Immediate Concerns: All Relative

They said nothing about being on vacation in this land of Disney. The couple with 2 young girls asked to see the room that rents for $179 a week (and $100 deposit), and when they returned the key they asked about Florida's perennial unwanted visitor, roaches. 

The desk clerk assured them these little varmints have no room in this inn. That seemed to assuage the couple and they took the room for a week, maybe more, starting the next day when their time is up in their current long-term-suite abode.

I wanted to stop them and ask them their story--why are they living in a motel--but it's too early for that kind of boldness, even for me. Besides, they seemed stressed. 

Sitting in the otherwise pleasant, but worn, motel lobby, I was mentally picking out the real tourists from the hard-time customers. I watched as groceries were toted in--not the snack food of vacationers but rather the microwavable and hot-plate-able versions to feed a family. Expensive, especially if they had to shop at the nearby 7-11 or Walgreen's. Nutrition goes out the window. Ramen noodles and cereal, not fresh fruits and veggies.

To dispel the myth about "vacationing" families not deserving to be acknowledged as "homeless," let me describe the living conditions of one family that lived here 4 brutally long years. They started out in a room with a king bed, mom, dad and their 9-month old boy. Having lost their place to live when the real estate and job bubble splattered, a friend told them about this extended stay place that cut you a deal on the rent, a mere $179 a week, including (limited) housekeeping and utilities.

With no option besides the streets, the family put their stuff in storage, believing that the day would soon come when they could reclaim their lives and their belongings. The $180 a month storage fee made sense in the beginning of their homeless-honeymoon, but soon this budget-busting expense was axed in lieu of weekly rent. Management padlocked their unit and eventually sold and/or tossed their stuff...important documents, pictures, baby mementos, wedding gifts...gone.

Their room at first was just a room, with the king-sized bed hogging most of the space. With just the 2 of them, and other than not having room for their baby to move around, they managed. He worked off-and-on, she cared for the baby. But the relative peace of this arrangement was shattered about one year into their stay.

His mother, sister and her 2 girls lost their place to live. No help available from family or friends, no Plan B, and the additional complication--one of the girls has cerebral palsy and epilepsy. So the couple asked for a slightly larger room and invited their family to join them.

1960s vintage hot plate

Lest anyone think their new room was one of those fairly spacious suites--2-bedroom, small living room, with a kitchen, wrong. It was the size of an average decent motel room with a half-wall divider making an imaginary 2nd room. No kitchen. The dresser held the hot plate and coffee maker. A tiny microwave sat nearby. They requested and received a slightly larger than dorm-sized refrigerator. 

Their space was ever-so-slightly larger than my modest 27' motorhome--a space for one. They had 8, including 4 adults, which bathroom logistics alone would be a nightmare. Three years. 

No amount of imagination on my part could perceive the stress. When I asked the beleaguered mother what was the worst part, she spewed a list of understandable realities:

• no privacy, 
• no room to move around, being afraid to wander outside because of drug/prostitution trade using the motel, 
• no neighborly socializing because she didn't know who was in on the nefarious activities, 
• not being able to have her toddler play in the sand-filled playground because feral cats used it for a litter box, 
• no place to cook a decent meal except for an extremely limited menu routine that could be prepared in their cramped quarters, 
• worrying about her toddler reaching up and grabbing the hot plate,
• washing dishes in the same place they washed their bodies, and 
• fearing that one of the fairly regular drug raids would turn ugly and inadvertently involve their extended family. 

She was beyond shame, and she knew the overwhelmed authorities would overlook their conditions because they were at least trying to care for themselves.

I asked her what was good. She just as quickly responded: 

• we were together (an understatement!), 
• we weren't on the streets (in a resort town that cares more about their famous mouse than the needs of people), 
• we were able to help our family, and the school was wonderful for her sister-in-law's two girls. She gushed about how special the school staff made the girls feel. They had everything they needed to be like the housed-kids. Christmas brought an avalanche of gifts. 

She also pointed out that the unusually kind motel manager works with his customers (those who abide by the basic standard of respect for people and property). He cuts a little slack on late rent when times are rough, though expecting payback eventually. He's worked with local compassionate church-goers to set up a small food pantry and he's reached into his pocket to help when nothing else is available, as he recently did for the woman released from the hospital with wounds but no clean bandages. 

From all accounts, these families are among...well, an unknown number experiencing some version of this nomadic life. Amazingly, we have no idea how many families and single adults are in this motel-bound plight. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, HUD, doesn't consider  people in motels unless their money was used to house them. In most cases it's not. HUD doesn't report these people as homeless to Congress who set a meager dollar amount based on HUD's numbers. HUD's thinking--they're not as bad off as those on the streets or those in shelters.

I challenge that urban-based, clueless Beltway thinking. 

Being a highly mobile, inadequately sheltered, resource-challenged, largely invisible "household" is as vulnerable as many other homeless persons/families. Making no attempt to quantify this number, in fact vehemently fighting against aligning the HUD definition of homelessness with other federal agencies (that rightfully include households in motels as "homeless"), HUD does a huge disservice, especially when reporting the homeless census for Congress. Their paltry 600,000 tallied in the point-in-time count has no sense of urgency. Nor does it hold any sense of reality.

A serious move is afoot to align HUD's definition of homelessness with reality. A bipartisan bill, HR 32, The Homeless Children and Youth Act, in 2 very simple pages, does away with scads of complications surrounding HUD's confusing requirements. Yes, this will mean more people will be counted as homeless. No, communities will not be forced to serve families and youth. It will be their choice.

I firmly believe that if Congress doesn't get a clue about the alarming sense of homelessness, particularly for families and youth on their own, they will never ante up resources to meet the need. Eventually, the young ones, like the little girl on the left, will grow up, some to become homeless adults, and maybe then they'll count. Better late than never....

If you're interested in helping get this legislation passed, check our campaign's website, http://helphomelesskidsnow.org, for more info.

Neat Little Boxes? No--It's a Mess!

These are NOT homeless boys. No, their family stayed in a motel after their house was condemned. They paid for the motel with a combination of their own money and agencies' money. The proposed definition of homelessness would NOT consider them homeless.

The latest in negotiations over HUD's definition of homelessness leaves me shaking my silver-thatched head.

For newcomers, or those lucky enough to forget this saga is dragging on, HUD is fighting tooth-and-nail to avoid including families and unaccompanied youth in their very narrow definition of homelessness if the aforementioned are doubled-up with someone who was willing to take them in, or if they've scraped together enough to get a crappy motel room.

When I think back to the homeless families and youth I've known, I fail to conjure up any situations that fit the neat, box-like definition of homelessness that HUD is pushing. The definition isn't even worth typing, but for those who want to see that I'm not making this up, click here.

And that isn't even the definition of "chronic homelessness," the actual definition for HUD-funded shelters across this unevenly housed land. (A "chronically homeless" person is defined as "an unaccompanied homeless individual with a disabling condition who has either been continuously homeless for a year or more, or has had at least four episodes of homelessness in the past three years." )

I want to point out some obvious flaws in their Beltway-bumblehead "logic."

HOMELESSNESS DOESN'T FIT INTO NEAT BOXES.
Proposed changes to the definition assume that a family will stay for a specified period at a motel, or simply stay with Uncle Max and Aunt Martha who have made arrangements with their landlord for a whole slew of "company" to stay for an unknown period of time. THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS!!

A newly-homeless family, especially those without a shelter in their area (common beyond the Beltway or metro areas), will usually try the motel route, hoping they'll just be there a short time. Classic case was a family I met in Reno (CLICK to read a more detailed account).

Mom and Dad worked--albeit irregularly--and took care of their 6 kids the best they could. The owner of their house chose not to make essential repairs, thus the house was condemned and the family, including a baby, were evicted. Reno has no family shelter--but they have one for adults (another story for another day). The parents pieced together a combination of their own money and agency money to stay in the motel until they eventually found a place.

HUD would not consider them homeless, and as non-homeless they wouldn't be eligible for the sparse assistance HUD-funded agencies give. THEY WERE NOT HOMELESS? Come on.

SHELTERS, NOT ENOUGH AND NOT FOR EVERYONE

Melissa and her kids in Milton, FL shared their story with us for the documentary we're working on. My fingers would fall off if I tried typing all the contortions this Mom and her kids went through to avoid sleeping on a sandy Florida beach. They did sleep in their car when turned away from the shelter right before Christmas because it was full.

Suffice to say they hopped from motels to friends, to motels, trying the shelter that wouldn't let her stay if she kept her job because it conflicted with their curfew, to motels, to friends...well, you get the idea. THEY WERE NOT HOMELESS? Give me a break.

I could go on and on. And this diatribe of mine doesn't even touch the bombshell of an issue of unaccompanied homeless youth. Some other day... I want to point out some huge flaws in the NUMBERS controversy.

HUD's NUMBERS SUCK WIND
HUD uses their very inaccurate "point-in-time" count which counts people in shelters or "chronic" (I much prefer the term "long-term" or how about the more truthful term "ignored"?) adults the well-intentioned volunteer enumerators happen to find on the streets. HUD gives the number 754,000, often sliding over the confusing fact that it's a point-in-time count--whatever that means. It ends up being reported--in the media and to Congress--as 754k. Not bad for a wealthy nation of more than 300 million. Way to go, America!

The US Dept. of Education, using an admittedly under-counted but more verifiable census of school-age homeless kids, came up with over 900,000 for a school year. That doesn't include parents and younger/older siblings. It doesn't include kids who are not identified as homeless. It DOES include families in motels or doubled up.

Most outrageously, one of the "advocacy" negotiators, citing concerns of unnamed advocates and cities among others, pointed out that the proposed expanded definition would possibly cause the 750k number to be bumped up to 2.5-10 million. HOW CAN YOU CALL YOURSELF AN ADVOCATE if you capitulate to the argument of "not enough resources" as the reason to restrict the definition change? Look at homeless kids in the face and tell them that.

So, let me get this straight. People who lost their housing and move into a motel or double-up or combine those survival strategies are not homeless because a few bone-headed advocates and unenlightened bureaucrats don't want the estimate of homelessness to reflect reality???? Are you kidding me?!

I'm sure they'd justify their position by saying the government doesn't have resources to help that many people. Nah, not in this country of tax-cuts for the richest and a military strategy run amok, and bail-outs for friends in high places, and....

Seems to me that it's time to let the negotiators and advocates who that think it's a vacation to stay in one cramped and crappy motel room for an indeterminate period of time with very little money and a bunch of kids who know this isn't Disneyland--let them try it for a night or two. Then move over to Uncle Max and Aunt Martha's, with their surly landlord who is just looking for a reason to kick someone out.

Then come back to the negotiating table and play nicely. Up to 10 million Americans are counting on you.

Explain It To Me Like I'm a 6-Year Old

Beach towns are nice, especially for us "snow birds" who flee the wintry mess that makes everyone north of the Mason-Dixon line real miserable.

We're now filming in the Panhandle of Florida. Yes, they have plenty of homeless adults, and a shocking number of homeless families with children. One local advocacy group, the EscaRosa Coalition for the Homeless, offers some sobering numbers to dispel myths that homelessness is just the visible adults who dot cities and towns nationwide.

In our interviews of kids whose families have experienced homelessness, we hear much of the same story--hurt, embarrassment, fear, hopes, dreams and determination--all fueled by their experiences of homelessness. The kids' stories are amazing, and worth getting, if only to be inspired. Our documentary, My Own Four Walls, will set you back $20 bucks, proceeds which help our cool organization, HEAR US, continue to give voice and visibility to homeless kids and families.

Last week I went e-scouting for homelessness indicators in the counties around here. I won't embarrass the county educator I spoke with, but let me lay out my premise and see if I make sense to my readers:

Homelessness and poverty go hand-in-hand. If you look at an area's poverty stats by going to the Census Bureau site, you'll find CONSERVATIVE ( gross underestimates by my thinking) numbers and percentages of poverty in a town or county. Look up a county, click on the map link, follow the directions to identify the poverty area.

The particular county official who is supposed to be helping homeless students with school issues said, "We haven't identified any homeless students." Bull feathers!

If you look at this county and follow the map, you'll see the geographic area with the most concentration of poverty. Look up the schools in that area, find out how many students are receiving free lunch (qualify by poverty) and just know that AT LEAST 10% of those students are going to experience homelessness.

The county I examined has a town with a poverty pocket and schools where up to half (hundreds) of the students were getting free lunch.

Seems to me someone is missing some real basic math lessons. Ignoring homelessness doesn't make it go away. It makes it worse.