Chicagoland

They're looking out for those on the streets this winter

By Michelle Martin | Staff writer
Sunday, March 8, 2015

They're looking out for those on the streets this winter

The main dorm at the Franciscan House of Joseph and Mary, seen on Nov. 26, 2014, accommodates 209 men every night of the year. The women and men have separate sleeping areas. (Karen Callaway / Catholic New World)
Franciscan Brother Maxwell Klug waits to see if anyone needs assistance as staff member Relundus Washington assigns beds for the night at the shelter. (Karen Callaway / Catholic New World)

As temperatures in the Chicago area nosedived in February and early March, Catholic agencies stepped up their efforts to help people stay warm and safe.

“All our shelter beds are full,” said Msgr. Michael Boland, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Chicago, on Feb. 19. “All 287 beds. We are completely full.”

Temperatures that morning dropped to 8 degrees below zero, setting a record for the date.

But Catholic Charities workers were still on the streets, inviting homeless men and women to go to shelters and warming shelters, and providing transportation to get them. The work is done in collaboration with the city of Chicago, and people are taken to shelters that have room for them if Catholic Charities shelters are filled, or to warming centers.

“If it’s after about 7:30 or 8 o’- clock at night, it’s really disruptive to the shelters to have people coming in, so in that case, we would take them to a 24-hour warming center and then find a shelter for them in the morning,” Boland said.

Not all the people workers approach are willing to come to a shelter, Boland noted. In that case, all they can do is leave people with an open invitation to call for help.

Catholic Charities staff members also did well-being checks on senior citizens and families and delivered emergency food boxes to families that had no food in the house, Boland said.

Overall, the agency experienced a 20 percent increase in requests for cold weather clothing, food, heat and rental bill assistance, according to a statement released Feb. 26.

“In an average week we may have 40 to 50 people stop at our Emergency Assistance Center at our downtown office,” Boland said. “This winter we are seeing up to 75 people coming to our offices to receive warm clothing and blankets to help them battle this harsh winter or for short term assistance in paying their heating bills, and that doesn’t include the significant increases we also are seeing at all of our regional offices.”

Catholic Charities has nine food pantries in Cook and Lake counties, all of which are seeing an increase in clientele. “Many times families will see their food budgets stretched during severe weather,” Boland said. “A significant number of our clients rely on hourly wages and when businesses are closed or it is dangerous to go to work that results in lost wages. Combine lost wages with schoolchildren at home during cold weather and there are extra meals and food needed for the home, which often is outside of the family’s budget.”

Franciscan Outreach, a nonprofit organization that operates two shelters, a day center, a soup kitchen and offers case management services to homeless people, kept its shelters open all day on Feb. 19, said executive director Diana Faust. Shelter guests normally must leave at 6:30 a.m. and can return to claim their beds in the evening.

“That’s because we just don’t have the funding to keep them open all day,” Faust said, estimating that it costs about $1,200 a day to stay open, depending on how many staff are entitled to overtime.

Sometimes the organization gets reimbursed for staying open by the city of Chicago, which provides funding for both Franciscan House, a 257-bed facility with men’s and women’s dormitories at 2715 W. Harrison St., and Franciscan Annex, a 65-bed shelter for men at 200 S. Sacramento. On the night of Feb. 18-19, the shelters squeezed extra people in, housing 50 women and 225 men at Franciscan House and 74 men at the Annex. But Faust said sometimes Franciscan Outreach has to make the decision to stay open before it knows whether the city will reimburse it, and sometimes it stays open even after the city says it can’t pay.

“On Sunday (Feb. 15) we decided to stay open because it’s the weekend and a lot of the places people go to stay warm are closed,” she said. “And at the time, we told the city that Wednesday and Thursday are predicted to be really cold, and could they reimburse us for staying open. They said they couldn’t, but it was just so cold, we stayed open anyway.”

Boland and Faust said that monetary donations are always welcome, and can help cover costs that outstrip government contracts and grants. Warm clothing is also needed. Franciscan Outreach said its guests are often in need of socks, underwear, hats and gloves. Boland said Catholic Charities needs all kinds of warm coats.

“There are a lot of people who still don’t have an adequate winter coat,” he said, “down to the children who come to our early childhood centers. Sometimes their parents won’t bring them to the center because they can’t dress them properly for the weather.”

Faust said she would also welcome people who would be willing to volunteer to help supervise the shelters on the days they stay open because of the cold. “It’s hard to find people because it’s last minute,” she said. “But we could put someone’s name on a list of emergency volunteers.”

For information about Franciscan Outreach, visit www.franoutreach.org or call 773-278-6724. The organization plans to start a new fundraising campaign called “Step Ahead” in March.

For information about Catholic Charites, visit www.catholiccharities.net or call (312) 655-7700. If you or someone you know is in need of shelter, call 311.

Topics:

  • catholic charities
  • monsignor michael boland
  • franciscan house

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