Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Hunger and Homeless Rises

Hunger and homelessness increaseOfficials say more people seek food, shelter this year.

By MICHAEL CASS Tennessean Staff Writer

More Nashville residents are seeking emergency food aid this year, and more homeless families with children are looking for shelter, government and nonprofit officials said.

The trends are in line with those revealed in a 23-city survey released this week by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, which looked at changes between November 2006 and October of this year.

Nashville, which participated in the survey, did not see the same kinds of increases as some places. While four of five cities said requests for food aid rose an average of 12 percent, the local increase was 9 percent, said Phil Ryan, executive director of the Metro Development and Housing Agency, which compiled the city's data.

Matthew Bourlakas, a spokesman for Second Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee, said even the 5 percent jump seen by his agency means a lot more people are going hungry. Bourlakas said high gas prices and the national credit crunch and housing crisis have contributed to the problem.

"It's 160 more families each month, which is huge, considering that donations are roughly flat," he said. "There aren't enough donations to meet the demand."

Second Harvest provides emergency food boxes — generally enough to carry a family through three to five days — at 15 locations across Davidson County. After almost six months of the 2007-08 fiscal year, the agency is on pace to beat the previous year's record of 39,855 boxes by about 2,000, Bourlakas said.

Rescue Mission packed

Nashville was one of five cities that reported a decline in homeless adults seeking shelter. Ryan said the number here dropped about 4 percent.

But the Nashville Rescue Mission is seeing many more single mothers with children under 10 years old this year, spokesman Cliff Tredway said. The mission will break ground next month on an expansion of its Family Life Center, which was built for 80 people but housed 182 — including 42 children under 10 — Saturday night, he said.

Metro Councilman Erik Cole, who serves on a city commission working to end chronic homelessness, said Nashville needs to take recent successes and "magnify them in scale." For example, about 46 homeless people have participated in a pilot project that finds health care for them and directs them to housing.

"We've got a good shelter community," Cole said. "We've got good charitable organizations. What we've not done quite so well is find long-term solutions to the problems of accessible, affordable housing and mental health services."

Matt Leber, a spokesman for the Nashville Homeless Power Project, said the number of homeless people is increasing, and many shelters can't meet the demand. Cuts in federal housing money and a lack of truly affordable housing here have accelerated the problem, he said.
"Nashville is growing in terms of developments for middle-class and wealthy folks at an exponential rate, creating housing market rates that the working poor cannot afford," Leber said.

Ryan said most of the local food and shelter providers that provided data to MDHA expected increased demand for their services in 2008.