Face It: Families Don't Count

November 28th. Tina's due date. I lost track of her, this mother of five young boys with one on the way, teetering on the edge of homelessness again.

Earlier this year I helped get her and her boys out of the dinky camper they slept in, with and without electricity/water and barely space to breathe. Extreme hot and cold temperatures merely represented discomfort. More significant were the fear and frustration that continued to eat at her.

Thanks to the stimulus funds (Homeless Prevention and Rehousing Program - HPRP), they moved into a single-wide trailer, about 1,000 times bigger than their 13' tin can. Tina was temporarily relieved, but  scared, rightfully so, because her HPRP housing reprieve was as limited as her resources. Her entire pregnancy and postpartum was spent in traumatic stress. Not good.

All good things come to an end when it’s government money helping people in need. Despite the hype, HPRP is just a temporary housing subsidy. “Preventing or ending homelessness for over 750,000 Americans is a major milestone for the Recovery Act and for the Obama Administration’s Federal Strategic Plan to Prevent and End Homelessness,” HUD Secretary Donovan recently boasted.

For Tina and her boys, housing ends in January. Theoretically, Tina should have been making arrangements to clear up the $5,250 owed the out-of-state housing authority where the family lived before fleeing her violent husband. But her life has been anything but theoretical. Family help? Her mother is a half-step from homelessness herself. Times are tough. Wonder what Donovan would say to Tina and countless single parents in the same boat? Even the safety net — frayed as it is in most places — won't help because Las Cruces, NM has no real shelter for families.

I’ve sent a few messages to the busy, but aware, LC mayor. No response. And I can only imagine he has lots on his plate. Tina’s not his only constituent. He offered to help before, but $5k might be a tad much. And I sensed a real dismay from him when he learned she was pregnant again. I understand—both of them—sort of....

I contacted the LC school folks I know to see if they had any rabbits to pull out of their hat. The sad reply, "Unfortunately at this time resources in Las Cruces are scarce.  Many of our families are struggling to keep a roof over their heads."

Will Tina and her family fall between the cracks? Does this mean in January, when Las Cruces shivers, Tina and her kids will hit the streets prior to the kids being (inevitably) taken from her? Heard from Tina this week. She gave birth to an 8 lb. boy in mid-November. She's more frightened than ever.

I spoke with an attorney familiar with domestic violence law and she offered the faintest hope--under the Violence Against Women Act a housing authority might consider circumstances that caused her to be saddled with this debt. Tina would need a local attorney to advocate for her. Can we find one? Chances slim to next to none....

This is where my fury takes over. We use trillions of our tax dollars to bail out sleazy bankers and Wall Street robber barons. But we can’t make the absent father responsible for the $5,250 debt owed to the housing authority where he also lived? We stress the mother during her pregnancy, knowing that the mountain of money owed will cause the avalanche of homelessness to imperil her little boys and herself. And we knowingly throw them to the streets like yesterday's garbage.

Sign this petition to Mayor Miyagishima and congressional staffer Susie Cordero to urge their intervention.

Seems to me our distorted “celebration” of the birth of Jesus could be channeled into some real love for families like Tina’s. What if we didn’t buy gifts that people don’t really need and channel our generosity to those around us (and in any number of places, like beleaguered Haiti) to bring them some peace? Just typing those words makes me understand how the abyss becomes larger and the “have-nots” fall through…a child is born to us, but it’s not our responsibility.

Photo credit: Diane Nilan