July
3, 2014
The
Union of Grass Valley
Column: By Cindy
Maple
The recent grand jury report on
panhandling missed an opportunity to address the root causes of homelessness in
our community and to identify and address the human conditions that cause
people to become so desperate that they turn to begging on the street. It also
missed the opportunity to make recommendations that would provide long-lasting
solutions to the problem.
Additionally, the grand jury
report offers no proof that people identified as
panhandlers/vagrants/transients are in fact homeless.
Calls for service reports made
to law enforcement using key words to identify alleged homeless people are
subjective. People who aren’t homeless may look ragged and unkempt, causing a
caller to mistakenly identify them as homeless.
Though there’s no evidence to
suggest the people panhandling and committing crimes as noted in this report
are homeless, we would like to take this opportunity to review the causes of
homelessness and to offer some solutions.
There is usually no single life
event that causes a person to become homeless — inability to afford housing,
substance abuse, mental illness, disabilities and lack of a support system can
all contribute.
Few opportunities for substance
abuse treatment for low-income people can lead to homelessness as they may lose
relationships and housing to satisfy their overwhelming need.
Homeless individuals with
mental illness typically experience an inability to form or maintain
relationships (trust issues), and they often suffer diminished ability to take
care of themselves.
There is no easy fix for
homelessness. Ordinances that criminalize it are certainly not the answer. Such
laws offer false comfort to communities and provide no solution for people
living on the streets.
Sweeping camps won’t make the
problem disappear. It will only push people to change locations, often into
more populated areas.
Instead of focusing on creating
ordinances that criminalize homelessness, we should fund programs that provide
mental health care and substance abuse treatment, create affordable housing
opportunities, provide housing vouchers to supplement people living below the
poverty level, fund case managers to provide housing stability and life skills
guidance, and support housing units for individuals with a mental illness. The
$36,000 identified by NCPD could have been used for any of the above programs.
We would be naïve to depend
solely on government to provide the funding and services needed to create the
support system our homeless community members need in order to heal. Most
people with a mental illness and/or addictions are not eligible for treatment
in Nevada County.
Currently, our county substance
abuse treatment program allows a person to go through treatment only once,
though it’s common knowledge that addicts will generally relapse seven to eight
times before treatment becomes successful.
Participants in treatment
programs would have a much higher success rate if they had ongoing case
management and housing options when released.
Homeless individuals with an
untreated mental illness typically do not access mainstream services and when
they do, they often miss appointments, and there is usually no way to reach
them for follow-up. In addition to this, they often don’t meet the criteria for
eligibility for behavioral health services
This holistic approach would
require money, but not addressing the primary root causes of homelessness is
costing our community a great deal of money already. We can’t expect people
without resources or the ability to advocate for themselves to become housed
and stable without help. Some may never achieve that, even with help.
If we fail to acknowledge the
conditions that keep them homeless or see them as undeserving of help, what
does this say about our community?
Our community would benefit by
integrating our systems of care to support vulnerable people. Until we can
provide sufficient mental health and substance abuse treatment, until we can
provide affordable housing options or vouchers, until we can provide sufficient
case management to prevent people from falling through the cracks, we will
continue to experience the issues cited in the grand jury report and we will
continue to see homeless people on the streets.
That we have homeless people
who are not able to get the services and care they need is not a blight on our
community, it’s a humanitarian crisis and should be treated as such.
Several people in our community
have endorsed this letter. For a complete list of endorsements, or if you would
like to add your name to the list, please visit Hospitality House Community
Shelter or Sierra Roots on Facebook. You can also have your name added by
emailing Cindy Maple at cindy@hhshelter.org. A copy of this letter will be sent
to local elected officials.
Cindy Maple is the executive
director of Hospitality House and Reinette Senum is involved with Sierra Roots.
No comments:
Post a Comment