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Point-in-time count proves county harbors 20 percent of Brazos Valley's homeless 
Yearning For Place To Call Home: Twin City Mission shelter resident, Jennifer, 37, is one of many area residents who are displaced from their home because of a mental disability. Jennifer is striving to overcome her bipolar condition that has kept her from returning to her career as a nurse for over a year. Examiner Photo by Dave Lewis
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BY ROSEMARY SMITH, Examiner editor The Brazos Valley Homeless Coalition will be conducting a point-in-time count of the homeless in Grimes County on Wednesday, Jan. 21. The last count in 2007 showed approximately 20 percent of the homeless that live in Brazos Valley were from Grimes County. The one-day count showed only nine unsheltered persons in Grimes County and a total of 43 in the Brazos Valley. Since the count is restricted to the findings over a one-day period, coalition member Alsie Bond said the count is not completely accurate. “We have extrapolated that at any given time, there may be an estimated 1,000-plus homeless individuals in the Brazos Valley.” The estimated number follows the strict HUD definition of homeless and does not include people living with friends or someone who is not family, or even a legal guardian. “There is not a homeless shelter in Grimes County, so there is no shelter count, but there may have been people sheltered by other means, such as in a hotel, at a church, etc. For instance, if an agency is paying for someone to stay in a hotel on an emergency basis, we can count that person as homeless,” said Bond. “These are the people we think we are missing in our counts and would like to get the word out.” The coalition is asking for the communtiy’s help in identifying areas in the county where homeless individuals and families may be living or congregating, such as abandoned buildings, wooded areas, tents and elsewhere. It is the goal of the coalition to reduce homelessness by providing an accurate count to improve services and provide additional funding to better serve clients. “Currently, many homeless access services such as food, medical care, clothing and shelter without letting the service provider know that they are homeless,” said Bond. “Unless a person goes to a shelter that is specifically for the homeless, such as Twin City Mission in Bryan or Faith Mission in Brenham, service providers do not know if the person is homeless or not.” According to Homeless and Housing Services Program Director Steven Bethea of Twin City Mission, most of the homeless that stay in The Bridge shelter in Bryan suffer from mental or health disabilities, were displaced as victims of domestic violence or have drug abuse issues. Others are simply financially strapped, such as seniors that depend on pension or social security checks that cannot keep up with the annual rise in the cost of living, or have recently found themselves jobless. “Some people don’t have family or any place to go. Almost every one of them has a mental or health disability. Some of them have been on a VA pension and just don’t have any other place to live,” said Bethea. Three such tennants have resided at the Bryan shelter for over 20 years and are between the ages of 53 and 73. Shelter resident Tim, 55, admits he has been living at the shelter for nearly five years. Tim said an alcohol abuse problem he was able to manage previously as a law enforcement officer finally caught up with him once he turned 50. “I’ve been an alcoholic since I was in college, but I was functional until I was about 50. It’s a progressive illness,” Tim said. “I wasn’t always like this. I had a home and a career and a normal life before this.” He added that tucking away the stress of his job, rather than dealing with it head on or seeking assistance, compounded his drinking problem. “As an officer, you see a lot of horrible things and I had a lot of personal tragedy I didn’t really deal with like I should have,” said Tim, who has been sober for 18 months thanks to the help of his case manager, Sandra Hoelscher. “Because Sandra Hoelscher cared about me as a person and kept after me, I finally got it. I can’t be drinking and be of use to anybody,” Tim said. Tim now serves as a desk monitor and is taking steps to full recovery one day at a time. Fellow shelter resident, Jennifer, 37, said her bipolar condition caused her to come back to the shelter after a one-year hiatus. She too was an active member of society, she said, before her condition kept her from working after spending nine years in the nursing field. “I’m not able to work because of my disability. I have too much anxiety,” she said. “I hope after I get stabilized, I can go back to nursing.” Jennifer added that though she is grateful for the shelter’s assistance and has made friends that help her feel less isolated, “A lot of stuff is uncertain right now. It’s a depressing place to be-” Kendall, 47, who said he retired early as an aerobics instructor for Bally’s Total Fitness in California, agrees that being homeless is no place to be. “I talk to other people here on occasion, but it gets too depressing to listen to people’s problems,” said the four-month shelter resident. “The shelter has helped because it was here in a pinch. I’d rather stay here than with associates and it helps me save a little bit of money,” said Kendall, who has also been diagnosed with a long-term physical illness. Kendall said he abandoned his apartment in California because of illegal drugs and has been trying to make his way back to his only living family member, a twin brother in Houston, ever since. “We were never really a close-knit family. I just want to see him and keep in contact with him,” said Kendall. “My mother’s dead and my father probably is, too.” Kendall is hoping to move into his own apartment by the end of the month, and three shelter residents agree their goal is to “get back to a normal life”. “People seem to think that there aren’t homeless people in rural areas because you don’t see them under bridges off the Interstate, but they are under bridges and in abandoned buildings and who knows where else,” said Lena Mae Farris Foundation and Elder-Aid Executive Director Cynthia Parker Robertson of Washington. Local law enforcement agencies will also be assisting with identifying places where the homeless tend to reside. According to Navasota Police Chief Shawn Myatt, there are about five local people that are homeless and not all of them want assistance. “We take them (coalition members participating in point-in-time counts) to places we know are abandoned, where homeless folks are known to hang out, so they can offer them help,” said Chief Myatt. According to Bond, point in-time counts are required for grant funding that provides a means for coalition agencies, like the Twin City Mission shelter, to help the homeless. For more information, contact Alsie Bond at 979-209-5175 or abond@bryantx.gov, Amy Hamilton Foster at 979-209-2882 or amy@bryanisd.org or Cynthia Parker Robertson at 936-878-2107 or cynthia@LMFFoundation.org.
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