{"id":8896,"date":"2011-02-14T20:37:48","date_gmt":"2011-02-15T04:37:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.reallifesuperheroes.org\/?p=6446"},"modified":"2011-02-14T20:37:48","modified_gmt":"2011-02-15T04:37:48","slug":"homeless-in-seattle-a-struggle-on-the-streets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/2011\/02\/14\/homeless-in-seattle-a-struggle-on-the-streets\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeless in Seattle: a struggle on the streets"},"content":{"rendered":"

Originally posted: http:\/\/www.thejibsheet.com\/?p=4652<\/a>
\nBy Jeremy Graber<\/a>
\n

\"(SOURCE:<\/a>

(SOURCE: Anonymous) From the left: Skyman, Thanatos, Red Dragon, and White Baron<\/p><\/div>
\nLocals call the restaurant and shop area on Alaskan Way \u201cthe aqueduct.\u201d The street is lined with businesses such as Red Robin, Ye Olde Curiosity Shop, and ferry services which shuttle tourists to and from Bainbridge Island.
\nTo the less fortunate, this area is called home along with other spots across Seattle that provide shelter from the cold and wet weather after the sun sets and the strip closes for the night. These are the people who were unable to get into the many homeless shelters that are found throughout the city.
\nMany shelters have entrance requirements such as passing drug and alcohol screenings, background checks, and sex offender checks. Those who do not fit the bill find themselves put back onto the streets to fend for themselves.
\nThe Union Gospel Mission Men\u2019s Shelter has room for 209 people per night, which includes 104 homeless people that are part of their residential recovery program, a program created to help those suffering from substance abuse find long-term solutions to attaining a better life.
\nAmong other services, this specific shelter offers occupation counseling, spiritual guidance, and programs specifically designed for women and children. They have staff on duty 24-hours a day to receive donations and to aid in emergency intakes when they have the room.
\nLate at night a \u201cSearch & Rescue\u201d van patrols the streets handing out blankets, food, and clothing to those that are camping in doorways. There are anywhere between 10 and 20 people standing outside of the Mission\u2019s doors on 2nd Avenue, hoping they will be let in or wandering with no place else to go.
\nIf you come back to Alaskan Way after the businesses close, it is painfully obvious that it is not enough to take care of those in need. On Saturday night, two brothers were huddled together with their dog hiding in the bushes under the overpass below the Pike Place market.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve been homeless for about two and a half years now \u2013 only in Seattle for about a year,\u201d the oldest said. His youngest brother claimed to be 18, but it he was obviously far younger. The two had been hiding from the police that force them out of the area during the day.
\nA coalition of approximately 10 superheroes from Seattle, Portland and Vancouver (Canada) spent close to 18 hours on Saturday handing out food, hygiene supplies, and provisions to the needy which included the two brothers. They pointed out various encampments throughout Seattle where people had been taking shelter.
\n

\"(SOURCE:<\/a>

(SOURCE: JEREMY GRABER) Knight Owl renders aid to a homeless man who defended his possessions<\/p><\/div>
\nOne such place was under the 6th and Cherry street overpass where at least 30 people were under blankets, sleeping bags, and ponchos. Their possessions were cluttered together in piles of various sizes which indicated how long they had been there.
\nThe encampment was inhabited by those who were sober and those who were obviously not. There was a married couple who found themselves homeless within the past few weeks after they had been evicted. Underneath an American flag, two veterans shared a spot where they racked out for the night.
\nFor two hours, the group of super volunteers unloaded supplies from a minivan and conversed with the inhabitants. Skyman, a native of Seattle, had prepared almost 100 bundles that he called \u201cSky packs\u201d which contained 2 puddings, a granola bar, two pairs of socks, and hygiene items.
\nKnight Owl, a superhero from Portland, gave medical attention to a man whose hands were badly injured while defending his possessions from a gang that frequently raids their shelters.
\n\u201cThey come in the night as we\u2019re going to sleep to steal our things,\u201d one of the homeless said. He describes a group of 8 or 9 men that rob and attack them on nearly a nightly basis. He added that \u201cmany of the people here can\u2019t get into a shelter because they don\u2019t pass the drug tests.\u201d
\nThe people under the overpass pointed out that it is hard for many of them to stay clean because of a white van that comes by selling drugs. \u201cThose who are struggling with their sobriety find themselves unable to say \u2018no,\u2019\u201d commented Thanatos, one of the superheros from Vancouver, Canada.
\nA spokesperson from the Seattle\/King County Coalition on Homelessness said stories like this are all too common. People are assaulted and what little they have is taken from them, sometimes by the people that they share the same space with. \u201cMore needs to be done to help them, we just need the resources to get the job done,\u201d the volunteer said.
\nAs federal and state resources shrink, many of these shelters are relying heavily on the donations from their local communities. With a shrinking economy, outreach programs are finding themselves with less and less to work with.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Real Life Superheroes help out the homeless in Seattle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10136,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10],"tags":[118,345,429,573,1203,2190,2196,2313,2338,2430,2637,2835,2927],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8896"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8896"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8896\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rlsh.net\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}