NPACH: The National Policy and Advocacy Council on Homelessness

IL - CHICAGO -- Not counting all homeless doesn't make them
go away

Chicago Sun-Times - 12/24/2006 - COMMENTARY -- This Christmas, Elashune Calhoun and her seven children, ages 9 to 16, will be staying with her mother in Englewood but the occasion will lack much joy. "There are no Christmas lights, no Christmas tree, no presents," says Calhoun, 32. Calhoun may have a roof over her head but she and her children are essentially homeless; they were evicted from their own rented house last spring after Calhoun lost her job. She had to take off time to care for her 10-year-old asthmatic son and her employer let her go. "I don't fault him, but my children come first," Calhoun says. The lack of income led to the eviction. The City of Chicago does not count Calhoun as one of its homeless. It includes only those who are staying in city-funded shelters or are sleeping out in the open on Chicago streets or are spotted on the CTA. The last census of homeless people was taken on Jan. 27, 2005, and the city counted 6,715. But "doubling up," like she does with her mother, "is homelessness," Calhoun argues. "I don't have the financial stability to go out on my own and pay market rent." In fact, a recent study by the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless and the University of Illinois at Chicago showed that if one includes people who are doubling-up, the real number of homeless people in Chicago on any one night is more than triple the city's numbers: 21,078, including 9,871 children and 1,348 unaccompanied homeless youth. More than 11,000 families are doubled up because they can't afford to pay rent and have nowhere else to go.

The city's Housing Department spokeswoman told Sun-Times reporter Fran Spielman that the city uses the same definition of homelessness as the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. "We do not count people who are doubled up with friends and family," says Molly Sullivan. "Under the HUD model, they have a place to live. This enables us to focus our immediate resources on those who are most vulnerable. They physically have nowhere to go." Mayor Daley says he wants to end homelessness. But clearly, if the numbers collected by UIC and the Coalition for the Homeless are right -- and they seem more meticulous in gathering statistics than the city -- he has a long way to go. It is impossible to fix the problem unless you know the extent of it. The coalition would like Daley to spend $55 million a year on affordable housing, but that number may be impossible for the city when it is under financial restraint. The issue, though, needs to be studied more thoroughly. The coalition says for the entire fiscal year ending June 30, the homeless population in Chicago was 73,656 -- close to the population of Evanston . The mayor is concerned about the performance of Chicago schools, but if such a huge proportion of students are homeless -- the Board of Education figures 8,461 of its students are living in "doubled-up" situations with friends or family -- then how can these children be expected to excel in school? Calhoun says two of her children are in special-ed classes, and she just prays that somehow the family will find their way over the next year. "I'm just counting on the Lord."