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Highlands Today

Surveying County Homelessness

Jim Konkoly/Highlands Today

Richard Reinhardt, executive director of the Highlands County Coalition for the Homeless, surveys Julie Reinmann, working a part-time job with Beach Front Outreach in Avon Park. Reinmann is working two part-time jobs and living in temporary transitional housing while she tries to find a full-time job that will allow her to rent permanent housing. On Monday, the Coalition for the Homeless launched its annual, weeklong survey to document the number of homeless people in the county and what services they need to become self sufficient.

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By JIM KONKOLY

Highlands Today

Published: January 27, 2009

SEBRING - On Monday, five two-person teams of volunteers fanned out across the county, helping the Highlands County Coalition for the Homeless conduct its annual, weeklong survey of homeless people in the county.

Due to the tough economy, Richard Reinhardt, executive director of the coalition, expects to find more people in that predicament than the 912 homeless people documented last year.

Knowing that not every homeless person could be found during a week's survey, the coalition estimated the actual number at about 1,400 for 2008.

Only about one out of five homeless people fit the image of single men sleeping under a bridge or living in a make-shift camp in a woods, Reinhardt said.

About 80 percent of the county's homeless are trying to overcome circumstances like those that Julie Reimann finds herself in. Reinhardt and volunteer Anthony Lomonico found her doing landscaping work Monday for Beach Front Outreach at an Avon Park Housing Authority complex.

"She is one of the hardest working people you could ever hope to meet," Reinhardt said.

Working two-part time jobs, the 44-year-old woman is staying in a temporary, transitional housing apartment, and is listed as homeless because she needs to land the full-time job that will allow her to rent permanent housing.

Like many people in this tough economy, Reimann had been staying with friends. But, she said, when her friends took custody of their grandchildren, there simply was no room for her.

The definition of being homeless includes not only people with nowhere to live but in cars, abandoned buildings or woods, or in a temporary shelter, but also those staying with family or friends who don't have the resources to obtain housing on their own, Reinhardt said.

"Most citizens would be very surprised to see the face of homelessness, and how much it has changed," Reinhardt said. People with no resources who are staying with a friend or family member, he said, "could be the person you work with, the person you go to church with."

The definition of homeless, he said, includes people who "are sheltered in any way and they don't have the resources to afford housing of their own."

Besides basic information on a person, the survey questionnaire filled out for every homeless person also lists the services they need but are not finding, from transportation, medical and employment to legal aid, clothing, food, day care and housing placement.

"We're using this survey to tell us where our gaps in services are, to determine where we need to focus our attention," Reinhardt said.

Reinhardt and the coalition's volunteers know where the "hot spots" for homeless people are, and are distributing the survey questionnaires at social service agencies as well as temporary day labor agencies.

But, he said, the coalition is asking people to call its office - at 863-452-1086 - with information on locating homeless people, both those who are on the streets and individuals or families with no resources who are staying with family or friends.

"Those people are the hardest to find," he said of families staying with a family member or friend. Reinhardt said he's asking them to call because that's the only way the coalition can let them know about referrals for help and include them in the survey.

"When we apply for funding, a lot of our funding is scored based upon what our homeless need is," he explained. "It doesn't necessarily mean we get more funding, but it strengthens the funding that we are receiving."

Much of the coalition's work is to help prevent people from becoming homeless, by referring them for services to social service agencies or emergency help from church programs.

Alice Oldham, a coalition board member, said the homeless survey provides important data for both the state and federal governments in setting policies and funding to address the problem of homelessness.

Highlands Today reporter Jim Konkoly can be reached at 863-386-5855 or e-mail jkonkoly@highlandstoday.com

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