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Homeless needs far exceed services in suburbia

Some of the county's 11,000 homeless live in woods near you or vie for precious few shelter beds. In a sense, their big-city brethren are more fortunate.

By KEVIN GRAHAM
Published April 22, 2005

BRANDON - Richard Mence has developed a sixth sense when it comes to finding a place to sleep in Brandon.

He doesn't care about reasonable rates or free continental breakfast. It's all about location, location, location. A nice, quiet spot that few people know exist.

On a recent chilly morning, he parks an SUV near an empty lot off Falkenburg Road.

"This is it," he says, stepping out of the vehicle and pointing to a wooded area.

A clinical case manager for Mental Health Care, Mence visits homeless camps around Hillsborough County to ensure that homeless people get the medicines that many of them need.

"You just sort of know where the camps are," Mence said.

Mence also provides information about drop-in centers in Tampa where homeless people can go for a shower, a bite to eat and a place to do laundry. Mental Health Care also helps out with transportation, when it can, using a van to take homeless people into the city.

It's easier to find pockets of homeless people in the city. When it comes to unincorporated parts of the county, including the Brandon area, Mence often relies on the Sheriff's Office to point out new camps because the population is extremely transient.

"Something can be a campsite tonight for half a dozen people, then no one will ever go back," Mence said.

It's also tougher for homeless and poor people living outside Tampa to find the services they need. The Brandon Outreach Clinic, for example, claims to be the only place in the area where people not eligible for Medicaid or another health plan can receive free treatment and medication.

"Social services are taxed out there ... they're more spread out and they're more difficult to attain," said Rayme Nuckles, chief executive officer for the Homeless Coalition of Hillsborough County.

Nuckles said the biggest issue facing homeless people in Hillsborough - and across the state - is a lack of shelters. The coalition counted 8,082 people as homeless or lacking a permanent home in the county in October 2003. A survey of Hillsborough County's homeless conducted in January showed a 36 percent increase, to 11,023. The coalition reports that Hillsborough has 2,248 beds available in various shelters. "If we don't do something about it here soon, we will see more people on the streets," Nuckles said.

The Mary and Martha House caters to homeless and/or abused women, with or without children.

"We don't do men at all," said Priscilla Mixon, the Ruskin shelter's executive director.

Mixon said that most homeless shelters find it easier to provide services for men than for women and children. Single men, she said, require less bed space and need less attention.

"First of all, men don't usually have the children with them," Mixon said. "When you're doing the women, you have to do a place where they can get their own meals, parenting and nutrition classes ..."

Since the shelter incorporated in 1987, more than 3,000 people have gone through its doors, Mixon said. There is room for 14 people in an undisclosed emergency shelter and for three new families each year in the transition program, where some women and their children stay as long as three years. Mixon helps them learn a trade and find a place to live.

The women usually have two to four children in tow, Mixon said. When the shelter is full, she refers women to the city, but few want to leave the rural communities they've known all their lives.

"They live and work in the rural areas like Thonotosassa, Plant City, Balm, Wimauma ...," Mixon said. "They don't want to go to Tampa."

Most of the wooded campsites are empty during the day, Mence said. People move around looking for work, asking for handouts. He said the homeless try to be discreet about the location of the camps, usually not going to them until after dark.

A typical campsite in the woods tends to be messy, Mence said. There's scattered beer bottles, a shoe here, a blanket there. At one site that Mence frequents, beer bottles and cans line the open spaces next to flattened cardboard boxes covered by fallen leaves. There's a small American flag hanging from a tree branch, a slightly damp blanket and a shoe without its mate. Nearby, there's discarded religious material and a Bible nearby on the ground.

"I'm always touched by how many homeless people keep their faith when they have every right in the world to be angry," Mence said.

One group of men have set up a small tent city in the woods behind a church. The congregation knows they exist, and the men are grateful that they are allowed to stay. In return, they keep the area clean, even recycling their own trash.

"We're seeing homeless families living out of their cars and living in tents," said Stacey Efaw, program manager for Emergency Care Help Organization, or ECHO, on N Parsons Avenue.

Statistics bear witness to the growing demand.

The Homeless Coalition of Hillsborough County recently deployed 200 volunteers to count people who lack permanent housing. Of the 11,023 homeless the coalition reported, they found 4,295 with the Department of Children and Families, 3,766 living on streets and in shelters, 1,758 in the Hillsborough school district, 1,102 in jail and 102 in motels, cars, abandoned buildings and tents.

"There's no place in Brandon to send families," Efaw said. "No place other than Metropolitan Ministries (in Tampa)."

Families can receive limited help from ECHO. The nonprofit organization can provide up to 10 items per individual and a seven-day supply of food per household, including meats. Because resources are low, Efaw said ECHO limits services to two times to the same person within six months, and four times ever.

ECHO serves close to 20 homeless people a month, Efaw said. She sometimes refers single men and women to a halfway house on Orient Road that can often do a lot more.

At ChristLike Ministry, a faith-based shelter and rehabilitation center at 3011 N Orient Road, about 2,500 people a month find hot meals three times a day. Less than a mile north of the Orient Road jail, ChristLike Ministry is often the first stop for newly released inmates, said the Rev. Tony B. Jenkins, the church's pastor.

Jenkins said he and his staff know about the wooded campsites in the surrounding Brandon area. His facility at 3011 N Orient Road can accommodate 40 men. A house next door houses a dozen women. The waiting list is always full, he said, and the woods are the first place people go when he has to turn them away. Many of them don't bother putting their names on the waiting list, he said.

"There's no question that we need more programs that help people transition back into the community," Jenkins said.

Many of the people who go through the rehabilitation program at ChristLike Ministry are ordered there by the court. Some people leave jail with $100 from the state and no place to live. ChristLike Ministry doesn't charge for room and board. It helps residents there find jobs in the community as cooks, mechanics, anything "honest," Jenkins said.

After a few months at ChristLike Ministry, Jenkins said, men and women should have enough money saved up to move into their own place.

Even with assistance from ECHO and ChristLike, the odds still seemed to be stacked against suburban homeless people.

"There hasn't been anything in the past five years that's galvanized homeless issues," said Nuckles of the Homeless Coalition.

He pointed to an incident in Broward and Dade counties where homeless shelters and tents were set up in downtown areas.

"That really caused quite the commotion, and they had heated discussion about the topics and how to solve it," Nuckles said. "That's when the community became involved and said we need to do something about this issue."

Nuckles said his organization is working with a task force to come up with a solution for Hillsborough's homeless problem. They've discussed some radical ideas, he said, like busing the homeless from Hillsborough to a neighboring county like Sarasota.

"Do we send them to other counties?" Nuckles asked. "None of us have adequate resources."

For some agencies and churches, prevention is the goal.

The Brandon Outreach Clinic, at 517 N Parsons Ave., isn't set up to provide medical care to the homeless, but nurses don't turn people away if they come in with a medical emergency, said Deborah Meegan, the clinic's executive director.

"We serve a different type ... the working poor, people who have income but don't have enough money to provide basic health care," Meegan said.

The clinic is open three days a week and relies on volunteers to help serve nearly 70 patients a week, Meegan said. The clinic provides free medical service and free prescription drugs.

"Some of the people we treat are barely able to hold on to their jobs," Meegan said. "Their health impacts their ability to work. I certainly would like to think we've helped a lot of people keep their jobs so they don't become homeless."

Area churches regularly provide aid to families on the verge of becoming homeless. Some provide money from designated "poor funds" that help pay bills. Others, like St. Anthony's Food Pantry at Resurrection Catholic Church in Riverview, offer hot meals and groceries.

The pantry sees few homeless people at the Riverview location at 6819 Krycul Ave., said volunteer Anita De Biase, but the church drives to several places in Tampa on Sundays to pass out food and personal hygiene products.

"There's a great need out there," De Biase said. "We have to remember something: These are our brothers and sisters, too. We are not the ones to judge them. For one reason or another they're out there. We have to share what we have."

Times researcher Cathy Wos contributed to this story. Kevin Graham can be reached at 226-3433 or kgraham@sptimes.com

[Last modified April 21, 2005, 08:33:10]