Hope for a new year, and more work

Last week when I was at the Chicago Alliance to End Homelessness’ Breakfast with the Mayor I was heartened to hear the new mayor comment so passionately on his dedication to ending homelessness in Chicago, and is willing “to put money where his mouth is”. I was also pleased to hear about the research from Loyola University showing that homeless providers in Chicago are making a difference in the fight to end homelessness. We are decreasing homelessness and the people who come into our programs also leave into permanent housing and, most importantly, stay stably housed after exiting. We are making a difference!

This year RSSI has helped over 40 people who had been living on the street for more than 12 months, all of whom have multiple disabilities, attain housing with the support they need to stay stable. Next year our goal is another 50 people.

BUT, yesterday I was at a meeting where Jon Egan, from the Department of Family and Children Services, brought up a salient point. He commented that homeless service providers can work together as hard as they want and as effectively as possible and we still will not end homelessness. His point was that people who experience homelessness interact with other systems than the homeless system, and the causes of homelessness are not able to be fully addressed by homeless providers.

Poor education, poverty level jobs without benefits, drug and crime infested neighborhoods, a huge lack of affordable housing, etc. These are some of the big factors that are beyond the control of the homeless providers. So, there are other systems of care that are involved with these issues and if we work together we can do more prevention and have a faster response for people at risk of homelessness. This will take systems integration on the city-wide and a regional level. That will RSSI’s, and my work, for the next year and beyond.

I look forward to the challenge.

2011 Benefit Speech

I was really happy with the speech at our benefit this year and so thought I would share it with anyone who wants to read it, so here it is:

It has been a very exciting year for us and one worth celebrating.  I would like to make it clear that we are not celebrating people being homeless, we are not celebrating poverty, we are not celebrating that there are people that suffer from debilitating mental, physical and substance abuse disorders, and we are not celebrating the fact that people are infected with HIV & AIDS.

We are celebrating hope; hope that we can have an impact on the growing tide of homelessness and poverty in Chicago. We are celebrating everyone in this room who believes in this hope and supports our work to end homelessness and poverty. We are celebrating RSSI’s staff who work tirelessly to help those in need. Most of all we celebrate our program participants, two of whom you will hear their stories tonight. Our program participants have to work hard to overcome the many obstacles they face, learn how to manage their disabilities, maintain stability in their housing and avoid the pitfalls of poverty. In this day and age, with the financial uncertainty many, many people are facing, we celebrate tonight the ability to see beyond our own issues to help others in need.

While our program participants are working to change their lives, we are working to make RSSI one of the premier organizations providing homeless services to the region. From our award from SAMHSA last year, to two new grants in the past year from the Department of Housing and Urban Development that will to enable us to provide housing subsidies and Comprehensive Case Management services to the homeless people who have been on the streets the longest and who have the most severe illnesses. This new program will enable us to help 150 people get off of the street corners, out from under the bridges and away from shelters and into housing with services. With these grant awards we have been able to house 28 individuals to date, and expect to house an additional five people a month for the next ten months – this is in addition to the 50 homeless families and individuals that we will continue to help toward independence.

With these funds and the funds from individuals, businesses, foundations and corporations we look forward, with hope, to a future where people do not need to live on the streets, and where a disability does not mean isolation and poverty. We look forward to a future where housing is affordable, services are available to people who need them, and we have the resources to prevent homelessness before it happens.

UPDATE! UPDATE!

Time for an RSSI update. A lot has happened since my last post in July. In September RSSI received an award from SAMHSA a division of the Department of Health and Human Services for a 5 year grant to provide outreach supportive housing services to chronically homeless adults. This is a major accomplishment for the agency and led to another grant award from the Chicago Alliance to End Homelessness for rental subsidies to provide housing units. Since September we have hired 4 new outreach workers, a team leader and a psychiatric nurse. This is an exciting time for us and will allow us to help at least 150 chronically homeless people get off the streets and into permanent housing with supportive services!

Are the homeless getting younger?

I have noticed a disturbing trend recently. The exits and entrances to the highway near my office are populated by younger people with signs saying they are homeless and in need of money for food. They look sun worn and dirty, and usually have backpacks. Are these young travelers coming to Chicago for the Lollapallooza and other music fests, are they traveling the country on some wanderlust, or are they a new breed of homeless? I started to see these kids in their 20′s back in the late winter, so I am guessing that they are not just here for the festivals. What is leading these young people to the streets? Is it drugs, lack of job opportunities, or bad situations at home? The economy is making it very difficult for those graduating high school or college to find gainful employment, which can lead to going underground to find income. Time will tell, but we need to engage these kids before they become the street people of tomorrow, or worse, don’t make that far.

The anticipation is killing me.

So, the state of Illinois has not provided any information about our state contract for services that began July 1^st. I have no idea whether we will be receiving all of the contract, part of the contract, or none at all. How does one budget when there is no clue as to whether or not income will be coming in or not? If I knew that we were being cut at least I could plan, but now I am just in limbo. Of course, I have had to take precautionary measures to deal with the cash flow shortage this creates. Laying off staff, reducing hours and reducing benefits. Hopefully the states problems won’t bankrupt our organization. But not knowing is creating more problems than if we knew we were losing funding. Who runs a company this way?

New opportunities

Despite the fact that my recent post have not been the most uplifting, there are some really great opportunities for RSSI. First, we received notice from SAMHSA that we are being considered for a grant- we made it past the first round. This in itself is a big accomplishment as they are really tough. Secondly there are some new funding streams becoming available for homeless services that RSSI can take advantage of; such as sweet home Chicago ordinance in the city, the 10,000 homes initiative, and the possibility of new HUD funding.
All of these mean a great deal in helping us achieve our goal of getting decent housing with services for the homeless. RSSI does a lot of good with little resources, so these opportunities mean we can touch more lives though our services and housing program. After being at this agency for almost ten years now I feel that RSSI is on the verge of significant growth that could have an incredible impact on the homeless population in Chicago. So, keeping watching us. We are breaking through.

Mixed messages in the recovery

What are we to make of the news reports coming out of our nation’s capitol and local news sources? Some say things are getting better, while others say that they are worse. I always want to know what the data says. A recent report from SAMHSA shows that while homelessness in general is decreasing, there are more families who are homeless than ever before. Is this a sign of the economic times with foreclosures and unemployment at record highs? Or is the homeless system and affordable housing easier to access for single people. Yes and Yes.

At RSSI we have been struggling with some of these same issues. The economic problems mean that individual, foundation and corporate giving is down, but the need has increased three fold. We are getting more and more calls and just stopping by our office every day from people asking for help in keeping their housing, trying to avoid the streets. At the same time our resources have been cut in half and our state and local funders are not paying us for the services we have already provided. We have been implementing new strategies to serve more families in our homeless program, but there is such a limited resource of family units available it has been difficult.

At the same time we have received notice that we may be receiving a federal grant that allow us to double the size of our homeless program, and have an even greater impact on the homeless problem here in Chicago. My biggest fear is being forced to close the agency before that happens. This would mean laying off all of the staff, and kicking 48 individuals and families back to the curb because the money that was supposed to come in to pay for salaries and operating is delayed another 4 to 6 months. We will not be able to stay open that long without a miracle.

Let’s just say that I am praying.

On the bandwagon

GO BLACKHAWKS!

Who maintains hope?

Sometimes the hardest thing about being the director is maintaining hope in the face of what seems like overwhelming odds. I feel as though it is my job to encourage and motivate my staff and board to do what is necessary. But what about when one feels not-so-hopeful himself? It is hard to be the motivator when it seems like all the news you are getting that will affect your ability to operate the agency is dark. State funding cuts, individual donations down, corporations not giving, demand for services tripled, staff stretched thin, foundation giving decreased or not at all. The numbers are maddening. You can only have a contingency plan for so much, but when everything goes south it becomes a real challenge. The state budget issue is the most frustrating. The uncertainty and the promise of late or non-payment is totally disruptive. I know that if we decided not to pay our staff or our creditors they would leave or cancel our account. And it is all about maintaining political power for those who were elected by the people. Yet, what they don’t realize is that the people are the ones who are going to suffer and are suffering. The people with money will have to deal with it as well. We have created in our society the idea that we all “should” the haves, so when people are the have nots, they will do whatever it takes to become one who has.

Sometimes I think that businesses can lay off staff and produce less “stuff” and then rebound when people are spending again and they can then rehire staff. In social services we are facing all those people who have been let go, and we all know that the low man on the totem pole is always the one who gets the ax first. As I have said before, we are trying to do this with fewer dollars and fewer resources. So, we end up with a lot of unskilled, undereducated and working poor who are now the unemployed poor – soon to be homeless. People really are hanging on by a thread. So are we.

I am proud of the people I work with, my staff, because they work REALLY hard and are dedicated to helping people turn their lives around and attain stability. So, the one thing giving me hope right now, that lets me be a leader who motivates, is the people we serve and their will to overcome.

Time management

There is so much to do and so little time. I had a good book recommended to me about time mangement and it really helped. I must finish it some day. I always end my day with so much left on my to do list I feel as though I could work until midnight every night just to keep up. I find the most difficult thing to decides is what not to do. What do I put off until another day. The prioritizing is the challenge fo me. There are so many committes and activites outside of actually running the agency that end up suffering. In the end I know I should be more active with these groups, but just run out of minutes in the day to do it correctly.