0 HUD--the Homelessness Creation Agency?

My good faith gets shaken on a regular basis, and when it involves the US Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, aka HUD, it really flaps wildly. What I'm yammering about is a policy that leaves a formerly homeless family damned if they do, damned if they don't.

Tina, the courageous mother I've written about over the past couple years, and her 6 young boys, live in a modest house trailer in Las Cruces, NM. First I blogged about the family's bleak situation after I found them living in a 13' beater-camper-trailer--mom and her 5 baby boys. Stimulus money came about, giving communities funds to help move families like Tina's into housing. Then  I blogged about the difficulties finding a landlord to rent to this large family. She finally found the landlord with the trailer. But...

Her next struggle came transferring into Section 8 (subsidized housing), not because she wasn't in need or qualified (she got through the eye-of-the-needle exam at the HUD-regulated public housing authority), but because...she has bad credit. Yup. Bad credit.

In her previous married life, she incurred a penalty of about $5,200 for unreported income with the public housing authority. She was in the process of getting her then-husband reinstated on the lease (he apparently talked her into it after putting her in the hospital), and Tina's brother moved in before being okayed by the PHA. Tina and her kids left her abusive ex, but now she gets saddled with that past debt--a barrier to keep her and the kids from qualifying for public housing.

Hubby (now ex), 1/2 the gene pool, apparently doesn't have to assume his share of this debt. Mom and kids struggle mightily, comply with copious regulations, scrimp and scrape to keep together and out of the shredded child welfare "system," and she's got to pay the whole $5,200. It gets worse.

HEAR US negotiated a payment plan and found donors to help pay off the debt, Tina and her boys got their Section 8 certificate allowing them to stay in their humble trailer. Then, the Las Cruces housing authority diligently does an income review and finds, gasp, that $180 a month is being paid on the prior debt by HEAR US so Tina and the kids wouldn't be homeless. According to HUD regulations, they need to factor in this money--that Tina never touches--into her income, more than doubling her rent.

Tina protests, attends a hearing and is shot down. I write to the old HA and ha-ha. They shoot me down, claiming HUD regulations. So now, after all this time--mid-2010 till now--Tina, saddled with the care of her 6 little boys (try to get a job under her conditions), has no way to increase her income enough to pay the increased rent that HUD says she needs to pay because she's lucky enough to have someone paying her past debt with the old HA so she and her 6 boys won't be homeless in Las Cruces.

How's that for stupid? Now, without being able to pay the money both housing authorities are demanding, this family teeters on the precipice of homelessness in a city that has no emergency shelter for families. So then, for want of about a $2,000 balance on the past debt and $100 a month on the current housing, this family will get churned up in the same system that found it in its heart to bail out rich bankers, hedge fund traders, and the rest of the sleazy bums.

The ex--father of 4 of her children--may get stuck with half the debt in a pending divorce agreement. But HUD will factor that into Tina's rent, raising it further. This gets dumber and dumber as I type. 

HEAR US will again try to collect money to help Tina and the kids, fighting for a change of policies in the meantime. It feels really sleazy sending money to a housing authority that's making life this hard on her, but she has no option--other than the unacceptable one of homelessness. If you want to donate, here's the secure link. It's tax-deductible. We don't take a penny and it all goes directly to pay that stupid debt.

My delirious hope out of all this...that we get to a point where HUD agrees to "do no harm" for Tina, and for scores of other housing-vulnerable decent human beings in this country--that would be the majority of us. Sigh.

Detail: HUD--the Homelessness Creation Agency?

0 Homeless Kids...As Ignored as Dead Birds...

Step over. Walk around. Don't look. Forget about. 

Dead birds don't merit much attention except by bird-lovers. That's kinda the same way homeless kids tend to be treated. I'm a homeless-kid-lover. And stepping over, walking around, not looking or forgetting about homeless children in Las Cruces, NM, or elsewhere, is not an option. I've long written about this tragic travesty.

My ire got raised as I read this Las Cruces Bulletin article about the long-vacated Las Cruces family shelter now being converted into a children crisis center. Let me say straight up that I think every community should have a safe place for young (and older) children to go when they are in danger. But...

...the vacant building that for 4 years sat vacant on the campus of the Community of Hope used to house homeless families. My first visit to Las Cruces, a pleasant community of about 80,000 on the south end of New Mexico, had me tethered to their shelter by way of extension cord. I spent time inside, talking with families, interviewing kids for "My Own Four Walls," the now-popular HEAR US series of documentaries (DVD, $40).

Las Cruces has no other family shelter. Families in crisis can go to the Rescue Mission across the street, but it's a tough choice, for too many reasons to discuss in limited space. As a parent of homeless kids, you have to decide if this risk is worth it. And often parents in crisis don't make the best choices. Neither do I. And sometimes we fail to make sure people in crisis have adequate options. Then we're disappointed at their decisions.

When I first met LC Mayor Ken last year, he didn't know that his community's only shelter for families was shuttered. He was pretty upset about not being told. We've talked since then and he seems genuinely concerned. 

Which gets me back to the dead bird analogy. Do we step over, walk around, not look or forget about homeless kids in Las Cruces and across the country? They're not birds, worthy creatures that birds are. These are kids, and parents (some flawed, some not), that seem to get less attention than dead birds.

Seems to me we should put some of our country's misguided passions into something that counts. Making sure families in crisis have a safe place to go, and adequate supports to get them back on their feet, would be a good place to start. With over 1.5 million kids, including hundreds of thousands under the age of 5, we've got our work cut out for us, unless we want to wait and do the human version of scraping these kids off our streets.   

Detail: Homeless Kids...As Ignored as Dead Birds...

0 Home Sweet Home, but Really...

For reasons far beyond my understanding, my path crosses with some very interesting people. I'm in Las Cruces, NM now, having shown our new documentary, "It's All About the Children," to one of the women in it and to a small group of educators. I'm also filming interviews with "non-homeless" homeless families/youth, those staying in motels or doubled up with others for the HEAR US Learning Curve Express project.

One of the outreach team put me in contact with a young mother with 5 little boys under the age of 7 staying in a local motel. Tina was more than willing and able to talk about her predicament.So I went to interview her imagining what a motel room with 5 young boys would be like.

This young mom with "deer-in-the-headlights" eyes and a soft voice let me in. As we introduced ourselves I saw 2 of her 5 asleep on the double beds. The other 3 were with her mother. She assured me the little guys would sleep through more noise than we'd make, so I set up and began the interview.

Domestic violence, no stranger to any income bracket, ethnicity, religion, education level, or part of the country, was the initial cause of homelessness. Last weekend she got tossed from the DV shelter, for reasons not relevant to this discussion. Tina's mother had packed up her life and moved here to be a support for her daughter. Something tells me she has some firsthand knowledge of these too-common struggles.

When Tina and the boys were ousted from the shelter, they had nowhere to go. Tina's mom was living in a 13' travel trailer, a humble abode if I ever saw one. So she bought another cheap one for herself and let Tina and the kids stay in the tiny one. All chilly weekend, no electricity or water. Propane-powered oven (DANGEROUS) providing some warmth, augmented by body heat. Someone from the school got wind of it, and the school put them in a motel for3 nights until a better plan materialized.

Friday noon was checkout time, and things got pretty dicey. Help for this family was slow to develop. Eventually donors came up with enough money to put the little trailer on a RV pad, with electric, water and sewer. Her mom lives nearby in the same park, close enough to help out with childcare, transportation and moral support. 

When faced with sleeping on the streets with her children, Tina scrounged for help. I verified, it was not available. The stimulus money for Rapid Rehousing--she was #90 on the list, a wait of between 3-9 months. The only other place was the mission, and I understand a shelter-shy Tina, especially because the mission, with mostly men, has had its share of troubles, including a murder of one woman resident by another last year.


Tina has plans to finish her GED, and get further training to get a good job. I don't want to discourage her. But according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, to afford fair market rent for a 3-bedroom apartment in Las Cruces she'll need an income of $30k+. 

Now, I know that's the theory, and the reality is different, and she'll probably be able to find something cheaper. But with the economy, the job market, the lack of child care, and what is likely her need for counseling, that's a pretty steep mountain to climb with 5 pairs of hands holding onto you. 

Seems to me a woman who tumbles from a horrible violent marriage should have it better than landing in a pile of rubble that makes her think going back to her abuser is a better option. She and the kids deserve a helping hand. I'm not begrudging the outpouring of compassion the long-suffering people of Haiti are receiving. I just think that ignoring the growing number of poor families in this country might be a disaster too big for us to dig out from under.  

Detail: Home Sweet Home, but Really...