Blog

Is It Too Much To Ask?

This week’s blog was written by VSH’s volunteer program coordinator, Alison Jones-Nassar.

The morning of Thursday, January 27 was very cold. Snow, slush, and ice crusted the ground and you really had to keep moving to stay warm. By the time I arrived at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church to check in as a volunteer, a line had started to form outside. People with bags and backpacks shuffled in place and blew into their hands, waiting for the doors to open.

Inside the church, fellow volunteers sat in the warmth and listened to instructions while waiting for the coffee to brew. As participants in the January 2011 Point in Time Count, our task was to administer surveys to the homeless individuals lining up outside.  Their answers would give Homeward, Richmond’s central research & data collection agency, demographic information on how many people are homeless and who they are. More importantly, it would provide insight into why they are homeless. The survey consisted of 70 questions that asked people to classify themselves in terms of a variety of risk factors. Have you ever had a problem with alcohol? Have you ever received treatment for mental illness? Did you ever serve in the military? Were you homeless as a child? Knowing the answers to these questions helps our community to better understand the complicated issues confronting people who are experiencing housing crises and also helps to focus resources.

Within the space of a few hours, I conducted six surveys. I glimpsed six different versions of hell that morning, but they all pointed to one gigantic failure of our society to take care of its most vulnerable citizens. And the biggest question – why? – went unanswered.

Ron, a military veteran with diabetes, had spent the previous night under the Manchester Bridge. As hard as I try, I can’t imagine myself doing that. Alicia had spent the night in a shelter.  In her mid-forties, she suffered from severe depression. When she replied to my questions, she returned my gaze and patted my hand, as if to reassure me but I was not reassured. She could be my sister, my daughter, my best friend. She could even be me.

Albert was also in his forties, but he looked much older. Staring straight ahead, he curtly described his extensive criminal history and substance abuse problem. He was doing his best not to care that a complete stranger was chronicling his plunge to rock-bottom.  Jake was my age, fifty-one, and had a Master’s degree in public administration. In a soft voice, he spoke to me about his teenagers, his years in Massachusetts, and his struggles with mental illness. He had been living in an encampment for just over a year and did not express much confidence in the possibility that his situation might improve.

Why is it acceptable in this country for people to wander the cold streets with no place to go? Why do they have to sleep under bridges and in parks? Why, as sick as some of them are, can’t they get the treatment they need and the compassion any of us in similar circumstances would want and deserve?

In response to the final question, “What would it take for you to be permanently housed?” the answer was always the same. A job. Income. Money. A way to support myself. A place I can afford. “I don’t want anyone’s charity,” Ron told me. “I don’t need anyone’s help. I just want to be able to take care of myself.” That’s not too much to ask….is it?

Celebrating South Bay Apartments' Grand Opening

South Bay Apartments in Portsmouth

February 2nd was a day of celebration for Virginia Supportive Housing. That morning, about 150 VSH staff, board, donors, sponsors, city officials, and supporters as well as clients gathered in Portsmouth to celebrate the grand opening of its newest supportive apartment building, South Bay.

Phil Smith of Towne Bank, a member of South Bay’s Adopt-A-Room committee, presided over the ceremony which featured remarks by The Honorable Kenneth Wright, mayor of the City of Portsmouth; Neil Walsh, VSH board member; and the Honorable Alan Krasnoff, mayor of the City of Chesapeake. 

Left to right: The Honorable Alan Krasnoff, Mayor, City of Chesapeake; The Honorable Kenneth Wright, Mayor, City of Portsmouth; Sarah Paige Fuller, Director, Office to End Homelessness, City of Norfolk; Andrew Friedman, Director of Housing and Neighborhood Preservation, City of Virginia Beach

 Dr. Melvin Marriner, senior pastor at Grove Baptist Church, provided the invocation. The program culminated with an announcement from Mayor Krasnoff that Chesapeake hopes to be the site of VSH’s next supportive apartment building in the South Hampton Roads area.

One of the featured speakers was Lisa White, a resident of South Bay, who shared her experience of homelessness. After being diagnosed with colon cancer in 2004, Lisa’s illness and overwhelming medical expenses caused her to lose her job, then her car, and finally her home. “Virginia Supportive Housing gave me a safe, warm, and comfortable place where I could get the treatment I needed, begin the recovery process, and start to get back on my feet.”

South Bay is the third supportive apartment building in the South Hampton Roads area developed through regional collaboration. Gosnold Apartments of Norfolk opened in 2006, and Cloverleaf Apartments in Virginia Beach opened in 2008. The building is EarthCraft certified and features solar panels on the roof that are designed to reduce the overall kilowatt load by at least 20%.

Lisa White, South Bay Apartments Tenant

Thanks to this newest development, 40 formerly homeless individuals are now off the streets and into stable and affordable housing. The remaining 20 units will be occupied as soon as the qualified individuals are screened and identified. The VSH model, which integrates intensive case management services with permanent housing, boasts a 90% success rate and is considered a proven permanent solution to homelessness.

A Place to Start Saves Lives and Money

This week’s blog was written by VSH’s Executive Director, Alice Tousignant.

Five years ago, we were all scratching our heads trying to figure out what to do with a certain segment of the homeless population who weren’t getting helped.  These were individuals who were chronically homeless with serious mental illness, many of whom also had a co-occurring substance abuse issue.  Truthfully, many of us had gotten to the point of saying that this specific population chose to be homeless— that was our excuse.  The thing is, no one bothered to ask them what they wanted and if they really did want to be homeless.  The bottom line was that the community, including Virginia Supportive Housing, didn’t know how to help them and we had almost given up trying. 

But then two things happened: we starting hearing stories from around the nation about how chronically homeless people were costing the community money—in other words, even though chronically homeless people comprise a relatively small percentage (about 15%) of the overall population of people experiencing homelessness, they were using a disproportionately high amount of the resources in the community.  We also started hearing about some best practice programs that were successfully housing this population, and these programs were gradually spreading around the nation.

One of these programs was Pathways to Housing, a program that began in New York almost 10 years ago.  After hearing about this program, I must admit I was very skeptical. Not only did I not really believe it could work, it also seemed very costly.  Then PBS did a special on a gentleman called “Footie” who they followed as he entered the Pathways program.  One of the things I vividly remember from the Pathways video was that they talked to individuals who had been living on the streets for years and asked them what they wanted most.  And, guess what they said?  They wanted housing.  They didn’t say they wanted to remain homeless.  That video turned my skepticism to amazement and optimism.  I remember thinking, “We can do this here in Richmond.” 

Working with many partners in the community, including Homeward, the Daily Planet, the Community Services Boards of Richmond, Chesterfield and Henrico and the Virginia Housing Development Authority, A Place to Start (APTS) became our Pathways to Housing in Greater Richmond.  The program was launched in late 2007 and began taking individuals off the street shortly thereafter.

APTS places individuals with an extensive history of homelessness and a serious mental illness into permanent housing and wraps intensive services around them.  APTS has a dedicated service team of professionals, including a psychiatrist, nurse, social worker, peer counselor, substance abuse counselor and employment specialist who provide services 24/7.  APTS also has a housing specialist who works with landlords to broker leases, get clients into permanent housing, and ensure that program participants and landlords are getting what they need.  

We knew the program worked because it was evidenced based, but we needed to prove it worked here in Richmond.  So, we undertook an evaluation funded through the Greater Richmond Chamber Foundation and conducted by the Central VA Health Planning Agency.  The research looked at hospital and incarceration data on 50 clients enrolled in the program and measured costs and incidents 20 months prior to program entry and 20 months after.  The research is complete and the report was released today.

While we knew the program would work, we didn’t know how well it would work.  APTS has taken 58 people off the streets in three years with a 98% success rate in keeping people stably housed!  Only one person has returned to homelessness. 

And APTS is saving the community precious resources.  The research shows that the program has saved the community over $320,000 in the first 20 months in hospital and incarceration costs alone. This does not even include other costs, such as ambulance costs, judiciary costs, and the costs to the homeless services system.

Has this program made a difference in the community?  Yes!  In addition to cost savings, it is making a big difference in the community. We’re taking people off the streets. Most of the folks in the program were unsheltered prior to entering the program and were counted as such in the community’s twice yearly count of individuals experiencing homelessness.  In July 2008, there were 148 people who were counted as “unsheltered homeless.”  In July 2010, that number had gone down to 119, which is a 19% reduction in two years!  Some of this reduction is due to APTS.

What about peoples’ lives?  Just ask Jerome who has been in the program for over two years.  He had been homeless for eight years, living in alleys, dumpsters, and under cars and bushes in Richmond. He suffered frostbite in both feet.  “I struggled like a dog.”  He said that he would have died if he had lived on the street one more year. 

And, there are many more stories like Jerome’s. Despite all that we have accomplished through VSH and APTS, there is still plenty of work that needs to be done. There are still people living on the streets who need to get into housing and get the help they need, and we can’t do that without the community’s support.  To support A Place To Start and the work of VSH to provide proven permanent solutions to homelessness, click here. Thank you!

No Quick Fixes

Ours is a culture of quick fixes. Learn a language in five minutes a day. Lose 14 pounds in 14 days. Become a millionaire by scratching a lottery ticket. We expect problems that have resulted from years of bad luck and bad habits to disappear overnight, and when one quick-fix doesn’t work, we quickly lose patience and move on to the next “sure thing.”

It was no surprise, then, that when Ted Williams burst into the headlines just after the new year, people expected a quick turnaround. Despite a very complicated history that included a decade of homelessness, incarceration, substance abuse, and estrangement from family, the expectation was that he “take advantage” of all the opportunities that were flowing his way and “be good.” “Listen to your mom!” is what The Today Show’s Matt Lauer advised him.

It would have been enough to make anyone’s head spin. This individual went from living on the street and panhandling at traffic lights to having a new house and a lucrative broadcasting contract within a week. He went from invisible nobody to special guest on The Jimmy Fallon Show, Entertainment Tonight, and Dr. Phil in the blink of an eye. With so much invested in his success, people needed to believe that a “fairytale ending” was possible. Disappointment was not an option.

Did we really believe it was going to be that simple?

Less than ten days after skyrocketing to fame, Ted Williams was arrested for disorderly conduct and voluntarily admitted into rehab soon after. Of course, public reactions ran the gamut. “It is truly amazing that Americans always get sucked in by people like Williams. The man is a drunk and almost beyond hope.”  “I grew up with one of the best BS artists on the planet…Ted is about one of the best I’ve ever seen.”

Others seemed to feel more compassion. “I am very happy that this homeless person is getting another chance in life: most homeless are more likely to win the [lottery] than to be given such a good chance. I wish him well.”

Regardless of whatever opinions and feelings we may have on the subject, one thing is certainly true. Chronic homelessness is not a quick fix. The spiral into homelessness is often exacerbated by a number of complicating factors, and it can take years. It only stands to reason that true recovery would also take years, and some people struggle with it for the remainder of their lives. Three decades of research tells us that people like Ted Williams can’t even begin to heal without the support and stability that permanent supportive housing offers.

So let’s not kid ourselves. The path is long and the issues are complex. If we are going to insist that people turn their lives around, it only makes sense that we invest our hopes and resources in the strategy that offers them the best chance of succeeding. With permanent supportive housing, we might not get that “fairytale ending” that we crave so much, but we can get something even better: an end to homelessness.

A Man In Need Of A Second Chance

By now, we’ve all heard the story. “Homeless Man With Golden Voice Finds Fame.” It began with a YouTube video that went viral over the new year’s day weekend. The footage depicts a bedraggled man standing at a traffic intersection in Ohio holding a cardboard sign – a sight familiar to many, though most of us respond to this sight by driving quickly past without bothering to look. A reporter from the Columbus Dispatch stopped and filmed the man, 53-year-old Ted Williams, and in less than a week, his “golden voice” had earned him a number of television appearances and lucrative job offers.

Speaking to The Today Show’s Matt Lauer on the morning of Wednesday January 5th, Mr. Williams described his experiences with homelessness. It’s an experience we at Virginia Supportive Housing have encountered many times. More than a decade on the streets. History of substance abuse and incarceration. Painful estrangement from family members. Despite his TV appearance makeover, his gaunt face, wiry frame, and trembling hands betray years of hard living. And yet his smile is luminous and his eyes sparkle with emotion.  Following the interview, Matt Lauer declares that Ted Williams is “just a man in need of a second chance.”

We at Virginia Supportive Housing couldn’t agree more and, in fact, second chances are really what we are all about. Look back at the faces of the VSH clients featured in our blog and newsletter over the course of last year. Read their testimonials. Although they don’t have “golden voices” and they haven’t appeared on The Jimmy Fallon Show, they do share something in common with Ted Williams, and that is the desire to be something more than merely “homeless.” They want to transcend the suffocating limitations of that label and rediscover the purpose for which they were put on this earth. Like Mr. Williams, we all have a “God-given gift” that defines who we were meant to be. And despite whatever bad mistakes or poor choices we happen to have made, we are all deserving of a second chance.