October 22, 2012. The Daily Progress.
A group of 26 religious congregations from the Charlottesville-Albemarle area will spend the next year researching and developing ways to better deal with homelessness in the area.
The Interfaith Movement Promoting Action by Congregations Together (IMPACT) chose homelessness from a list of three community problems to focus on. Other options were public transportation and pedestrian safety.
The Rev. Al Horton challenged movement members, which include both Jewish and Muslim congregations, to help the homeless by providing more than just shelter.
Shelter, Horton said, is just the first step to helping the homeless improve their lives.
“Earlier this year the Crossings opened its doors, and 30 of our [homeless] have a more permanent place to call home, but it’s not easy,” he said. “When you are used to living out on the street, a one-room apartment can be pretty confining.”
The Crossings is a low-income housing development in downtown Charlottesville that has units dedicated to the chronically homeless.
Horton told a story of a Crossings resident who was allowed to erect a tent in his new one-bedroom apartment to help him better adjust to life under roof. To better assist the homeless, Horton said, the area needs a combined effort to help those in need find jobs, doctors and mental health care.
“We need to realize that shelter is an important step, but it is not the only step to combating the many evils that face the homeless,” he said. “Homelessness … is a yawning wound in our community, but it needs more to heal, a Band-Aid just won’t do. Charlottesville can do better, and you and I can do better.”
Since its start in 2006, the interfaith movement has studied and tried to solve issues including transportation, affordable housing, dental care, pre-K education and mental health. Earlier this year, the group got the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and the city of Charlottesville to allocate money to the Healthy Transitions program to help ex-offenders re-enter society. The program, a joint effort with the Region Ten Community Services Board and the local District 9 probation and parole office, helps former inmates remain mentally stable as they leave prison and look for work.
As part of the upcoming fiscal year 2012-2013 budget, the supervisors allocated $42,500 to the program.
Before delegations from member congregations retired to vote on which problem the interfaith movement should focus on, Rev. Jim Richardson of St. Paul’s Memorial Episcopal Church told voters the process will not always be easy.
“You are all doing something, that if you do this right, I guarantee you, is going to make you uncomfortable,” Richardson, who serves as co-president of the movement, said. “I am asking you to do something that the world has a very hard time doing: I am asking you to see through each others’ eyes.”
The movement is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, whose goal is to become entirely self-funded, said Co-President Dorothy Jordan. To help reach that goal, the movement needs to raise $50,000 this year.
“To date we have raised $41,400, which is the most we have ever raised, and it is something to be proud of,” Jordan said. “We need to own and pay for this organization ourselves.”
