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Newsletter for May 2024

   


Raffle Tickets for The Jim Click Millons for Tucson are available for purchase here: The Homing Project Homepage



Upcoming Events:  

The event at The Maverick has been rescheduled for July 14th.



The Homing Project featured on The Buzz!

Project volunteers met with Arizona Public Media's Zac Ziegler and Christopher Conover on May 14th, at the Keeling Neighborhood site.  Meeting with the public radio crew were Kris Olson-Garewal, Greg Fahr, Corey Thompson, C.J. Boyd and Greg Sasse of Southern Arizona Land Trust.  The resulting article aired on May 17th on The Buzz, as part of a series on AZ Public Media called Where to Live?, addressing issues of housing availability and affordability.  The first part of the article features The Homing Project and the second part is about the Marist College project for senior housing.

Listen to the broadcast, read the online article, and/or download the full transcript here: 

The Buzz for May 17th -- Helping those who would otherwise be homeless



We had a wonderful response to a recent newsletter request for volunteers who have executive skills.  Project CEO Kris Olson-Garewal writes:

—Teresa Whetzel, retired Financial Analyst and Administrator in the Provost’s office at the University of Arizona, will be working with The Homing Project Bookkeeper and  Board Treasurer, Jennifer Leinhos.  Teresa’s experience with research budgets along with the work of an experienced Grant Writer who also recently volunteered will definitely enhance the quality and quantity of our grant applications. 

—Dale Whetzel, a Senior Project Manager and Team Leader, retired recently from Roche/Ventana Medical Systems.  He has already drafted a marketing plan for THP and will both give some of the talks we are invited to present and can prepare other volunteers to speak for The Homing Project. 

— Lisa Ann Landy, a fresh graduate of the University of Arizona Eller College of Management, will use THP’s media platforms to educate the public about homelessness.  Her first project is to create a short video about personal experiences of unhoused individuals. 


Still Needed: A Graphic Design Volunteer

The project seeks a volunteer for Graphic Design in support of project communications including this newsletter, advertisement of events, and social media generally.  Interested volunteers should send a sample graphic product to volunteers@thehomingproject.org.



A Book Review by Monika Kriebel

The Man in the Dog Park - Coming Up Close to Homelessness

by Cathy A. Small Ph.D., with Jason Kordosky and Ross Moore, published 2020 by Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY and London.


This book is available from the Pima County Library, independent bookstores, and Amazon.


About the authors:  Cathy A. Small is Professor Emerita of Cultural Anthropology at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff,  AZ.  Jason Kordosky is a researcher for the Culinary Union who works and lives in Las Vegas, NV.  Ross Moore is a disabled Vietnam Veteran and resident of northern Arizona who survived three years of recurrent homelessness and now lives in a HUD-subsidized apartment.


The Man in the Dog Park is a total of 152 pages organized into nine chapters, followed by 23 pages of notes.  Professor Small and her co-authors explain how so many people slide into homelessness, the coping mechanisms they develop to survive, and what helpful resources are available and where that help falls short.  The book explains how Cathy Small met Ross Moore, who was living in a tent in the woods near Flagstaff, and how long it took for Moore to trust Small, thus allowing her to gain insight into the houseless culture.  The reader learns why people are forced to live in the woods, in vehicles, under bridges, in parks and washes, and to sleep in shelters or couch-surf with friends or family.  Small, by volunteering in shelters and conducting interviews with shelter occupants and street dwellers, uncovered the hardships they faced, and how they adapted to cope with myriad difficult situations.  


The reader will learn how the homeless find places to spend nights, some using pan-handling income to pay for an occasional night in a cheap hotel during the coldest nights.  Many pan-handle to get cash, and/or use payday or title loans, to pay for car registration, gas, and repairs; cars are used for both transportation and sleeping.  Some earn money working day jobs where they are commonly exploited by “Day Labor Companies.”  Cash is also needed to pay for: a US Postal Service or UPS mail box; or rent on a storage unit to secure household items, a few valuables, and essential documents after an eviction; or to pay interest on payday or title loans or on a pawned item.  


Cash is also needed to pay for communication needs “because homeless people, and particularly those who are unsheltered, are hard to find.”  It is vital to be locatable for many reasons: so that the Veterans Administration can notify one of approval for treatment, so a probation officer can verify your whereabouts, so that one can hear about a housing opportunity.  Some qualify for a free government phone with limited minutes, commonly called an Obama phone.  Most unhoused people carry a cell phone, and so, of course, must find places to recharge.


Many homeless residents receive a small Veterans pension or government subsidy, but neither is enough to afford permanent housing, food, and health care.  Navigating federal and state bureaucracies (chapter 7) is another aspect that “regular citizens” would experience very differently.  Prof. Small points out that the path to a subsidized apartment is a very long, complicated, and often humiliating experience; many are unable to secure the reliable income required to maintain an apartment over the long term.  Common reasons for sliding back into homelessness repeatedly include low wages, loss of jobs, and loss of government subsidies, sometimes due to changes in government leaders and policies, often circumstances well beyond the individual’s control.  Americans who live on extremely low incomes are unable to save money for an unexpected financial emergency, such as a cut in work hours or a medical problem.   Conflicts with family, partners, landlords, or employers also contribute to homelessness.


The final chapter of the book summarizes how much Prof. Small has learned about the homeless culture since she met her co-author Ross Moore: “… to say homeless people are invisible and misunderstood is misleading—not because it is untrue, but because it misses the whole truth. … Who are the homeless invisible to or misunderstood by? That actor is me, (she writes) the reader, the American public.”  She continues to explain how the homeless are stuck in a Catch-22 loop within the system.  Small does not offer solutions to homelessness, but instead asks what we could do ourselves to be more understanding and compassionate.  She recommends that urban planners and not-for-profit organizations who work on providing housing should work within their own neighborhoods to not hide homeless residents from view (by putting them in ghettos); Small offers an example from Bhutan, a country that focuses on “Gross National Happiness” in contrast to the US focus on “Gross National Product.”  Chapter 9 also relates some statistics about an industry that generates large profits from lending money to the poorest Americans, problematic social policies and the alternatives, and a few final scenes of difficult situations that homeless people experience.


The Man in the Dog Park provides an important and interesting view into a culture few Americans understand and is an excellent resource for volunteers and donors working to end homelessness.  I highly recommend this book.

 

A Youtube video about the book is here.  



Volunteer Dale Whetzel Visits Chula Vista near San Diego!


Last Thursday, May 16th, while in San Diego on other business, I found an hour or so to make my way south of San Diego to the town of Chula Vista to put my eyes on their recently opened shelter village and maybe speak to someone.  I took a couple of pictures (one is included above) and briefly spoke with the security guard at the gate entrance.  It was super clean and very nicely finished!


Despite my conveying my interest based on being a volunteer in a Tucson group that is planning to build a similar community, he was appropriately wary of providing much information to me about the operation other than to confirm that had over 60 units in the community, that the buildings immediately inside the gate has bathrooms, showers, and kitchen facilities.  Knowing that we could ultimately find and meet with the group responsible for this community, I decided not to bother the good man further.


Overall, I was extremely impressed with this community: cleanliness, privacy fence shielding from the surrounding areas (privacy for residents and no eyesore for the neighbors), security, and proximity to public transportation, plus many industrial and retail jobs in the area. 


I look forward to connecting to the leadership to discuss their lessons learned on the project as well as their operating costs structure and suggestions for our group.


 A public broadcasting article on the Chula Vista VIllage





MEETINGS:

General/Volunteer Meetings are held the last Saturday of the month at 10AM at St. Phillips in the Hills in the Children’s Chapel Room.

Join us to plan new & discuss past events.

Board Meetings are held on the next to the last Saturday of the month at 1PM at Kris Olson’s home. Project volunteers are welcome to attend.



The Homing Project Newsletter

Joe Vaughan edited this month’s newsletter. 

Email suggestions of items for inclusion to: newsletter@thehomingproject.org

Our email address is: newsletter@thehomingproject.org

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