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News: December 15, 2006
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| The 175-bed Austin Resource Center for the Homeless holds a nightly bed lottery. Managers say the center is able to accommodate everyone on most nights, but the recent cold weather has resulted in extra-long lines, and there are plans to increase the capacity to 200 the next time the temperature dips to freezing. These people are waiting in the alley behind the center for the lottery to begin. | 
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When nighttime temperatures dipped into the 20s a couple of weeks back, a handful of local churches opened up their doors to the homeless. As usual, the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless' 175 beds were all taken; next door, the Salvation Army's 100 slots reserved for homeless males were filled as well. Anywhere between 50 and 70 people typically spill into the church shelters when they open on nights the temperature falls to 32 degrees, said Carol Swicker, program director with Front Steps, formerly the Capital Area Homeless Alliance. According
to an analysis of the local homeless situation released last month by
the Community Action Network, a public-private partnership between local
organizations, government offices, businesses, and individuals with a
focus on health and well-being issues in Austin and Travis County, the
shelter-seeking crowd made up only a fraction of Austin's homeless population.
Among the highlights of "Facts and Questions About Homelessness,"
an update of CAN's 2001 "Homelessness Assessment Report" and
its 2002 Homelessness FAQ (see www.caction.org/reports.htm),
are these disconcerting statistics, paraprashed directly from the analysis:
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Unless
you've been living on another planet, you're already aware that affordable
housing is hard to come by in the Austin area, where, according to the Department
of Housing and Urban Development, fair market rent for a two-bedroom apartment
is $836. According to Lisa Garcia, vice president of assisted housing for
the Housing Authority of the City of Austin, about 5,900 families are on
the local waiting list for Section 8 vouchers and 4,680 are on the list
for public housing. Despite the gloomy stats, however, Austin was one of a select number of local governments across the country recognized in a report released Oct. 31 by the National Alliance to End Homelessness for its efforts to work with its homeless population. (For more, see "A New Vision: What Is in Community Plans to End Homelessness?," www.naeh.org/content/article/detail/1397.) However, without a combination of good affordable-housing programs and significant homelessness-prevention plans in place, well-intended community efforts to make a dent in the local homeless population won't make a lasting difference, said Nan P. Roman, president of the National Alliance to End Homelessness. "You can't cherry-pick a few pieces and think that they are going to work," said Roman. Simply focusing on rapid rehousing without prevention programs won't work, for example, because "as soon as you empty out the shelter … the beds are just going to fill up again," she said. Austin's Ending Chronic Homelessness Task Force, also affiliated with CAN, has focused on rehousing through collaborations with housing nonprofits like Caritas of Austin and Foundation Communities, noted Rivera, but overall homelessness-prevention efforts – such as making child care more affordable, raising the minimum wage, and offering accessible substance-abuse programs, for example – haven't been as strong, he said, because the funding simply isn't there. Considering, Rivera added, that 15% to 20% of the Austin-area homeless population is classified as chronically homeless – continuously without a home for at least a year or temporarily homeless at least four times over a three-year period, according to a HUD definition cited in CAN's FAQ – and that the chronically homeless consume about 50% of all services used locally by homeless people, putting money into prevention efforts at all levels – local, state, and federal – makes sound economic sense. "It's a matter of time and resources." And if governments don't invest more in these types of programs, "we're going to continue to have our community experience this," he said. Copyright © 2008 Austin Chronicle Corporation. All rights reserved. |
| Original Austin Chronicle
article may be viewed at http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/ story?oid=oid:429276 |
