ChosenFast.com

Mark Stinson

This is a guest post from my friend, Mark:

Hello,I’m Mark Stinson I was once a Homeless man here in Greensboro,N.C.. But now I’m living in and Oxford house and I’m sober an Off the street’s. Thank’s to the Help from my now Loving friend’s and family of StreetWatch G-Boro.. I’m also a memember,and love speaking on behave of Them and homelessness. If I can be of any help please let me know. mstinson60@yahoo.com Thank You!

Mark is also on Facebook. And he appears in this Fox8 video on Facebook (no longer available on Fox8 site). The woman who appears in that video is also housed now.

Read more on Guest post: Mark, no longer homeless in Greensboro…

Totals for the 2010 Guilford County homeless count (part of the annual, nationwide HUD count) were reported to the state and available on the web as of March 12th, as reported here at ChosenFast.com. Those numbers were officially released to the media today:

Read more on Local homeless count numbers officially released: “Homelessness on rise”…

A News & Record article about homeless camps in the path of the Downtown Greenway elicited the usual negative comments about homeless people. One of those who responded with truth (and grace) was a friend of mine, who’s been homeless in the past. The only experts on homelessness are people who’ve been homeless. His comment was worth blogging:

Read more on Expert: Homelessness not a choice; your response is…

image credit: News-Record.com/Nelson Kepley

In the city’s path
Saturday, March 6, 2010
By Lorraine Ahearn

GREENSBORO – Two paths converged in a not-so-distant wood this week: the $26 million Downtown Greenway, and a longtime homeless “tent city” in its way.

Read more on “In the city’s path” — Homeless move for Greenway…

Cara MICHELE Forrest

CARA MICHELE FORREST

I’m a Jesus follower, proud momma of three and advocate for the homeless.

I do street outreach to the homeless with the StreetWatch team. We help homeless and hungry people get what they need. (Why do I do it? Read this…)

Read more on Bio…

“Can you please get me some boots? I need to get these feet off the ground.” — Alexander, homeless in Greensboro

Alexander's new boots replace the old pair with the deep splits across the soles. Whenever it rained or snowed, his feet got wet.

Read more on New boots for homeless feet…

FOX8’s Roxanna Haynes came along with me and Derek Dunham on StreetWatch.

Urban Ministry estimated it served 4,000 meals Thursday.

Sam Wood appreciates the warm food and kindness of the volunteers.

He has held retail and odd jobs his whole working life, but when he lost his last job and got divorced, he found himself on the streets for nearly two years.

Read more on The importance of a good sleeping bag…

100% Cotton

Originally uploaded by caramichele

The new sign outside Cotton’s tent.

StreetWatch, 13 Nov 2009

Our most recent needs list for our StreetWatch homeless street outreach ministry. We tell the people we see that if they need something we don’t have on the truck or van, we’ll write it down and post it, and if it gets donated, we’ll bring it to them. All of these people live outside in Greensboro. Can you help?

Read more on StreetWatch: Current needs, 11/16/2009…

I wrote about the guys on the block (and more) for the News & Record: “When there’s nowhere to go,” by Michele Forrest; published Sunday, Nov. 1, 2009.  It’s online here, and reposted below:

On the block. Image credit: Michele Forrest / ChosenFast.com

My ministry partner, Audrie Keen, and I provide a street outreach to the homeless in Greensboro, and we’ve made a lot of friends along the way. We eat together, go to church together and have cookouts. Sometimes our homeless friends stay with us. We visit formerly homeless friends in their homes.

When we say “homeless friends,” we really mean friends.

Two Friday mornings ago, we visited “The Block” at Lee and South Eugene streets. It had been 11 days since my last visit, when we’d talked about the artistic bench installed, then removed, from along the new stretch of the Downtown Greenway in that area. Neighbors said the bench attracted drug addicts and prostitutes.

The guys on The Block dismissed that notion. One said: “The problem is not as serious as they say it is on the news. And the bench has nothing to do with it.”

Read more on When there’s nowhere to go…