Originally published November 21, 2014
By Laura L. Acosta
UTEP News Service
Cuts in federal funding for homeless support services have created a need for organizations that help the homeless to join forces with academic institutions, the public and private sectors, and community leaders to improve the current condition of El Paso’s homeless population, concluded panelists during the first Paso del Norte Region State of the Homeless Conference at The University of Texas at El Paso.
Organized by the Opportunity Center for the Homeless and its partner organizations, including the Department of Social Work in the College of Health Sciences at UTEP, the Nov. 19 conference was the first of a three-part series focused on identifying the causes and conditions of homelessness, finding potential solutions to minimize the effects of homelessness in the Paso del Norte community, and reducing the social stigma associated with homeless people in the community.
“When programs are in place that address the specific needs of the homeless community, we can recognize a decreased burden on taxpayers and county funds,” said Daniel Vasquez, fund development director at the Opportunity Center for the Homeless in El Paso.
Vasquez’s opening remarks were followed by a panel of experts on mental health, education, service provision and community awareness who discussed how the current data and trends on homelessness are directly impacting the Paso del Norte community.
“It makes sense both financially and pragmatically to invest in programs that secure the well-being of this population,” Vasquez said. “To accomplish this requires partnership at multiple levels. It cannot be done exclusively by care providers and it cannot exclusively be done by governmental agencies. The solution is based in multilevel partnerships where care providers, governmental agencies, academic institutions, local institutions, local businesses and industry work collectively. “
The El Paso Coalition for the Homeless estimates that 1,394 men, women and children are homeless in El Paso.
According to data from the coalition’s January 2014 point-in-time survey, approximately 592 of these individuals are in short-term and emergency shelters, 467 are in transitional housing, 153 are in permanent support housing and 182 are on the street. The survey also found that throughout the year, an average of 5,500 unique individuals will pass through the shelters seeking assistance.
Despite efforts by the federal government’s Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program that provided help to people experiencing homelessness to be quickly re-housed and stabilized, a constant and perpetual homeless population will always exist, Vasquez said.
According to Vasquez, the re-housing program, which ended in 2012, reduced funding for social service programs for the homeless, such as shelters and transitional living centers that provide people who are homeless with medical care, education programs, job training and other resources to help them reintegrate into the community.
“We have worked with social reintegration and community,” Vasquez said. “Here lies the fundamental flaw in the rapid re-housing program. These steps cannot be accomplished in 30, 60 or even 90 days. They require time, development and investment.”
In June, the Opportunity Center lost $500,000 in programmatic funding. As a result, the center cut programs directed at youth services, transportation and a full-time psychiatrist.
Eighteen percent of the homeless population in El Paso reported having a mental health condition, including bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
“My understanding of the homeless problem in El Paso is we need to expect that they’re always going to be here and we need to develop a safety net that will help care for them,” said Raymond Tullius, founder and executive director of the Opportunity Center for the Homeless.
Tullius was homeless when his sister suggested he attend UTEP and become a social worker. He earned his bachelor’s degree in social work from UTEP in 1990 and his master’s degree in social work from The University of Texas at Austin in 1993.
Before he and his wife, Lily Tullius, opened the Opportunity Center in 1994, there were only five homeless shelters in El Paso with a capacity to serve 450 people and more than 1,000 people living on the streets.
Located in downtown El Paso, the Opportunity Center for the Homeless is the largest homeless shelter system in West Texas and Southern New Mexico with two shelters – one for men and one for women – and seven residential centers for the elderly, mentally ill, veterans, families and other homeless populations.
“In those days, it was the outreach component of the continuum of care,” Tullius said, referring to the days when the center first opened. “It was also a place where other agencies could come in. It had the greatest effect in El Paso of clearing the streets of homelessness. Anybody could come in. It pulled in about 80 percent of the street people and they came in to get a place to shower, a place to eat.”
The point-in-time survey estimated the center sheltered 43 percent of the single men and women in the homeless population.
However, with the loss in funding, Tullius said the Opportunity Center cannot handle this problem alone anymore.
The center has developed new initiatives, including a promising new partnership with UTEP’s Department of Social Work that provides graduate social work students with educational opportunities to help homeless persons reintegrate into the community.
Students in the macro-level social work class taught by Eva Moya, Ph.D., assistant professor of social work, are engaging the Opportunity Center as a research tool for case studies and analysis for how best to advance care to the homeless.
This fall semester, graduate students Jacqueline Loweree, Corene Seymour, Courtney Adcox and doctoral student Paola Chavez are helping residents with the first “Voices and Images” Photovoice project.
People who are experiencing homelessness will use disposable cameras to document who they are, how they live and what their solutions are to transition out of their homeless situation for a photo exhibit. They will also put together a plan of action that they will present to policy decision makers, Moya said.
“We need to do a better job of humanizing the experiences,” Moya told conference participants. “We know them, you have the experts here, you have the champions, the advocates, the founders of the most important resources in the community. Several of them have been touched by homelessness in one way or another. We need to humanize these stories and we need to call on those that are living (homeless) to tell their stories.”