Advocates for homeless tackle huge problems, enjoy success
By Laura Ruby
Like the clients they serve, they come from all walks of life. Many of the Fauquier County professionals who work with the area’s homeless come from faith-based initiatives, while others fell into the line of work that they all seem to find rewarding, frustrating, and perpetually worthwhile.This week ? the week before Thanksgiving ? has been designated as National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week by the National Coalition for the Homeless. But, for these employees, every week is homelessness awareness week.
“People in Fauquier County don’t know [homelessness] is here because it’s a wealthy county, but poverty is everywhere,” said Tyronne Champion, executive director of Community Touch, which operates a one-year transitional housing program at its Bealeton-area compound.
The county is also home to an emergency housing shelter called The Haven and the Vint Hill Transitional Housing program, a two-year program, both of which are operated by Fauquier Family Shelter Services. In the last fiscal year, which ended in June, FFSS provided shelter for 441 people, said Ed Childress, executive director of the agency.
Childress was particularly pleased to note that 43 percent of The Haven’s residents, who have 90 days in the shelter and must secure employment within a week of their arrival, moved into permanent housing upon their departure and another five percent went into a transitional housing program.
That means, Childress emphasized, that nearly half of the families served by the shelter have taken the first major step toward breaking the cycle of chronic homelessness by securing a permanent place to live.
What’s troubling to shelter employees, however, is the uptick in the number of calls seeking assistance due to continuing and deepening problems with the economy.
“We are presently turning away more families than usual because we are full,” Childress said. “We are most always full, but we historically do not have the volume of calls that we have now, therefore, don't turn away as many as we have been for the last six months.”
Officials cite rising unemployment and the foreclosure crisis as significant contributors to this increased demand. Though some of the area’s homeless have lost their houses in foreclosure, more are renters who are put out when their landlord loses the house in foreclosure and they are unable to secure a new place to stay.
Self-sufficiency is the goal of all three of the county’s shelters. The homeless clients they serve come in with unique needs and problems, and it is the employees’ job to help them help themselves.
As one might imagine, the job is demanding and, sometimes, overwhelming, but in recent interviews these professionals discussed the rewards that motivate them to come to work every day.
How did you come to work with the homeless?
“We heard the cry of the community,” said Champion, noting that when he and his wife Felicia moved to Fauquier in the late 1990s they first started a food pantry because of the demand they saw. Pastor of True Deliverance Church of God, Champion said that soon church members expressed a need for shelter. “And this was way before the economic crunch we’re in now,” he said, noting that some of the first participants in the transitional housing program were members of his church.
Before coming to Fauquier County, Champion worked with hungry and homeless people in Alaska through church outreach programs.
A former Methodist minister, Childress was drawn to FFSS four and a half years ago out of a desire to help the working poor.
“Vint Hill [transitional housing program] is what really attracted me. It was the hope that we could actually transition people in two years from homelessness to stability and not just put a Band-aid on the problem,” he said.
That desire to really address some root problems and make lasting changes in people’s lives was echoed by Childress’ staff.
Annie Cato, program manager at Vint Hill, comes from a background in adult protective services at Fauquier County Social Services.
“What attracted me to the Vint Hill program was the opportunity to help children as well as adults,” she said. “All of the statistics say that if you’re homeless as a child there’s a far greater likelihood that you’ll be homeless as an adult.”
Cato said that having two years to work with clients provides a wonderful opportunity to help them get back on their feet. With a focus on education ? including improving job skills, financial management, and parenting ? the program sets strict guidelines for how residents spend their money and has a number of requirements that they must meet throughout the two-year period.
“People can change if they’re given enough support,” Cato said. “I do what I do because I am very grateful for my life, and I want to help others, particularly women, become self sufficient and independent.”
Sabine Scholz, a case manager at The Haven, was a minister’s wife for 16 years before she went back to school to earn a degree in psychology. Through her church, Scholz said, she did a lot of counseling with families in trouble, helping them attain the food, shelter or services that they needed.
“It got too easy to push them on to the next level,” she said recently. “I wanted to take care of them. I wanted to make sure that they were okay. This is really hands on, as opposed to giving them something and then stepping back.”
In her position, Scholz works with families to set up a plan of action. She is part cheerleader, part teacher, part counselor and, when necessary, can lay down the law. After an initial meeting to talk about the family’s goals, clients know what is expected of them, and they must take the initiative to improve their lives.
“They respond very well to it. I’m not there bothering them to do things. I give them a deadline and expect them to meet it,” Scholz said. If they don’t, she practices “tough love,” she said, adding that the program “can only work with people who are ready to make a change.”
Scholz also shared Cato’s sentiment about giving people time to get their lives together.
“Knowing that they have a place to stay takes the pressure off so that they have time to start to think and to find work,” she said.
Sue Smith, The Haven’s new shelter coordinator, stumbled onto her work with the homeless shortly after learning about the local problem. She attended the shelter’s annual gala fundraiser more than five years ago and was astonished to learn about the need in the county. Shortly thereafter, she took a job as The Haven’s resident manager, a position she held until taking her new post six months ago.
“I wanted a job where I could go home and feel good about what I did,” Smith said, noting the she developed close relationships with residents while working the night shift at the shelter.
As resident manager, Smith made sure that the clients were in by curfew, gave out medication from the office, and, generally, made sure that the evening ran smoothly in the house. After the kids are settled in bed, “that’s when the moms want to sit and talk. That’s when their issues come up,” Smith said.
Smith enjoyed that bonding and said that she knew when she took the job that she had the compassion for it.
“I was surprised that I liked it so much. I was surprised at myself that I could be as strict as I had to be. I always tell the residents, ‘don’t mistake kindness for weakness,’” she said, adding that enforcing the house rules is what makes the shelter function properly.
In her new role, Smith misses the evening chats with residents, but is enjoying getting to know the community members who offer The Haven so much support.
Like Smith, Lura Bratcher, a case manager at Vint Hill, was looking for a meaningful job. After being in the mortgage industry for six years, she was looking for a job about which she could feel passionate. Her credit repair background has been particularly helpful to Vint Hill clients.
Joanne Bryant, an administrative assistant at the shelter, also fell into her position. She was looking for rewarding work to fill the void left when her youngest child went off to college. She found it at the shelter and said she loves the constant activity and knowing that she’s helping people.
What’s the most frustrating part of your job?
“The worst thing for me is seeing the children,” Scholz said. “When you have a family that has always lived in shelters and for them this is normal, the kids don’t have any aspirations. Or, sometimes, you have a kid who has a passion, who has a gift, but the parents don’t support it.”
Childress and Smith agreed that the most challenging part of the job is the low wages that shelter residents earn, “when we have residents who are working two or three jobs and you know they’re trying and they’re still not going to make it. It’s an expensive place to live,” she said.
“It’s frustrating that they can get a job that’s not really going to pay them enough to help them make real progress to get out of homelessness,” Childress added.
Cato said that she is most frustrated by “people with a lot of potential who make poor choices.”
“What’s difficult about our program is you have to really be ready to change. We don’t want to be cop or parent. We want to give them options, have them think it through, so they can be self-regulating,” she said.
Champion said that trying to encourage and support residents who are not working the program is his biggest challenge. “We offer them financial counseling, a case worker to help them, but [some] are chronically homeless, and they’re not going to change. It’s hard because you have to put them out and it’s heartbreaking because they have kids,” he said.
Walking that fine line between compassion and enforcing the rules is the toughest challenge for Bratcher as well, she said.
“They really need to be held accountable while they’re here,” she said.
What is your favorite aspect of your job?
This answer was nearly unanimous. Success is the thing that keeps these advocates going. And by success they don’t mean high wages or company cars, but the success of their clients.
“We just had a lady graduate from the program two weeks ago. She saved her money and got an apartment for her and her son,” Champion said. “She was so happy to be independent. To see people gain back their independence, that’s when we know we’re doing our job.”
Bratcher agreed.
“We’ve had four or five single moms leave recently,” she said. “Watching them leave here debt-free and able to be self-sufficient, that’s what it’s all about.”
“When they come here, the despair is what hits me first,” Scholz said. “They come here after a long road. They’ve lost their apartment, maybe they stayed with relatives or slept in their car. When they get here, they don’t think anything will ever change in their lives.”
But when they work the program, secure a job, begin saving money and making plans for the future, Scholz said, their outlook changes.
“To see those changes ? the way they walk changes, the way they talk changes and that’s really cool,” she said.
Success, they say, is made possible in large part because of community support.
“We get huge community support. We couldn’t do it without those people. It’s a real collaborative effort,” Cato added.