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CHICAGO'S HOUSE OF HOPE
Tough, Loving Methods of Helping the Homeless
by Sister Connie Driscoll
From the Summer 1993 issue of Policy Review
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     Ten years ago, Sister Therese O'Sullivan and I were
surprised by a spiritual calling to help homeless women and their
children on Chicago's impoverished south side, and opened the St.
Martin de Porres House of Hope. It wasn't work we had planned to
do, or that we had trained to do, but we found a real need in
this community, and we realized we had to do what we could to
heal these battered lives. Since we opened our first residence in
1983, we've learned a lot about homelessness -- what causes it,
what perpetuates it, and what we believe needs to be done to
alleviate it.
     The issue of homelessness has been a major headline grabber
in the last few years, with a whole network of homeless advocacy
groups springing up around the country. These advocates -- some
of whom have never even worked with the homeless population --
believe the solution to homelessness is simply to provide
housing. Our experience has convinced us that, while the housing
supply is a factor, the deeper problem is a lack of personal
responsibility on the part of homeless people themselves.

Breaking Down Walls

     The St. Martin de Porres House of Hope is located in a pair
of old buildings in the Woodlawn neighborhood, not very far
geographically from Hyde Park, the University of Chicago's
locale. I discovered the need in this neighborhood when I came
back to Chicago to visit the nuns who had taught me in high
school. They walked me around the Woodlawn neighborhood, and took
me to a soup kitchen. The needs of the local population were
great, so I decided to stay. Sister Therese joined me in finding
and leasing our first building, which we bought six months later
with money we raised from donations.
     We learned a lot about rehabbing and remodeling -- including
the best way to break down a brick wall and techniques for
getting the most out of a sledgehammer -- when we were getting
our first building ready to open. The need for facilities in
Chicago was so great that women began moving in even before the
work was done. Our skills were in good shape by the time we took
on our second building, the local Catholic parish's former
school.
     Today we have a total of 110 beds for women and their
children in the two facilities. We reserve two-thirds of our
space for substance abusers. Our success rate -- only 4 to 5
percent of our residents ever return to Chicago's shelter system,
as opposed to nearly 40 percent for the system as a whole --
tells us we're doing something right.

Responsibility and Accountability

     St. Martin's is different from other shelters because -- to
put it bluntly -- this is not a place where homeless women are
going to be coddled. We put a tremendous amount of stress on
personal responsibility and accountability, which sets our group
apart from most other agencies. There are many causes of
homelessness: drug and alcohol addiction, mental illness, and
lack of education or housing are just a few.
     But what we've found is that the most common cause is a lack
of personal responsibility; thanks to public assistance, these
women almost always have the money to pay their rent, but they
often do not. Sometimes they spend the money on something else;
or they get mad at the landlord and don't pay the rent; or they
forget to pay the rent on time, month after month, until the
landlord evicts them. The public welfare bureaucrats say the poor
don't receive enough government money, but I disagree. The main
causes of homelessness are various kinds of dysfunctionality, and
an often total lack of understanding of personal responsibility
and discipline.
     Anyone who wants to stay at St. Martin's has to follow the
rules, and we have a large number of rules to follow. Wake-up is
at 6:30 A.M. every morning on weekdays, and 7:00 A.M. on
weekends. Every woman is expected to keep her own area neat and
clean. All residents must attend group sessions on Monday and
Wednesday mornings from 10:00 A.M. until 11:30 A.M.; at these
sessions, residents discuss their problems, what they hope to
achieve in their lives, and how the programs at St. Martin's can
help them. Substance abusers have daily 12-step meetings -- both
Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous sessions are held at
our facility -- evening meetings on various topics, and
individual therapy sessions. Any resident who does not have a
high school diploma must attend equivalency classes -- these
classes are not optional. Residents are required to take classes
in parenting and life skills. Mothers must keep an eye on their
children at all times, although we do have our own preschool,
open every day, for the younger children of our residents.
     We try to teach our residents financial responsibility as
well. Anyone who stays here is required to save 80 percent of her
assistance money and 50 percent of her food stamps, so that she
will have a nestegg when she leaves to set up her own household
again. Learning to manage and save money is imperative for these
women, so we also instruct them about comparative shopping, and
other real-life skills.

Strict Rules

     Since accountability is so important, we have strict rules
regarding the whereabouts of our residents; they can't just come
and go. They must sign out when they leave the building, stating
their destinations -- just writing "out" is not adequate -- and
their expected time of return. They also must tell us if they'll
be present for meals. Women with children must be in by 7:30 P.M.
except in summer, when the curfew is extended to 8:15 P.M.
Everyone else has to be in by 9:30 P.M. These curfews don't apply
to the substance abusers; they are not allowed to leave without
getting a pass and telling us specifically where they are going.
They also have a four-hour limit on how long they can be gone, a
limit we can extend as they get stabilized.
     It goes without saying that alcohol, drugs, and weapons are
not allowed on the premises. Any prescription medication is
locked up, and issued when needed -- our first priority is the
safety of the children.
     These are tough rules -- and there are many more -- and we
receive a lot of criticism from other service-providers because
of them. Even some members of our own religious orders think we
are too hard on our residents. But the fact is that discipline
and responsibility are what these women need, and this "tough
love" works.
     If one of the residents is having a difficult time following
the rules, we have a talk with her. We give everyone several
chances to get her life together. If a resident can't work out
her problems at St. Martin's, we help her to find a different
place to go. But such relocations don't happen often.
     Despite all our rules, women beat our doors down to get in
to St. Martin's. The word on the street is that we're tough but
fair, and that St. Martin de Porres is the place to come if you
want to get your life in order. Many of our residents have been
in other shelters, and they have not received the kind of help
they really need.
     Most of our residents are referred to us by government
agencies, including Chicago's Department of Human Services or the
Department of Children and Families, or by hospitals, schools, or
churches. Hardly anyone just walks through the door -- but
homeless women often ask for a referral to us.

Drug Abuse

     The very hardest part of my job is watching the suffering of
good people with substance-abuse problems, and what that does to
their children. The effect on the kids is the most gut-wrenching
part of all. Substance-abusers, in particular, have a hard time
resolving their problems; they really have to want to turn their
lives around. Over the years we have seen more and more women
with drug- and alcohol-abuse problems, and a year ago we made the
decision to devote half of our resources to them. Once we get
these residents stabilized, we encourage them to look for
apartments. Many of our "graduates" live in the community, in two
nearby apartment buildings, where they can support each other in
their efforts. They still call in to the House of Hope and let us
know how they're doing; they still come in here for Narcotics
Anonymous meetings, and every Sunday afternoon they have a
meeting of their own. So far, our success rate with drug users
has been very encouraging.
     At the same time we decided to separate the abuser
population from the other homeless, we drastically cut back on
the number of pregnant and parenting teens we housed. This
population used to be a large part of our clientele.
     The primary reason for the decision to reduce our beds for
this group is that most of these girls are not really homeless.
Perhaps one out of 100 really qualifies as homeless; the rest
just did not want to follow their mama's rules. Helping these
girls was a very tough proposition for us: if they weren't going
to obey their mothers, and get into the house by 9:00 or 10:00 at
night, they sure weren't going to follow our guidelines, and be
in by 7:30! So instead of offering them shelter, we've changed
our focus -- we try to get them back with their families, and to
make sure they stay in school so they can get the educations they
must have if they're ever going to break the dead-end cycle of
poverty.
     When pregnant and parenting teens come to us, we require
that they stay in school. Then we assign to the girl a case
worker, who works with the girl to get her back together with her
family and into programs to help with specific problems. We try
to help these girls set and achieve goals, for themselves and for
their children, and we follow up continually. In the meantime,
we're putting our limited housing resources where they can make
the most difference: rehabilitating drug and alcohol abusers. I
think we've made the right choice.
     The second-hardest part of the job, I must admit, is raising
funds. The bulk of our support comes from foundations,
corporations, individuals, and speaking fees -- I'll go almost
anywhere to make a speech. I do most of the fund-raising myself.
To maintain our independence, and continue to operate our shelter
in the way we feel we must, we do not accept money from any
government agency, or even from the Roman Catholic Church. Some
individual parishes do take up special collections for us, and
that helps. But things are often tight. Sister Therese and I are
fortunate to have a dedicated staff who put in long hours for
very little money; nobody who works for us is doing it for the
pay scale.
     Our work at St. Martin's, and our techniques for helping
homeless women take charge of their lives, attracted attention at
City Hall. Chicago's Commissioner of Human Services, Daniel
Alvarez, decided it would be a good idea to have a civilian head
up Mayor Richard Daley's Task Force on the Homeless, and he
thought I might bring some fresh ideas to the job, so I was
appointed chairman in 1989. I am the first non-bureaucrat to hold
the position. One of my first acts as chairman was to re-evaluate
the way the staffs of Chicago-area shelters were counting the
number of homeless in our city.

Homeless Numbers Don't Add Up

     The actual number of homeless in America is a hotly
contested figure. I think some of the advocates inflate the
number of homeless individuals in order to get more financial
assistance from the agencies that support them. Actually, there
are more than enough genuine homeless people without exaggerating
the count. The National Coalition for the Homeless claims that
there are between 2.5 to 3 million homeless people in the United
States. I think that number is vastly inflated; the real number
is probably closer to half a million, and they are not all
looking for shelter on the same night. I base my estimate on
regular polls I take of the usage of shelters in different
cities, a poll I update frequently. So I no longer pay attention
to the NCH figures.
     The homeless count gets inflated in part because people who
aren't really homeless are often included, like those who are
just between apartments for a few days, and go to a shelter
instead of to a friend's place or a motel. In Chicago, the
court-mandated system says that anytime there aren't enough
regular beds for the inmates at Cook County Jail, the excess
population has to be released, and many of these men simply head
for a homeless shelter. They are not allowed to sleep on
mattresses on the floor in jail, but that is exactly what they do
as soon as they're released. Another major problem is the
overcounting of the legitimate homeless.
     Previously, if a woman went to Shelter A and found it full,
she was counted as a turn-away. If she went to Shelter B, and
they didn't have room either, she was counted a second time. By
the time she actually found a bed at Shelter C, she'd been
counted three times.
     To prevent this overcounting, I developed a form for service
providers to fill out, with space for initials (to preserve
privacy), age, number of children, and their ages -- to prevent
double and triple counting. By implementing this tracking system,
we cut the count of turn-aways in Chicago by two-thirds. Today,
in my capacity as chairman of the task force, I keep track of all
of the area-shelter statistics, and we have a pretty good idea of
exactly how many homeless people there are in the city and how
many beds are required. These statistics tell me that our methods
work better than those used by other groups for tracking the
homeless population.

Warming Centers vs. Real Warmth

     Another point on which we disagree with the advocates is
whether or not we need warming centers. There are a number of
well-meaning people who believe in setting up mattresses in
church basements and letting people sleep there overnight.
Usually, it's a different location every night, and the people
have got to find a place to spend the day. Too often, they make a
nuisance of themselves in local libraries and parks. What's
worse, they don't have the continuity that they need to get their
lives together.
     I can't imagine sleeping in a different place every night,
with no place to keep my personal belongings, no place to go
during the day, no way to put a resum‚ together, nowhere even
that I could tell a prospective employer he could call me! I
especially can't imagine putting a child through it -- yet, many
homeless advocates are putting resources into these warming
centers, instead of into real shelters with real programs that
could help these people regain their lives. If you're going to
try to get people stabilized, you can't just revolve them through
a nightly system. You have to do more than offer them a place to
sleep.
     There is an urgent need for more shelters that take our
approach and advance the objective of getting the homeless to be
more responsible for their own lives. My first word of advice to
anyone considering the St. Martin's approach is to take off the
rose-colored glasses. Take a look at each individual person, and
try to address her or his needs. Because no matter what you do,
you're not going to solve the whole homeless problem with one
program. We spent our first six months figuring out that you can
only do so much.
     We've found that it is essential to keep the house from
getting too large. I think that anything over 100 adult beds is
too big, because you can't really give individuals the help they
need. Frankly, I think the smaller houses -- those with 50 or 60
beds -- have the best chances for success.
     Another thing we've determined in our work is that
government assistance actually may be part of the problem. We're
not going to see any significant improvements in the homeless
numbers until we see some major policy changes in the way welfare
is administered. I'd like to see the whole system abandoned;
people should not live continually on the dole. People must
obtain job skills; they have to decide on their own what they
want to make of their lives.
     The homeless advocates, because of their heavy reliance on
government funding, have called me cruel for saying that we must
cut off this easy government money, that we must put time limits
on how long individuals can collect assistance, and that we must
put limits on the amount of assistance available.
     But the fact is there's nothing more satisfying than being
self-sufficient, and accomplishing your goals. The people who
have come through St. Martin de Porres are happy. Their lives are
their own. They have discovered the satisfactions of earning
their own money, saving their money, and spending it as they
wish.

Success and Independence

     The really satisfying part of my job is seeing our success
stories, and they're all over the Chicago area, with jobs and
responsibilities. They are living in decent apartments; they're
teaching their children a better way to live; they're getting
educations and turning their backs on the way they used to live.
Not a day goes by that Sister Therese and I don't hear from a
former resident, just checking in to let us know how her life is
coming along. And it's almost always good news.

Happy Endings

     There are women like Juanita Green, a child of the black
middle class who had a college degree and a responsible job, and
burned them both up with her five-year crack habit. When she
arrived at St. Martin's, she was broke, with a brand-new baby;
her other child had been taken from her and was in foster care.
Her first day here, she told us, "I feel like I'm no good." We
told her it was up to her to make things happen, but that we were
here to help her. Nine months later, she was clean; she'd saved
$3,000 in cash, and more than $1,200 in food stamps. She was
reunited with her older daughter, and she was ready to set up her
own apartment. It was a proud moment when she got a job, told
public aid goodbye, and came back to inform us, "Now I'm a
taxpayer again."
     "Roxanne" (not her real name) will admit that she doesn't
always maintain our strict 10:30 P.M. bedtime -- but at least
she's not staying up all night anymore. She benefitted from our
forced discipline and accountability -- and tells us that the
life-skills classes she had at St. Martin's taught her how to
take care of her children. Through our programs, Roxanne kicked
her crack and alcohol addictions, and has stayed clean. Being
free from drugs and a good mother to her children are huge
accomplishments for this former resident, and she credits the
responsibility she learned at St. Martin's with giving her the
strength to do both.
     Most of our clientele is poor and black, but by no means
all. One of the toughest cases we've ever had was "Catherine,"
from a middle-class white family. She was sent to us six months
pregnant, after seven years of continuous drinking. Catherine was
abusive, and tested every single limit we had.
     One night she managed to slip out the back door of the
shelter, get hold of a bottle, and disappeared for several days.
We threw her out when she finally turned up several days later --
but she came back the next week, bruised and battered, and begged
us to take her back. We did, but we watched her like hawks after
that; she didn't even get to go to the bathroom by herself.
     Three months later Catherine had a beautiful baby with no
trace of fetal alcohol syndrome; today, she's happily married and
has a good job. Catherine is one of our greatest success stories,
but there are scores of other women like her.
     The St. Martin de Porres House of Hope alone can only do so
much. But there is no reason that other individuals or groups who
want to make a difference helping the homeless can't apply the
same principles and achieve the same results. I firmly believe
that the only way we really can help the homeless is to teach
them how to help themselves.

SISTER CONNIE DRISCOLL is president of St. Martin de Porres House
of Hope. BRYAN MILLER, who assisted in writing this article, is a
freelance writer in Chicago.

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