Part one
NORRISTOWN — People experiencing homelessness in Montgomery County have their own stories, each different and often surprising.
As Montgomery County prepares for its annual Point-in-Time Count to assess the local homeless situation, many in the area grapple with this ongoing problem, as community leaders attempt to dissect the issue and offer tangible solutions for those in need.
The process starts with listening and observing.
“The thing I’ve noticed with homelessness is that everyone has a place of origin, and everyone is either coming from somewhere, moving from somewhere, or they’ve ended up where they end up,” said Norristown Municipal Councilman Hakim Jones.
Norristown Police Lt. Todd Dillon described the situation in the county seat while giving a departmental report as temporary acting police chief during a December 2021 Norristown Municipal Council meeting.
“The uptick is out-of-Norristown people coming to Norristown for either drugs or mental health,” he said. “They may be associated with a mental health agency … and then like other illnesses, they stop taking medication, their symptoms increase, get worse and then they are homeless.
“We … see them when they initially come into town, and then we start taking notice of them, and then we can track their spirals, and shortly thereafter, they’re at the hotels, they’re living bed-to-bed, and then they’re homeless,” Dillon said. “The opioid epidemic has increased our homelessness dramatically.”
Access Services Program Director Mark Boorse said he sees things a little differently.
“I think the stereotype that we have in the public is the person either has an addiction, or they have a mental health problem, and both of those things are untreated, and if those things were worked on, a person would just not be homeless,” he said.
“There are some people for whom that’s true. There’s some people for whom a mental health issue or a substance abuse issue is the driver that got them outside,” he continued. “A lot of times that’s not true.”
Contributing factors to homelessness
Boorse attributed several circumstances that could contribute to becoming homeless, including health.
“A lot of times, I think the statistic is that 40 percent or close to 45 percent of people who become homeless, their health, or their health problems, or their inability to pay for health care if it’s not the cause of it, it’s certainly a large contributing factor,” he said.
Finances, eviction and loss of employment were other noted factors.
“It’s really hard to maintain a job when you’re homeless,” he said. “Can you show up on time? Can you show up clean? Once you’re homeless, it gets really hard to get those things back.”
Some people are homeless because they can’t afford rent.
Kayleigh Silver, the administrator for Montgomery County Office of Housing and Community Development, acknowledged some serious obstacles the area’s current housing market is up against.
“In the private real estate market, land value and rents … continue to rise,” Silver said. in some areas of Montgomery County, we’re seeing 12- to 17-percent rent increases.”
“Vacancy rates for apartments, particularly for affordable apartments, are the lowest that they’ve ever been in 20 years at 2.2 percent for some of the more affordable places,” she continued. “Competition for more affordable places is really, really tight.”
When the remnants of Hurricane Ida barreled through Montgomery County in early September 2021, an EF-2 tornado and historic flooding levels devastated much of the area.
“We almost doubled the number of people who are homeless in the county, and also, we lost a lot of housing for lower-income folks in the county,” Boorse said.
Lack of housing is commonplace in Norristown, Jones observed.
“Housing’s always been the challenge. Having enough units, enough shelters, just brick and mortar housing has always been an issue,” Jones said, adding “we’re strapped for land. We don’t have a lot of space. So even if we wanted to build a shelter, we couldn’t.”
“Your Way Home has recently launched an initiative called ‘Homes for All’ to start addressing some of these housing affordability barriers and issues that we’re seeing,” Silver said. “But we’re going to need a lot more support at all levels — federal, local, municipal, individual, corporation, philanthropy — to have an all-hands-on-deck approach … we’re really looking at a tough few years ahead of us,” Silver said.
The county’s housing and community development department is involved with the Homes for All program, which Silver described as a public-private partnership.
“We help oversee the shelter system throughout the county, and robustly find partners to provide short-, medium- or long-term rental assistance in order to exit people from homelessness,” she said.
Your Way Home in Montco
Established in 2014, Your Way Home acts as a “unified and coordinated housing crisis response system,” providing a myriad of services with the ultimate goal of reducing homelessness, according to the county website. Since 2014, more than 3,000 households have been connected to housing, according to Silver.
“Our shelters are always full so there is always a demand for it,” she said.
Even when a spot does open up at a shelter, community leaders understand it can be a difficult decision for someone.
“[The shelter] might be in the city. It might be in other townships, and in those cases it may not have been attractive either because those folks would lose access to their jobs, and lose access to their transportation center,” Jones said. “There are times when shelter does become available but it doesn’t always work out.”
Boorse agreed.
“There’s a lot of little more practical things that go into a day of being homeless that if you’re not homeless they don’t necessarily cross your mind,” Boorse said. “You think, ‘well we’re offering shelter, that’s a great thing,’ but it usually comes at some sort of cost that the person has to calculate.
“Is it worth it for me inside? Or is it worth it for me to go to the hospital? Is it worth it for me to accept some service? The context of it is often more complicated than we understand,” he continued.
More families becoming homeless
“We’ve seen a trend of more families becoming homeless, and sometimes for the first time, and then also we’ve seen an increase in older adults becoming homeless,” Boorse said.
Statistics of the county’s current homeless rates are not up to date, as officials prepare to conduct the annual Point-in-Time Count on Jan. 25.
From 2014 to 2018, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s profile for Lower Merion, Norristown, Abington, and Montgomery County’s Continuum of Care recorded ranging numbers for the “number of people who are homeless for the first time.”
Data was not available for 2014, according to the report, but figures showed 733 people in 2015, 798 people in 2016, 647 people in 2017, and 584 people in 2018.
“So if it’s your first time, do you know where supports are or services are in the community that you’re in?” Boorse asked.
Local partnerships crucial
In Norristown, Jones praised the municipality’s law enforcement agency for its work with the homeless.
“Our police department did a good job of not criminalizing homelessness, but really trying to help get down to the root of it,” he said.
In establishing partnerships, Jones emphasized important steps are usually mental health intervention as well as “getting people services instead of criminal records, and into a system where they can be assisted.”
“I think there’s some solid organizations that will meet homeless people where they’re at,” Jones said.
He spotlighted several local groups including The Salvation Army of Norristown, Missionaries of Charity sisters in Norristown, Laurel House in East Norriton Township, and Your Way Home Montgomery County.
“The challenge is once we meet them where they’re at, where do we guide them from there?” Jones said.
How to get help
Your Way Home has a two-pronged approach in assisting people experiencing homeless: its hotline and Street Outreach team.
“The first thing that’s provided for anyone sleeping in a place not meant for habitation is immediate outreach by our Street Outreach team for crisis planning, diversion and safety,” Silver said.
When someone calls 211, Boorse said the “operator will ask a series of questions” related to the person’s backstory and enter the findings into a database.
Street Outreach teams will then go and meet with people to get a better understanding of their situation.
“What are your immediate physical needs? … Do you know how to navigate the things that are available to you in your community as a person who is homeless?” Boorse asked.
Following those conversations, “we enroll them for all of the services that they’re eligible for, that they’re interested in,” Boorse said.
While Boorse recognized that it fluctuates pretty heavily, he estimated there’s approximately 150 to 190 new cases each day.
“We have an active caseload and we stay with the people on that caseload,” he said.
In addition, several “priority populations” could be eligible for “emergency hoteling” through the Street Outreach team, Silver said, including families with children, pregnant women and others with certain medical or behavioral health issues.
“They use that emergency hoteling for a bridge until a shelter spot opens up,” Silver said. “They also prioritize any high needs person to get into a shelter spot as soon as a bed opens.”
When asked what happens if people outside those designated groups cannot get a spot in a shelter, Boorse was candid in his response.
“That means that they have to find a place to sleep, a place to be, and … they also have to figure out how they’re going to be outside during the day,” he said.
“Our goal, this is relief work, when people are outside, it’s really about helping people be as safe and as comfortable as possible,” Boorse said. “So sleeping bags, tents, sometimes a heater, certainly good socks, good coats, good gloves, hats. Just being able to have the personal gear that you need to be outside for extended periods of time.”
Boorse added that his agency has used social media to appeal for needed items, and people have stepped up.
“I was pretty amazed … the generosity of the community to donate a lot of really good gear so we could hand that out,” he said.
Cold weather is relentless
As the winter months can produce instances of inclement weather and frigid temperatures, the area’s homeless must continue to battle the elements on a daily basis.
“Cold weather is just relentless,” Boorse said.
“Last winter, we handed out over 500 pairs of Merino Wool Socks,” Boorse said. “When you don’t change your socks very often, and you’re outside all the time, the kind of socks is really important.”
County officials stressed the importance of implementing measures to keep people safe.
A “Code Blue” declaration is issued when “temperature or the wind chill is expected to be below 20 degrees.” according to a statement from a county spokesperson, adding that residents in need of shelter should call Your Way Home at 211 or text their zip code to 898-211.
Along with “increased funding and support for more hotels,” Silver said that Your Way Home secures 86 additional beds in Lansdale, Norristown and Pottstown during “Code Blue” calls in a given winter season.
During instances of dropping temperatures, Silver said “Cold Blue” shelters are open at the Norristown Hospitality Center, located at 530 Church St. No. 1, and at Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church, located at 1000 W. Main St. in Lansdale. There’s a shelter open every night during winter for “Pottstown folks experiencing homelessness” at Al’s Heart Warming Center. Single men and women are eligible to stay at the facility located out of the former St. Aloysius Parish School on North Hanover Street, Silver said.
Christina Jordan, director of the Coordinated Homeless Outreach Center, noted the 50-bed homeless shelter in Norristown adds eight more beds during a “Code Blue.”
Other shelters include Missionary Sisters of Charity Norristown, located at 630 DeKalb St., and The Salvation Army year-round shelters for families at 533 Swede St. in Norristown and 137 King St. in Pottstown.
Coming together for solutions
So what will it take to alleviate homelessness in Montgomery County? It takes a village, as the saying goes.
“It’s my belief that homelessness is really a community-level issue,” Boorse said. “In every community, there are some residents of a community who are living outside, and the question is, on a community level, what do we want to do about that?”
“Working together, we have the capability of being able to provide resources to everybody who needs those resources, but I think that comes from a variety of areas, and it’s not just nonprofits, it’s not city government,” said Resources for Human Development Regional Director Owen Camuso.
The national nonprofit runs the Norristown-based CHOC, located at 1001 W. Sterigere St., within the boundaries of the Norristown State Hospital.
“It’s working as a community together to work toward solving homelessness, and I do believe in Montgomery County,” Camuso continued. “If we do partner together to solve homelessness, we are able to do it, it is a manageable problem.”
For Jones, he said it’s about “collaboration, and just (an) understanding that one or two communities cannot consume the majority of poverty and pressure.
“I think places like Norristown, Pottstown, we do have a lot of responsibility,” Jones said. “We do have a lot of demand thrown at us without enough resources, and I do think there’s other communities out there who are in (a) better position to even assist.”
“Above anything else, Your Way Home is a partnership, and I liken housing and homelessness to the climate change crisis,” Silver said. “It is going to take massive acknowledgment, investment, and I don’t just mean money. Just an all-hands-on-deck approach … in the public and private sector.”
“We need federal investment,” Silver continued. “We need state, county and local government investment. We need to inform our policy and funding decisions from the people with lived experience of homelessness.
“We need corporations to understand that we all want the same thing, and no one should have to sleep in any place not meant to be slept in. We all have the same goal to end homelessness,” she went on to say. “We need to really work together and provide the safe, affordable housing that’s needed to end homelessness.”
