Walk In Her Shoes? No Way! Classic Example of Homeless Youth and Her Challenges

Not all homeless youth (ages 12 to 25-ish, not in custody of parent/guardian) are alike. But plenty of the 2+ million homeless youth in America today share many of the circumstances of “Abby,” a 22-year-old woman I’ve interviewed for my latest HEAR US project. Here’s the starter list:

• Dysfunctional parent, in this case her mother, suffering from mental illness, drugs and alcohol abuse. Father not in the picture.
• Abuse, physical and mental, at the hands of her mother.
• Sexually abused by the mother’s boyfriend, became pregnant in her mid teens.
• Responded to her situation by turning to drugs, alcohol and harmful behavior, making choices now haunting her.
• Kicked out, with nowhere to go. Bounced around with friends until she wore out her welcome mat.
• Temporarily taken in by a fringe relative, a functional family that truly cares for Abby.  

When I met Abby and her host family, things were frayed. Despite extraordinary hospitality and extremely positive environment, Abby, with her 2 infants (16 months and 3 months), disrupted the household, just because of natural occurrences, like babies crying. “Maxine” is is home-schooling their 2 teens, thus babies crying makes it hard to concentrate. One gave up his bedroom for Abby and her babies. 

Abby, despite her self-described and observable intelligence, did not finish high school. A GED is on her list so she can go to college and pursue a medical career. She was inspired by the extraordinary care given to her oldest baby when he almost died. 

The baby’s near-death episode resulted in 2 months in a children’s hospital, causing Abby to lose her apartment. That didn’t matter at the time because she was staying in the hospital with her son. Her youngest was with the baby’s father’s family.

When the baby finally recovered and was ready to be released, the family had nowhere to go. A shelter was not an option because no vacancies and a medically frail infant would be too risky in a germ-filled, uncontrolled environment. She has no vehicle, so living in Walmart parking lot like so many do wasn’t an option. Couch surfing with friends not an option for obvious reasons. So, despite hardly knowing Abby, Maxine, husband and 2 teens, stepped up.

This doesn’t always work—the goodhearted housed family accepting a stranger (and babies) into their house—but in this case it did. Maxine is a compassionate, astute woman who realized that Abby had no clue about parenting and lacked life skills. No surprise, given her dysfunctional upbringing?

So Maxine offered Abby a crash course in caring for babies, doing it in a way that it harbored acceptance, not resentment. Abby relished this opportunity. The babies flourished. But, Abby’s time at the house was limited. Abby and Maxine got a painful lesson—how hard it is to find a place to live when you don’t have much money.

When Abby and her son were in the hospital, Maxine ran a GoFundMe campaign for them, raising about $7000 to be used to get them a place to live. Figuring first month rent, security deposit and all the other non-negotiable start-up expenses, this seemingly huge amount was not going to last, but it was a start.

Abby’s income is child support from sperm donors and a pittance of welfare. She gets food stamps and WIC. Her family’s food intake was augmented by Maxine and her family. Maxine also has taught Abby a little about food management and preparation. 

Abby showed me pages of phone numbers of landlords and property managers in the Tampa area she called. Hard to ignore the scratches through the names. Babies caused some phone denials. Her tenuous income—planning to work but no job—the other pitfall. Bad credit would have also been a stumbling block but most conversations ended before that. Private rents were $800+. Subsidized, a 10-year waiting list. Location made some places untenable, since Abby doesn’t drive and has no vehicle. Bus line essential. 

When I left Abby after our first interview, she had hopes of finding a house trailer and a park that not too seedy or expensive, on a bus line, near places she could possibly work. She asked if I’d come through the area again and wanted me to see her new place. Optimism.

So today, as I was heading to northwest Florida, I texted Abby and asked if I should swing by for a followup interview. She sent me the address.The park, in a mixed area—churches, industrial, commercial. All tired. Units in her park matched the neighborhood. Some decorated with care, others ramshackle. Yellow speed bumps slowed traffic. Kids were evident. 

Her bedraggled single-wide 3 bedroom unit had minimal furniture and household items. Her babies had just been at the hospital, with a spate of infections and relatively minor issues. Her doctor wants her to have a CT scan because her recurring migraines are not responding to the meds. Oh yeah, and she has heart issues. Stress, she says. No kidding. 

OK, back to the daunting list of issues facing her:

• To get a job, she needs qualified childcare (medical issues huge for both babies). Department of Children and Families seems to be not responsive (Google the department and "dysfunction.") 
• She's lined up a job, starting tomorrow, at a chain grocery a mile down the road. She can walk, she assured me. Yeah, and how’s that going to work in bad weather, or at night, or when she needs to get the kids from child care because of illness? And she’ll lose it if she doesn’t get child care.
• She needs to come up with $1500 to pay off the trailer by the end of the month. We didn’t get to discuss why/how because of crying babies. The $4500 down payment will be forfeited without the final payment. And they’ll be evicted. And the owner will be happy. (A worthwhile read on this issue.)
• Her food stamps (SNAP) were inexplicably cut.
• She has psychological issues stemming from her young life’s hellish experiences, but cannot find a counselor that will accept her medicaid payments. And unless she gets help coping, she’ll stress out…you see where this goes. 

This is only a short summary. I left her with as much encouragement as I could muster. I tried to cover my horror at the impossibility of her avoiding homelessness again. To say she needs a miracle is an understatement. 

And this is just one young woman, an unaccompanied homeless youth with 2 babies. You don’t want to know how many more are out there…. 

Open Letter to Sheila Crowley, Respected Housing Advocate

Dear Sheila,

I think we’ve met. We certainly have walked the same paths, dinosaurs that we both are in the world of housing advocacy. And I think we both want the same thing. But I’m troubled by remarks attributed to you:

‘While representatives of organizations and governments say the definition of homeless should be expanded to increase federal aid for the types of homeless in rural areas, Crowley stressed that without more funding, it would just take money away from helping other homeless living on the streets.’

What will it take for us to get beyond this log-jam of an argument, one that gives elected officials cover for ignoring the skyrocketing homeless population?

I get the math you’re suggesting. But, what I can’t figure is how do we get to Point B, the funding, if we don’t make a case for it? Knowing how slow our federal policy and funding mechanism is, I suggest Point A: get the feds to own the scope of homelessness as it really is--people have lost housing and have nowhere to go--is the vital first step.

Having spent time with doubled up and otherwise homeless/not-HUD-homeless parents and kids over the past 10 years as I’ve traveled backroads of America chronicling homeless families/youth for my nonprofit organization HEAR US,  I can tell you that the suffering they experience is often every bit as bad, or worse, as the people I worked with in my shelter-running days. My Worn Out Welcome Mat series of documentaries lets these families and youth speak for themselves. 

The last thing we need is to pit one group against the other. That’s what seems to be happening on this effort to get HUD to expand the definition of homelessness to include those they’ve managed to exclude--families, youth, and others not counted as homeless. 

My respect for the National Low Income Housing Coalition is profound. My concern is that your position on this issue might be mistaken for agreeing with HUD on their ever-narrowing definition of homelessness that paves the way to their bowing out of their role in ending homelessness. 

We can’t expect Congress to loosen their pursestrings to alleviate homelessness unless we make the case that it’s a need. Millions of homeless families and youth in addition to the uncounted single adults, a number I’d estimate to be at least 7 million, far exceeds the 500,000 HUD reports to Congress.

Having recently spoken to a number of Hill staffers and Congresspersons, I’m appalled at their lack of knowledge of HUD, homelessness, and housing needs of people in poverty and crisis. The NLIHC Out of Reach report provides vital statistics on the extent of the housing  affordability crisis. What we are lacking is a credible account of the scope of homelessness in our country. 

Until we establish a comprehensive definition of homelessness that includes the spectrum of people who have lost housing and have nowhere to go, we will be complicit in the ongoing strategy of ignoring the plight of houseless babies, toddlers, children, youth and adults. That, I suspect, is a point of agreement for both of us.

Respectfully,

Diane Nilan

President/founder HEAR US Inc.

Pope Francis, Savior for America's Homeless Families and Youth?

One, faced with insurmountable odds, can only hope for a savior. As Pope Francis packs his bags (I can't imagine he has a butler doing that task), I'm packing up my hopes in one basket for his pending U.S. trip on behalf of the 3 million or so homeless kids and their families.

Despite our ongoing best effort to get Congress to address the growing issue of homeless kids, nothing seems to work. Recently, the U.S. Department of Education released the latest number of school kids identified as homeless, 1,360,747. This number represents DOUBLE the amount of students since before the recession.

As the kind folks at the National Alliance to End Homelessness were good enough to point out, most of these students are doubled up, staying with friends, relatives, or acquaintances because they have nowhere to go. (If you want to hear from the families and youth as to what it's like being doubled up, here's my latest HEAR US documentary, Worn Out Welcome Mat - KS.)

Pope Francis will visit NYC where record number of homeless families and youth are overwhelming the underwhelming system.

He will travel to Philadelphia where families living in tents have befuddled authorities in their feeble attempts to make sure no one, especially babies and toddlers, are sleeping on the streets.

He will stop in DC to afflict the comfortable members of Congress as he addresses a joint session. (Oh, to be a fly on the wall watching the squirming...).

So, the "eggs (hopes)" in my basket are:

• Get Congress to issue a joint apology to the millions of homeless families and youth, coupled by their commitment to revamp our nation's paltry approach to this population, and the serious funding necessary. Oh yeah, pass (fully funded) the Homeless Children and Youth Act for a show of good faith.
• Get Congress to agree that poverty in America is immoral and that they will immediately and wholeheartedly take drastic steps to restore a decent quality of life to the disenfranchised.
• Get Congress to institute a moratorium on any cruel initiatives to punish those at the bottom of the economic ladder--in areas not limited to health care, criminal justice, welfare, childcare, education and nutrition. 
• Hear the confession of the NAEH folks who up till now denied the plight of families and youth who lost housing and doubled up with others.

I'm sure these things will happen. Wanna know why? The Nuns On The Bus will be in DC to make sure things go well. Amen!

Ignoring Homeless Families and Youth: They Don't Disappear

Lost housing, doubled up, staying with others.

For thousands of students in Kansas, with and without parents, who have nowhere to go, doubled up means instability, tensions, and worse….

High mobility, poverty, trauma, family crises, coupled with the lack of safe and affordable housing options combine to create an onslaught of families and youth with nowhere to go. Over 70% of the more than 10,000 KS students identified as homeless are doubled up, temporarily staying in the housing of others. 

Many go unidentified…but HEAR US Inc. invites them to tell their stories in these short video clips.

Doubled up families and youth often are exposed to violence and abuse with no escape. Reliant on others for housing, often because shelters are overcrowded, nonexistent or not appropriate for many reasons, they desperately turn to anyone willing to take them in.

Often families or young persons on their own don’t connect their hardships with the official status of “homeless” and they don’t share details about their nomadic conditions. “Hard times” and “couch surfing,” euphemisms for homelessness, often mask the shame and turmoil they experience.

Fragile arrangements to stay with others often include the “walking on egg shells” mindset, a reliable predictor of the “worn out welcome mat” syndrome.

Also hidden is the instability and danger they face. Unscrupulous hosts—whether family, friends or acquaintances—may take advantage of the desperate plight of their lodgers. Sex abuse, human trafficking and prostitution can be the price for a place to stay or cause an ill-conceived option to escape the predator-host.

Once trapped in the homelessness vortex, it becomes almost impossible to escape. Not officially deemed “homeless,” a bureaucratic barricade erected by HUD, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, they don’t qualify for assistance. Slashed human service budgets means little help is available.

Through the federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Education Act, tremendous support for students experiencing homelessness may be available in the form of school supplies, coats, backpacks, shoes, food and toiletries to meet immediate needs. Homeless liaisons, required in each district, may also connect students with community resources, tutoring, and extracurricular activities.

Identifying students experiencing hidden homelessness and determining their needs is crucial to ensure academic success.  Alert school personnel may pick up clues of housing instability, perhaps clarifying underlying reasons for a student’s struggles.

Homelessness. Yes, that term bears plenty of negative stigmas, but it comes in many shapes. Identifying doubled up students allows for barriers to academic success to dissolve, giving them the opportunity to focus on the only stability they know—school routines.  

To join the effort to get the bipartisan Homeless Children and Youth Act passed, go to www.helphomelesskidsnow.org and TAKE ACTION. 

Crushing Reality for Homeless Families

The turtle looked up at me. I gasped in horror. Crunch. I ran over this timid, stalwart creature before I knew it was happening. I don't like creating any road kill, but a turtle? Tillie the Turtle, my motorhome's nickname, might give you a correct clue that I like turtles.

I had no idea these slow moving reptiles were so common crossing roads at this time of year. After the first mishap I paid attention. And saw lots. Most ducked their heads into their shells when my van approached. I can't imagine how terrifying that must seem. Plenty didn't make it, run over by other vehicles. I'd like to think I didn't hit any more, but who knows?

Inadvertently snuffing out a life is one thing. It wasn't practical to stop and carry them across the highway, though the thought occurred to me, and I'm sure some do-gooders do. As horrible as it seems, I'm sure other drivers take to crushing them for sport. Which led me to my train of thought about homeless families...

Having just left Kansas after a productive and surprisingly pleasant 3 months working on Worn Out Welcome Mat --KS, a documentary about homeless families and youth who doubled up with others because they have nowhere to go, I met some amazing parents and young people. Despite all that has happened to them, and they've all been through many different forms of hell, they keep trying to survive and thrive.

Melissa's story is probably the most grueling, though Maggie's is pretty awful, too. Candace, a young Marine with a darling 4-yo daughter, will rip at your heart. (All short YouTube vids on my Worn Out Welcome Mat KS playlist)

With ample road time to think and the unpredictable appearance of turtles in various stages of going from one side of the highway to the other, I couldn't help but make the comparison between turtles and homeless families.

I watched one resolute turtle just climb onto the pavement and plunge ahead, not looking for traffic. Kind of a damned if I do, damned if I don't way of thinking. Kind of like when a parent makes the desperate decision to move in with a risky host because she and her kids have nowhere to go.

Kansas has identified over 10,000 school kids in various forms of homeless situations. That doesn't KS policies and practices seem aimed at, well, crushing vulnerable families.

Melissa and her 7-yo daughter are homeless,
doubled up and desperate.

include their younger and older siblings or parents. And that doesn't include those not identified by the schools, which would likely double the number. Lots more are homeless, and not only are resources scarce,

And yet, HUD, the federal agency charged with housing the housing-vulnerable and un-housed, continues to fight the need to expand their definition of homeless.

To urge your congresspersons to support the bipartisan legislation to change HUD's definition of homelessness, go to http://helphomelesskidsnow.org and TAKE ACTION.

In my mind, HUD's like the cruel-hearted driver intentionally running over the helpless turtle.

Sex—Not the Reason Most Homeless Moms Double Up With Men

Going from bad to worse. Frying pan to the fire. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. None of those adages express the level of dire anguish Melissa and her daughter face. 

A 3-year string of horrible events culminated in this pert mother and her adorable 7-year-old daughter landing in the Kansas version of prison: a town of less than 400, with nary a grocery store, much less any sign of life, no transportation and no support network.

Melissa, who's worked in the home healthcare field for a number of years, tossed out a desperate Craig’s List plea a few weeks ago to escape from the apartment she platonically shared with “Max,” who had “compassionately" offered to share the 2-bedroom apartment he was about to rent with Melissa who had just escaped another untenable living situation.

“Sex,” she told me in the interview she agreed to do for my HEAR US doubled up project, Worn Out Welcome Mat--KS. “What is it with men who think of nothing else, even after I clearly spelled out that I was not interested in it…at all?” 

A divorce tossed her over the edge 3 years ago. The job she had fell apart. When she faced eviction she remorsefully turned to the father of her older daughter to take her, knowing he could provide a decent living situation for the few months Melissa anticipated it would take to get back on her feet.

She attentively and creatively strove to patch her life together, protectively tending to her youngest daughter’s needs. The school McKinney-Vento homeless liaison accommodated their high mobility. They bounced from being doubled up in friend’s apartments to motels to the highly-restrictive, religious shelter back to friends. 

Melissa’s housing choices in this military town were nil, subsidized housing not available, so she generated options intended to give them a place until she could save money to get their own place. Jobs paying a living wage, even for this hard-working woman who put herself through college? Forget it. So she turned to the underground employment and housing network to compensate for the basic needs’ drought in Kansas (and other states). 

Even this didn’t work. Seemingly “safe” arrangements turned hellish. Moving from one bad situation led to even worse. A constant state of panic and heightened parent-protective alertness were matched by the absolute lack of alternatives in the Sunflower State.

Social services and the hypothetical safety net have been all but eliminated by the tax-slashing Governor Sam Brownback and his Republican conspirators. So few shelters exist in Kansas—and they have months’ long waiting lists—that families like Melissa’s desperately do what they have to do.

When the last straw came in the form of sexual and physical confrontation that needed police intervention (again), Melissa turned to a town I’ll call “Hell.” The man who agreed to take in these two vulnerable nomads assured her this was to help him with home health care, not sex. 

Three days later, Melissa told me he made explicitly clear that he had needs and expectations. 

I suggested she contact the nearest shelter (and even offered to give them a ride). I explained the “trick” of qualifying for admission—to make sure the intake counselor knew she and her daughter are in danger (they are), that their circumstances are dire and housing is dependent on her providing for her “host’s” sexual needs. HUD has a high bar when it comes to determining eligibility for their vaunted homeless shelter beds. 

Melissa and her daughter might not be “homeless enough” to qualify for help. If that’s the case, she is absolutely out of options. 

The public library in this hellish town is only open a couple hours a day, three days a week, with one computer. That is, if she will be able to leave the house of this invalid-predator. So searching on Craig’s List won’t even be an option.

  

Deep Hole of Homelessness Swallows Homeless Families

[Kansas City, KS] Friday was payday for Crystal, a fast food employee. She cashed her check and then bought a few, too few for her way of thinking, birthday presents for her son whose 8th birthday was Valentine’s Day.

She, her husband and other child, Brittany and her boyfriend and her 2 children, and Tyler and his partner, a motley community that shared this rundown but affordable house in Kansas City, Kansas, celebrated “Danny’s” birthday Saturday. 

On Sunday, they were picking through the ashes of their rental house. Everything was destroyed in an electrical fire caused by, they surmise, shoddy repairs done by a dubious “handyman” hired by their landlord. 

The Red Cross gave them 2 rooms in a motel for 3 nights and a promise of first month’s rent and security deposit if they found housing within the week. 

Crystal’s family hugged their yellow lab as they left him with a friend, then they made their possession-less way to the motel. 

They went from housed and self-sufficient to homeless and desperate in a flash. It wasn’t their fault. One might be tempted to blame the landlord for neglect. According to Crystal, he didn’t have insurance, so he told them not to expect anything from him—like their security deposit or unused rent. Without that money they had nothing.

One of their stops Tuesday morning was the KC School Board building, where I happened to be on my HEAR US Inc. quest to film stories of families experiencing homelessness, doubling (or tripling or worse) up with others, families not considered “homeless enough” by HUD. (READ this EXCELLENT article on doubled up from the Educational Leadership Journal.)

They enthusiastically said I could share their story to let others know how easy it is to slide from independence to scraping through the rubble of our shattered safety net. 

Fortunately for the two moms, their school board stop netted them more help than they could have imagined. Thanks to the McKinney-Vento Homeless Education Act, federal legislation removing barriers to school stability, their kids would be transported to/from the motel to their same schools. 

Staff gave the moms uniforms, backpacks, school supplies, toiletries, food and a few books. The families were connected with resources to stay in the motel for another week, only possible because they could stagger back on their feet with a little more time.

 But I must clarify a few crucial points:

• These families, though tripled up due to economic hardship prior to the fire, and figuring to be doubled up (or more) again after leaving the motel next week, will not be eligible for HUD assistance because they’re not homeless by HUD’s definition. 
• Besides the fact that they wouldn't have been able to find room in area shelters because every shelter across the land is at capacity thanks to this beastly winter weather, they would not be able to stay together because few shelters take intact families. 
• And with Crystal’s work schedule, overnights, she would have to choose between work and staying with her family at the shelter, a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you don’t choice.
• Public (subsidized) housing in KC, and mostly everywhere else, has 3-years or more waiting lists. 
• The only way they can afford the $700 mo. rent and utilities is with 3-4 adults working, the others chip in by providing childcare. Even then it’s dicey.  

If they’re “lucky,” they’ll find another landlord—likely to be a slumlord because they don’t have sufficient income and lack good credit records—who will rent to them, dog and all. If not, they’ll tumble deeper into the hole of homelessness, finding that it’s hard to be self-sufficient when you have nowhere to go. And their lovable labrador will also be homeless.

The campaign to get HUD’s definition in line with the more realistic US Department of Education’s definition—which includes those doubled up and in motels— continues. It takes but a moment, and your zip code, to nudge your federal lawmakers to cosponsor the Homeless Children and Youth Act. www.helphomelesskidsnow.org TAKE ACTION!

(HEAR US is looking for KS families and youth with nowhere to go who are willing to share their stories for the Worn Out Welcome Mat - KS documentary in the making, Spring 2015. Contact Diane for more info.)