Street Voices

A glimpse into the lives of Toledo's homeless citizens

by Rick Claypool

published November 15th 2006

'You've always got to be on guard. You never know when somebody's going to try to take something from you, or when you have the opportunity to take advantage of somebody else. Never let down your guard. I can assess people, figure out whether they're gonna listen to me. You've got to make eye contact and talk to them.'

This advice isn't coming from a professional speaker at a Business Communications seminar. The comments are from Daniel, a Toledo homeless man speaking candidly with Toledo-Lucas County Homeless Ser-vices board members at the Homeless Awareness Project Tent City on Nov. 3, about panhandling. He's been on the streets for more than ten years.

TLC Board members Ken Leslie, Dan Rogers, Richard Langford and others listen intently. They're bundled up and huddled in a circle for warmth in the corner of the tent, where volunteers, board members and several area homeless men, women and children will sleep through the cold night.

Langford is the Director of the Mildred Bayer Clinic for the Homeless and vice chair of the Toledo Area Alliance to End Homelessness (TAAEH). Rogers is President of the Cherry Street Mission and serves on TAAEH's executive board. Ken Leslie, who organized the event, is vice chair of the Toledo-Lucas County Home-lessness Board and president of a local company, Strategic Search Consultants.

Dubbed "the Three Musketeers," they are committed to doing what it takes to help Toledo's homeless population, one life at a time.

'Daniel'

An African-American man with a bright smile and a contagious laugh, Daniel wears a knit cap and heavy coat and is wrapped in a heavy woolen blanket. When he tells stories, he glides easily between the comic and the tragic. He arrived at the Tent City the previous night, high and looking to hustle a couple dollars.

He has agreed to be taken to Compass, an addiction services corporation which provides programs for the homeless and veterans. Though he's reluctant to speak at any length about his military service, Daniel is both.

"If it's obvious somebody has money and they're willing to take the time, I'll ask for $60 or $70 for a bus ticket," Daniel says. "A guy gave it to me once, took me to the ATM at his bank. But he burnt that bread, and I won't mess around with any burnt bread.

"He told me if I spent it on anything, y'know, like I shouldn't spend it on, that God would punish me. When people burn bread, you don't mess with that."

"Burnt bread" is money given on the condition that the recipient won't spend it to feed personal vices, like drugs or alcohol.

A man of deep faith and admittedly deep vices, Daniel decided he's struggled to negotiate addiction, morality and poverty for too long.

Ken Leslie, vice chair of the TLC board who organized the Tent City, judges the entire event's success on the possibility that Daniel's life might have been turned in a new direction. "How much is one life worth?" Leslie asks in hopes the community will respond: as much as we can give.

Leslie stayed up and talked with Daniel through Tent City's first night. By the second night, Daniel was determined to change his life.

Daniel puts his life in perspective. "I once saw this woman walking to work. She was vertically challenged, real short, and she had something wrong with her spine so she couldn't walk right. But she was all dressed up, looked nice and going to work. Here I am with two strong arms.

He sighed. "I've got to turn my life around."

The have-nots

Even during an economic recession, the extent of homelessness in a nation as wealthy as the United States screams 'injustice.' According to the 2000 U.S. census, over a million Ohioans (13.3 percent) lived below the poverty line. A 2005 U.S. Conference of Mayors Report shows that homelessness and hunger in the U.S. as a whole have been increasing since 1982.

Meanwhile, the average CEO's salary was $13.5 million in 2005, up 16.4 percent from 2004, according to the Corporate Library's 2006 CEO Pay Survey.

In 2004, Economic and Community Development consultant Matt White conducted research and composed a community needs assessment plan for Toledo. According to his report, between 2,280 and 3,300 Toledoans – 26 percent of them children – experienced homelessness in a given year. That estimate may put Toledo's problems as less than comparably-sized cities like Dayton, as more than 6,000 experienced homelessness in Montgomery County in 2004.

"There are so many people who are so blessed who don't believe that you don't choose to be-come homeless," said former City Council President Louis Escobar from the podium during the Tent City's opening ceremonies. "We've got to get rid of the idea that homeless people are lazy. You think people want to be out here in the cold?"

Rogers criticizes the Federal Government's strategies through the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which he says "are not realistic because they only address the downstream issue. The upstream burden falls on the private sector.'

In other words, federal policies are geared towards managing those who are presently homeless. Little attention is paid to core concerns, such as the availability of affordable housing, that perpetuate the problem.

According to an-alysis by the Western Regional Advocacy Project in Oregon (www.sistersoftheroad.org), the U.S. government spends 65 percent less today on developing affordable housing than it did in 1978. On the other hand, the government does dispense increasing amounts toward subsidies for homeownership programs for the middle class – $38 billion in 1978 vs. $122 billion in 2005.

The project of managing the presently homeless is a daunting task. Matt White's report reveals approximately 43 percent of Toledo's homeless require treatment for mental illness and 30 percent need treatment for addictions. Homeless women are particularly vulnerable, as 13.5 percent of women and family units face the streets in a flight from domestic violence.

"These are deep-seated issues that will last way beyond the term of any elected official. So we need to forget about timelines and just get to work," says Rogers.

Rodney Schuster, The Cherry Street Mission's Director of Development, elaborates. "We're 100 percent funded by private donations. When you deal with federal dollars, you need to follow their mandate and do their paperwork. The HUD definition of a shelter limits a person's stay to 90 days. People can stay at Cherry Street Mission for as long as it takes."

If one considers care for the poor to be part of the federal government's responsibility, it seems clear that affordable housing has not been a priority.

Rogers elaborated on some chilling figures: "Five years ago, there were 87 people in beds at Cherry Street. Tonight there are 192. Seven years ago, the median age of a homeless person was 52. Today, it's 36."

The homeless population is getting younger. And there are more of them than ever.

'Dave'

"Are you just going to listen to what the politicians say? Or are you going to talk to the homeless to find out what's really going on?"

A middle-aged man with a silver-and-gold handlebar moustache and piercing blue eyes, Dave has been spending most nights at St. Paul's Emergency Shelter. He says his circumstances are the result of a "business partnership that went sour."

"I'm a rebel from the word 'go,'" he says. "If somebody's done something wrong, I'll be there, picketing."

Dave applies his activist mentality to his own situation. "There are human rights issues no one is paying attention to. Children Services is breaking up homes. Shelters are putting obstacles in front of the homeless instead of helping them. We need to face these situations head on."

Waving his hands, he rails about the injustices he sees. "I'm aware of the stereotypes. People look at us and ask themselves, 'Why feed some bum?' Meanwhile, there's no living wage, no affordable housing.

"In shelters, there's no place to put your things, and if you leave your stuff behind, it's going to get stolen. You've got to carry everything on your back. Before 9/11, you could store things in lockers at the bus and train stations.

"Shelters try to emphasize that people have rights, but when it comes down to it, the homeless are treated like they're nothing. If shelter staff says it should be quiet, you've got to be

quiet or you'll be written up or kicked out. Isn't that taking away rights, like freedom of speech?"

"You're not gonna get ahead, so you might as well be homeless. Everything that a homeless person can do to try to get out of their circumstances is an obstacle."

In response to his complaints, Dave would like to see social workers conduct in-depth interviews with the homeless to make sure their needs are being met.

"People don't want to look into these issues because they don't want to believe what's happening."

One life at a time

"I piss people off because I'm so into homelessness," says TLC Board vice chair Leslie with a twinkle in his eye. "I'd given up on bringing together shelter directors. Then Dan and Richard came along."

Leslie, a former professional comedian, laughs heartily. He's unsure of exactly where his efforts will lead. But he has faith in the TLC Board, and he looks forward to getting things done.

The board recently secured a grant from the United Way. Leslie is passionate that the funding can be used to find new ways to use internet technology to aide the homeless in acquiring marketable skills, finding jobs and securing services.

"The TLC Board's role is strategic. We're in the early stages of planning projects and coordinating services between the shelters and homeless assistance groups. TAAEH is tactical; they're the people on the front lines, actually out there helping people."

Homeless single men remain the largest segment of Toledo's homeless population, 57 percent. Of these men, a staggering 67 percent claim veteran status.

Single adult women and family units (90 percent of which are women with children) make up 34 percent of Toledo's homeless, while 9 percent are unaccompanied youths under 18.

At Tent City's opening, one formerly homeless young woman, "Katrina," spoke at length. The former varsity cheerleader talked about dropping out of high school, becoming addicted to crack and having four children, all of whom were taken away by the Children Services Board.

Eventually, she fled her brutally abusive relationship with her then-husband and sought help through Compass. For a time, she resided at Cherry Street's Aurora House, where the staff helped her study to get her GED.

She presently has a 3.396 GPA at the University of Toledo as she studies to become a social worker.

"Next time the politicians decide to make cuts to homeless services, they'll have to tell us what cemetery they think people like Katrina will wind up in," said Leslie.

'Pat'

"I don't want anybody to feel sorry for me. I made lots of mistakes. But each day you wake up, you've got to be thankful. I'm so far down, I've got no place left to go but up. Things can only get better."

Pat is 26 years old, and he's lived on the streets of Toledo for two years. A scruffy white kid who says his story is the same as everyone else's, he became addicted to cocaine and spent his income on his habit until he lost job, home and family.

"It gets lonely on the streets," says Pat, who came to Tent City with his girlfriend and other friends, who are also homeless. "Most of the time, you don't know where your friends are. But you try to stick together, because nobody who's not homeless wants to talk to you."

Still, Pat says it's hard for people living on the streets together to trust one another. "One time, me and one of my friends were sleeping in a doorway. I woke up in the middle of the night, and he was stealing one of my socks. 'Go back to sleep,' he said, and I just had to laugh, it was so ridiculous.

"The next morning, he gave me this pink sock. 'I hope there isn't some girl going around with just one pink sock,' I said, and he told me he'd found it on the sidewalk a few blocks away."

From the donation center at Tent City, Pat's girlfriend got him a pair of cowboy boots for the winter. "Great! I'll be a country boy," he joked. "I was wearing just socks when I came here, so this is terrific."

Later, he observed, "When there are nice things donated, like those cowboy boots, sometimes you just have to pass them over. Forget them. You have to watch them or they'll get stolen, or you wind up fighting for them."

The truth of his concern became painfully clear when Pat realized one of his blankets had been stolen. "That's low, man. That's lower than low." Tent City volunteers provided him with additional sheets.

Finding solutions

Rogers reflects on the ultimate aim of the TLC Board, TAAEH, and the Cherry Street Mission. "Food, clothing and shelter don't change people – they stabilize people. But we want to be here when they finally want to engage and overcome their problems. We call that 'the long conversation.' Our ultimate goal is to put ourselves out of business, to end homelessness."

Leslie's goals are less lofty, but no less challenging. "What if we could just end homelessness for one individual who becomes homeless? What if we just save one life? How much is that worth?"

To get involved, email the Homeless Awareness Project at hap@taaeh.com.

In honor of those who serve–

In Toledo, 67 percent of homeless men claim veteran status. According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, veterans make up 40 percent of homeless men nationally.

Linda Webb of the Toledo Veterans Affairs Outpatient Clinic says VA records document 978 visits (including repeats) from homeless veterans from Oct. 2005 to Sept. 2006. Of the homeless vets the VA works with, Webb estimates 85 percent are chemically dependent.

While Vietnam vets constitute the majority at 63 percent, Webb says her agency receives visits from veterans of all ages, "from 18 to 80," who have endured all conflicts. While few in number, servicemen returning from Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom (in Afghanistan) are arriving for assistance. Nationwide, these young vets make up 7 percent of individuals who sought assistance through the VA's homeless services programs. Their numbers are expected to increase.

A glimpse of homelessness across the nation

(from the Institute for the Study of Homelessness and Poverty)

City/County	Homeless Count *
Chicago, Il.	6,715
Dayton, Oh.	more than 6,000 annually
Detroit, Mich.	14,827
Columbus, Oh. (Franklin Cty.)	1,869
New York, N.Y.	48,155
San Francisco, Ca.	6,248
Toledo, Oh.	2,280-3,300 annually
Washington, D.C.	5,518

* Estimated using various methods, as no standardized technique for measuring homelessness exists at present. Toledo's numbers are a conservative estimate based on info from Toledo's Homeless Management Information System, which gathers data on individuals currently seeking assistance in most shelters. This number excludes people living outside of shelters.

Make a difference!

We're on the verge of winter in Ohio, and homeless men, women and children are feeling the chill. Here are a few Toledo organizations helping the homeless. Can't afford to donate money? Consider donating your time. Food and new or gently used belongings are always welcome too. Let's show 'em Toledo has a heart!

Aurora Project, Inc.
1035 N. Superior St.
(419) 244-3200

Cherry Street Mission Ministries
105 17th Street
(419) 242-5141
www.cherrystreetmission.com

COMPASS
2465 Collingwood Blvd.
(419) 321-6830
www.ccrscompass.org

Homeless Awareness Project / Toledo Area Alliance to End Homelessness
www.taaeh.com

Maumee Valley Habitat for Humanity
223 South Fearing Boulevard
(419) 382-1964
www.mvhabitat.org

FOCUS
2283 Ashland Ave.
(419) 244-2175
www.focustoledo.org

Mildred Bayer Health Clinic for the Homeless
2101 Jefferson Avenue
(419) 241-1554

United Way of Greater Toledo
One Stranahan Square
(419) 248-2424
www.uwgtol.org

Toledo Northwestern Ohio Food Bank, Inc.
24 East Woodruff Ave
(419) 242-5000
www.toledofoodbank.org

St. Paul's Community Center
230 13th Street
419-255-5520