Ideas for Lower Cost Housing and Sustainability for Homeless People Locally

I have been sent this info from a friend Faith that I have been kindly allowed to share here.....
Has the makings of an important discussion....

Dignity Village is a not a perfect model, but when it comes to providing truly LOW COST transitional housing, this is the way to go. They have been posting older photos lately, looking back on their interesting history... With record numbers of homeless people on the streets (and 3 to 5 year waiting lists for (higher cost) subsidized housing for most people), we need to facilitate development of a dozen such housing projects - each with shared gardens and workshops to facilitate greater self-support and skills training.There should also be 12-step or other kinds of effective treatment programs easily available to all residents. It should be noted that more rural treatment programs involving learning and useful work tend to be very effective. Check out, http://dignityadvocate.wordpress.com/the-need-for-more-rural-recovery-communities/ (http://dignityadvocate.wordpress.com/the-need-for-more-rural-recovery-communities/) and http://blanchethouse.org/site/?page_id=46 .

Certified social workers should be involved directly in any new dignity-village-like projects if families with children would live in such communities. Self government in such communities should invite liaisons from local governments and neighborhood associations into their councils- to help build cooperation and trust. Micro-business develpment among workers who want more than part time work could lead to greater personal incomes in such communities. The City of Portland currently facilitates this for Dignity Village, which operates a food cart, a garden nursery, and an E-Bay Store. This is the right idea.

In this way, we would be able to afford to offer enough (simpler) housing and to give the dignity of self-support to as many people locally as are suffering outside. In this way there may be a more realistic possibility of our ending homelessness.

Note: so far Portland has but one such community - population 55. There are ten thousand homeless people in the Portland metro! Three million across the U.S. This is a lot of suffering already, and it is growing.

On the need for government to strive for far LOWER COST affordable housing projects - in order to house more people, check out, http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=283507526965 --

Here is Dignity Village's Page on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Dignity-Village/254702658436?ref=mf

Other bold experiments / models include:
The Friends of Boston Homeless's "Farm at Long Island Shelter" (here on Facebook too)
http://www.fobh.org/the-farm--long-island ;
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Friends-of-Bostons-Homeless/70420955016?v=wall

and

The Homeless Gardening Project, of Santa Cruz County, CA. (they also operate a store, etc.)
http://www.homelessgardenproject.org/


http://photos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs169.snc3/19635_104742032880033_100000327098004_113715_24412 23_n.jpg (http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=113715&op=1&view=all&subj=303057244227&aid=-1&auser=0&oid=303057244227&id=100000327098004)



(http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=113716&op=1&view=all&subj=303057244227&aid=-1&auser=0&oid=303057244227&id=100000327098004)


http://photos-e.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs137.snc3/18435_104747929546110_100000327098004_113789_60472 70_n.jpg (http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=113789&op=1&view=all&subj=303057244227&aid=-1&auser=0&oid=303057244227&id=100000327098004)


http://photos-b.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs157.snc3/18435_104747966212773_100000327098004_113790_10042 51_n.jpg (http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=113790&op=1&view=all&subj=303057244227&aid=-1&auser=0&oid=303057244227&id=100000327098004)

Portland Oregon can have two such places according to the law> that we{Dignity Village} had the city council enact when we became stewards over the parcel of ground we call Sunderland Yard.

I also agree with Faith that any more tent cities has to have social workers on site to help folks get on the right paths to get off the streets and back into socitey.

Someday I will write about the struggle that we had in getting all this done. It is an on going project. I believe this model can be approved on and every city can diffintely use a place like this.

I am proud to have called Dignity Village home for almost ten years. And am still helping out when I'm able.