Outreach Experts Say Face Of Homeless Getting Younger In NJ
CAMDEN, N.J. (AP) — Raymond had a pension, a home and wife. It's all gone now— the 24 years he spent with Bell Telephone in Voorhees, the house worth hundreds of thousands of dollars that wouldn't sell and the wife who suddenly died.
So on a slowly warming Wednesday morning, Raymond sat with two other homeless friends and a lot of geese at Wiggins Park Marina and answered questions from outreach advocates as part of the annual statewide federally-mandated survey.
"I had to walk away from the house. I had no other choice," he said of carrying the mortgage for six months as he slashed the asking price further and further.
Can this situation happen to anybody?
"You better believe it," he warned.
NJCounts 2017, which recently took place across all of New Jersey, is coordinated by Monarch Housing Associates and carried out at the local level by agencies tasked with community efforts to end homelessness.
Last year's count found 8,941 homeless men, women and children across New Jersey. According to data provided by Monarch, that's a decrease of 1,270 people from 2015.
Erin Crean, director of the Camden County office of Community Development, said data they collect is sent to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and used to determine the amount of funding municipalities get.
The questions she and fellow outreach workers asked— how long have you been homeless, where did you sleep last night, are you a veteran, do you have any medical conditions, are you using drugs —are used at the local level to best determine how to allocate those federal funds.
Walter Chatman Jr., 50, has spent the last three weeks staying overnight at Joseph's House of Camden.
"I'm looking for my own place," he tells NJ.com, with lottery tickets splayed out on the table before him. "I've got family and friends here in Camden but they don't want to lend a hand."
Wendy Medoff graduated from Cherry Hill High School East in 1983, attended Camden County College and has been spending nights in the shelter for the past 10 months.
Between being locked out of her former apartment and her car being impounded, getting back on her own two feet hasn't been easy.
"I'm not that upset anymore," she said between drags off a cigarette. "I was crying," she continues, placing emphasis on "was."
The younger generation, said former Camden County Improvement Authority director-turned-volunteer Gino Lewis, is reluctant to come to a shelter. He sees them staggering down Broadway in the morning between scoring drugs, the "invincibility" of youth having yet to wear off.
"We're seeing a trend now where you're having a lot more younger individuals on the street and that's part of the heroin epidemic," said Lewis, who accompanied Crean and Community Planning and Advisory Council planner Rashid Humphrey.
"The face of homelessness— it's getting younger and younger," Humphrey said.
Together, the trio scoured Camden on Wednesday with bags of water bottles and sandwiches in tow. They knew a lot of those in need by name and where they frequently stayed at.
The group went to "The Ledge" that's situated under an overpass shy of the BB&T Pavilion, "The Shack" that lives up to its moniker, around the marina and under a bridge along a waterway that intersects with Route 30.
Isn't this an uphill battle?
"But it's worth it," Crean counters as she drives on down Broadway.
As for Raymond, who didn't wish to provide his last name, he could cash in on his pension today but it will double to more than $200,000 if he waits until 2019.
"I just have to stay alive until then," he halfheartedly laughs, shouldering his two newfound friends with that responsibility.
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