Newsmakers July 14, 2016

The city of La Crosse has the potential to end homelessness by the end of 2016 according to a national consultant who’s working with city leaders on the issue.

Erin Healy of New York City was hired by Gundersen Health System, and met with various leaders during a trip in June. She said finding solutions involving permanent housing for individuals and families who are homeless is a much more stable option than the existing approach of offering emergency shelter beds.

“La Crosse is spending $14,000 annually on one shelter bed,” said Healy. “That could pay for two one-bedroom apartments annually. I would argue that investment in a short-term emergency shelter bed is not a great investment. You could pay for someone to have their own apartment for a year. That’s a better investment.”

Healy said replacing a crisis system that involves a drain on public services like police, the court system, detox centers and unpaid visits to the emergency room with permanent housing just make sense.

“What you’re paying for with your public tax dollars, you’re paying four times more to maintain that person’s homelessness than it would have been if you were investing in their rent with services,” Healy said. “It’s a lot cheaper to help people get into stable housing, and that’s also when they start to make better choices about their life and get healthier.”

Healy is working with many organizations and governments on the issue in La Crosse.

While homelessness has always been an issue in La Crosse, those who work for non-profits that help homeless people said its become more noticeable in recent years. The main reason people become homeless is their inability to afford housing. While 70 percent of the clients at the Salvation Army work full-time, Social Services Director Kelley Waddell said people don’t earn enough money and just can’t afford to pay the rent. She said in recent years, the 80-bed emergency shelter in downtown La Crosse has seen a major increase in sheltering entire families.

The situation is similar at the Franciscan Hospitality House, which runs a day center that has gotten busier since a tent ministry where the homeless camped outside at Wesley United Methodist Church in La Crosse shut down earlier this summer. Catholic Charities of La Crosse Executive Director Roberto Partarrieu is among those serving on the coalition that’s looking for a long-term solution for the city’s homeless. He said many people in the La Crosse area care about improving the lives of the homeless.

“La Crosse is a unique community that is about the perfect sized city to be able to address all these problems in a very professional and effective way,” Partarrieu said. “We have hospitals, universities, entrepreneurs, businesses and everybody wants to solve this issue.”

Healy said there are enough resources now in La Crosse to solve homelessness without spending more money, but she said there has to be a shift in focus from planning how to deal with homeless people to one of action.

“Communities become used to having homeless people and so this level of urgency isn’t there that may be there if a tornado had just hit,” she said. “You would have an urgent response, a lot of the red tape would fall away and you would just get people back into housing.”