Kudos to New Orleans

[billvon 3,132]

This is a great example of the good government can do if they set their mind to it.
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Homeless veterans in New Orleans find shelter at last

The Editorial Board, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune By The Editorial Board, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune
January 16, 2015 at 6:17 AM

Michael Washington, a U.S. Air Force veteran, was sleeping on a bus stop bench at Elysian Fields and St. Claude avenues when outreach workers for Unity of Greater New Orleans found him last summer. Within weeks, they had moved him into his own apartment.

The same was done for more than 200 other homeless veterans last year. That means that every veteran Unity had found to be living on the city's streets is now in permanent housing with support services.

That is a significant achievement -- and a testament to Mayor Mitch Landrieu's commitment to end homelessness in New Orleans.

It doesn't mean the work here is finished or that there will never be another homeless veteran in the city. But there has been remarkable progress in a short period of time.

Unity, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, the Housing Authority of New Orleans and dozens of nonprofits worked together to quickly get the veterans into housing. When a homeless veteran is located, the VA's Supportive Services for Veterans Families Program verifies military records, assesses the individual's mental and physical needs and provides initial rental assistance.

The Landrieu administration is investing $1.2 million to help renovate the Sacred Heart convent and school on Canal Street into 109 apartments for chronically homeless people and low-income families. Unity, which owns the building, is leading the $7.6 million project. Catholic Charities and the VA are providing support services. Twenty-two formerly homeless veterans are already living in the apartment building, while work continues on other units.

The veteran initiative is one part of the city's larger effort to find housing and services for homeless residents.

The number of chronically homeless people in the city has dropped dramatically, from 4,579 in 2009 to 677 in 2013. Unity executive director Martha Kegel said last spring that she hoped the city could eliminate chronic homelessness in 2015.

Chronic homelessness is defined as a person with a disability who has been homeless for more than a year or who has been without a home four times in the past three years.
. . .

Unity executive director Martha Kegel believes that New Orleanians have a greater understanding than others might.

"We are the only community in America where everybody experienced homelessness together nine years ago," she said at Unity's annual meeting last spring. "It's a shared experience we all understand in a way we didn't understand before; how important it is for every human being to have a home ... We understand our community will not be recovered from (Katrina) until we bring everybody home, until everybody in our community has a home."
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[ryoder 1,590]

I just recently saw this Daily Show story on a Salt Lake City program for the homeless: http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/lntv3q/the-homeless-homed

"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

[BIGUN 1,503]

Morning, Bill.

Those are called "Stand-Downs" and are actually a nationwide effort in each city. We've been doing them here for the past several years. Two years ago seemed to peak where we got 177 Homeless vets off the streets, in shelter, clothing, household items, etc. in less than 24 hours and eventually jobs.

http://www.va.gov/homeless/events.asp

Last year, we were down to 13 because the VA and HUD had set up an office and anyone driving around seeing a homeless person could call the office any day of the year and they would send out a van to check them out.

There are those that take the book bag of clothes, the shower, the food and tell everyone they wish to remain on the streets. And, that is their right.

Nobody has time to listen; because they're desperately chasing the need of being heard.

[muff528 3]

billvon

This is a great example of the good government can do if they set their mind to it....

Yes, government ...and some tax-deductible charity organizations.