Welcome to the official blog of the Worcester Homeless Action Committee! We will be regularly updating this blog as we move forward with our new campaign - Open Doors-End Homelessness. Our city suffers from a chronic condition of poverty in the inner city - the Main South area. We have the same unemployment levels in Main South as seen in Baghdad - 30%. The City suffers from an astonishly high 20% poverty rate. Out of 30,000 people in the inner city, only 2,000 bothered to vote in the last city election - an embarassingly low 6% turnout. The inner city of Worcester is in many other ways a war zone
- perpetual drug supply from NYC and Boston with ever more pure heroin, according to the state police.
- Pervasive racism documented by WGBH in a special that showed how hard it is for people of Puerto Rican ancestry to find work in Worcester.
- Chopped up lodging houses owned by absentee landlords who don't care a whit for the inner city or their tenants.
- the absolute flight of industry from the city, essentially killing off living wage jobs, and creating what former Senator John Edwards terms, "Two Americas."
All of these factors have ravaged the community of the inner city, and these factors have combined to force many individuals, for varying reasons, into a life of dangerous homelessness on our streets. In the past four years, I have been unfortunate enough to attend numerous funerals for the homeless - people who died trying to heat themselves with propane, people who died from exposure, people who died from heat exposure, and this constant string of tragedies has been accompanied by a steady drum beat against social service agencies in the city - as if these agencies, who have arisen to tackle the poverty and disinvestment run amok in the urban core, have created this mess.
At the same time, Worcester has finally started to turn in a new direction - the downtown has the investment and needed vision, Quinsig Village has promise as the city's gateway, both a possible bond bill for road repair and new trains to Boston combine with a hot real estate market to generate growth in our corner of the world.
Why then, can't we have the same powerful vision for the 3000 homeless and marginally housed that we have for infrastructure, skating rinks on the Common, and downtown movie theaters? Does our city really believe, in its heart of hearts, that the downtown project will work if you don't at least do some planning to end homelessness, to address the chronic homeless who basically camp out downtown? Governor Ed Rendell of PA certainly saw that planning to end homelessness had to co-occur with plans for urban revitalization. He credits Philly's plan to end homelessness with the city's downtown resurgence. Why can't our city leaders look to other successful projects and replicate them?
WHAc is launching Open Doors - End Homelessness on the premise that if our city can find the resources and vision for these huge and successful economic and infrastructure projects, then they can also focus resources and energy on human projects, to address the horrendous conditions of our inner city, and the homelessness that is one small element of these conditions. Our campaign is an optimistic one, that we can forge a successful vision for ending homelessness together.
However, since the city has essentially put all current efforts on hold while they look at social service agency tax issues, siting problems, and funding, WHAC intends to launch a campaign to educate the ctiizenry of the city about the roots causes of homelessness and to ask for the City Manager of Worcester to provide the needed moral leadership on this issue. Utilizing the well-worn path of successful city campaigns, WHAC will first use our warchest to educate the citizens through billboards, voter mailings, and radio spots. Then, as we head towards fall, WHAC will ask the citizens to demand accountability for our city leaders to plan a new trajectory in the city to end homelessness. We will contact voters directly and ask them to join us in our efforts to get a new and compassionate effort underway to tackle this problem.
Stay tuned for more posts on this new campaign!
