By Theodore M. Dues Executive director, Salvation Army Samoshel
Last year the City Council considered two new ordinances that would impact the homeless population in this community. One of the proposed ordinances regulate public feeding programs and the other prohibits outdoor sleeping in front of businesses.
I attended the City Council meeting and listened to hours of public testimony on these proposals. I listened as scores of local residents and business owners talked about their fear of taking their children to the parks, of how their businesses were being jeopardized by the homeless menace, and of how the social service system was failing. The general picture that was painted of the homeless population was that they were a drunken, addicted, mentally ill, derelict, and purposeless group of people.
As I listened to these comments, it occurred to me that the entire homeless population of Santa Monica was being judged by the actions of a very small percentage of their actual population, and that such a judgment is the very essence of discrimination.
Unfortunately, that small percentage of the homeless population that does engage in aggressive panhandling, public intoxication, etc. is also the most visible part of the population. The vast majority of homeless are not so visible. They live in programs like Salvation Army Santa Monica Shelter (Samoshel) — going to jobs everyday and working hard to change the conditions of their lives.
I decided that it was very important to show the community the less visible face of the homeless, the face of the homeless who genuinely care about their community, and by doing so begin to heal some of the hurtful stereotypes about the homeless. Thus was born the Samoshel Community Care Program.
The Community Care Program is comprised exclusively of staff and residents of the shelter who volunteer their time to go out into local parks and business areas and do clean up projects. Currently the program provides cleaning services to Palisades Park, Reed Park, the Third Street Promenade, and Seventh St. between Colorado Avenue and Olympic Boulevard. We receive no compensation for our work, nor do we want any. We only want to be of service to our community.
There are many benefits that come from this program. I believe the original purpose of healing the negative imagery surrounding the homeless is happening slowly, but other benefits are more immediate and tangible.
The first is that the residents who participate in this program have the opportunity to become service providers rather than just service recipients — and there is tremendous empowerment and therapy in that. The second is that, while cleaning the parks and streets, the Samoshel residents do outreach to the chronically homeless — this has been particularly productive. It seems that one homeless person extending a hand to another homeless person can be more effective than a professional social worker offering referrals and services.
Lastly, the City of Santa Monica enjoys cleaner parks and streets with no expenditure on the city’s part, and the residents of Samoshel who provide this service feel a closer connection to the community — a critical benefit since homelessness is often a long and painful process of disconnection from community.
My vision for the future of the Community Care Program is that it continue to grow and that we can someday respond to specific calls from local residents and businesses to provide clean-up of messes left by chronically homeless individuals and be able to respond to outreach calls from local police or residents.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 22, 2003. Read the original PDF.