WORKING POOR STRUGGLE FOR HOUSING

The typical homeless person on the Peninsula is a single mother with
two or three children. She bags groceries, cleans hotels or works in
a service sector job earning minimum wage or about $1,500 a month.

Unrecognizable as homeless by sight, she often works or look for work
during the day while their children are at school. At night, they
sleep in cars, garages and motels until their funds run out.

Although women and children have topped the list of homeless in San
Mateo County for quite some time, more homeless work today though
often in low-paying jobs.

"What has changed is that more and more homeless people are working,"
said Brian Greenberg, director of programs and services at Shelter
Network in San Mateo. "It's a combination of service sector jobs and
expensive housing. It's a really rough combination for people."

At Shelter Network's Redwood Family House, a nine-unit homeless
shelter for families in Redwood City, program director Rebecca
Amado-Sprigg said most her clients, all working, became homeless
after losing a source of income, a dependent or a home because of
rising costs of living. Some work in retail, food service or
administrative jobs whereas others suffered from layoffs following
the dot-com bust in 2001. Many have some higher education, though
most dropped out before completing their degree.

Lucantai Sloan, a resident at Shelter Network's Maple Street Shelter
for single adults in Redwood City, for example, attended the
accounting program at Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Ga., for three
years before dropping out. After serving jail time for a DUI in May,
29-year-old Sloan lost his job and apartment, followed by four months
of alcohol and drug treatment. In late October, he found himself on
the streets struggling to obtain shelter for the night. Recently
hired for a part-time position at an Express clothing store, Sloan
earned just enough to pay $35 for a motel room every now and then.
Other nights, he slept on the streets.

"It was pretty rough for me and then it started raining and I was
like 'hey wait a minute, I need to find something more stable,'" he said.

That's when an acquaintance referred him to the Maple Street Shelter
where he has stayed for about a week.

Rasheedah Blake, Maple Street Shelter program director, said more
than 50 percent of her clients work either part-time or full-time and
many have employment when they enter the program.

"This is not a program designed for people sloughing off," Blake
said. "They have to be willing to work and save between 50 to 75
percent of their income toward permanent housing."

Josh Donald, a construction worker, came to the Maple Street Shelter
about two months ago after staying with his sister at vacant houses
and apartments undergoing remodeling. Faced with the prospect of
losing his job, Donald, a longtime methamphetamine user, decided to
clean up his act and now hopes to find permanent housing within a
couple of months.

"I'm just trying to get on my feet, get a little more sobriety under
my belt, maybe get some more tools toward life," he said.

Donald grew up with drugs in his home and started smoking
methamphetamine at 12.

"My parents always had friends and people over smoking crack and
smoking meth in the house ...," he said, adding that his stepfather,
a serious drinker, kicked him out of his mother's house last spring.
"My dad died when I was 11 years old from a drug overdose. They found
him in a motel. So I say I was pretty much influenced young."

After losing his apartment, friends, girlfriend and himself to drugs,
Donald now looks forward to the future.

"I have no money in my pocket right now but it doesn't matter.
Nothing matters but I got a piece of mind today," the 24-year-old said.

Blake said the single adult shelter sees more substance abuse than
the family shelters and, thus, has a popular on-site drug and alcohol
treatment program, which both Donald and Sloan attend.

Greenberg recognizes in addition to supportive services to treat
homeless' psychiatric and substance abuse problems, more subsidized
housing and rental assistance are needed.

Redwood City currently has 263 subsidized family units, 217
subsidized elderly units and 58 subsidized ownership units, said
Redwood City housing coordinator Debbi Jones-Thomas. Another 66
mixed-use subsidized units are under way, she said.

Another group at risk of homelessness is people with disabilities
living on often inadequate disability payments. Maple Street Shelter
resident Tom Milton, a Vietnam veteran who suffers from degenerative
joint disease, arthritis, heart disease, congestive heart failure,
diabetes and post-traumatic stress disorder, a type of depression,
receives an $846 per month VA pension, not enough to retain permanent housing.

A self-admitted vagabond, 55-year-old Milton has visited numerous
shelters across the country and said Maple Street Shelter ranks among
the better ones.

"It's not perfect, but they really go out of their way to help you
here and they don't charge you, which a lot of shelters do," Milton said.

The Shelter Network's success rate varies between 65 percent for
individuals and 80 percent for families who are then permanently
re-housed, Greenberg and Blake said.

"A solution that works does exist," Greenberg wrote in an e-mail. "
Transitional housing with solid support services gives these people
the respite and help needed to get back on their feet and succeed in
returning to permanent housing."

In San Mateo County, more than 6,000 people become homeless every
year, according to Shelter Network's figures. That's nearly 2,000
more than the Human Services Agency's annual count of about 4,000
homeless in the county.

"Homeless people are just people trying to survive," Amado-Sprigg
said. "They want to work. They want to be successful. They want to
provide for their families."

Shelter Network is part funded by government grants and part
individual donors. Donations can be mailed to Shelter Network, 1450
Chapin Ave., Burlingame, CA 94010. To discuss a donation, contact
Executive Director Michele Jackson at 685-5880.