Begging for beds

June 30, 2005

THE STORIES are different --a lost job, a deported husband, a violent spouse, illness, a drug problem -- but the endings all converge at a single place: family homelessness. The people are typically single parents, usually mothers, tying knots in the fraying threads of their lives to protect their children.

Some say that walking into a homeless shelter is the hardest thing they've had to do. They describe the shame of telling their children that the shelter will be home for now.

But shelters can be starting points where families catch their breath and regroup, getting help with housing but also education, employment, and substance abuse. From shelters, some families go on to build healthy lives that defy despair. Their stories end as tales of hard-won self-sufficiency.

The challenge can be getting families into shelters and providing key services.

Some families have incomes that are too high to allow them to qualify for state assistance. Others can't come up with the documents -- such as pay stubs and birth certificates -- they need to complete the state's application for shelter.

So a homeless father and veteran who was born in Stoneham and has a 3-year-old daughter couldn't get into a state-funded shelter because his Social Security disability check is too large.

''Asking for help has been like pulling teeth," he said in an interview about his efforts, which finally succeeded when he found a shelter that had privately funded beds. Unfortunately, there aren't enough of these beds to meet the demand.

On Wednesday, the Massachusetts Coalition for the Homeless got a call from a woman with a 14-month-old baby who was living with her mother. The woman says her mother shifted from verbal abuse to physical abuse. The woman needs shelter, but Leslie Lawrence of the coalition says she has stumbled on the welfare department's request for documents, including a letter from her mother.

Some relief is pending in the Legislature's conference committee budget. It would raise eligibility from 100 percent of the federal poverty line to 130 percent. The budget would also place families who appear to be income-eligible in shelters and give them 30 days to gather and submit verifying documents. These are provisions that Governor Romney should not veto.

Massachusetts should use scarce public dollars only for people with real needs who meet eligibility rules. But the state can afford to be more generous to and patient with homeless families, because there is currently a 97-bed-per-night vacancy rate in state-funded beds. These are empty beds that could be safety nets for families.