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Who's Problem is Homelessness?: Work
Who's Problem is Homelessness?
By: Emma ann Lay
This article is an investigative journal piece over the course of January through May of 2023 concentrating on the question of who is to blame for the failures of Rock Hill's 2009 10-year Plan to End Homelessness. The story consists of an article, photos, and a news package on Homeless Court in Rock Hill, South Carolina.
Who's Problem is Homelessness?: Welcome
Staff Report
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(Rock Hill, S.C.) – Rock Hill is on the outskirts of one of North Carolina’s largest and fastest-growing cities, and with a growing city comes a growing homeless population.
Being 25 miles outside of downtown Charlotte, North Carolina with a plethora of non-profit and volunteer homeless organizations causes the overflow of homeless people in Charlotte to seek refuge in Rock Hill instead.
Rock Hill’s 2009 10-year Plan to End Homelessness was the first of many probable remedies to the issue, but with the homeless population growing each year the problems just keep getting worse.
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“So many come down for opportunities, to access resources, to look for jobs, to look for shelters because Charlotte has maxed out their capacity,” said Pathways Community Center Executive Director Alex Greenawalt.
“Rock Hill has such a dense cluster of amazing non-profits and service providers that are able to provide that piece of the puzzle to help people get self-sufficient,” said Greenawalt
Pathways Community Center in Rock Hill is one of many homeless resources available to the public and was one of the few successful outcomes of the 2009 10-year plan.
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Rock Hill’s 2009 10-year Plan to End Homelessness was ultimately never fulfilled to its total potential, “that 10-year plan was not adaptive, and looked at often to really adapt to the plan year after year as things in the environment, as policies, as things are changing you really have to adjust it and that’s where I think it kinda fell short,” said Greenawalt.
The incompletion of the 2009 10-year plan led to many advocates for homelessness in the community in search of other ways to help.
Life House Founder Courtney Denton came up with the concept of the Life House Shelters after realizing there was a “growing need in our community,” and wanting to “provide a service on the continuum of care for our community that was unmet and desperately needed.”
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Within Rock Hill, there are many non-profit organizations and other private foundations or volunteer groups that assist homeless people, but yet the city has hit its highest homeless population in all time with other two hundred people experiencing homelessness in some form.
Rock Hill natives wonder where the city stands on the growing homelessness problem since the book closed on the 2009 10-year plan.
“There are smaller organizations like Trunk of Love, Women's Life Shelter and Bethel Men's Shelter that the City routinely works with in assisting with logistical and, in some cases (through CACH) financial support. These shelters, and others, play a crucial role in the continuum of care in Rock Hill,” said Rock Hill Mayor John Gettys.
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The city clearly supports many of the local non-profits in Rock Hill and York County without question, but the real question is how big of a priority is homelessness to the city of Rock Hill.
When asked what he thought the city’s biggest necessity was at the moment, Mayor Gettys responded with, “[t]his is a difficult and far-reaching issue and requires an "all hands on deck" mentality. It requires other political jurisdictions to assist and that is another set of issues to work through so the city has additional resources at its disposal.”
One of the biggest pieces of aid the city has contributed to the homelessness problem is the new affordable housing initiative.
“So when you talk about housing we have affordable housing, and then you have attainable housing. Attainable housing is really what you're talking about when you're talking about individuals that…make decent money they’re making a good living, however, the cost of things [are] so expensive they just can’t afford to live in The Exchange (affordable housing units),” said City of Rock Hill Community Development Coordinator Corrine Sferrazza.
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The high rate of gentrification occurring within the surrounding Charlotte-Metro area causes for severe displacement and increases the homeless numbers, and with today’s economy, things are only getting worse.
“It’s kinda what we call the recourse housing; that gap where you make too much to qualify for assisted units…you’re in this missing middle piece. That’s the piece that we need to figure out,” Sferrazza said.
South Carolina recently passed a new amendment to a 1976 Affordable Housing Bill that now allows for towns, cities and municipalities with a population over 50,000 to qualify for the adoption of voluntary inclusionary housing options.
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This new amendment allows Rock Hill to adapt new affordable housing developments with a certain percentage of units in each housing development dedicated to affordable rent based on an annual income median.
The city has also adopted an initiative that was originally established in San Diego known as “Homeless Court.”
“The purpose is to see whether the homeless have some legal issues that are keeping them from having a home or having a job,” said Rock Hill City Municipal Judge Jane Modla.
Homeless Court started in California as a result of many homeless people being unable to get jobs and get off the street from receiving misdemeanors for simply being on the streets.
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Homeless Court in Rock Hill
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City judges in California were able to come up with a way to expunge many of these people from small misdemeanors stopping them from succeeding and getting off the streets.
Homeless court sessions in South Carolina have recently begun working with the South Carolina Legal Services team to help resolve previous civil legal issues to “find housing, find a job…so that could be getting a birth certificate, it could be getting an expungement, getting their drivers license restored [and] any number of those things. ” said Managing Attorney at South Carolina Legal Services Jamie L. Bell.
Homeless Court allows for those at a disadvantage to be given a second chance to get back on their feet and off the streets.
“It’s gonna be a drop in the bucket, but it’s one small thing that people in the legal community can do,” Modla said.
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It is clear that there are many options and opportunities for support for the homeless in Rock Hill, but it is unclear if the city is on the same page and timeline for solving this problem as everyone else.
Leaders in the community met with the Catawba Area Coalition for Homelessness recently to discuss a new plan that involves everyone in York County being on board.
“It's an issue which we all know will continue to grow as York County's population grows, and we the Mayors of Clover, Fort Mill, Rock Hill, Tega Cay and York realize it's going to take all of us working together to find solutions,” said Greenawalt in a draft of the sub-committee proposal to the Mayors of York County.
“This suggestive committee would ultimately be “forming a new Homeless and Affordable Housing Commission with membership composed of citizens selected by each municipality and township and by the County Council,” Greenawalt said.
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The Life House
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“Together these men and women would have responsibility to the York County Council for seeking solutions that would help our county be proactive in its approach to this growing issue before it begins to affect our quality of life,” Greenawalt said.
The CACH hopes that, in agreement with all the county’s mayors, this will take some pressure off individual cities, and allow professionals with real-world experience to step in while still working under the county.
By creating this subcommittee, it allows professionals with familiarity of the situation of the community to step in and provide accurate data, feedback and options for solutions.
However, for those first-hand experiencing homelessness, Rock Hill and York County are already doing above and beyond the norm.
“Compared to a different city, you guys have a lot of services,” said a current homeless member at the Haven shelter Julia Jones.
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The Haven is a non-profit organization and one of three shelters in the Life House Shelters for Women and Children in Rock Hill that provide short-term, emergency, and long-term sheltering.
“We didn’t have [a] bathroom, we had portable potties outside. We didn’t have a place to take a shower,” said a current homeless member Maria when comparing The Haven to other shelters she has been in.
For some of the women living at the Haven, Rock Hill has already done more than they could have imagined, but there is always more to be done.
“Our community is in need of affordable housing more specifically housing that meets the wage rate of one who works and makes $15 - $20 an hour. We have very [few] options for those working and making that type of wage,” said Denton.
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Maria and Julia Jones at the Haven Shelter
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“We’re decently strong on the rapid re-housing side, but [on] the permanent supportive housing side we have little to none in our entire community,” said Greenawalt.
However, Mayor Gettys assures that there is much already being done and plenty of assisted and affordable housing options.
“Over the last 5 years or so, the city has approved over 1500 affordable housing complexes and [is] waiting on the private developers to build these units once they obtain their necessary financing,” said Gettys.
Despite the reassurance from the city’s Mayor, many of these options are still too expensive or don’t have sustainable employment to maintain the rent.
Like every other growing city in America, Rock Hill has some progress to make regarding its homeless population.
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“It’s something that we can’t just say “it’s a problem locally.” It is a national problem,” said Greenawalt.
However, Rock Hill could make a lot more progress quicker if the city and surrounding organizations could all work together toward a common goal of helping the homeless in Rock Hill rather than multiple dependent goals.
“It takes two of us to tango together, to make a quality of life where everyone has a chance to thrive, live, work and play here in this community,” said Greenawalt.
The City of Rock Hill does have viable programs available to assist homeless individuals, and the community has many viable organizations and options for sheltering, food, employment assistance and more.
The two sides of solving this problem are coexisting together in one city, but are they coinciding with one another in the same community?
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The Newest Shelter in the Life House Organization, The Haven
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