| July 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 © 2004 email: wch@vcn.com PAGE DOWN FOR TABLE OF CONTENTS |
An Invitation to attend the July 14, 2004 session in Cheyenne 
Wyoming Winds is published by the Wyoming Coalition for the Homeless, 907 Logan Avenue, Cheyenne, WY 82001-5247. phone: 307-634-8499; fax: 307-634-9089. email: wch@vcn.com
Editor for this edition of Wyoming Winds is Virginia Sellner.
Views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the Wyoming Coalition for the Homeless, its staff or board.
Copyrights revert back to the author upon publication.
WCH is a 501(c)(3) all volunteer non-profit agency depending upon the community, foundation and corporate grants for funding. Donations may be mailed to 907 Logan Avenue, Cheyenne, WY 82001-5247. If you would like your donation to be used for a specific need please indicate this on your check. © 2004
**In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this
material is distributed without charge or profit to
those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving
this type of information for non-profit research and
educational purposes only.**
WY Advocates Work for Housing Trust Fund The Wyoming Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials (WAHR) has developed a concept paper and draft legislative language for the establishment of a housing trust fund in the state. While the campaign to establish a housing trust fund in Wyoming is still in its infancy, the effort is motivated by concerns about otherwise dwindling funding for housing and human services at the federal, state and local levels.
WAHR's membership includes public housing agencies, public officials, service providers, housing and homelessness advocates, housing counseling organizations, realtors, developers, public officials, and others. The concept paper and legislative language for a housing trust fund are currently under review by WAHR's membership. Virginia Sellner of the Wyoming Coalition for the Homeless (WCH) and a member of WAHR said she is pleased with the progress the groups are making. "WCH has been at the forefront in the state in its support of the National Housing Trust Fund Campaign, so we recognize the value of housing trusts funds and how they can leverage one another," Ms. Sellner said. "We are very excited that WAHR is working to establish a housing trust fund at the state level in Wyoming."
After the legislative proposal and supporting materials are finalized and approved by its membership, WAHR will reach out to allies in the state capitol who might be willing to introduce housing trust fund legislation. The organization has already had preliminary conversations with key legislators. As WAHR's members serve an estimated 30% of the state's population in a variety of human service and housing capacities, the organization hopes that it will be able to develop broad support for its trust fund proposal.
As proposed by WAHR, the trust fund would be available for grants and loans for a range of purposes, including creating and maintaining affordable housing and infrastructure to support such housing, providing homebuyer assistance, providing rental assistance, creating and improving homeless shelters, gap financing to be used in conjunction with public and private sources, among other uses.
A board to administer the trust fund would be appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate and would include public, private and consumer interests. While the board would develop the application process, the legislation lays out 15 criteria that could serve as preferences, such as the extent of leveraging of other funds, the capacity of the applicant, whether the project serves people with the lowest incomes, and the proximity of the project to employment opportunities and transportation. As proposed by WAHR, the legislation also requires the distribution of at least 30% of the trust fund in rural areas.
Gerry Bolger of the Evanston Housing Authority and a WAHR member involved in the development of the housing trust fund concept paper and legislative language said, "WAHR members, advocates and developers have been very successful at elevating affordable housing. The current budget crisis in the nation makes it apparent that we explore a new source of funding for affordable housing."
For more information: Gerry Bolger, Evanston Housing Authority, (307) 789-2381 or gerry@evanstonhousing.org.
This year the Stand Down in Cheyenne will be held on September 10, 2004, from 9:00 a.m. until noon.
The event will take place at the newly renovated Depot at Capitol and 15th Streets. Food will be served
at noon. Various agencies working with homeless veterans will be represented as well as many of the
services from the VA Medical Center in Cheyenne. For more information on this event contact Larry Melka or
phone 307-778-7353.
Fighting back against an epidemic of hate crimes and hate language directed at our nation's homeless citizens, forty members of House the Homeless took on Best Buy.
Best Buy, along with Amazon.com, Target, Birgin Mega Stores, Tower Records, FYE Entertainment, Barnes & Nobles, and Borders (all national retailers), have been selling hate videos that defile people experiencing homelessness. Best Buy failed to join other retailers in stopping these sales and meeting a June 1, 2004 deadline set by the National Coalition for the Homeless. This author followed up certified letters by making numerous phone calls to Best Buy both locally and nationally, but to no avail. On Tuesday, June 15th at 10:00 am House the Homeless held a full blown press conference and educational picket at the Best Buy at Highway 290 and MoPac.
The ranks of the picket line swelled to 40 picketers when youths from LifeWorks joined the growing number of protesters from House the Homeless. Media from channels 36,24,42, News 8 Austin, and the Austin American Statesman gave witness to the demonstration that resulted in the following statement just hours after the public outcry for justice began:
"Best Buy shares the community's concern about issues related to violence
against the homeless, and we understand our obligation to customers to
monitor the products on our shelves. We will not be carrying (the videos
or DVDs in the future.)"
Sweet Victory! As of this writing, FYE Entertainment is the only national retailer that continues to carry these debase films.
At the educational picket, House the Homeless in conjunction with the National Coalition for the Homeless, also released the fifth annual Hate Crimes Report citing 131 murders and 281 acts of violence committed against persons experiencing homelessness over the last five years. These hate crimes took place in 119 US cities. The crimes include: beatings with baseball bats, rapes, shootings, and emulations. The report was simultaneously released in Cleveland, OH. In Los Angeles, actor Mike Ferrel of *MASH* fame and Senator John Conyers in Washington, DC also released the report at the same time.
The Hate Crimes Report which shows hate crimes against homeless persons includes last June's terrorist act when several young men drove around in a pickup for several days shooting homeless people in Austin, TX. James Clements taking blood thinners almost bled to death when he was struck several times with pellets.
Just one week prior to the release of the report and the educational picket, a hate video destined for retail sales was confiscated and four young American terrorists in Cleveland, OH were arrested. They were sneaking up on unsuspecting homeless people and stunning them with 50,000 volts of electricity in their groins and throats while they slept. (The perpetrators are under arrest and awaiting prosecution.)
Since the report, a homeless man has received third degree burns when he was doused with a flammable liquid and set on fire in Corpus Christi, TX.
Also since the report, a New York City homeless woman was stoned to death when gang "wanna-bes" left her blood on thirty bricks.
This is an abomination! These atrocities must be stopped now. This is very similar to the time just prior to World War II when Adolph Hitler started his "cleansing" practices. His efforts began with hate language such as calling a person a "transient." This gives the impression that a person is just "passing through" and therefore is not a part of the community. Gypsies and people with disabilities were decried as weak, inferior, and somehow of a lesser human value. Jews were similarly targeted and eventually millions of people were exterminated in the Holocaust. History is repeating itself if we let it. Businesses are making money from the misery of others and gangs are beheading homeless people as part of initiation rights as happened in Denver, CO two years ago.
The next time you are standing at the water cooler and someone makes a joke about "some homeless bum" making a fortune by standing on a Texas street corner in 100 degree heat; or starts to tell an off-color joke about how "Welfare mothers make better lovers," stop them right there. Tell them, "Hey, man that ain't cool."
Check out www.nationalhomeless.org/hatecrimes to see the entire report and learn what else you can do to stop the hate. House the Homeless and the National Coalition for the Homeless (NCH) recommend:
Just as soldiers are taught never to leave a comrade on the field
of battle, homeless veterans should never be left on the street.
Gordon Mansfield, deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of
Veterans Affairs, made that statement recently during a visit
to Winthorne House, a shelter for homeless vets.
''We have an obligation to work with these folks,'' said
Mansfield, a Vietnam veteran who was partially paralyzed in
combat. ''These are my brothers and sisters. But the bottom line
is they've got to make a decision to change and acknowledge their
problems before we can help them.''
He said the VA can't solve the problem of homeless veterans alone
and needs the support of more community organizations such as
Operation Stand Down, a nonprofit agency in Nashville that runs
Winthorne House at 807 Winthorne Court, and other services for
homeless vets.
A VA study found that there were about 250,000 homeless vets
nationwide, Mansfield said, but homeless advocates think the
number is much higher.
He said he didn't think veterans were any more likely to become
homeless than other people but said Vietnam veterans account for
a larger proportion of the homeless population than veterans of
other wars.
And, he said, there's no doubt that combat can lead to mental
health problems that could in turn lead to homelessness.
''These folks involved in combat are prone to some mental health
issues,'' he said. ''It's not the normal course of life to go
around killing people. But we tell them that they're doing it for
the benefit of their country.''
Unlike soldiers returning from Vietnam, he said, soldiers
returning from Iraq are given mental health exams and provided
with any help they need.
Fred Collins, a former homeless veteran who sought help at
Operation Stand Down and is now the resident manager of Winthorne
House, said post-traumatic stress is common among soldiers in
combat.
''I can't think of anything more gruesome than shooting people
and having people shoot at you,'' said Collins, who served in the
U.S. Army in Korea in the 1960s.
Collins, 59, said he battled drug and alcohol addiction for 40
years before he sought help.
''This program for me was pure life saving,'' he said. ''Along
with that psychic change, you need to get treatment and get
better; there has to be someone there to guide you.''
Steve Eaten, a Vietnam veteran who's been homeless off and on for
20 years, said he finally reached a low point last year in drug
and alcohol addiction and decided to seek help.
''You have to change everything about your life, and this program
helped me do that,'' he said. ''And it helped me gain a whole lot
of spirituality.''
After spending 10 months at the home, the 54-year-old said, he
bought a recreational vehicle and is planning to live in it at a
local RV park.
The VA is reviewing its mental health programs to determine the
best way to help homeless veterans with mental health or drug and
alcohol problems, Mansfield said. Mental health programs are not
available to veterans in some areas of the country, and the VA is
trying to fix that, he said.
The agency is also reconsidering its prior steps to make mental
health treatment programs available only on an outpatient basis.
Some vets may need hospitalization and are unable to get it, he
said.
The federal government has set aside $35 million to address
homelessness among veterans, he added.
''When I visit places like this and talk to the veterans, it
really helps me do my job better,'' Mansfield said.
Now is the time to turn our attention to empowering those we serve by educating them about the importance of registration and mobilization. We at the National Low Income Housing Coalition are encouraging our local partners to join us by holding rallies to educate low income people about the importance of voting and the threat to affordable housing.
Here are four steps to help you get started:
Step 1- Contact other service providers or reach out to clients, residents, staff, community activists, and the board of elections to plan a voter registration event in your community on July 22, 2004.
Step 2- Decide what type of event will work best for you and the resources available to you. For more information on planning these events, please contact Katie Fisher at NLIHC, 202-662-1530 x222, Katie@nlihc.org, or visit our website, www.nlihc.org/vrem.
Step 3- Contact Katie Fisher at NLIHC, 202-662-1530 x222, Katie@nlihc.org, to help us keep track of the events happening all over the country.
Step 4- Plan a media outreach strategy so the candidates and community can be informed about the level of concern among the homeless population about issues important to the community.
Did you know that 84% of all charitable contributions come from individuals? How can your organization
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In this Raising More Money Introductory Session, you will learn a system for building sustainable funding for the mission of your organization from lifelong individual donors, as well as:
· Participants are encouraged to bring other staff, board, volunteers, and business associates to engage them in this practical and effective new team-based approach. Register soon; space is limited.
Presenter: Raising More Money trains and coaches nonprofit organizations of all sizes and types in implementing the Raising More Money mission-centered system for building lifelong donors.
A homeless-outreach worker at an airport terminal
needs special powers of observation.
"We don't have the obvious homeless people here.
Not the ones with the shopping carts and the
bags," said Mike Noel, the head of a Volunteers
of America homeless outreach team at Kennedy and
LaGuardia airports.
The guy in the Polo shirt and pressed pants
pulling a black Samsonite looks like a business
traveler. But when Noel and co-worker Howard
Cunningham see him two days in a row, they make a
note of it.
When they see him at Terminal 4 one day, then at
Terminal 1 the next, they know the man must be a
stranded traveler or an out-of-luck New Yorker.
"We walk through daily, and our instincts just
make us stop. Didn't we see that guy yesterday?"
Noel said. "They blend in with the travelers.
Either a smart cart with luggage or just neatly
dressed."
Noel and Cunningham are part of the four-member
team that scours the airports for homeless people
five days a week under a contract with the Port
Authority.
They make hundreds of contacts a year with people
who have decided to live, at least for a while,
in an airport terminal. Their job is to coax the
people into shelters. It sometimes takes months
of persuasion.
The Port Authority has a policy against forcibly
removing the homeless. Noel, 53, says the airport
homeless are more professional looking than
street homeless, yet most are significantly less
resourceful than the character played by Tom
Hanks in the movie "The Terminal."
The movie tells the story of Viktor Navorski, who
is stranded at Terminal 4 at Kennedy Airport when
there is a coup in his Eastern European country.
He is allowed neither to return home nor to leave
the airport. While stuck for months in the
terminal, Navorski finds an airport job and love
with a flight attendant played by Catherine
Zeta-Jones. The film opens today. Kennedy workers
got a special screening.
In the real life of the homeless at the airport,
there is no glamorous flight attendant, but there
are happy endings.
Noel and Cunningham, 52, remember a woman from
St. Louis who traveled to India with plans to get
married. The marriage was cancelled, and she
returned but refused to contact her family.
"She was hanging out here in Terminal 4," Noel
said. "She must have stayed here a good two or
three weeks before we were able to motivate her
to say 'yes.'"
She agreed to go into the city's shelter system.
Several months later, she called from St. Louis,
where she had returned and found a job.
"She wanted to apologize for causing us so much
trouble," Noel remembered.
Then there's the story of Timothy Wigfall, who
lost his job as an airport cleaner about two yers
ago, but decided to stay. "This was my home,"
said Wigfall, 49.
He slept for a year in Terminal 3, which he said
has softer chairs than Terminal 4.
Wigfall survived, he said, because of his
MetroCard. He traveled to soup kitchens for food
and the YMCA for showers. Meantime, the outreach
team was trying to coax him into a shelter.
Last year, a swollen leg placed Wigfall in the
hospital. A social worker there found him a group
home in Jamaica, where he has lived for nine
months. Wigfall still visits the airport, where
he affectionately greeted Noel and Cunningham
yesterday.
"Even though we didn't place him, it's good to
see that he's got somewhere to live and that he's
safe," Noel said. "All the social workers work
together."
While talking to Wigfall, Noel and Cunningham had
one eye on another man. They first met him April
6, and he has been hanging out at the airport,
off and on, ever since. On that first day, the
man was wearing three coats, so they nicknamed
him "three coat."
Yesterday, he had shed his coats and had on a
blue knit shirt, and he looked much thinner. He
was slumped on a plastic seat when the two
workers approached him.
"We really don't know what his story is," Noel
said. "He says he's good. Everybody's good. When
somebody's good, we know he's bad."
"Three coat" hasn't admitted he needs help yet.
Until he says "OK, Howie and Mike, I'm ready"
he'll be living at the terminal.
I was going for my early morning walk the other day when I saw an old, fragile homeless man slowly pushing his cart with all his belongings. He seemed to be hungry, lonely, lost and barely surviving. I wonder how we can help to relieve his hunger and homelessness or at least to make his remaining time a little more comfortable. In the richest nation on Earth, and in one of the richest areas pf the country, how can we tolerate poor souls dying on the street? Cupertino is full of multi-million dollar homes, SUVs and luxury cars . There are long lines in Starbucks where people think nothing of spending $3.50 on a cafe latte every day. Have we lost our compassion, or do we depend too much on city politicians who seem to have lost touch with reality? And are we confident we might not suffer the same fate when we are older? It is time to join hands and lend help to these poor, unfortunate souls. Shame on us, and shame on the politicians who cannot find a solution. Manmohan Pejavar At the end of the first week of June, Ichiro was batting .340 and yet the Mariners were dead last in their division. Veteran observers repeat the adage, "It's a team sport. No one player can do it alone."
Having played baseball, we know that adage all too well. While a player can work on his or her individual statistics, it doesn't overcome losing.
In a similar manner, we are mismanaging our lives in King County. More often than not, it is our individual statistics, not the effort to bring our team to success, that we pursue.
For businesses, households and even governments, especially in tough times, it is keeping our own heads above water that seems to matter most. For suburban city governments, it is watching costs rise and services dwindle as revenue declines. Even the "big guys" suffer, for both the city of Seattle and King County also seek remedies to growing human need with shrinking funds.
Critics who still think government waste is the problem are at the ready with new initiatives for voters to cut public revenue still further on the premise that it is good for the team when in fact it is even more pandering to the individualistic ethic. For the few who may benefit from such voter initiatives, the crush of harm from their passage would make us all suffer.
On this night in King County, an estimated 8,000 men, women and children will simply be seeking a roof over every bed. About 4,600 of the more fortunate will bed down in a shelter or transitional facility, most of which are in Seattle. But the other 3,400 will be on the streets, in their cars, in greenbelts, or in deserted buildings. With no shelter left and no friends or family near to provide a temporary bed, it isn't exactly a team effort when you are the one with no place to stay.
Tent city, dating back to the early 1990s in Seattle, has provided the individual homeless person the chance to be on a team of people seeking to overcome their homelessness together. With up to 100 beds and strict rules and with help from friends in the faith and nonprofit communities, tent city has become another source of help for "this night."
Two years ago, Seattle went through its own self-scrutiny about whether to allow tent city to exist. Now, we witness the same scrutiny in greater Bothell. What is more essential for all of us to see, than even the details of who lives at tent city, is the imperative in our civil society for neighborliness.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Lutheran pastor who resisted Hitler in Germany during World War II, wrote, "Neighborliness is not a quality in other people, it is simply their claim on ourselves."
As some in Seattle were upset when the tent city idea began, many in Bothell are now also outraged. Despite their protests that it was process and not people that was the target of their rage, the details of their defense do not matter. What matters are the failures we continue to accrue at being neighbors.
This resistance to being a neighbor doesn't stop with tent cities. In King County, budgets for human services continue a decline that hurts the most vulnerable of our neighbors. Suburban cities balk at having to pick up caring for the needy, not because these cities don't care, but because their resources are also stretched and further weight simply cannot be borne. Even Seattle, long the model of caring, faces cuts that will punish too many simply for being in need.
There is no more critical time than today, this night, for regional solutions. Homelessness is not just a Seattle problem. According to the annual "One Night Count" sponsored by the Seattle/King County Coalition for the Homeless, 82 percent of the shelter beds in King County are in Seattle, yet only 52 percent of those utilizing shelter had Seattle as their last permanent address; 26 percent listed greater King County as their last address. While it may be news to our neighbors in Bothell, homelessness affects every community in King County.
The good news is that efforts are under way to create regional solutions through groups such as the Committee to End Homelessness in King County. There is a growing understanding that the need far outweighs the ability of nonprofits and faith communities to meet it. Some ask, "Why don't churches do more?" — forgetting that nearly half the shelter beds now provided have a faith-community connection.
It is time for the public as a whole to be the team it must be, and for individuals on the team to see themselves as key players. We must move beyond parochial criticisms of efforts to help those in need, including efforts to create tent cities, and embrace the more challenging and ultimately more satisfying and productive work of finding regional solutions to what is clearly a regional problem.
Bill Kirlin-Hackett is coordinator of the Interfaith Task Force on Homelessness, based at St. Mark's Cathedral in Seattle. The Rev. David C. Bloom is director of the Rauschenbusch Center for Spirit and Action at the University Baptist Church in Seattle. Kirlin-Hackett is a member of the 22-person King County Citizens' Advisory Commission on Homeless Encampments.
June 15, 2004 -- Sgt. Ezell C. Lawrence was laid to rest today at Fort Bliss National Cemetery.
A faceless name, Sgt. Lawrence served his country for 12 years. He fought in Vietnam, but sadly lived his last days in El Paso as one of the many homeless veterans.
The Dignity Memorial Homeless Veterans Burial Program provided Sgt. Lawrence with a burial befitting his service. He died in December, but was buried with dignity and full military honors Tuesday.
The funeral home of Kaster-Maxon and Futrell paid for the expenses.
Dozens of fellow veterans attended the services. They did not know him, nonetheless they honored his life.
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