New Street Chronicle Available in Cleveland

The new issue of the Street Chronicle is available and on the streets of Cleveland.  Make sure you pick one up from your favorite local vendor.  They are available on the streets of Cleveland and always at the West Side Market.  There are some fantastic photos from the rally down in Columbus asking for Medicaid expansion, the pancake breakfast, and the new vendor uniforms.   There are stories from each of the vendors of the paper.  There are news stories about the Homeless Congress and the new Cleveland Foodbank program.  We have a couple of poems including one by our departed friend Daniel Thompson. 

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Secretary of State Issues Fraud Press Release

The Ohio Secretary of State issued a press release about referrals of fraud to the Ohio Attorney.  This was a bizarre release about the lack of voter suppression in the last election, which was strange since we witnessed offensive billboards put up in the inner City of Cleveland.   The release claims that there was not an "epidemic," but there were some irregularities in the last election.  Out of 5.7 million voters, there were only 135 suspicious ballots which is the farthest away from an epidemic that you could ever get.  There was no discussion of the long lines that are a form of voter suppression.  There was no discussion of not allowing weekend voting another voter suppression activity.

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Memorial Day: Remember those Veterans Who are Homeless

Today is Memorial Day in the United States.  A time when we remember those serving the United States who gave the ultimate sacrifice.  It is great that there are hundreds of volunteers cleaning up cemeteries, and attending memorials or parades.   But what if we remembered those veterans who are largely forgotten by our society but not dead?  There are large numbers of veterans who are homeless and living in isolation from our society including a large number of vets still from the Viet Nam era. 

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Mental Health System Full of Holes in Ohio

The Dispatch estimated that taxpayers pick up $1.3 million from the Franklin County jail because of untreated mental health care. This does not include the billions of unreimbursed care at the emergency rooms throughout Ohio that taxpayers pick up.   The Dispatch mentioned the significant cuts to the Mental Health system since 2007.  One of the surprising advocates has been Governor John Kasich. The Dispatch mentioned that Kasich's brother is mentally ill.   He approved a budget that cut mental health agencies in 2011, and most agencies were happy that they did not receive a bigger cut.   The Governor's rhetoric has been very good, but the actions have not followed suit.

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Cleveland Endorses National Housing Trust

At the May 13, Cleveland City Council meeting the members passed a resolution in support of HR 1213, the Common Sense Housing Investment Act of 2013.  The goal is to get all of our local Congressional members to endorse this campaign.  The United for Homes campaign under the direction of the National Low Income Housing Coalition worked over the last few years to develop a strategy to fund the National Housing Trust.  Congress created the trust, but the funding source collapsed as the 2008 housing bubble burst. 

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Family Homelessness Almanac Published

We received a beautiful and comprehensive American Almanac of Family Homelessness published by the Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness.
 
This is a huge book in the style of a coffee table book from the 1970s.  Every page has some wonderful charts or graphs. For policy wonks this book is not to miss.  There is a page dedicated to each state with statistics on the major cities within those states.  These stats are based on flawed Annual counts, which dramatically undercounts families.

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Missing Persons Website a Needed Improvement

Back in 2009, NEOCH wrote about the gruesome discovery of 11 women in the home of a serial killer.  These women were in effect homeless women who made the fateful decision to reject shelter and instead found a home with a predator.  Then in 2011, a report was issued by the City of Cleveland in response to the perception that the City dropped the ball on preventing the deaths of 11 women on Imperial Ave.  The missing persons report (click on the pdf in the middle of the page) provided a series of recommendations for improving missing persons searches.

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Local Reports from DC National Meetings

One of the best part of the meeting of the National Coalition for the Homeless meeting is hearing the local updates from around the United States.  It is good to hear that the struggles in Cleveland are nothing compared to some of the other areas of the country.   Every once in a while there are victories that we could all learn to replicate locally.
South Dakota
Has decided not to expand Medicaid.  Worked to establish a state Housing Trust Fund in March 2013, and part of the fund goes to economic development.

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Pancake Breakfast Successful

The National Honor Society Members of St. Josephs Academy organized a Pancake Breakfast last Saturday to raise money for NEOCH.  These future leaders of Cleveland took a Saturday to help out homeless families in Cleveland.   They found donations of food and coffee for the breakfast.  They raised $1,250 to help us publish the Family Street Card, and continue to organize around the effort to meet the overflow demand of Moms and Kids that we know will show up at the shelters this summer.  These funds will help us staff the partnership to bring religious organizations to the table to assist MHS keep families together this summer. 

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Come to Thursday City Council Hearing

Many governmental bodies including the County Council are not big on these pieces of legislation that urge other governments to do something.   I know that they are symbolic and don't have a lot of impact, but I like them.  It is a chance for your local elected officials to state their positions and identify what proposals they would like to see enacted, but are not in their purview to regulate.  It makes it easier for voters to know the values of their local leaders, and makes it easier to select candidates to support for higher office. 

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Sequestration Means Shelter/Programs Close in 2014

We have posted more detailed information after staff met with senior HUD officials in our membership site.  You can only get to it by logging in to the site.  It is posted in the Member HUB section of the website.  You have to be a member to get access to the member section, but we try to include detailed information for those working in the system or want additional information for their advocacy.

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We Worry About Michelle Knight and the Other Kidnap Victims

Michelle Knight was the taken first and so she endured the torture for the largest number of years.  If media reports are correct she was beaten and held alone in the basement for years chained like an animal for a dozen years rarely being outside.  There were no rallies or missing person flyers hung up for Ms. Knight.  She lived a troubled life before her kidnapping, and her mom moved to Florida after not hearing from her daughter for a couple of years.  The community were not aware that she was even missing, and so she is basically without a place to return upon her discharge from the hospital.

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Family Homelessness on the Rise: Houses of Worship Asked to Respond

Every summer family homelessness increases in Cleveland.  Last year we had record numbers, and we need help.  We don't necessarily need space, but we need volunteers, hygiene items, care kits, and support for the family shelters in Cleveland.  The first meeting in April, there was discussion about an overflow plan for the summer.  We are working on finalizing that plan over the next few weeks.  The goal is to not turn anyone away from shelter and to keep families together.  If you are a member of a religious congregations social justice committee, or your House of Worship youth committee, or your hunger and homeless committee we want you to attend the meeting.   Tuesday May 28, 2013 at 5:30 p.m. at the Mental Health Services main building.

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Bill Faith at CAHA on May 6

The next Cuyahoga Affordable Housing Alliance meeting is May 6, 2013 at HUD (1350 Euclid Ave) in the US Bank Building lower level at 1:30 p.m.  We will have the Executive Director of the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio, Bill Faith who will give an overview of the state budget process, talk about some national policy issues, and the protection of the state housing trust fund. Bill is the leading advocate down in Columbus for the past 20 years on housing and homelessness.

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Josh Kanary: An Intimate Portrait From a Co-Worker

Anyone who met Josh Kanary would describe him as kind, but he was far more than a surface-level "nice person." He was a guy who devoted his life to helping people -- to fight for the underdog, to focus on the otherwise forgotten. He was a homeless advocate, a community organizer, a self-described "oddity in an American world" who was about to receive his master's degree in social work. I met Josh while working at the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless (NEOCH).

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Former NEOCH Staff Dies

NEOCH was fortunate to have Joshua Kanary work for us between 2005 to 2009.  He began his career as an AmeriCorps*VISTA member serving the United States for two years here locally.  He was soft spoken and would go out of his way to help people.  We received word from two former employees that Josh had passed away over the last two days. Larry Davis, our volunteer coordinator, was hired by Josh and worked closely with him at our West Side location.  He could not believe the news, and wants to gather people for a local remembrance.  We are all terribly sad today to hear the news of his death at such a young age.

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