God. ~ Proverbs 14:31 (NIV)
In all the back and forth over housing and emergency shelters and compassion there's a question that keeps coming up in various and subtle forms: why are people homeless?
Of course, a simple answer is "because they don't have a home to go to at night."
Well, then, how does someone end up that way?
A child has a home with parents; legally, they can't kick them out until age 18 but, to my shock when as an adult I realized this actually happens, they can at that point. And yes, some young adults who have spent their teen years in foster care can be ushered onto the street on their eighteenth birthday. Maybe a dozen to a score per year right here in this county. So that's one source of homelessness.
You can go to college or move out to a job, and have things fall apart on you, still without a credit card to fall back on let alone a savings account and emergency fund. Relationships abruptly end, decisions are made – we have a landing place for victims of domestic violence, but if you leave a relationship because of stuff (and stuff can be serious yet not violent), you may or may not have a place to go.
And even if your stuff doesn't involve a spouse or roommate, in today's economy if you run short, eviction court is not far away. A few badly timed bills, a gap in employment, losing your child care and juggling this versus that: you find your stuff on the street, and your locks changed.
If you avoid that, or after that all happens, and you move in with Aunt May or Gramma, are you homeless? According to the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) guidelines on homelessness, no, only if you are residing in a place "not intended for human habitation" (i.e., sleeping in your car); according the Department of Education (DoE) definition for homeless students, yes. I've had respected older members of our community, after hearing me explain this, come up after and say "so, my Dad died when I was in second grade, and we moved in with Grandmother, stayed with her until Mom remarried when I was in fourth grade – are you saying we were homeless back in 1952?" Well, according to 2019 DoE rules, yes, you were. That can work, but it's not stable, and not assured, so I see why the rule is written that way to protect students.
Then there's the classic. It's the image that tends to hit the mental movie theater when I say the word "homeless." It's a guy in an old ratty overcoat with a brown paper bag sticking out of the pocket, and a bottle inside. Or the woman pushing a cart filled with random plunder, wearing four jackets and a badly fitting wig, muttering to herself down the sidewalk.
Yes, those are realities, even here in our town. We know this. And there's a long conversation to be had, in public and civic terms, about involuntary admissions and pink slips and threat of harm to self or others. You can be mentally unstable, even have a relatively stable disability income, but lack capacity to fend properly for yourself while not technically being a danger to yourself. You and I might think they are, but the law . . .
Also those who are actively using, who in many cases will speak eloquently about wanting to quit, but not yet. [Deep sigh.] Not a big chunk of the population on the street or couch-surfing, but the hardest to serve, the toughest to know how best to help. Is guaranteed 365 shelter assistance, or enabling? It's a fair question.
But the biggest chunk of the challenge is represented by the factoid "the average age of a person who is homeless in America is nine years old." Now, the reality behind that is a 25 year old young mother with a baby and three year old, not quite making it, and trying to get by as best as the three of them, averaging out to age nine (do the math), can manage. If there are 250 young mothers who have lost children to foster care due to drug use, there are 1250 who fear losing their kids even though they're clean and green, but just can't put together that first and last month's rent. And are losing hope that there's a way forward with dignity and respect.
That's where we all come in. More next week!
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's been working on housing and homelessness issues since 1986, and stopped believing in easy solutions by about 1987. Tell him where you see paths forward at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
