PSUMC Advocates at City Hall To Save Shelter Network
A number of volunteers who have been running our homeless shelter once a week have been fighting back against the City's recent closing of many shelters in the system. Several PSUMC volunteers met with the General Welfare Committee staff in December to express our deep concern over the closing. The following testimony has been filed for a public hearing held by the General Welfare Committee on “Restructuring of Services to the Street Homeless Population” at City on January 13:
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you regarding proposed changes in the emergency shelter programs operated by New York City’s Department of Homeless Services. I and many members of my congregation are very concerned about the effect of a proposed restructuring of the City’s homeless services programs on clients of the faith-based Emergency Shelter Network. In 2005, the Park Slope United Methodist Church, where I am the pastor, became involved in the Emergency Shelter Network, run by the Partnership for the Homeless, which enlists volunteers from the city’s congregations to participate in a small but critical way in the city’s social safety net. Until early October, members of our church were responsible each Tuesday evening for providing 10-12 homeless men with a hot meal, and for staying overnight with them in a temporary shelter. The temporary shelter operated out of the basement of the Hanson Place United Methodist Church in Fort Greene; members of the Hanson Place congregation volunteered on Monday nights, and a team of volunteers from our congregation was there every Tuesday.
Our guests on Tuesday nights were relatively
high-functioning individuals, often employed full- or part-time, who
were turning to emergency services as a result of difficulty or delay
in finding affordable, permanent housing. We provided them with
several things that helped them in their journey back to
self-sufficiency – a warm, safe place to stay, healthy food, and
informal human contact. The temporary shelter did not offer
professional services – the clients were in case management at the
drop-in center from which they had been referred. Our job was simply to
welcome them and share a meal with them. For various reasons, they did
not want to go into the City’s shelter system, and the volunteer-run
Emergency Network provided an alternative.
In early October, the
Hanson Place shelter (along with 20 other faith-based shelters
throughout the city) was discontinued by the Department of Homeless
Services. As a result, options for the homeless have been reduced at a
time of mounting need. Last winter, The Gathering Place on Atlantic
Avenue – the drop-in center from which clients were referred to Hanson
and other faith-based shelters in Brooklyn – had 50 “faith beds,” as
they are called, to which they could refer their clients each night.
There are now just 30 such beds available, and as a result more people
are staying overnight at the drop-in centers, sleeping on chairs, or on
the street. It did not need to be this way – members of our
congregation and others would willingly have continued to volunteer
their time and to provide food.
The Gathering Place, once one
of several drop-in centers in Brooklyn, is now the only one in the
borough. At this time, it remains open 24 hours, but starting in the
new fiscal year it is slated to close at 8:30 p.m. If this closure goes
forward, along with the elimination of faith beds, it will be a huge
loss for people who rely on drop-in centers and the emergency network
to avoid living on the streets while they set their lives back in order
after family disturbances, job losses or evictions. As volunteers who
shared meals and fellowship with these people, we are concerned about
them. We are also confused that the City might choose to forego the
opportunity to work with congregations that offer their own space and
thousands of hours of volunteer time to provide shelter beds.
We
are aware that the Department of Homeless Services maintains that there
will not be fewer places for people to stay after the restructuring.
Research by the Coalition for the Homeless suggests this is not the
case. Under the city's proposed reorganization
a) with the drop-in centers closed at night there will be fewer places for people to stay
b) people will have to be "on the streets" for several months before being deemed eligible for respite beds.
We
fear that the Administration’s current proposal will have devastating
consequences for the street homeless population. We also fear that it
will lead ultimately to higher costs for the City, as those denied
services through the faith-based shelter network end up sleeping on the
streets and subways. This is of particular concern at a time when a
growing number of people are likely to find themselves temporarily
homeless due to the downturn in the economy. There are alternatives to
the city’s proposed restructuring that would answer the needs of this
population while keeping costs low by drawing upon dedicated and
motivated volunteers from congregations throughout the city. We urge
DHS to meet as soon as possible with clergy and advocates to discuss
strategies for moving forward cooperatively.