Follow-up on Homeless Veterans

Two days ago, I blogged about a CNN article on homeless female veterans, and today, I attended a presentation at Milwaukee's Continuum of Care by Barbara Gilbert, Program Manager of the Mental Health Division at the Clement J. Zablocki VA Medical Center.

She discussed the CHALENG Program, "Community Homelessness Assessment, Local Education and Networking Groups" which is a program designed to improve the continuum of care by the local VA and community agencies. Using CHALENG surveys, veterans' needs are ranked-both from the consumer's perspective and from the service provider's perspective.

In Milwaukee area, the identified needs are long-term & permanent housing, immediate shelter, and Job training/emotional psychiatric services.

HUD estimates that nationally, 15% of all homeless adults are veterans, and locally, according to VA, there are an estimated 216 homeless veterans. A temporary overflow shelter operated last winter by the Hebron House of Hospitality served 131 homeless men, of which 20% were veterans.

While the local community groups (such as Guest House of Milwaukee who is collaborating with VA to increase access to supportive housing) have been very supportive of VA and efforts to serve homeless veterans, better housing, better programs and services are still needed to serve not only our veterans, but also to other people who are homeless.

UPDATE: For clarification, the Waukesha information comes from Executive Summary of the Study Group Report on the Waukesha Overflow Shelter.

Update 2: People interested in veteran mental health issues should check out the Wisconsin Warrior Summit on October 22th.

Could things have been different?

What could have been done differently in the past? What can we do differently from here on?

CNN article on homeless veterans

Interesting article on homeless female veterans. The situation isn't as bad here in Wisconsin as it is in other states with a large number of military bases, but we're still seeing some homeless veterans (both male & female) in the metro area. Waukesha County has, and is projected to continue to have, an affordable housing shortage, so I wonder how Waukesha County will serve our men and women returning from military service.

The Political Environment: In Support Of Housing, UN Declarss October 5th World Habitat Day

James Rowen at The Political Environment talks about some of the issues of affordable housing in the region.

The Political Environment: In Support Of Housing, UN Declarss October 5th World Habitat Day

Key points to consider:

This is because fair and affordable housing for thousands of residents is and has been effectively limited, even denied, through a combination of a) the 1955 state law barring annexation that applies only to the City of Milwaukee, b) aggressive local zoning codes that ban multi-unit housing and c) regional enabling of suburban sprawl that has encouraged development far from the urban center in Milwaukee.

Come to next event to learn about revenue sources

Come to the Task Force's next event, Finding Funding for County Housing Trust Funds on Wednesday, October 7 at 5:30-7:00 p.m. at La Casa de Esperanza, 410 Arcadian Avenue in Waukesha. The main speaker is Mary Brooks, Director of the Housing Trust Fund Project, a national resource on housing trust funds at the Center for Community Change in Washington D.C. She will speak about the dedicated public revenue sources other communities use to support affordable housing through housing trust funds.

We'll discuss funding options for a Waukesha County housing trust fund and the benefits of having one. If you plan to attend, please pre-register at maryp@cacscw.org or 262-354-4017.

New RTA proposal, but no Waukesha

Governor Doyle announced today at the Milwaukee Intermodal Station that a new Regional Transit Authority would created. Initially, there will be sub-RTAs before being eventually merged into a true RTA with proportional representation of each County. Details here.

The new RTA will be responsible for the continued progress of the new Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee (KRM) rail connection as well as better positioning the communities to obtain federal funding.

When the bus and rail service is fully implemented, this should provide an economic boost to the communities involved, especially with the KRM connection. It should also make it easier for people to find housing-they'd have more options with a greater geographic area available for them to look in, and linkages to employment areas will make it easier to find jobs (and afford better housing).

It looks like at this time this RTA is limited to three counties, but there's no reason why Waukesha can't become part of it in the near future. But will Waukesha County?

Update: Story on JSOnline. Rowen notes that Waukesha is out by choice.

Department of D'oh!

A recent review of existing research on family homelessness has affirmed that the primary cause for most homelessness among families is the inability to find housing they can afford

D'oh! I would've never guessed that.

I know, I'm being sarcastic, but honestly, when communities enact policies that, deliberately or not, make housing more costly, what exactly do they think is going to happen? That all the people who work at their McDonald's, their Starbucks, who watch and educate their kids, clean their houses, will somehow magically appear at the start of each shift? And go away "somewhere else" (fantasyland, perhaps?) when their shift is done? Look to Oconomowoc, Pewaukee, even the City of Waukesha & their "ad hoc housing mix report" all seem to operate under the belief system that people of lower economic classes should live somewhere else-anywhere else.

When will people realize that it's simply not practical-or good for our greater community-to keep doing this? President Bush had an initiative to end homelessness and prioritized funding for that, a priority that continues to this day. Despite that, we see:

The release of this review comes on the heel of another release: the 2008 Annual Homeless Assessment Report, by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The report suggests family homelessness increased over the last year.

New Monthly Action for September

The monthly action for September is to let us know your county supervisory district! To find out which district you're in, click here. Type in your address to get a list of all your elected officials. About halfway down the page, your county supervisory district number is listed, and the name of your county board supervisor.

Please e-mail Mary Peschel to let her know you're an affordable housing advocate, and which district you're from. This action will help us to know if we have good representation from around the county when we contact our county board supervisors in support of a housing trust fund.