 |
| Our
vision is to see every individual and family |
| living
successfully and interdependently |
| within
a caring community |
|
|
|
 |
|
| Nationally,
Homelessness Has Been Dramatically Increasing Since The 1980’s |
According to the National Coalition on the Homeless (2002), the
systemic or structural causes of homelessness, poverty and lack of
affordable housing are on the increase. It is widely accepted that
today’s homelessness crisis, in both urban and rural areas, started
in the 1980’s. The first counts started appearing shortly after, but
due to differing methodologies and definitions, widely varying estimates
were produced. What is different now, is the sheer scale of it, the
changing composition of the homeless population, and the changing
causes of rural homelessness.
|
| Shortage of Affordable Housing. |
Paying 30% or less of one’s income for housing is considered the
federal definition of affordable housing. According to the National
Low Income Housing Coalition, declining wages have put housing out
of reach for many workers: in every state, more than the minimum wage
is required to afford a one- or twobedroom apartment at Fair Market
Rent. The gap between the number of affordable housing units and the
number of people needing them has created a housing crisis for poor
people. From 1973 to 1993 over 2.3 million units disappeared from
the affordable housing market. These units were either abandoned,
converted into condominiums or expensive apartments, or became unaffordable
because of cost increases. Between 1991 and 1995, median rental costs
paid by low-income renters rose 21%; at the same time, the number
of low-income renters increased. Over these years, despite an improving
economy, the affordable housing gap grew by one million.
|
| The increases in poverty |
are partly due to a decline in public assistance programs. Early
studies from the Welfare to Work program have concluded that although
the total number of individuals who are on government welfare programs
has gone own, the number of individuals who are now attempting to
subsist on below living wage jobs without medical benefits has increased
significantly. These people are always one paycheck away from homelessness.
Welfare reform is also having an impact: many families leaving welfare
lose health insurance, despite continued Medicaid eligibility. A recent
study found that 675,000 people lost health insurance in 1997 as a
result of the federal welfare reform legislation, including 400,000
children.
|
| “Rural areas have some distinctive populations that
urban providers and researchers may not have experience with.” |
|
| Homelessness
Has Now Become A Rural Issue |
In 1991 the Housing Assistance Council (HAC) reviewed national,
state, and local studies, reports, and public hearings to summarize
what was known about rural homelessness. HAC found that homelessness
occurs in rural areas throughout the country; it is a problem of national
concern. The first accounts of rural homelessness appeared in the
early 1980s, and the number of reports documenting this problem has
increased substantially since then. Homelessness is a social
problem that can no longer be viewed as limited to major urban areas
in the United States.
Homelessness is often assumed to be an urban phenomenon because homeless
people are more numerous, more geographically concentrated, and more
visible in urban areas. However, many people experience homelessness
and housing distress in Kansas's small towns and rural areas. The
situation has received little notice, as the media, research and public’s
attention has been focused on the more visible homeless in urban areas.
This lack of recognition can be attributed to rural communities preferring
private and voluntary action, selfhelp, and reliance on friends and
relatives rather than government assistance.
Most of what is known about homelessness is based on research conducted
in urban areas. Researchers are still in the early stages of understanding
how to identify and serve rural homeless people. Some researchers
argue that current definitions reflect an urban perspective because
they are based on the types of situations in which urban homeless
people are found and that they are not readily applicable to the rural
environment. For example, typical urban- modeled research based upon
surveys of shelter and service providers may not identify all rural
homeless persons since relatively few such services are located in
rural communities.
Rural homelessness, like urban
homelessness, is the result of poverty and a lack of affordable housing.
In 1997, the non-metropolitan poverty rate was higher than the rate
inside metropolitan areas (15.9% and 12.6% respectively); it was also
higher than the national poverty rate of 13.3%.
Other trends affecting rural homelessness include the distance between
low-cost housing and employment opportunities; lack of transportation;
decline in homeownership; restrictive land-use regulations and housing
codes; rising rent burdens; and insecure tenancy resulting from changes
in the local real estate market (for example, the displacement of
trailer park residents).
Rural homelessness is primarily an economic problem and the “failure
of policymakers to appreciate the extent of the rural economic crisis,
and the degree to which a majority of rural counties are especially
vulnerable, has contributed to the tendency to perceive homelessness
exclusively as an urban problem.
|
| Is Rural Homelessness Increasing? |
This is a difficult question to answer, due to the lack of consistent
and accurate counts, especially in rural areas. Many people who have
been providing services to the homeless in rural Kansas, will tell
you that they are being inundated, especially with families. Farm
foreclosures sharply increased, half of low-wage labor-intensive rural
manufacturing jobs have been lost to foreign competition. The rural
unemployment rate for the first time started to exceeds the urban
unemployment rate. The Homeless Assistance Council tracked rural household
size from 1979 to 1983, and they found increases in rural poverty
during that period that were strongly associated with an increase
in household size, not by one or two person, but by three or more
persons. They believe that such large increases can only be explained
by widescale doubling up among poor working families.
Rural
homelessness looks very different than urban homelessness
and it is these differences that make it particularly difficult to
define and measure, even more so than urban homelessness. The nature
of rural homelessness obscures the prevalence of homelessness such
as “the willingness of neighbors to take care of their own by shuttling
families from neighbor to neighbor.”
Other ways that rural homelessness looks different than urban homelessness
is in the composition of the rural homeless population. The typical
stereotype of homeless people as White, middle-aged men who are suffering
from alcoholism no longer applies. Whether in urban or rural This
is a difficult question to answer, due to the lack of consistent and
accurate counts, especially in rural areas. Many people who have been
providing services to the homeless in rural Kansas, will tell you
that they are being inundated, especially with families. Farm foreclosures
sharply increased, half of low-wage labor-intensive rural manufacturing
jobs have been lost to foreign competition. The rural unemployment
rate for the first time started to exceeds the urban unemployment
rate. The Homeless Assistance Council tracked rural household size
from 1979 to 1983, and they found increases in rural poverty during
that period that were strongly associated with an increase in household
size, not by one or two person, but by three or more persons. They
believe that such large increases can only be explained by widescale
doubling up among poor working families. Rural homelessness looks
very different than urban homelessness and it is these differences
that areas, families, particularly female-headed families, are the
fastest growing segment of the homeless population. Rural areas have
some distinctive populations that urban providers and researchers
may not have experience with, such as Native Americans, migrant workers,
and rural veterans that present challenges to outreach and engagement.
Studies comparing urban and rural homeless populations have shown
that homeless people in rural areas are more likely to be white, female,
younger, currently working, more educated, homeless for the first
time, and homeless for a shorter period of time. Findings also include
higher rates of domestic violence and lower rates of alcohol and substance
abuse.
There are few or no shelters in rural areas, despite significant levels
of homelessness, and few public places such as heating grates, subways
or bus stations, or all night businesses where homeless people can
congregate. Instead, in rural areas, they have campgrounds, woods,
and abandoned farms. Also, many people in homeless situations are
forced to live with relatives and friends in crowded, temporary arrangements.
People in these situations are experiencing homelessness but are less
likely to be counted because they are not receiving services.
An important issue when discussing prevalence of homelessness in rural
and urban areas is "the issue of relative burden". Compared to urban
communities to deal with homelessness and even relatively low numbers
can overwhelm a rural community's ability to help the homeless in
their community.
|
| Service systems in rural areas are different from urban
areas. |
They are informal and personal, utilizing churches, family, etc.
There usually are no formal institutions such as the Salvation Army,
a local social service office or an established soup kitchen. Also,
the isolation and geographical distances in rural areas can hamper
efforts to coordinate services throughout rural communities and outright
denial that homelessness exists in their rural community. There is
also a lack of specialized services, especially for people with serious
or complicated problems such as a severe and persistent mental illness.
It also does not make economic sense to replicate specialized services
already found in urban areas. Unfortunately, the local police and
jail can end up being the ones that deal with the rural homeless with
serious or complicated problems.
Due to the lack of services, many rural poor commonly use three strategies
to stave off "literal homelessness": doubling up in short-term arrangements,
use of inadequate or unsafe housing, and ? or frequent moves from
rented apartments, to doubling up, to camping out.
If only people who use services such as soup kitchens, food banks,
and shelters are counted as homeless, but yet there are little to
no homeless services providers in most rural areas, then people can
erroneously conclude that there are no homeless in their rural community.
Indeed, that has been a problem encountered by homeless advocates
in Kansas. |
|
| How
Many People Are Homeless In Rural Kansas? |
So far only two studies have attempted to count ALL rural homeless
in their area: one in Ohio and one in Kentucky, both of which obtained
data different from the U. S Census Bureau’s 1990 S-night count. Researchers
in Ohio identified and interviewed all homeless people in 21 rural
counties in Ohio. The National Institute of Mental Health funded the
Ohio study for $375,000. It lasted 6 months and employed over 90 staff.
The Ohio study found a one-week prevalence of homelessness in rural
counties was 5.7 per 10,000 and the 6- month prevalence was 14 per
10000. In Kentucky, the one-day rate of homelessness for rural areas
was 12.9 per 10,000 compared with 22.1 per 10,000 in 3 urban counties.
Rates based on data from the Census 1990 S-night count were 1.2 per
10,000 for rural and 17.5 per 10,000 for urban. Martha Burt of the
Urban Institute compared data from two national pointin- time counts
of homelessness conducted in 1996 – one conducted in February and
the other in October. Based on these counts, she derived rates of
homelessness for three different size communities, as follows: in
cities, there was an average of 63.95 per 10,000, for suburban/urban
fringe areas, 12.45 per 10,000 and for rural areas, 12.75 per 10,000.
These various estimates illustrate the complexities of counting the
rural homeless.
According to U.S. Census data, 98.9% of land in Kansas is considered
rural and 28.6% of the population is in rural areas. In 2000, there
were 2,688,418 people in Kansas, which would mean that 768,888 people
live in rural areas.
During the end of February 2004, the KSHC conducted a comprehensive
survey of all homeless shelters and housing programs specifically
for people who are homeless and found an available 921 beds in the
rural areas of Kansas. These beds are almost always full.
The KSHC conducted a point-in-time homeless count on the night of
March 15, 2004. There were 297 people counted as homeless. Based on
estimates from research on the prevalence of homelessness nationally
and statewide, it was felt there were large numbers of people who
were not counted. To account for all the homeless persons missed on
the night of the survey, and to develop a more accurate count, estimates
from research conducted. Using data from the 2000 Census, the numbers
of both rural and urban populations in Kansas’s rural areas were obtained
and the appropriate rates for either urban or rural were applied.
In rural Kansas (all counties except Leavenworth, Wyandotte, Johnson,
Douglas, Shawnee and Sedgwick) it can be estimated that there are
about 3,563 homeless individuals, and 1,936 families with children
for a total of 7746 people who are homeless.
To obtain the numbers of families with children and subpopulations,
percentages derived from the KSHC’s survey were applied to the numbers
generated in using research estimates and Census data. |
|
| How
Many Rural Homeless People Have Mental Illness? |
According to U.S. Census data, 98.9% of land in Kansas is considered
rural and 28.6% of the population is in rural areas. In 2000, there
were 2,688,418 people in Kansas, which would mean that 768,888 people
live in rural areas.
If, by using Martha Burt’s estimates, Census data and percentages
derived from the KSHC count, it can be estimated that there are 1007
people in rural areas experiencing homelessness and who also have
a mental illness. Culhane and Kuhn found that for eighty percent of
those experiencing homelessness, it is a short, single episode. They
also found that for this eighty percent, the service system works,
but for people with a mental illness and/or substance abuse problem
many barriers in the homeless and mental health service system and
government entitlement programs lead to chronic homelessness and make
it difficult to overcome homelessness: lack of community mental health
resources after deinstitutionalization, lack of discharge planning
from prisons, and multiple barriers for homeless people to access
social security, general assistance, food stamps, etc. due to psychiatric
symptoms and to lack of an address.
Homeless people with mental disorders remain homeless for longer periods
of time and have less contact with family and friends. They encounter
more barriers to employment, tend to be in poorer physical health,
and have more contact with the legal system than homeless people who
do not suffer from mental disorder.
Many people who are chronically homeless, mentally ill and using substances
have amassed criminal records, and have poor credit and rental histories,
making it difficult to rent an apartment. The Federal Task Force on
Homelessness and Severe Mental Illness documented what many homeless
advocates and service providers knew from experience, that the unique
needs of those with mental illness living on the streets frequently
couldn't be addressed by the outreach and emergency shelter programs
that serve the general homeless population.
Low-income people with mental disorders are at increased risk of homelessness.
According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, despite the
disproportionate number of severely mentally ill people among the
homeless population, increases in homelessness are not attributable
to the release of severely mentally ill people from institutions.
Most patients were released from mental hospitals in the 1950s and
1960s, yet vast increases in homelessness did not occur until the
1980s, when incomes and housing options for those living on the margins
began to diminish rapidly. |
|
| But,
is it cost effective to provide housing to the chronically homeless! |
Unacceptable costs to society result from the poor access to health
care and affordable housing. Because homeless people often are uninsured
and lack access to low-cost preventive health care, they go without
care until relatively minor problems become medical or psychiatric
emergencies. Ultimately, most homeless people do get treated, but
it is treatment of the most expensive sort, delivered in hospital
emergency rooms and acute care wards.
A significant amount of research has demonstrates that providing services
in a permanent housing setting is less expensive than the cost of
habitual shelter stays and the emergency medical services often required
by the chronically ill homeless. Placing homeless individuals diagnosed
with a psychiatric disability into subsidized supportive housing costs
little more than leaving them homeless because utilization of shelters,
hospitals and correctional facilities decreases. |
|
| A
Supportive Housing/Housing First Model is the Solution |
Supportive housing is defined as housing that "combines principles
of community mainstreaming, tenant empowerments, and flexibility in
the programming of mental health services." It is indepenendent, permanent
housing with flexible community supports, such as case management
and rental subsidies that are chosen by the client. Housing needs
are viewed as separate from treatment needs.
The pathways to housing program in New York which is a nationally
recognized and respected program known for it's use of a housing first
approach, only requires two things of its clients: representative
payeeship through the program and two meetings a month with a case
manager. They do not require that clients take psychiatric medications
or be abstinent from substances, yet this program has achieved extremely
successful outcomes. Over a 5 - year period, the 242 individuals in
Pathways achieved an 88% housing retention rate, vs. a 47% rate for
participants in traditional treatment programs in New York City. Clients
in the Pathways to Housing program in New York spent significantly
less time homeless and in psychiatric hospitals and incurred fewer
costs than the participants in a continuum of residential services.
There is also research that shows that permanent supportive housing
costs less than congregate settings with on - site services.
According to the Federal Task Force on Homelessness and Severe Mental
Illness only 5 - 7% of homeless persons with mental illness need to
be institutionalized; most can live in the community with the appropriate
supportive housing options in the form of supportive services and
rental assistance.
Research has demonstrated that formerly homeless people with serious
mental illness can achieve residential stability for significantly
long periods of time and that independent living has better outcomes
that congregate settings. Also, if supportive housing is provided
then homeless mentally ill individuals can be reintegrated in to the
community and linked to community- based services. |
|
|
|
