As far back as the fourteenth century, homelessness was only an issue for those who could help it.
The church in these times was able to take care of the deserving poor and make sure that they were not on the streets. At this time the homeless people included those who wandered, such as men who were migrating workers; they made up most of the homeless population at this time.The undeserving poor were sometimes forced to work in work camps and work long hours for very little pay, many of these actions stripped the individual of their self dignity and even the deserving poor were forced to wear badges that singled them out from the rest at times (Martin, 2007). As the years passed, many of the homeless population consisted of men, vagrants, miners or men doing seasonal work. It wasn’t until the Great Depression that families in their entirety were becoming homeless. Around this time was when the government started to let some of the harsher laws go because there were so many homeless people.
In this day and age, it seems less likely for someone to be homeless, but this is not the way it actually is. Homelessness is still apart of some peoples every day life. There has always been and always will be homeless persons. Why though? Homeless can be defined as someone who does not have a regular place of dwelling or a permanent address for example.
Homelessness is increasing in the United States, people who have children are in the streets and in some shelters there is no room and people are being turned away to sleep in the cold brutal streets.Homelessness began to increase between 1970 and 1980 due to a decrease in affordable housing and an increase in poverty (Martin, 2007). In order to determine who exactly is homeless we need to use critical thinking skills to do so. The government seems to think that this is the definition of homeless: An individual who lacks a fix, regular, and adequate nighttime residence; including if they are in a home or shelter or hotel (Martin, 2007).
According to this definition, there are on average 650,000 individuals who are homeless in any given night in the United States (Martin, 2007).This number may not be entirely accurate because of the people that are living in a car, with a relative or in an abandoned building; they call this the “hidden homeless”. When we consider these individuals, the homeless rate will jump to about 3. 5 million people nationally (Martin, 2007).
It is hard to determine the exact amount of homeless peoples, there have been numerous ways of trying to do this including; having police dress up as regular citizens and try to “interview” possible homeless people and because of someone changing from being homeless and then finding a home for a while then homeless again the results are very inaccurate.As a human service professional, it will be my job to determine causes of homelessness, to do this could help me to help the person in need. We must also look at common stereotypes of those who are homeless or on the streets and disregard these things to really make a difference because we are the ones that will influence state programs that are funded by the people’s votes. The majority of people believe that being homeless was due to a personal choice. Things such as poor work ethic, bad money management or just laziness may be what others think of the homeless and how they came to be homeless.
In all actuality this is most often not the case at all. Homeless people could have been an average working middle class person who had it all, suddenly they were laid off because of their company moving to China to have their work done for next to nothing. After this happened, they did not have enough money to pay their bills and slowly but surely they lost their house, job, car and everything else. Was this their fault? No. Everyday this happens to hard working people and they are left helpless and homeless.
There are the select others that do gamble or drink their lives away but some actually do not develop substance abuse problems until after they are left homeless. As a Human Service Professional, we have to understand all that goes along with every part of every class of people. We have to understand and acknowledge all of the feelings and negative attitudes that people feel about the homeless. It is important as professionals that we do not hold these same stereotypes as others do, in order to help people we must embrace all feelings and thoughts but use it to do well and seek out help for them.
Other than Human Service professionals, the government has things that help out the homeless too. The McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act of 1987 was passed to guarantee government assistance for the homeless and homeless services (Martin, 2007). This act includes funding of over 180 million dollars and there are also Welfare program to help homeless or those in need of assistance. The Welfare program helps single mothers for example by helping them enter or reenter the workforce and find a job that will suit them best.There are many ways that Human Services help the homeless; many shelters have the information necessary for an individual to get the help and support they need to get back up on their feet again.
Many unemployment agencies also have workshops designed to help the unemployed and sometimes will also train or teach people for free to help their odds of getting a job. A Human Service Professional would provide counseling services to adults and children that are homeless.We would offer support groups and advocate for the homeless on a community level and influencing policy and legislation to aid the homeless population and also on a personal case basis (Martin, 2007). We supervise shelters and are case managers for children as well as adults, assisting them to obtain economic and housing stability.
We need to give our clients support systems to help move them towards work and away from poverty. There are many programs that are designed to help the homeless and they are offered in three levels: Emergency shelters, Transitional housing, and Public Housing projects.All of these levels are designed to help the homeless no matter what level they may be experiencing. As stated earlier in this paper, there will always be homelessness in the U. S. It is sad but true.
With the help of human service professionals, hopefully the number of homeless will significantly drop in the years to come. Homelessness has many causes and root causes, these have to do with the personal lives of people and their past or the economy. What ever the cause of it, human service will continue to provide help, insight and knowledge it takes to help someone out of homelessness and back on the right track to a good happy life.
