Case for Support

Just imagine.

You or a loved one got very sick and went through all your sav-ings, desperately trying to get well. Or maybe you lost your job or became disabled and unable to work.

Maybe you fled domestic violence in the middle of the night with a child or two in your arms and only the clothes on your back.

Now you’re homeless. What will you do?

If you are like most homeless people in Northwest Arkansas, you will spend at least a year homeless, maybe longer. You are likely to be robbed.

You might be arrested just for being homeless.

Believe it or not, your friends and family will be generous with advice, but less so with money, food, or a place to stay. You will have zero pri-vacy, and it will be very difficult for you to get clothes.

Your physical health will decline, and if you get sick, you will get sicker. You probably won’t receive medical treatment.

You’ll likely spiral into depression, and there’s a better than even chance that you’ll contemplate suicide.

This is unacceptable. For you. For anyone. That we would let these stories play out says more about us than any homeless person.

That’s why 7hills exists. We won’t stand by. We’re here to end homelessness in Northwest Arkansas. We want you to join us.

2,4622,462 members of our Northwest Arkansas community are homeless.

1,1951,195 are childen.

139139 of those children are not even 6 years old.

616616 are “invisible homeless,” living in abandoned buildings or doubling up with friends or relatives.

Source: 2015 Northwest Arkansas Homeless Report, Community and Family Institute, University of Arkansas

America now has the greatest number of homeless people since the Great Depression.

Here in Northwest Arkansas, our homeless community is growing much at a much faster rate than it is in the rest of the United States. Since 2007 Northwest Arkansas’ general population has grown by 5% while our homeless population has grown by 116% – a growth rate that is 22 times faster than the general population.

On any given evening, 700,000 people are homeless. Over the course of a single year, three million Americans will experience the anxiety, pain, and vulnerability of being homeless.

In the last ten years, poverty in Rogers and Springdale has more than doubled. Northwest Arkansas now has the largest population of poverty in Arkansas. We can expect many more homeless among us because it is from the ranks of the poor that people become homeless.

The homeless look very much like the rest of Northwest Arkansas–like you and me.

Their educational attainment mirrors everyone else’s. Almost 38% are Veterans, 40% percent of whom have seen combat. 60% are under the age of 50 years old. 80% are white, 14% are black, 4% percent are Hispanic, and the balance are of other ethnicities. Most homeless (over 63%) are male.

The homeless are too often stereotyped by the rest of us as slackers who “should just get a job,” but only 9% of our homeless report ab-solutely no income. What we don’t realize is that almost 36% of the homeless already work full- or part-time.

Why don’t they just get a job?

Of those who aren’t working, many can’t work because of poor health. Some can’t find a job, and some lack transportation and can’t get to work. Those who do work make, on average, about $600 a month.

They are the working poor, and they are trapped in a cycle that is very difficult to escape. That’s what we do. We help move people out of this cycle, but we can’t do it alone.

We need you.

Over half (52.2%) of all homeless persons counted in Benton and Washington Counties were less than 18 years of age.

Nearly 90 percent of homeless youth reported doubling-up with friends and relatives; the remainder lived in shelters, hotels/motels, were not accompanied by an adult, or were living in some other home-less situation.

Homeless youth attending school were highly concentrated in the ar-ea’s three largest school districts — Bentonville, Fayetteville, and Rog-ers. Nevertheless, Siloam Springs and Gentry, reported large numbers of homeless students despite the smaller size of these school districts.

If you’re like most homeless people in Northwest Arkansas, you’ve lost almost everything. You may even have been robbed of the few person-al possessions you managed to preserve–even your ID. Most of us take our ID for granted, but since 9-11 it’s impossible to do much without an ID. You can’t get a bank account; you can’t access the bank account you might already have. You can’t cash a check. You can’t write a check. In today’s United States of America, you don’t exist.

Without ID, you can’t get a job. So, even if you can work and need to work, with no ID employers can’t hire you without breaking the rules. Those that do break the rules are also unlikely to actually pay, and when they do pay, they often break other rules like paying below mini-mum wage. Forget about benefits.

Let’s say you work hard to get a job interview. Without an ID, you can’t get into many buildings where the job interview takes place.

Rachel and Joel, who you see depicted at left, were robbed of all they had, even their IDs. And without them, they couldn’t find work. And they were made homeless. All it took was not having a small plastic and paper card that most of us never give a second thought.

Along with taking down other barriers, 7hills works with its clients to replace lost or stolen IDs. There’s a lot more to getting this done than meets the eye, like providing a mailing address, acquiring and paying for birth certificates to prove citizenship, providing showers, shoes, and clothes so you look half decent for the photo, making sure you have transportation to the DMV or the Social Security Office to get your ID, providing that mailing address so that when it’s mailed to you, you get it.

I just want a shower. I want to feel human again, like a regular person.

It’s not all we want it to be or need it to be, but Northwest Arkansas’ homeless come home to our Day Center every day.

They come for showers. To do laundry. To get at least one square meal. We provide shoes and clothing, blankets and tents. We provide stor-age lockers and a safe mail drop. We help with prescriptions.

Those who are job-hunting have access to computers, printers, a tele-phone, and job-search assistance.

We’re not just there for the body. We’re there for the whole person. We provide case management and counseling referrals.

Whatever it takes. That’s what moves us. Whether it’s a cup of coffee, a hug, straight talk, words of comfort or hope, or something practical like a ride to a job interview or to a clinic appointment, we get it done.

Northwest Arkansas’ homeless population is vulnerable. Except for homeless children, nobody is more vulnerable than those who are both homeless and disabled.

Some disabilities are readily apparent. Others, like mental illness, are harder to see but no less devastating in their impact.

7hills’ Walker Family Center provides permanent supportive housing to those disabled people with documented disabilities. Without 7hills, they would be living on the streets or worse, be easy prey for criminals or even dying on our streets.

The Walker Center also provides dormitory-style housing for those who are transitioning into permanent housing. Our case managers help our Walker Center clients work through those issues that have been barriers to a productive life. We provide financial education, counseling resources for mental illness and substance-abuse and cri-sis counseling–whatever’s in the way. Our whole-person strategies are designed to support these people in becoming 7hills success stories.

We also maintain two three-bedroom, two-bath family units that are reserved for families or single parents with kids.

Just under 38% of NWA’s homeless population are veterans, and 40% of our vets have seen combat.

It’s no secret that many come home to Northwest Arkansas with PTSD–an debilitating condition that sometimes results in homeless-ness.

7hills Supportive Service for Veteran Families (SSVF) program is a fun-damental part of 7hills, promoting housing stability among low-income Veterans and Veteran families who are currently homeless or at-risk of becoming homeless.

Support services include housing search assistance, case manage-ment, storage fees, moving costs, security deposits, rental assistance, utility assistance, psych-educational groups, childcare, legal services and community referrals.

This 7hills program is a lifeline to more than 100 veterans in NWA who lack the resources or support network to provide for themselves and their families.

Our vets were there for us. We’re there for them. Join us.

87 cents of every dollar contributed to 7hills is spent directly serving NW Arkansas’ homeless people. You may not know it, but this is a big deal.

Many nonprofits can’t or don’t put the lion’s share of resources di-rectly into benefiting those they serve. When the people we’re there for have so little and need so much, we’re reminded daily of how important it is to stay focused on putting the money where it makes the biggest difference–into programs, services, and strategies that will help end homelessness in Northwest Arkansas.

We recognize, however, that we have to grow contributed suppport to get the job done. The need is growing faster than we are. The need is growing faster than our base of support.

We are doing everything we can to activate and animate those big-hearted people who share our commitment to ending homelessness in Northwest Arkansas.