I Met a Man

There are great stories to tell everywhere. There are people doing incredible things in service to each other. Telling stories about communities coming together to support each other, can help us overcome the cynicism and negativity that seems to have taken over our politics and is on display every minute of every day on social media. The three stories below highlight people who are doing what they can to overcome crushing poverty in the richest state in the US.

Profiles From Grace Church, Hartford

I met a man who lost everything after his service to our country. He became homeless. When he was finally able to move into his family's home it had been vandalized. All the wiring and all the pipes had been stripped out of the walls. There's no heat, no water and no power. He lives there in the warmer months. He lives in a shelter in the winter. He considers himself lucky because he has VA benefits and his neighbors take care of his dog and two cats in the winter.

I met a man who spent four months in jail because he tried to help a woman who was the victim of a car jacking. He stood by this woman as the police arrived and lent his support. Because the man nominally fit the description of the carjacker (black, male, slender) he was arrested and thrown in jail. He could not afford bail, so he waited four months for the legal system to finally ask the victim if he was the one who assaulted her. She said no and he was finally released. He is clinically depressed, but has hope because of his part time employment made possible by Grace Church.

I met a woman at Grace Church who volunteers her time cutting the hair of the homeless and others who attend their weekly meal. Three weeks ago her house burned down. She missed one week, but was back after settling into a hotel room. She hopes to be back in her home six months from now.

Grace Church is stepping in where so many have failed.

According to NBC Connecticut in a report released in 2012, at 31.2 percent, Hartford's poverty rate is four times the 7.8 percent poverty rate of the suburbs, which include all 57 towns in Hartford County plus Tolland County and Middlesex County. City Data.com puts the percentage of families in Hartford below the poverty line at 43.4%.

Putting the Homeless in Jail?

Making Homelessness a Crime

The City Council in Columbia, South Carolina decided to do something about the homeless congregating downtown. In the Summer of 2013 they voted to arrest the homeless if they refused to be put in a remote camp. 

Not all of these stories end badly. Within days of passing an ordinance in Columbia, SC that would have made homelessness a crime, people within their own community rose up to protest. Among the protesters...the police. The Homeless will no longer be swept up and taken to a camp against their will. The option of going to the camp is still there, but only as a temporary solution while other options are explored.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/04/columbia-criminalizing-homelessness_n_3866273.html

If the coalition of the police, city workers and advocates had not made their voices heard, Columbia would have gone back to the days of debtor prisons and prison camps. Speaking up can make a difference.

But the idea of throwing people in poverty in jail is gaining momentum. According to an article in Community Digital News...

According to the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty, 100 of America’s largest 187 cities has passed anti-homeless laws. These laws criminalize everything from sleeping in cars to lying down in public; 30 percent of American cities ban sitting or lying in public. In 2011, 37 cities banned sleeping in cars; that’s now illegal in 81 cities.These laws carry penalties that the homeless can rarely pay; sleeping in your car in Palo Alto, California can result a fine of $1,000. The alternative is jail – up to six months.

Homelessness and Hunger

All this while homelessness is on the rise. The National Center for Family Homelessness reports that the number of homeless children is now 1.3 million.

Not only is it illegal to be homeless...in some cities it is illegal to help. NPR reports that "21 cities have passed measures aimed at restricting the people who feed the homeless since January 2013. In that same time, similar legislation was introduced in more than 10 cities. Combined, these measures represent a 47 percent increase in the number of cities that have passed or introduced legislation to restrict food sharing since the coalition last counted in 2010."