A Couple of Good Resources re: Homelessness and Poverty

This was posted over at the John Edwards forum but I thought it needed more exposure. Credit goes to pamela.

Bobbie just showed me this link and I think it's a great site. http://www.irp.wisc.edu/initiatives/outreach/dispatch.h... They give daily updates, from newspapers throughout the country, on the issues of poverty and homelessness. I've added it to my bookmarks and plan to check it regularly to see what is going on with this issue and to post these articles in the appropriate places on DU and elsewhere. I will probably miss a few days so it would be great if a few others could also "adopt" this site.

I also came across a site recently that focuses on Poverty and Homelessness from a legal standpoint. Many of you have already seen and responded to one thread I posted about this organization in reference to their objections to the 2009 budget. They are doing lots of other good things like fighting the laws that restrict feeding the homeless and other laws that "criminalize homelessness." The organization is called The National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. Here is a link...http://www.nlchp.org/index.cfm

Sojourners is another good organization. http://www.sojo.net / They are a religious group but they aren't right-wing and they do good work. A lot of you are probably familiar with them through Jim Wallis but may not be familiar with all the work they do on behalf of the homeless and poverty issues. For example, here is an alert they sent out to "Pledge to Vote Out Poverty."http://go.sojo.net/campaign/voteoutpoverty

There are a couple other organizations I've been checking out but I'll limit this post to these three. Please feel free to add any links you have found that might be of interest. And thanks in advance for reading this and doing whatever you can do to help.

I still believe that Edwards supporters are the best.

a community radio station? they may be broadcasting

The Homelessness Marathon is a 14 hour radio broadcast featuring the voices and stories of homeless people from around the U.S. The Homelessness Marathon originates from Nashville this year and features live call-ins all night long via a toll-free number.


Find out more about the Homelessness Marathon at www.homelessnessmarthon.org

In Tucson and southern Arizona you can listen on KXCI 91.3 Tucson or on-line http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/kxci/ppr/index.shtml

Within the 14 hour national broadcast, KXCI will feature brief segments at the top of each hour that spotlight local issues, people, programs and service providers such Tucson Planning Council for the Homeless, Primavera, and Wingspan's Homeless Youth Project.

6pm-6:05 Leslie Carlson is the Impementation Coordinator for the The Plan To End Homelessness for the Tucson Planning Council for the Homeless www.tpch.org. She can be reached at 520-661-6686 or by email lacarlson@cox.net


7pm-7:05 Deborah Dale is the Chief Development Officer of the Primavera Foundation. You can find out about all of the services Primavera offers at www.primavera.org or 520-623-5111

8pm-8:05 Brian Flagg is a long time volunteer of the Catholic Social Worker Community, Casa Maria. Casa Maria serves lunch to 600 individuals and 200 families daily in its soup kitchen. More information is available at www.casamariatucson.org . Brian can be reached by phone at 520-624-0312 or at 401 E 26th St., Tucson, AZ 85713.


9pm-9:05 Steve Wenzel is a social worker with the Southern Arizona VA in the Healthcare for Homeless Veterans Program (HCHV) Steve can be reached at steven.wenzel@va.gov or 520-629-1839.


10pm-10:05 Larry Munguia is the pastor at the Sober Project, a church that he founded about six years ago. He is also a member of the Meth Free Alliance and is involved with all kinds of positive stuff focusing on people making some type of life recovery efforts. He can be reached at 520.404.6237.


11pm-11:05 Fernando Siqueiros is a student with the Voices 110 Degrees After School Project. More information about this low-income youth project is available at www.voicesinc.org


12am-12:05 Anna Watson Wheeler is the program director for the Primavera Prisoner Re-Entry Project (PREP). More information is available at the www.primaver.org and 520-547-3341.


1am-1:05 Michele Keller is a recent Primavera Prisoner Re-Entry Project (PREP) participant. More information about the PREP program is available at 520-547-3341. Michele can be reached at 520-302-3940.

2am-2:05 Tom is a resident at Esperanza en Escalante(EE). Cindy Owen is the supervisor for the Disabled Units at EE. Phyllis Russell is the Executive Director at EE. More information is available at www.eeeveterans.org or by phone at 520-571-8294.

3am-3:05 Courtney Jones is Wingspan's Youth Program Coordinator. Wingspan is Southern Arizona's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center. Courtney can be reached at the Eon Youth Center, 520-620-6245 office and 520-954-2344 cell or at courtney@wingspan.org


4am-4:05 Fernando Siqueiros Voices 110 Degrees After School Project

See 11pm listing above.


5am-5:05 Deborah Dale is the Chief Development Director for Primavera. More information about Primavera's Home Ownership Program is available at www.primavera.org Call 882-5383 to sign up for orientation.


6am-6:05 Brian Flagg Casa Maria

See 8pm listing above.

listen online www.kpfk.org

Also, if you hear of these in advance, could you please post a notice?

I haven't heard of this, so I VERY MUCH appreciate your post!

:yourock:

but it is one of the things I think is important for community radio to be doing. The charter is about giving voice to local communities that are not served by regular media.

I know the person that produced my local segments and Brian Flagg who was in one of them. Good folks that have been there.

I have heard it in past years as well. I am sorry I should have posted it earlier - you might get in contact with them and see what they have planned for next year. I see the link was printed wrong in my post - try this: http://www.homelessnessmarathon.org/

Usually it is held around the end of January but got moved this year - not sure why.

The hours I caught had were on location in Nashville (outdoors) they had sort of open mic and a couple folks (activists or "expert" types) on phone lines plus two open call in lines, one for anybody and one reserved for homeless only. People could walk up and tell their stories or answer questions or talk about whatever the subject of the moment was - the ones I recall were womens issues, police harassment and panhandling laws, other crimes - including crime attributed to the homeless and violence against them, children, substance abuse, social services, veterans, etc.

Then another hour it seemed to be being broadcast from San Jose (I think) and one of the big issues was the city providing tuff-shed tool sheds as housing - seemed to be an unpopular move, pretty degrading - maybe more so because of the rules and regs about coming and going, fences around the compounds etc.

Some of it has a pretty amateur sound to it (I happen to like that - it is more real) and have to be honest some of the speakers reinforce stereotypes, others very articulate and well informed. Some were brutally honest about addiction and survival.

One woman who was clearly a victim of republican brainwashing, was kind of interesting. She and her husband were both veterans, working, homeless, bathing in gas station bathrooms, and yet she went on a rant about drugs and how people who "chose" to do that deserve to be where they were (yet clearly she deserved help) WTF? Goes to show no matter how hard a conservative falls they still think they deserve benefits and anybody else is just a loser. They are empathy-disabled, I guess.

:kick: & R

thanks for the links

Thanks to pamela also!
:D

The fight is for visibility - "out of sight out of mind" is deadly. It takes courage to keep putting the issue of poverty in front of people. It makes people uncomfortable, and they will attack the messenger, and attack the most vulnerable.

You may feel alone here, but you speak for millions who have no voice. That is the good work, and there is no higher calling. Thank you, and know that you are not alone.

Pamela put out some good resources here, and I really appreciate you posting this here!

:hug:

I haven't been online much and just noticed this. Thanks for posting it here!

One quick correction: I said in the original post that that first site updates daily and it actually updates twice a week. It's still a great resource for getting fairly up to date info on homelessness and poverty issues. I think it is very important that we stay aware of the laws that are being passed in our own communities that are effectively "criminalizing homelessness" like the anti-public feeding laws, loitering laws, etc.

Researching the legal aspects of homelessness has been an eye-opener for me and I have Bobbie to thank for raising my awareness of this issue.

get the local community to understand the LEGAL issues, and the destructive impact, and what it did to me, personally, and I'm sure for many others.

:cry:

really, this is HUGE... and hardly anyone understands it.

If you want a good book, try John Gr

I already have the sites saved, there is good information there. :hi:

K&R

are getting more attention here.

thank you

They're very good.

Thanks, Demgirl, for helping get this more visibility. :)