The Homeless Family Next Door

After the overnight temperatures drop into the teens tomorrow night, don't be surprised when whole families freeze to death on the streets in Kentucky.

Shelters are so overwhelmed by the increase in homeless families, they're having to turn people away.

Shelters in Louisville and Southern Indiana say they are struggling to cope with an increase in homeless families — turning common areas into makeshift sleeping quarters, starting waiting lists, and, in some cases, turning people away.

Advocates, school and shelter officials all say they fear family homelessness is reaching record levels here, and while it’s difficult to precisely quantify, they cite a variety of indications, which include:

*Jefferson County Public Schools counted 9,023 homeless students during the 2008-09 school year, and educators project that the district is on pace to exceed that number during the current school year. Already, schools have seen about 800 more homeless children than the same time in the last school year.

*Volunteers of America says its emergency shelter and transitional apartments for homeless families, which can house 18 households, have been full since at least mid-2008 and since then, the number of families requesting housing aid has risen 21 percent. At the same time, the Salvation Army began a waiting list for its temporary apartments about four months ago, and is turning away four to five families a day, said Margaret Saunders, the agency’s director of transitional housing.

*Wayside Christian Mission gained some space for families when it started using the Hotel Louisville to house women and children in November, transferring people from its Market Street shelter. But within days, the mission’s 60-person shelter space was full, said Nina Moseley, Wayside’s chief operating officer, noting that one of its families had been living in a tent.

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Advocates blame the increases on worsening poverty rates and joblessness.

“We’re seeing a lot of middle-class families who never thought they would be faced with a homeless situation,” Saunders said.

“Every family shelter in Louisville has a long waiting list,” Moseley said, adding, “there’s people out there.”

And, they fear, worst may be yet to come.

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