Thusday, April 1, 2010

Services showing effect on homeless

Growth rate has slowed

By Lee Hammel TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
lhammel@telegram.com

WORCESTER - While there are still substantial numbers of homeless people in the city and the county, the growth rate slowed and even reversed itself over the past year.

The 1,409 people that the Central Massachusetts Housing Alliance found to be homeless in Worcester County in the alliance’s point-in-time survey Jan. 27 is five fewer people than it found a year ago. That comes after an increase of 123 homeless people and people in homeless families the year before, or a 9.5 percent jump.

In the city, CMHA’s count of 1,060 homeless people was an increase of seven people — a 0.7 percent increase — over the year before. That increase is a better showing than in 2009, when a jump of 101 people was counted over the year before, a 10.6 percent hike.

City Manager Michael V. O’Brien, chairman of the Leadership Council of the Worcester County Regional Network, took pride in the 38 percent decrease in the number of chronically homeless individuals in Worcester. The Leadership Council is applying $4.3 million in state and federal funds toward ending homelessness in the county, and is particularly focused on chronically homeless individuals.

Mr. O’Brien said that fewer than 20 chronically homeless individuals continue to regularly use the People in Peril shelter at 701 Main St. He said that since November, 69 chronic and episodic users of the PIP shelter have been placed in permanent housing.

While South Middlesex Opportunity Council officials did not return calls seeking comment yesterday, Mr. O’Brien said in December, a month after admission to the PIP shelter was restricted to referrals, that the average nightly census there dropped 16.5 percent to 89 people in November, compared to the previous November.

With help from the state Interagency Council on Housing and Homelessness, and federal homelessness prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program, and $1.6 million from the private Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts since 2007, “these are encouraging signals that our approach and collaborative private/public partnership is working,” the city manager said.

The CMHA count on behalf of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development also found a decrease of 36 homeless individuals — 6.9 percent — down to 482 in the county. Of those, 330 were in Worcester, a decrease of 31 or 8.6 percent.

However, there was an increase of 38 people living in homeless families — 5.5 percent — growing to 730 people living in homeless families in Worcester. In the county the increase was 3.5 percent or 31 people in homeless families, growing to 927 people.

But Grace K. Carmark, CMHA executive director, said even that reflects good news. The number of homeless families dropped by 1, to 250, in Worcester and increased by 2, to 319, in Worcester County.

It is a result of efforts by the housing alliance, Friendly House, Catholic Charities and the Henry Lee Willis Center, Ms. Carmark said.