People sleep on the streets, in the parks and behind the buildings of the city because they don't have homes.
The business community in Dallas wants the homeless removed from sight. Bad for business. Bad for property values. Bad for sanitation and the condition of sidewalks and buildings. Bad. Bad. Bad.
Many city leaders and not a few residents believe building a new homeless assistance center will really help address the problem. At least the police will have a place to take the people they find asleep on our sidewalks.
Funny to me. Hardly anyone heard what Tom Dunning, the chair of Mayor Laura Miller's task force on homelessness, really said in his briefing earlier this week. Oh, he finally got around to unveiling the task force recommendation on site selection for the new homeless center.
But first he talked about solutions, real solutions to the challenges posed by people sleeping on the streets. Way to go, Tom! Thankless task and you did it well.
Homes. That's right. That's what Mr. Dunning said. So simple that almost everyone misses it!
People are homeless because they don't have homes. Er, I think that is what the word means!
Dallas needs SROs and lots of them. Single Resident Occupancy (SRO) units--hundreds of them. Relatively small and inexpensive efficiency apartments for currently homeless persons to lease. Places they can consider and call home.
Many homeless Dallasites qualify for various benefits that would allow them to lease apartments like these. From a business standpoint--the best way to approach the problem--SRO development and management works.
Presently Dallas has less than 200 such units. Six thousand homeless. Two hundred homes. Get it?
Developing SROs in downtown areas has worked in every major urban center where they have been attempted. Cities that address the need for homes find that they don't need to worry about "getting the homeless out of downtown." Once in homes, these folks turn into neighbors! Nice transition.
Without homes we cannot possibly make a dent in the real issues of homelessness.
Shelters are not the answer. Shelters are to homelessness what food pantries are to chronic underemployment and hunger. They simply are not enough.
We must have the courage, vision and good sense to take the next step and offer homes to those who do not have them.
In coming posts we will discuss the "place first" movement that tells us when people take possession of spaces they can control and consider their own, many of the chronic problems associated with homelessness dissipate quickly.
Homes--that's the ticket!
4 comments:
It's a worthy vision, Larry. Do you have an example of "various benefits" to allow the homeless folk to lease SRO's, or are you going to get into that in a follow-up? Looking forward to the next installment. Grace and peace to you!
Larry,
I follow this blog with as much interest as a white, middle class, relatively small town, political conservative can have. I really do appreciate learning from you. And believe it or not, I want to help. I really want to help. I know what Jesus' taught about compassion and justice. I care about these things and do what I can. (Well, certainly not all that I can, but I try to do something, not just say we should.) I say all this so that you know I don't enter this conversation as an expert. I am a little intimidated by the prophetic edge to your writing. I believe it is right and true and good, but I am still a little leary of engaging. I want the church to be some of the same things you want her to be (and I think Jesus intended for her to be) and I want to go there myself.
Here's my question. For most us us who didn't grow up among the urban poor, government assisted living--what I heard called "the projects"--is synonymous with social breakdown, violence, drug abuse, gang wars and general squalor. This is a caricature and I don't think this is what you mean, but I don't have a category for something else. Can you point me to an example or be more specific about what it would look like? Where has it been tried? Who builds it and pays for it? Just exactly what is SRO development and management and how do you avoid the problems associated with housing projects?
Please keep teaching us about how we can help the homeless have homes.
Tod, I love your heart!
What you describe of "the projects" is in fact the visible results, not so much of bad personal choices or of a failure in personal responsibility, but of a system with advantage weighted in favor of those who arrive on the scene with great advantage and much, much priviledge (education, net wealth and opportunity at birth, race, etc).
Don't misunderstand. People who are poor make all kinds of bad choices, as do those of us who are rich. It is just that poverty is an unforgiving reality when it comes to mistakes when poor folks make them. Even more so when misfortune strikes--even ordinary ones.
The social disintegration you speak of is not the result of the projects, it in fact creates them.
Political will in the US is lacking. We unite against public funding because we don't need it personally most of the time--social security and Medicare are curious exceptions, aren't they? Hmmmm. Go AARP! Right? So, since I don't need it for the education of my children or for housing or health care (though this is now reaching deep into the sacred middle class), I can't bring myself to regard it as an investment in the future of a better nation or city if by that I must fully include the poor.
We need to face our selfishness. By the way, public funding does not usually lead to the gigantic waste that many urban myths claim.
We would do well to remember the overall heart and the attitude of Jesus when we come to measure the effectiveness and viability of modern and post-modern vehicles and tools for getting things done. Picking up anything by Jonathan Kozol would be a great place to begin. Please stay in the game, Tod!
Greg,
Examples of the benefits that the homeless have access to include Social Security disability in many cases, as well as VA benefits. The fact is, in many cases people who secure a place to call home can move into the workforce and begin to normalize life. We are prepared to help with that. In the days ahead I will try to lay out our vision in more detail.
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