HOMELESSNESS IS NOT A FAIRY TALE
By: Jackie L. Culver, MFA, MA
Board Member, Mentor Research Institute
Not “Once Upon a Time” but today there are over a million homeless people in the United States, 40% are families with children. In a wonderful place called Oregon, 1 in 5 children live below the poverty limit. In a beautiful state with forests, mountains, and sandy beaches, 164,726 children under the age of 17 are fed from a magical place called the Food Bank. Oregon ranks 6th in the nation for childhood hunger. A good fairy tried to count all the homeless children in Oregon but all she counted were about 6,000 because they hide in cars and motels and can’t all be found. Oregon ranks 29th in the nation for the well being of its children.
(Find the sad statistics at: www.nationalhomelessness.org).
It’s not a fairy tale that Oregon ranks among the highest for homeless children in the nation. Why is this happening? Many people believe the blameful story that families are homeless because they are lazy, don’t want to work or are drug or alcohol affected. The true story is that the average monthly rent in Oregon is $600 per month before utilities. When a minimum wage salary is $ 260. per week, no one has to be a magician to see that a single parent with 4 to 10 thousand a year in child care expense faces demons every day.
Another story many people believe is that there are plenty of shelters and places to go when you have no home. Yet more than 30% of families requesting shelter are denied services because there is no space available. If a family can get into shelter the average stay permitted is 30 days. Parents have thirty days to overcome their problems, find housing, keep their kids in school, seek resources, attend “ready to rent” classes, find or keep a job, and follow the schedule of their case plan. Case managers help in finding and getting access to services but there needs to be active participation by the parents in order to get everything done in the time limit. If families don’t have a car and insurance, the bus is the only transportation available and it often does not go where they need to go in the time they have. In most shelters, childcare is not available. If parents need to go somewhere to apply for work or housing, they must take their children with them on the bus. It is not unusual to spend 4 hours with 2 or 3 children on a bus to South East Portland for one service and then pack them up again for another 2 hours and three transfers to get back to shelter before curfew.
Living in a shelter is noisy. There is not much privacy. Most of the time it’s crowded and there is not much for kids to do. With the stress on parents to get their plans moving, many times the children’s needs get left out. At their best, shelters are not places for kids to be happy, or well adjusted, or geared towards success. Trying to do homework is hard when there is no one with time or energy to help. Homeless kids often miss school and get behind. Some give up: not just on school, they just give up.
Children living in shelter have 27% more physical and mental health problems than their peers with homes. Chronic sadness causes acting out behavior and other problems that cannot be attended to in a timely way. Children wait up to three months for counseling. By then, many have left shelter, moved to another, or have gotten lost in the forest.
How can you help? Your contribution to Mentor Research Institute will be used to provide caregivers with skills necessary to help these valuable and worthy children. Funds will be used for emotional support and timely intervention to assist children in learning skills to increase resilience; so they can do better in school and in their day-to-day survival. Advocating for the educational needs of this special population often includes both being sure that children are enrolled in school and have the same rights as other children and the need to find supplies and fees so that they can participate in school activities and team sports.
Homelessness is not a fairy tale. There isn’t a fairy godmother who can wave her wand to make homelessness disappear. The truth is: children suffer.
The real story is: you can help. Your contributions to Mentor Research Institute’s Homeless Children’s Programs are fully tax-deductible. All funds are used for the benefit of the children. With your help, the stories of some children will have a happier ending.