By Ralph da Costa Nunez, President of Homes for the Homeless. The following is an excerpt from his book, A Shelter Is Not A Home…Or is it?

Twenty years ago, city shelters were no place for any family to call home. Their basic mission was simply emergency housing and little more. As a result, families remained entrenched in poverty, and many became homeless a second, third, or even forth time. Two decades later, shelters are still here, but many have evolved into very different places – dynamic, multi-service centers addressing the comprehensive needs of homeless families. With very little affordable housing being built, shelters have become one of the only housing options low-income families have. In fact, they may be the twenty-first century’s version of affordable housing.

As we attempt to end the cycle of family homelessness, the answer may lie in these facilities of the new millennium, shelters turned into “communities of opportunity.” Shelters have become powerful places where enormous changes in people’s lives and habits are taking place. They either are, or can be, residential educational training centers where families live and participate in programs addressing the root causes of poverty. In fact, today these facilities are at the forefront of the war on poverty, fighting domestic violence, teen pregnancy, illiteracy, illness, and foster care placements, while simultaneously providing job readiness, employment training, and education, all on-site.

Indeed, shelters have become the new “main streets” of poor communities, serving as an alternative approach to providing community services in a residential setting under one roof. And why not? If shelters have become more permanent than ever before, and in many ways are taking the place of old, newly gentrified neighborhoods, then their power should be harnessed and their potential to transform people’s lives recognized.

Some argue that this view of a shelter is misguided, acting as a barrier to the construction of permanent housing, but we must ask the fundamental question: when will this housing be built? Whether intentional or not, government has essentially abandoned its commitment to low-income housing. Today when government speaks of affordable housing, the question remains – affordable for whom? New York City’s new initiative to develop three-hundred units of affordable housing in downtown Manhattan is a perfect example. Qualifying applicants must earn between $50,000 and $85,000 annually. No low-income families meet that criteria, and homeless families never will. For the time being, shelters are all that is left. They have become surrogate low-income housing where poor families presently reside and will probably continue to do so for the foreseeable future. And, if, as we have seen, homelessness is more complex than just housing, shelter communities can play a highly significant role in reducing homelessness itself.

Shelters and Community
Part of the power of a shelter-turned-community is the potential for positive collaborations with the larger community. Local libraries, community colleges, museums, and cultural institutions can help enhance a shelter’s services and provide extracurricular activities. Children can be connected to mentors at a high school, receive one-on-one academic assistance at a library, and find a place in the spotlight in a local theater troupe. Adults can be linked to employment opportunities with community businesses and take their first steps on the road to independent living.

Shelters are much more than just temporary housing for the poor. Many have become visionary residential community centers handling front-line poverty and dealing it a powerful blow. These new communities, partnering with the broader community, offer enormous benefits to those in need, and they do so at a reasonable cost. In New York City, the estimated cost of a shelter-turned community is roughly $25 per person per day, including housing, education, childcare, and a full spectrum of programs and activities.

In addition to cost, these communities offer families a safer, more respectable living environment than the congregate emergency shelters that preceded them. With private living suites, indoor and outdoor play areas, computer labs, and classrooms, the atmosphere is one of a community center rather than a stark city shelter. These residences are essentially “one stop shops,” where all the programs and services a family needs to move forward are found under one roof.

Furthermore, this on-site approach, coupled with positive peer pressure from shelter residents and counselors, removes many of the traditional obstacles to program participation. The logistical nightmares of attempting to participate in educational and social programs, historically spread throughout the community, are gone. The search for transportation and childcare no longer stand in the way. Parents and children simply have to walk down the hall or go up the stairs to participate in services that will change their lives. Such is the power of a shelter community.

This is an approach already proven successful. In New York City, many Tier II facilities are working to address poverty and homelessness in new and dynamic ways. Shelters have transformed into communities of opportunity, where shelter directors advocate for resources for their residents just as elected official do for their communities, and staff members link families to a variety of education and employment options just like guidance counselors do for their students.

Simply put, turning shelters into communities of opportunity is an approach that works. It is truly the first step to ending family homelessness as we have known it. Families who partake in the power of a shelter are able to overcome their homelessness, move into new homes, and stay housed. Studies have shown that after two years, ninety percent of program participants in such communities maintained their permanent housing. Already, thousands of families who have come through these new communities have found housing and secure jobs, while furthering their education and strengthening their families. They have emerged from homelessness largely because of a common sense approach that takes a negative circumstance and transforms it into a positive opportunity for success.

Today, there is a new response to homelessness – a Ten-Year Plan coming out of Washington, D.C. It purports to end homelessness by closing the so-called “front door.” By closing shelters and dismantling programs, the plan expects the homeless to be absorbed into other existing service systems. It is in fact, reminiscent of the 1980’s “just say no” anti-drug and teen pregnancy campaigns, illogical approaches that do nothing about a problem except expect it to disappear. The Ten-Year Plan is already several years old and little has changed; the homeless keep coming, and only lip service is paid to the development of new low-income housing. If the truth be told, without a massive, immediate infusion of affordable housing for the poor, no plan, regardless of its timetable, can succeed. And with the national government functioning in a quasi-war economy and national and local deficits estimated to be in the trillions of dollars, it is inconceivable that any such initiative will be taken. In reality, the Ten-Year Plan is already dated, and represents and abdication of responsibility rather than a viable solution to the multi-faceted problem of homelessness.

Instead, those truly concerned with ending family homelessness are at a crossroads. They could, and should, continue to advocate for new housing, understanding that is still remains a long-term goal. They could also abandon viable solutions, and buy into the national ten-year plan, discovering several years from now that they have helped to usher in a new generation of the homeless. Or they could recognize the true breadth and depth of the problem, work within the environment and infrastructure already in place, and deal a powerful blow against family homelessness and severe poverty.

This book has described the history and reality of family homelessness in New York City, but the problems and solutions are similar everywhere, on the magnitude of the problem differs. New York has inadvertently developed a viable framework for ending family homelessness; it is now up to government officials and the public to recognize it and put it to work. Simply put, if we are ever going to end family homelessness as we have known it, we have to realize that it will take a community to do so – a new community of opportunity, which begins in shelters themselves. If we don’t, we will be faced with yet another generation of homeless families and children, idling in shelters across this country, waiting for the housing that may never come. For the time being at least, a shelter has indeed become a home.