 |
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
Become a monthly donor and help eliminate chronic homelessness |
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Fred Shack Interview w/Bill Ayres, host on WPLJ-FM Radio (August 08, 2005)
AYRES: This is Bill Ayres on PLJ, 95.5 FM. And this is
our COMMUNITY CONNECTION show. Our guest tonight is Fred
Shack, he's the executive director of Urban Pathways.
They've been around for 30 years doing lots of good things
right here in Manhattan. Mostly, in Manhattan. And may be
branching out soon, but mostly in Manhattan in a number of
different locations helping one of the most difficult
groups of people.
Now, I work just a couple of blocks from Penn Station at
World Hunger Year, and I'm right at Penn Station now for
WPLJ. So I see what's going on around and I see every day
that there are a number of people who are homeless, a
number of people; who seem like they h ave either mental
problems, emotional problems, drug addiction and maybe a
whole bunch of things and these are some of the most
difficult people in our society to try to help, for a lot
of different reasons. But there are groups trying to do
that and doing it rather successfully. And one of them is
Urban Pathways. And so we have the executive director,
Fred Shack, with us tonight.
Fred, this notion that you are dealing with in some cases
the poorest of the poor and in most cases the poorest of
the poor, and a population that a lot of other people;
think, well, just keep them away from me. How do you try
to reach out to folks who are in really dire straits.
Mr. FRED SHACK (Urban Pathways): Well, Bill, first of all
I want to thank you for giving me this opportunity this evening.
AYRES: You're welcome.
Mr. SHACK: You're absolutely correct. We're working with
some of New York City's most disadvantaged citizens. But
the reality is that we have found over the 30 years that we
have been doing this work that you can have a great deal of
success working with people with the right intervention.
We provide a number of services from real basic street
outreach. And you mentioned Penn Station. We actually
have a contract to do homeless outreach for Amtrak at Penn
Station. We do homeless outreach at Port Authority and at
the George Washington Bridge, the terminal, as well. We
run a couple of residential programs for homeless
development. One is a transitional shelter in the Midtown
West area and we have two permanent housing programs that
we operate for individuals who are seriously and
resultantly mentally ill.
AYRES: One of the interesting things to me and very
impressive is you deal with almost 10,000 people during the
course of a year and you're actually successful in getting
3,000 of them into some kind of a permanent program. Is
that correct?
Mr. SHACK: That is correct. And basically it's a matter
of having a very capable, talented staff that do the work
that we do, providing services based on the presenting
problems that the clients that we're working with.
AYRES: Fred, you want to make sure that you stay right on
the phone so we get enough volume, here. I think we got
it, thought, that it's the dedicated staff that makes a
difference. It's always that way. You got to have a
dedicated staff, people who really care. But then you also
have to have the right approach. And the right approach of
course is very difficult for the folks that you're talking
about. So, I mean, just even getting people to come into a
program often is difficult. How do you do that? I know
you go out into the street and you reach out to people, but
how do you actually get them in?
Mr. SHACK: Well, you know, it's interesting. I
participated, Bill, in what has become a annual process
here in New York City, where we do a street count
throughout one night during the winter. And we contact
individuals who are on the street between 1:00 in the
morning and about 4 am, and ask them what they want and
what they need, how we can help. And what's really
interesting is in those encounters is what you find most of
the time it's people interested in housing. They want a
place to stay.
AYRES: A safe place to stay.
Mr. SHACK: A safe place to stay.
AYRES: And they don't consider the shelters to be safe.
Mr. SHACK: Well, you know, unfortunately that is the
case. I think that that's really not fair to the shelter
system. The current commissioner has done a great deal to
significantly improve the conditions in the shelter and I
think that in some cases our clientele are not interested
in shelters because of the constraints that they place on
their behavior. And some of them just havea real difficult
time managing the expectations of a very structured shelter
environment. And also, you know, the fact that a lot of
the shelters have a significant number of people that that
are single adults, generally congregate facilities, where
they have shared rooms and large dorms. And that is not
the kind of environment that someone with serious mental
illness can really thrive in.
AYRES: Yeah, a lot of these folks cannot handle that kind
of environment because they feel too constrained in it.
Mr. SHACK: And threatened. And very threatened. Whether
the threat is real, or not--
AYRES: Well, there's a great deal of paranoia.
Mr. SHACK: Exactly. So what we try to do is to provide
them with the services that they're interested in. At our
drop-in centers we provide meals, we provide clothing, we
provide access to medical care. We do allow people to get
shelter from the weather and the elements so they can stay
in the facility overnight if necessary. We provide them
with referral for job training, for housing, special
services, drug and alcohol treatment and mental health
counseling, as well.
AYRES: Alright. So that's the first step. You get
somebody off the street and into one of your facilities,
you help them get some of their basic needs met. Food, for
example, a place to stay, maybe a shower, some clean
clothes, some basic amenities, maybe a toothbrush, even.
All kinds of things that you and I take for granted. But
what's the next step, though? Because if they then go out,
well, they've been helped for a few minutes, a few hours,
maybe a couple of days, but they're going to probably wind
up in the same situation again.
Mr. SHACK: Well, a lot of it is about developing a
trusting relationship.
AYRES: Yes.
Mr. SHACK: Engaging our clients, helping them understand
that there are other options available for them that we
will work with them to achieve them. In many cases, our
clients are eligible for SSI because of their disability,
so we work to get them their entitlement. And talk with
them about how those entitlements can be leveraged into
permanent housing programs that provide them with some
permanent shelter.
AYRES: So connecting people with services which are theres
by the very fact that they are citizens. They are entitled
to these services. But a lot of people don't have a clue
that even-- they think of Social Security for old people
and not for disabled people.
Mr. SHACK: Part of it is just that people are not aware
of what their eligibilities are and it's also very
difficult to negotiate these large systems in many cases.
AYRES: Sure. So you help them negotiate the system.
Mr. SHACK: Exactly. We help them fill out the
application, we'll send workers along with them to advocate
on their behalf. In cases where they are denied those
benefits, we will work with them to put together and appeal
to get the kind of support that they need in order to
hopefully access housing.
AYRES: Alright, we're talking tonight on COMMUNITY
CONNECTION with Fred Shack, who is the executive director
of Urban Pathways and their Web site is urbanpathways.org.
Their phone number is 212-736-7385. That's 212-736-7385.
And if you want to call either because you need a service
like this, or you know someone who does, or you'd like to
volunteer, you'd like to help in some way or another. The
person you want to ask for is Karen Trella, T-R-E-L-L-A,
and she's extension 15. The number again is 212-736-7385.
Alright, so we're kind moving through the process here.
You've gotten somebody off the street, you get them into a
facility, you connect them with some programs that they're
entitled too--some government programs that can give them
some resources and then you have a number of different
housing facilities that are sort of transition. Is that
right?
Mr. SHACK: Yeah, that is correct.
AYRES: OK, what are they and where are they?
Mr. SHACK: Well, we operate a transitional housing
program for single adults, 40 beds, and that one is located
on 40th Street in Midtown, Manhattan. And that is
contracted through the Department of Homeless Services.
And that is really designed to provide temporary shelter
while we work with individuals who are seriously and
persistently mentally ill to access permanent housing. And
generally the permanent housing that is most appropriate
for our clientele are supportive housing programs.
AYRES: That place is the Travelers Hotel, correct?
Mr. SHACK: That is correct, the Travelers Hotel. Then we
operate two permanent housing, or actually extended stay
housing programs that are contracted under the Office of
Mental Health. And these are programs that are designed to
provide accommodations for individuals for a period of
anywhere from three to four years, depending on their need,
of the objective there-- and, again, we're working with a
population that are seriously, persistently mentally ill.
Some of the individuals may have substance abuse problems,
as well. We work with them on recovery, improving their
ability to manage their activities of daily living,
managing their banking, handling their medications, things
of that nature and being involved and engaged in a
therapeutic relationship. With the objective being to move
them on to less-supervised, less-structured housing in the
long term. That's the longest term housing that we
currently offer to this population.
AYRES: And during that time, they are getting all kinds of
counseling, maybe some medication; if they've had
addiction problems, they're getting counseling for that ins
some sort of a program. Is there any kind of record of
what percentage of people can actually do well in those
situations and then get on to the next step?
Mr. SHACK: Most of our clients are able to manage that
environment extremely well. They do improve and move
towards recovery. And, again, the objective, Bill, is to
move everyone into the next level of care or to a community
setting that is much less supervised and less structured
than what we offer. And I'd say anywhere from 70 to 80
percent of our clients will be able to do that eventually.
AYRES: That's very good. The problem, here, of course, is
that as soon as you move a certain groups through the
system and out, you got ten times as many people waiting to
get in, right?
Mr. SHACK: Yeah, it's people waiting to get in, but I
think the larger problem that we're confronted with is the
fact that there are very few appropriate supportive housing
units available for those who are currently in need.
AYRES: Let's just say, this concept of supportive housing
is very, very important. Just say a word about it, again.
Because you just sort of described it, but I think this
notion of, OK, if somebody is homeless, you get them a
place to stay. That's not good enough for a lot of people.
For some people it is. That's all they need. But for this
group of people, they need support and that's why it's
called supportive housing and you have a number of services
attached to it, correct?
Mr. SHACK: Yeah, and it's not that foreign of a concept.
I think the reality is that we all need support at some
level. The reality is that if we are working class, middle
class and have fairly decent mental health, we're able to
access that support on an as needed basis. Our clientele
needs support on a long term basis and supportive housing
will provide them with stable housing, with case workers
and social workers who are available to the system to
access services in the community. There are psychiatric
services available for those individuals who need
medication and/or therapeutic support. There are
vocational counselors available to enlist them in
developing job skills and hopefully moving them towards
unsupervised employment opportunities, as well.
AYRES: Well, you have this Esteem Program that does a lot
of that, right?
Mr. SHACK: Exactly. The Esteem Program is really
designed to assist people in moving into supervised work
settings. Initially we do some internships that are first
in agencies and then we try to place them in other programs
where individuals can work with them to work with them on
some basic skills and eventually to move them into
unsupervised, you know, basic employment.
AYRES: Alright, our guest tonight is Fred Shack. He's the
executive director of Urban Pathways. Their Web site is
urbanpathways.org. Their phone number is 212-736-7385.
And the person to call there is Karen Trella, T-R-E-L-L-A,
and she's at extension 15. If you know someone who needs
this kind of service or if you're in that situation, or if
you'd like to help out in some way or another. I assume
you have lots of volunteers.
Mr. SHACK: Yeah, we do. We actually have a board of
directors and a governing board that are very, very
involved in the organization. But we have another group of
young professionals that have been involved with the
organization for a number of years and these individuals
who are young leaders within our community who are
interested in community service and possibly in their
future interested in governing board involvement for
not-for-profits and they work on special projects, they do
some development activities, fundraising activities and
they engage our clients in some social activities, as well.
AYRES: Alright. So there's all kinds of possibilities for
volunteers here at 212-736-7385. And the person to talk to
is Karen Trella, T-R-E-L-L-A at extension 15.
Now, let's go back to the beginning, here, and mention-- we
did talk about Penn Station, because that's my part of
town, but you guys are also at the George Washington Bridge
Outreach Program, at the bus station there and also at Port
Authority, correct?
Mr. SHACK: That is correct. We do outreach at the Port
Authority Bus Terminal and we also do it at the George
Washington Bridge Bus Terminal. And basically, again,
it's reaching out to those individuals that many of us see
as we commute to work and on our way back home, engaging
them, getting them medical treatment, getting them to drug
and alcohol treatment programs, and assisting them in
accessing permanent housing and other services.
AYRES: All right. So this is something that any of us who
are commuters, because this is a kind of situation in all
of the major communication hubs in New York City, people
tend to congregate there for lots of different reasons.
And so there needs to be a program to help the kind of
folks that we're talking about here. And often and because
we work with programs all over the country, the situation
is the same. I think it's more extreme in New York City
than it is in a lot of other places, but pretty much
everyplace you go, there are folks who have some
combination of mental illness, of physical disabilities or
some addiction of one kind or another or some mix of all of
that, and they wind up on the streets. There are also a
certain number of people who didn't start out with any of
those problems, but they wound up being homeless for
economic reasons. And then, and this is one of the really
tragic things, all kinds of things develop for people who
beforehand were pretty much, quote, "normal" but become
homeless for a period of time and bad things happen to
you. Do you find that to be the case, that there are a
number of folks who didn't start out by being addicted or
have any extreme mental problems, but they had economic
problems and wound up developing all kinds of problems?
Mr. SHACK: Absolutely. I think the one common
denominator in homelessness is poverty. All of our clients
are individuals who don't have the resources to access the
services and things that they need. We have a number of
clients who have lost their jobs, sort of basically run out
of their support systems, and they're on the street. And
quite frankly, once you're there, it's very, very difficult
to get a shower, to prepare yourself for an interview, to
get enough rest, to be able to go out and do the things
that you need to do in order to regain your position in
society. And those are the kinds of services we're able
to provide.
AYRES: And you have a specific service for women, too.
Why don't you say something about that?
Mr. SHACK: One of our first programs was the Olivieri
Center, which is on 30th Street between Eighth and Ninth
Avenue. We opened that program back in 1980, so we're
celebrating our 25th year this year and we'll be doing a
special event in the spring of next year to acknowledge the
25 years of servicing homeless single women. And again,
this is a very fragile population. These are individuals
who are mentally ill, who have been homeless. These are
women that you see on the streets generally and we've been
able to engage them and to work with them, to watch their
recovery, getting them first off the street and into our
drop in centers and ultimately into permanent housing.
AYRES: All right. Now let's talk about the children in
the midst of all of this. Lots of the folks that you deal
with either don't have children or if they do, they're not
with their children, but there are some people and a
growing number of folks who are homeless who have children.
As a matter of fact, the largest segment in our population
of homeless people who are just growing is families.
Mr. SHACK: Yeah, that's true. That's unfortunate. I
spent the first 14 years here in New York City working with
homeless families joining the staff at Urban Pathways. And
you're absolutely right. There are a significant number of
families in the city who find themselves homeless with
dependent children. I think the city, at least the mayor,
has made a very firm commitment in working to eliminate
homelessness over the next five to seven years and is
doing that by making a commitment to finding ways to create
more affordable housing for this population.
AYRES: All right. But for the most part, you're dealing
with single people rather than families, right?
Mr. SHACK: Yeah. With Urban Pathways, it's exclusively
single adult men and women.
AYRES: OK. Now there is a new group of people that you
are working with now and that's prisoners, mentally ill
prisoners who are released from Sing Sing Prison. Has
that actually happened?
Mr. SHACK: Yes, it is. We are able to accommodate them
in our drop in centers. Again, it's a situation where
individuals who are in other institutions are being
released from those institutions without adequate housing.
We've been working with the officials at the prison and
with this client population to assist them in getting them
the out treatment that they need to continue to cover and
also to help them access permanent housing in the
community.
AYRES: My guest tonight on COMMUNITY CONNECTIONS is Fred
Shack. He's the executive director of Urban Pathways, an
organization that's been around for a number of years here.
30 years, to be exact. And their website is
urbanpathways.org.org. They're the folks who work at Penn
Station and up at the Port Authority Bus Terminal and also
the George Washington Bridge Bus Station, and they go into
the streets. They're there and also walk around in the
stations, and I've seen your workers there, and they help
people, sometimes bringing them food, but more often than
not trying to get them out of the stations and out of the
street into shelters that they have so that they can help
people on a more permanent basis. And there's a whole
process that folks go through. Now there's a lot of
people who will come off the streets for a night and get a
meal and get a place to stay, but then they go out again.
But the purpose of Urban Pathways is to get them to stay
and then get into a program that can help them long term.
And you figure that about 30 percent of the folks who
actually work with you in any way get into this longer
term situation, correct?
Mr. SHACK: Yeah, that's correct. I think it's also very
important, though, that commuters like myself realize that
they're coming through these major transportation hubs,
that there is support for those individuals that they see.
I think that out of the kindness of our hearts, we try to
give a little support and people will give cash to
panhandlers.
AYRES: Not helpful usually.
Mr. SHACK: Not helpful. It's much better to refer them
to the outreach teams that are a part of those facilities,
and those individuals who are professionals will make sure
if they need food, they'll get food. If they need
clothing, they'll get clothing. If they need medical
attention, they'll get medical attention.
AYRES: OK. But now I'm a commuter and I come in here
every week, every day, and I work in the field, but I don't
know where your people are unless I happen to see somebody.
How can I spot your people? Where are they in Penn
Station? Where are they at the other places?
Mr. SHACK: We have an office at Penn Station. We have an
office at Port Authority.
AYRES: Where's the office at Penn Station?
Mr. SHACK: Our office at Penn Station is on the Seventh
Avenue side at the bottom of the stairs, the stairs that
come right over the Garden, right there at the base. We're
right there. And actually, any Port Authority police
officer will know where the outreach offices are and they
work very closely with our outreach teams. So if you're a
commuter and you're interested in knowing where we're
located in those particular hubs--
AYRES: How about Port Authority Bus Terminal? Where are
you there?
Mr. SHACK: At the bus terminal, it's actually a little
more difficult to find. We're downstairs right under the
administrative offices of the bus terminal.
AYRES: OK. All right. But the point is that somebody can
tip you off to this. Any one of the officers there can
tell you where to go. If you spot somebody that you know
needs this kind of help and they're asking you for money,
don't give them money. Try to get them connected with
Urban Pathways people because then they're not just going
to get a couple of dollars which who knows what they're
going to do with it, but they're going to get some real
help that may take them out of this nightmare of
homelessness and get them into a better situation. That
really is the goal of Urban Pathways. And you can get
involved if you need the service or you can get involved as
a volunteer. Give them a call at 212-736-7385.
212-736-7385 and ask for Karen Trella, extension 15, or go
online to urbanpathways.org. Fred, you've been at this
work for a long time now. Do you feel hopeful? We keep
hearing about this program or that program. The
government's going to do this and then they don't do that.
Is any progress being made as far as you can see?
Mr. SHACK: Absolutely. I think we make a difference
every day. Whether it's one individual at a time or in
larger groups, I'm very optimistic now because I believe
that we're on the right path. There is a real rally in the
city around the plan to end chronic homelessness.
AYRES: We only have two minutes, but what are the key
parts of the program that we may not know about that are
up and coming that you think will make a difference?
Mr. SHACK: Well, two things. One, prevention. This
administration has really committed itself to investing
resources and catching people before they find themselves
on the street. They're working and they're targeting some
communities that are communities that tend to have a high
number of its citizens coming into shelters and they're
providing support there. The other major thing, the one
thing that's really going to make a difference long term
is a commitment to developing more supportive housing. As
long as housing is not affordable, there are always going
to be people out there on the streets.
AYRES: We only have room for 25,000 people in supportive
housing now. A lot of that supportive-- not supportive
housing, but SRO, single room occupancy, is disappearing.
Mr. SHACK: Right. They are becoming market rate units
because they're owned by for profit operators and this is a
very hot real estate market.
AYRES: It really is.
Mr. SHACK: It's not just the homeless, Bill. I mean, the
working class is having a hard time maintaining housing.
AYRES: Everybody is.
Mr. SHACK: But one of the things that makes me hopeful is
the fact that there's a real discussion going on now with
this administration around the need to develop and sustain
affordable housing in order to prevent folks from becoming
homeless and to give people who are currently homeless a
real exit.
AYRES: All right, folks. That's something that you want
to tell the mayor that you're in favor of because if we
don't have housing for people, they wind up on the streets.
There's higher incidence of crime. There's higher
incidence of mental illness and drug addiction and all
kinds of things. It's actually what we don't need. And
one of the basic problems is that we've had this enormous
escalation of the cost of housing not only in New York
City, but around the country, but especially here. And
it's hurt everybody, but the people on the bottom get hurt
the most. So we want to be supportive of programs to end
homelessness and to create supportive housing. That's a
very key term here that Fred's been using all night,
supportive housing. It's housing that has support services
for the people who need them the most. And Urban Pathways
is one of those organizations that provides those services.
So if you'd like to get involved with them, give them a
call at 212-736-7385. 212-736-7385. Ask for Karen Trella
at extension 15. Fred, thank you for being with us
tonight.
Mr. SHACK: Thank you very much, Bill.
AYRES: Till the next time, this is Bill Ayres. I wish you
much peace, love, and hope. That's something we all need a lot of.
# # #
|
|
|
|
|
|
