[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 138 (Monday, September 30, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12010-S12011]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
A PLACE TO STAY
Mr. SIMON. Mr. President there is a publication in Chicago called
Streetwise that is sold by homeless people. They sell it for $1.00
each, and my guess is that most of that money goes to the person who
sells it.
In an issue that I bought the other day from someone on Michigan
Avenue, who appeared to be homeless, is a brief analysis about who the
homeless are and why they are homeless.
It gives as a source for this the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless.
They also have a story written by Jeff Mason about a man named Mike
who tells about his 24 hour experience as a homeless person.
This takes place at the Pacific Garden Mission, which I've had the
opportunity to visit on several occasions. It is a religious
organization where people are obviously committed to living their faith
and helping those who are less fortunate.
Mr. President, I ask that both items from Streetwise be printed in
the Record.
The material follows:
[From Streetwise, Sept. 16-30, 1996]
A Place to Stay
(By Jeff Mason)
7 p.m. It's a summer Wednesday night in Chicago. The sky is
getting dark as people hustle to their cars, trains and
buses. Everyone has some place to go, it seems. Everyone,
that is, except Chicago's homeless. They remain on the
streets or go to a shelter, looking for a place to stay.
Like any other night during the year, guests at the Pacific
Garden Mission, located at 646 S. State St., are sitting on
folding chairs in the assembly room waiting for church to
begin. The room is large, easily accommodating the more than
400 men and women the shelter serves every night. Rectangular
signs hang from the walls with Bible verses proclaiming the
wonders of salvation. Men dressed in suit coats and ties
patrol the aisles, telling the guests not to lean against the
walls and not to wander around the room.
Some of those seated in the chairs are dressed in shabby,
dated clothing. Many men have overgrown beards and messy
hair; others are better groomed and wear newer clothes. To
stay the night, the guests must attend the church service. So
they sit, they wait and, eventually, they worship.
``You either feel like you're in the military or you feel
like you're in jail,'' says ``Mike,'' a 35-year-old homeless
man staying in the shelter. ``They treat you like a child--
like you don't have common sense. I guess they have to do it
like that. Otherwise, it would be total chaos.''
Mike, who declined to give his real name, has been homeless
since his basement apartment flooded earlier this year.
Pacific Garden Mission is his first shelter. He can't live at
home because of a falling out with his family. In fact, his
family and most of his friends don't even know he's staying
here.
According to the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless,
approximately 15,000 people are homeless like Mike on any
given night in Chicago. The Chicago Department of Human
Services reports that there are approximately 5,500 shelter
beds available in the winter. Some shelters close during the
summer, though, making the search for overnight housing even
harder.
Michael Stoops, Director of Field Organizing for the
National Coalition for the Homeless, recognizes that shelters
meet a gaping social need but criticizes the way homeless
people are treated in them.
``The regimentation is abominable,'' Stoops says. ``They
treat people who are adults like children.''
High numbers force shelters like Pacific Garden, which is
open all year, to enforce strict rules on the people who stay
there.
``The reason it has to be so regimented is for the safety
of everyone involved,'' says Pastor Phil Kwiatkowski,
director of the men's division at Pacific Garden. ``We want
this to be a safe haven.''
Father Jim Hoffman, director of the Franciscan House of
Mary and Joseph, a shelter located at 2715 W. Harrison St.,
agrees. ``We've been at 99 percent occupancy for the last two
years,'' Hoffman says. ``If procedures are followed, people
feel safe here.''
8 p.m. The church service at Pacific Garden has started. A
college student opens the service with a prayer for those who
haven't been saved. A chorus of junior high girls sings. A
preacher delivers his sermon. ``First-timers'' are ushered
into a small hallway adjacent to the meeting room to await
counseling with one of the staff. After the service, the men
and women are separated. Then, sandwiches and fruit are
served and the guests get in line to go upstairs for bed.
``When you're hungry, you go to the shelter,'' Mike says.
``When you want to sleep, you go to the shelter. When you
want to take a shower, you go to the shelter. Without the
shelter where would you get these things? What would you do?
Where would you go?''
Some wouldn't go to a shelter at all. ``I would always want
to stay on the street instead of a shelter,'' says Joel
Alfassa, Street Wise vendor # 267, who was homeless for
almost two years. ``I'm a very independent person. I don't
like to be regimented, and that [freedom] is what the street
offered.''
9:30 p.m. The men stand in line for mandatory showers.
Belongings are left in a locked room downstairs and each man
is frisked before walking up to the second floor. The men are
given hangers and told to strip in a communal dressing room
next to the showers. Each man hands his hanger of clothing to
an attendant and takes a timed two-minute maximum shower. A
staff member walks in the room where the men are undressing
and sprays the floor with an aerosol can. The men shout their
approval; the spray masks the smell.
``This is home for a lot of individuals,'' Kwiatkowski
says. ``When you're living in a communal environment,
everyone has to be clean.''
A small towel and a thin hospital gown are issued after the
showers and the dripping men plod their way to a bunk bed or
a place on the floor. The mission has approximately 250 beds,
but Kwiatkowski says they serve anywhere from 400 to 550
people a night.
``Unless you get there early to get a bed, or you're a
first-timer, you'll be sleeping on the hard, stone floor.
Unless you're exhausted, your first night in a shelter, you
can't sleep,'' Mike says. ``You have to be sure you're in a
safe area. You have to hide your things. With so many people,
it tends to be overcrowded; tempers flow easily. So, you've
got your guard up on that.''
``It could be a night in hell for you,'' Mike says.
11 p.m. The lights are dimmed. The room is filled with the
sounds of snoring and farting--sounds of men going to sleep.
Though all the men have bathed, the room still smells of
sweat and body ordor. Talking is prohibited, but the noises
of communal living keep some like Mike from getting a good
night's sleep.
``Man, these guys snore like crazy. A lot of people may
think that's not a big deal. But, let's say you're one of the
fortunate people that does have a job--you don't get enough
rest to go to work.''
[[Page S12011]]
Mike works as a telemarketer for a company in Chicago.
Beyond being tired, the stigma of living in a shelter hangs
over him in the workplace. He has told no one where he lives
for fear of getting fired.
``I would be a fool to say that I was staying in a
mission,'' he says. In most people's eyes being homeless
means you're a drunk, an addict or a criminal. Mike fears
that reputation--a reputation he says does not fit him.
``If people knew that you are homeless or are a transient,
that would lessen your opportunities to advance yourself or
get yourself back on track,'' he says. ``In order for you to
advance yourself, to pull yourself out of the situation that
you're in, in a way you have to don a disguise.
But the trappings of homelessness are hard to hide. People
can spot it just by the grocery bags some carry. ``Who's
gonna go in that interview area with a bunch of bags and all
your clothes and try to be taken seriously?'' Mike asks.
``People are dressed to the nines and here you are--you're
lucky to have a shirt and tie. Do you think you're gonna get
that job? You have to have a hell of an amount of character
to rise above that situation.''
Though the shelter gives bag lunches to those who are
employed during the day, Mike says it is not as helpful as it
could be for people who have jobs. ``You only get a change of
clean clothes once a week,'' he says. ``How are you are going
to feel comfortable going to a job wearing the same clothes
every day?''
In addition, the shelter staff often refuses to store
things for residents who have job interviews. ``You have a
hell of a time trying to convince them to let you leave your
clothes there for an hour without throwing them out,'' Mike
says. ``It seems like if you're trying to help yourself, they
really don't want you there.''
Kwiatkowski says the shelter will help guests with special
needs such as storage on an individual basis. Mike says the
clothes he stored at Pacific Garden were thrown away. Now
Mike stashes his clothes in a closet where he works, but says
he doesn't know what he'll do if someone finds them there.
1 a.m. Most of the residents at Pacific Garden are asleep.
Those who can't sleep--especially first timers--are awake
with their thoughts.
``You've got all of this stuff on your mind,'' Mike says.
``Where am I going to go in the morning? Do I smell okay?
What does my appearance look like? Am I presentable? Nine
times out of 10 I'm not because I'm wearing the same clothes
I was wearing yesterday.''
4:30 a.m. The lights go on. Residents are awakened for the
morning church service. Like the night before, attendance is
required to eat. ``All we ask is that they sit through the
service,'' Kwiatkowski says. ``I believe you shortchange an
individual if you give them a bowl of beans and a suit of
clothes and you shove them out the door.''
Not everyone likes it, though. ``It's forever in your face.
I mean, forever in your face when you're there,'' Mike says.
``It makes you not want to go to church sometimes.''
Not all shelters in Chicago have the same religious
requirements Pacific Garden has. Not all shelters allow
people to keep coming back, either. ``There is no limited
length of stay here,'' Kwiatkowski says.
At Hilda's Place, a homeless shelter in Evanston, Ill., men
and women have three days to establish goals or they are not
permitted to return. ``We will not let people stay on unless
they are willing to work with the case managers and with the
staff on goals,'' says Carolyn Ellis, the shelter's director.
Hilda's Place does not have any religious requirements.
However, Ellis says mandatory showers are handled on a
``case-by-case basis'' for those who need them.
5:30 a.m. The men are quiet as they collect their clothes.
Those with their own soap clean up for the day. The rest go
downstairs to get their bags and go to the service. Many fall
asleep again until they are dismissed for breakfast.
Breakfast consists of grits, eggs, a hard bagel and a glass
of water or coffee. ``The food is one of the better things,''
Mike says.
7 a.m. When they finish eating, the men leave the shelter,
re-entering street life for another day. Mike's job doesn't
start until late afternoon, so he heads for a park bench to
sit for awhile.
``You have nowhere to go in the morning. You're wearing the
same clothes. If it's raining, you're out here in the rain.
If it's freezing, you're out here in the cold.''
The stigma of homelessness follows him out of the shelter
and on to the streets. ``Just hanging out here in the park--
people act as if you're invisible,'' he says. ``Time moves
very slowly sitting on a bench waiting for a place to open
up. I wish I had enough money to go hang in McDonald's or
White Hen.''
Mike says he wishes the shelter would let people stay there
longer during the day. According to Kwiatkowski, the shelter
stays open all day during the winter but not the summer so
guests can use the time to look for jobs.
``I don't even know of a job that's interviewing at seven
o'clock in the morning,'' Mike says.
Les Brown of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless sees a
larger problem than how long shelters stay open. ``The
biggest danger with shelters is we've begun to, as a society,
accept shelters as a normal way of housing people,'' he says.
``It's becoming an institution--an institutionalized way of
helping people who really need jobs and housing.''
8 a.m. ``It is now eight o'clock,'' Mike says. ``Where am I
gonna go? '' Mike has to kill time until his job starts at
1:30 p.m.
``For me, this is just temporary,'' he says. ``I need to
get the hell away from here. I want something out of my
life.''
Until he has more money, though, Mike will continue going
to the shelter at night. It's not a home, but at least it's a
place to stay.
____
who are the homeless?
In Chicago, 80,000 are homeless during the course of one
year.
42% are single men.
40% are families with children: The fastest growing segment
of the homeless population is women with children. Domestic
violence is a leading cause of homelessness among women with
children.
17% are single women.
7% are unaccompanied youth: 25% of homeless youth become
homeless before their 13th birthday.
25% are disabled.
Amost 50% are veterans: More Vietnam veterans are homeless
today than the number of U.S. soldiers who died during the
entire war.
why are they homeless?
Lack of affordable housing
For every 225 households seeking housing, only 100
affordable housing units are available.
61% of poor Chicagoans spend 50% or more of their income on
rent.
In Chicago, 700 single room occupancies for low-income
people are destroyed each year.
The waiting period of public housing is 5\1/2\ years, and
the waiting period for Section 8 housing certificates is 10
years. The Chicago Housing Authority has closed the list to
new names.
Lack of decent jobs or sufficient income:
50% of homeless adults work full- or part-time but still
cannot afford rent.
Chicago has lost more than 130,000 manufacturing jobs in
the last decade.
In Chicago, a family of four must earn an annual income of
$33,490 to meet a basic budget including rent, transportation
and child care.
In Illinois, the ratio of low-skilled, unemployed workers
to jobs that pay a living wage is 222 to 1.
Lack of health care or support services:
30% of the homeless suffer from varying degrees of mental
illness.
40% are substance abusers.
8% have AIDS or are HIV-positive.
Source: The Chicago Coalition for the Homeless; City of
Chicago's ``Report on Hunger and Homeless in American
Cities'' for the U.S. Conference of Mayors 1990--
1994.
____________________