| January 2004 A publication of The Wyoming Coalition for the Homeless NASNA member 907 Logan Avenue Cheyenne, WY 82001-5247 307-634-8499 fax: 307-634-9089 © 2003 email: wch@vcn.com |
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By Alan Elsner WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Hunger and homelessness both increased this year in U.S. cities to the point that social services agencies were often unable to meet emergency demands for food and shelter, the U.S. Conference of Mayors said. The conference's annual survey of cities across the nation found that requests for emergency food assistance increased by an average of 17 percent while the demand for emergency shelter rose by an average of 13 percent. Conference president James Garner, mayor of Hempstead, New York, said cities did not foresee any improvement next year, despite a recent uptick in the national economy. More than half of the participating cities reported people in need were turned away due to lack of resources. More than 14 percent of requests for emergency food aid were not met and more than half the cities had cut the number of bags of food provided or the number of times people could receive food. "These are not simply statistics. These are real people in real cities all across America," said Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell, who chaired the conference's task force that drew up the report. Philip Mangano, director of the Bush administration's interagency council on homelessness, said the administration sought a radically different approach to chronic homelessness. It aimed to bring federal, state and local authorities together to form long-term plans to tackle the problem. "We are no longer satisfied managing homelessness. We aim to end this national disgrace," he said. The report gave a number of causes for both hunger and homelessness. Many of the homeless and hungry were unemployed; others held low-paid jobs which did not pay enough for them to provide for their families. A lack of affordable housing exacerbated the problem. Almost a quarter of the homeless are believed to be suffering from mental illness and a third abuse drugs or alcohol. Often, these two groups overlap. Police have often tried to deal with the problem by arresting people living on the streets under public nuisance laws and sending them to jail. But Mangano said such a punitive approach was mistaken. "Arresting them might deal with the problem for 60 or 90 days but it comes right back to the streets," he said. Almost half the homeless population is black, 35 percent is white and 13 percent Hispanic. People remain homeless an average of five months -- though many have lived on the streets for years. Cheyenne is an amazing community -- they go out of their way to help those in need and the agencies helping the less fortunate. We want to thank all of those individuals, churches, clubs, scout groups, school groups and others that made Christmas a joy for our clients. We had special foods, gifts for everyone (including someone who gave $10.00 to each person coming in on Christmas Day). We were able to provide new jackets, hats, gloves, socks, and underwear to all of those coming in on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Clients enjoyed the turkey, ham, cakes, cookies, and other special foods. Our thanks go out to all of those who made Christmas, for our clients, the special time that it should be. |