Monday, January 26, 1998
Skid row visit shows students reality
PUBLIC POLICY Tour of downtown proves great need for social
workers
By Matt Grace
Daily Bruin Contributor
A legless beggar with a toothless grin props himself against
makeshift crutches with a tin cup dangling from his mangled hand. A
brawl between two women spills into the street. A parade of beaming
toddlers waddle, hand in hand, through homeless people asleep on
the sidewalk to a local pre-school, waving at every new face they
meet. Welcome to skid row.
Almost all of the residents have been troubled by adversity – an
addiction, bad luck, abandonment or abuse – and the 50 square
blocks of downtown Los Angeles is their home.
Likewise, some of the students in UCLA’s School of Public Policy
and Social Welfare (SPPSW) have experienced hardship and been
motivated to help those who are not as fortunate.
"I feel like I lucked out," said Lisa Wasserman, a first-year
graduate student in SPPSW. "I want to help people who do not have
that chance."
"Most people are here because of something they experienced in
their childhood," said Adrienne Wile, another first-year graduate
student who was inspired to social work partially from her own life
experiences.
For the last four years, students working toward their Master’s
of Social Welfare (MSW) – a two-year program – have toured skid row
in an effort to bring them face-to-face with the unseen poverty of
Los Angeles.
Students are taken to various shelters, low-income apartments,
missions and other havens available to the 14,000 residents of skid
row of which approximately 2,000 are homeless at any given
time.
The skid row tour is one of several field trips aimed at MSW
students to find the community where they can make the biggest
impact.
Others explore community agencies, mental health facilities and
child care centers.
"Social workers need to see these issues, experience them and
talk to the people whose lives are affected," said Mary Brent
Werhli, creator of the skid-row tour.
Wehrli closely designed the tour with the residents of skid row
to convey the spectrum of life in the area.
"My ultimate goal is to find the students’ passion," Wehrli
said. "The challenge is finding out what interest they have in the
community and how best they can support the community’s needs."
Doctrine And Change
The most recent trip brought 35 students to the St. Vincent’s
Cardinal Manning Center for a tour through the streets by members
of the Homeless Outreach Program (HOP), themselves former homeless
residents of skid row.
Outfitted in lemon-yellow hats and jackets stamped boldly in
black with "HOP," and filled with the intimate knowledge of their
former home, Steve Martinez and Ray Blackshire led the MSW students
into the arteries of downtown Los Angeles.
Weaving through the empty streets, the guides first brought the
group to the Los Angeles Mission.
An elaborate, $33 million church-run facility, it operates
solely on private donations, which prevents government
interference.
Nearly a hundred men dotted the benches outside the mission,
some playing cards and dominoes, others staring blankly into the
streets. The mission offers showers, access to free clinics and new
clothes on a short-term basis.
In addition, individuals can apply to a one-year program known
as Fresh Start, after passing a 40-day trial period. The all-male
center provides food, private rooms, entertainment and exercise
facilities.
However, the mission places the residents on restriction. This
includes mandatory Bible Study, prayer service attendance and
classes designed to prepare the clients for an entry level job- all
at no cost.
"If you are uncomfortable with Christ," said Michael Nash,
volunteer coordinator for the mission, "you will be uncomfortable
here."
Non-Christians are allowed, but they are not exempted from the
religious requirements.
Private Housing and Outreach
Through the littered streets, Martinez and Blackshire led the
critical, observing eyes of the students through streets void of
food markets, restaurants and traffic. Toy stores of Asian-imported
goods occupy nearly every warehouse.
The next stop was one of many Single Room Occupancy (SRO)
buildings on skid row. SROs are low-income housing units built to
give residents the basic amenities found in normal apartments –
laundry rooms, kitchens and private rooms – at relatively
affordable prices.
Most units range from $250-300 a month depending on the
location. In addition, the rooms can be rented for one day and
night.
However, a lot of people do not take advantage of these
opportunities.
One of the problems with people accustomed to life on the
streets, according to Martinez, is convincing them to leave one of
the few things that offers stability.
"Do you think that when I was using (drugs) I would give 16
bucks for a place like this?" Martinez said shaking his head.
"Nope."
A significant proportion of Blackshire’s and Martinez’s job
involves teaching the residents about the opportunities available.
They provide information, refer individuals to clinics and
sometimes even hand out a little money.
In between stops, Blackshire steps off the sidewalk, leans his
ear to an elderly man squatting on the curb, and then nodding his
head, pulls two condoms out his pocket and hands them to him.
Then a man grinning ear to ear at the other end of the block
sees Blackshire and starts to bow repeatedly to him.
"Raymond!" the man yells. Blackshire smiles back and greets him
with a friendly hug and shake.
It is the relationships they develop and the ties they maintain
that allow Blackshire and Martinez to offer help on a more personal
level.
No Simple Solution
There are so many shelters, missions and clinics on skid row
because homeless people are rejected in many other
neighborhoods.
"People do not want homeless people in their backyards. In some
ways it’s nobody’s problem," Wehrli said.
When individuals finally gather the courage to make the change,
they have a hard time escaping skid row.
A lot of people get cleaned up, get a job and leave the
missions, but they have no other place to go, Wehrli said.
They cannot afford to live anywhere else, so they come back to a
place where they are comfortable and where their friends live.
Unfortunately, when former residents return, drug and alcohol
use resumes as a means to cope, Wehrli also said.
There is no simple solution to the problem other than getting
the people off skid row for good.
"People need to move off the row to stay clean," he said.
Before 1994, social welfare students were not exposed to the
realities of skid row. But familiarity with the program has piqued
the interest of many students.
"Throughout this whole trip, my mind has been rolling," said
Harold Pyuk, a MSW student.
As he reflected, the trip is about experiencing first-hand the
people and the communities which the theories are aimed to
help.AARON TOUT/Daily Bruin
Skid Row residents rotate between SROs (single room
occupancies), missions, and the street. They often live in tents
and tote their possessions in a shopping cart.