Category: In the Press

We can learn much from our peers. I just read an article by Taj Hall, who works with homeless individuals in Canada, about asking the question, “How’s it going?”

Ms. Hall does not ask this question unless she is prepared to listen to the answer. How many of us have walked by someone and asked, “Hey, how’s it going?” without even stopping to hear the answer? For homeless individuals, they usually don’t even get that much from people passing them by.

The homeless spend much of their lives feeling invisible, forgotten and utterly without value. What a tremendous blessing a genuine, unhurried conversation can be for these marginalized individuals! Something so easy and so simple can make a world of difference.

If you are able to, why not come in and listen to our guests? Their stories, real or not, are worth your time. It costs nothing to give back in this simple but important way.

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Many of us encounter the same scenery every day during our regular commute: the street team sweeping sidewalks, the throng of people crowding the metro during rush hour, the same homeless individual at the same street corner every day. That homeless person often becomes a fixture of the landscape and is sometimes acknowledged, sometimes not. Nonetheless, there is always a feeling that something is missing, something different, when that person disappears from the landscape. Such is the case for those who passed by and knew Peter Bis, a homeless man who spent his days close to Union Station and Capitol Hill.

Read about Peter Bis and the lives he touched in the Washington Post.

And though Peter was not part of our Georgetown community, there are many individuals just like him who are. Whether it’s the quiet man with the cane outside of the Foggy Bottom metro during the evening commute or the skinny guy hanging out inside Starbucks, these people are part of our community and there, rain or shine. Next time you pass by, why not take a moment to make eye contact and say hello.

Many people are often surprised to discover that many homeless people have cell phones. Even more surprising to many is that homeless people are also on Facebook and Twitter. A new study has found that homeless people are using their cell phones to connect to each other and to non-homeless people via Facebook and Twitter.

A recently published article in The Atlantic cites several statistics regarding homelessness and cell phone use, including one statistic from 2009 that states 30-45% of homeless people have cell phones. We can only imagine that that number has grown significantly with the widespread availability of pay-as-you-go phones and allure of smart phones.

At GMC, we have five beautiful computers for our guests to use. While a handful of our guests use the computers to search for jobs, the majority of our guests are on Facebook and YouTube. They are talking to their friends, homeless and not, and their family. They are watching the news and Tweeting about it, watching sports, nature documentaries, etc. I think this article in The Atlantic aptly describes why we see so many people in our center on social media sites:

It may just be that being able to connect through social networking and media sites makes it both easier to be homeless and easier to escape homelessness.

What is it going to take to end homelessness in the US?

Jean-Michel Giraud, Executive Director of Friendship Place, recently published a great blog post in the Huffington Post that stressed the importance of working together to make positive changes in the world. He realistically states that homelessness is not likely to become extinct, and that the focus should not be to end homelessness, but rather to strengthen the system to shorten the period of homelessness. How? By offering a strong support system that can get people back into housing that they can stay in. Giraud stresses:

This should start at home — right here in Washington, D.C., where more than 220 homeless families were housed in motel rooms at the peak of hypothermia season this past winter. […]

So the solution is to build strong homeless services networks. One of the things I like about the notion of “building” is that you can do it one brick at a time. This means that, even in hard times, you can lay a brick down — no matter how small — and grow the system at large toward a better day for people on the street. At the risk of overdoing the whole brick metaphor, another thing I like about it is that the bricks don’t all have to look the same and it’s really up to each one of us and each community empowering homeless people to find new and effective ways to solve homelessness, even if we have to split our bricks and rub our pennies together to do so.

Great words that are applicable for any problem. We are all part of the solution. Every little bit helps, whether it’s donating towels and toothbrushes to GMC, attending a Help the Homeless fundraiser, or lobbying against budget cuts to homeless services.

The New Yorker recently published a 15,000-word feature about Bruce Springsteen, which delves into Springsteen’s life and history of clinical depression. This news and word of this feature is making its way into many headlines, news segments, and blog posts.

Maybe you are wondering why we are blogging about it, too. Why would a homeless outreach organization be interested in what Springsteen, an influential and important figure in the music industry, has to say? The answer is this: When the Boss talks about a decades-long struggle with clinical depression, suicidal thoughts, and a family history of mental illness, it opens up a discussion about these issues that affect so many people, including the homeless.

The CDC’s staggering statistic is that one in ten Americans report suffering from depression. Research also show that chronically and street-based homeless people are more likely to experience depression.¹ Whether depression is a cause or result (or both) of homelessness, the fact is that many of the guests who pass through GMC’s doors are depressed, and so we bring in experts like Dr. Ron Koshes, our psychiatrist, to help diagnose and treat those who need help.

The news segment we aired this morning in our clubhouse mentioned Springsteen’s depression, which we hope will open channels of communication between us and our community.

¹La Gory, Mark, Ferris J. Ritchey, and Jeff Mullis. “Depression among the Homeless.” Journal of Health and Social Behavior. 31.1 (1990): 87-102. Web. 25 Jul. 2012.