Homelessness in Birmingham
Homelessness in Birmingham is a primary issue.
Mayor Bernard Kincaid assembled a Mayor's Commission to Prevent and End Chronic Homelessness, which drafted "Birmingham's Plan to End Chronic Homelessness", a 10-year action plan aimed at expanding housing options, improving access to support services, updating public policies, and mobilizing community awareness and volunteerism. The plan was adopted by the commission and submitted to the city in May 2007. According to Reverend Lawton Higgs, Sr of the Church of the Reconciler, a Methodist congregation that directly engages Birmingham's homeless, efforts to implement the 10-year plan stalled almost immediately.
One event which aims to implement several of the plan's recommendations is Project Homeless Connect, an annual one-day event at Boutwell Auditorium bringing together numerous agencies and volunteers to provide services such as issuing photo identifications, preparing tax returns, resolving legal disputes and providing medical examinations, haircuts, massages and meals. 518 individuals received help in the first event in April 2008 and at least 650 were helped in 2009. Boutwell Auditorium also opens as a warming station on nights when the temperature is forecast to drop below freezing. Some additional services, including donated clothing and toiletries and hot meals provided through Heart to Table, are distributed on those nights.
In a January 2012 survey, volunteers for One Roof (formerly Metropolitan Birmingham Services for the Homeless) found a total of 1,707 homeless individuals in the Birmingham area. Of those, 662 were residing in transitional shelters and 347 were sleeping in emergency shelters, leaving 698 unsheltered homeless living on the streets. Among those unsheltered, 347 were considered "chronically homeless", meaning that they have been living on the streets or in shelters for more than a year, or have been homeless four or more times in three years, with a physical, mental or developmental disability or substance addiction impairing their efforts to find a permanent home.
In all, the volunteers found that 717 of the people they interviewed had signs of severe mental illness and 894 were chronic substance abusers. 175 of the homeless were war veterans and 132 were living with HIV/AIDS. They found 25 homeless minors and 191 homeless families with dependent children.
In 2015 a report of date from the "Point in Time" count made by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development indicated that the state's homeless population dropped from 4,561 in January 2014 to 3,970 at the same time in 2015. Of those, 2,868 were individuals and 1,102 were with family members. 2,943 of the total were living in shelters or other institutional residences with the other 1,027 classified as "unsheltered". 607 were "chronically homeless," having lived continuously on the streets for more than a year. 474 of them were veterans, and 228 were minors living on their own. Of the state's 3,970 homeless people, 1,153 were counted in the Birmingham area, with 578 in Mobile, 441 in Montgomery and 420 in Huntsville.
Homeless shelters
- Brother Bryan Mission
- Changed Lives Christian Center
- Firehouse Mission
- First Light
- Interfaith Hospitality House
- Jimmie Hale Mission
- Pathways
- Safe Haven
- Salvation Army Birmingham Area Command
- St Benedict's Veterans Center
- The Foundry
Service providers
References
- "House it going?" (May 10, 2007) Birmingham Weekly
- Garrison, Greg (May 4, 2008) "Railroad Park disrupts homeless; police overreact, activists say." The Birmingham News
- Gray, Jeremy (October 18, 2012) "A snapshot of the Birmingham area's homeless population." The Birmingham News
- Gray, Jeremy (November 19, 2015) "Homelessness in Alabama dropped 13 percent in 1 year." The Birmingham News