Task Force to Present Plan to End Homelessness June 4th
From the Guilford County Task Force to End Homelessness web site:
Presentation of Guilford County’s Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness Read More
The Guilford County Board of Commissioners invites you to the presentation of the Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness developed by the Guilford County Task Force on Ending Homelessness.
The event will take place on Monday, June 4, 2007 at 3:00 p.m in the Auditorium at Guilford Technical Community College’s Percy H. Sears Applied Technology Building. Located at 601 High Point Road, Jamestown, NC 27282. Parking will be available in Lot G.
A special presentation will be given by Philip F. Mangano, Executive Director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness.
The taskforce would like to acknowledge the following organizations for their ongoing support throughout this process; the Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro, The Weaver Foundation, Tech Triad, Carolinanet.com, the City of High Point, the City of Greensboro,Guilford County, NPH Consulting the Guilford Center, the United Way of Greater Greensboro, the United Way of Greater High Point and the Homeless Prevention Coalition of Guilford County.
Special thanks to all community members who contributed their time, personal information, and ideas through Town Hall meetings, surveys, and interviews during the planning process.
>> PDF invitation to Ten Year Plan Presentation
>> Philip Mangano bio
>> Map of GTCC Jamestown campus
***Task Force to Present Plan to End Homelessness June 4th: I just realized how funny this title is. Homelessness will not be ending on June 4th, barring a miracle from God. The 10-year plan will be presented on June 4th. 
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TDBS: Passes For The People
T. Dianne Bellamy-Small, responding to a fellow City Council member’s allegation that she gave away too many free city bus passes:
“I gave the passes to schools in my district for parents who had no transportation to come see about their children. I gave them to agencies that had poor people who often ask staff for money to get back home like students at GTCC. I gave the passes to homeless people to encourage them to go to Welfare Reform or Workforce Development or to DSS to get help. I gave the passes to a teenage homeless shelter to encourage the teens to be independent to go look for a job and a drug treatment center. I requested 30 passes for staff and students at the A&T High School Summer Transportation Institute so that the students could experience our transit system and take a tour of the Depot. I gave 4 to a cancer patient who needed someone to ride the bus with her because she can not ride the bus by herself after her treatment. I gave the passes to people I saw standing in the rain or the hot sun waiting for the bus just to help. I asked nothing in return I did not even identify who I was because it is not about me.”
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Go Rest
For friends who left long ago, more recently, and those who may be going soon. Go rest. God bless.
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Memorial Day: Some Gave All
>> Cross-posted at Cara Michele blog
>> Previously: Veterans Day vs. Memorial Day
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Video: “Me Church”
My pastor, Bill Goans, has been preaching a series of sermons from the book of Revelation, entitled “What Jesus Thinks of the Church,” in which he talks about the attributes God wants to see in the Church — loving, truthful, holy, alive, accessible, dependent on Him. Today, Bill started off his message with a video called “Me Church,” which parodies our human, self-centered expectations of what “church” ought to be.
The video got a lot of laughs. But we definitely got the point. Good word.
>> Grace Community Church sermons online
>> RSS feed for Grace Community Church sermons
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“Abandon All Hope…?”
It was painted across the doorway leading to a dirty and disheveled cellar where some of my homeless friends slept, in a house on Cedar Street. As I stood staring up at those words, my face must have registered the sadness I felt, because one of the guys laughed nervously and said, “It’s just a joke.” Maybe then. Not anymore.
That was in 2004, and my friends had already been homeless for many years. They still are. And one by one, they are losing their hope. Last night, I saw the one who tried to laugh away those words three years ago. And it seems that he may have finally reached the end of his hope. I tried to give him some of mine, but when he told me what he is facing right now, something in me broke. And when my tears came, he said, “You can’t. We’re tough.” And I said, “I know. But you can’t leave. Don’t give up.”
I went to the funeral of a friend’s wife today. Before the service, her husband talked about how much she loved their children. As the family filed into the chapel, her mother’s anguished sobs filled the room. Her family did everything they could to try to save her. But in the end, addiction and illness took her life.
I’ve come to believe that some of the people I love will not be free this side of heaven. I know that some Christians would say that I just don’t have enough faith. Maybe they’re right. But maybe God heals in ways we don’t understand sometimes. I wish I did understand more. But I know that I know that I know that God is good, all the time, and all the time, God is good. And we shall be free. That is the hope that lives in me.
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Homeless Sleep Outside Shelter
As we headed back to our cars around 2:00 a.m., after a night of street outreach, our NightWatch van rolled through the intersection of Lee and Eugene — “the block.” And then we saw them, on the sidewalk. People. Homeless people. Sleeping on the sidewalk. Outside the homeless shelter.
We turned around and came back, pulling into the parking lot. There were more. Beside a bush, in parking spaces, on the porch of the health center. Ten in all. Ten homeless men and women, sleeping outside, on concrete, a few yards away from the tall, closed gate that encloses the homeless shelter.
We got out and quietly began putting together bags of snack food, hygiene items and bottled water. One by one, we went around and gently laid the bags beside the sleeping forms. One or two had a single blanket, and several were lying on cardboard boxes. Most were using the curb for a pillow.
Four of the ten woke up as we walked among them. One was a woman I met about seven years ago at Grace. She’s been homeless off and on as long as I’ve known her. She’s usually glad to see me, but this time, she seemed ashamed to be found sleeping outside in a parking lot.
The men hungrily ate the catered sandwiches we’d brought them. “What is this? This is really good,” one of them asked me. I wasn’t sure which sandwich we’d given him, but I asked if he and the man beside him wanted more. They both nodded “yes,” and said “thank you.” I said, “You’re very welcome,” but then added, “I’m so sorry you’re sleeping out here. Was the shelter full?” (It usually is.) The man closest to me then rattled off the exact date that he’d be eligible to get back into the shelter again — not until July. The other man nodded. “I’m so sorry,” I said. I couldn’t put into words what I was feeling, but “I’m so sorry” wasn’t enough.
We regularly visit homeless people who sleep under bridges, in the woods, in cars, and in other outside places that each has chosen to be his or her “spot.” Some have pitched tents, some have built shelters, some have mattresses or even furniture, and most have some belongings at their spot. But people sleeping on concrete outside the gates of a homeless shelter — well, that just felt different to me. It made me feel sick.
I walked over to a young man who was sitting up with his back against the wall, quietly eating his sandwich while a man jerked in his sleep beside him. I put my hand on his shoulder. “Do you have enough to eat? Can I get you anything else?” “I’m fine, thank you,” he said. “I’m sorry you have to sleep out here,” I said. “I’m OK,” he said, and I couldn’t tell if he was trying to reassure me or himself. I tried to smile, but I felt like crying, so I squeezed his shoulder and said, “God bless you. Good night.” And I walked back to the van, thinking, as I always do at the end of NightWatch, how it’s not right that some of us go home every night, and some of us never do.
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