04/10/08:Advocates See Media Fanning Homeless Scare - Madison-area Urban Ministry
Advocates See Media Fanning Homeless Scare
The Capital Times :: FRONT :: A1
Thursday, April 10, 2008
By PAT SCHNEIDER
Homeless people "are our brothers, our sisters. They are members of our community," says Linda Ketcham, executive director of Madison-area Urban Ministry.
She was preparing for a noontime press conference at Community Action Coalition of South Central Wisconsin called in response to what advocates perceive as a growing tendency to demonize the homeless in the wake of two recent deaths. "We're concerned about the stereotyping, the profiling, the scapegoating that's going on now," Ketcham said.
"We have a shared responsibility as a community," she said, "I think that's what's been forgotten here."
It started after the killing in January of Joel Marino at his home near Brittingham Park as police sought a "person of interest" who frequented State Street. Then it became known that downtown landlord Fred Mohs cut off parking for the members of First United Methodist Church when they refused to stop offering their building as an overflow shelter for homeless men, adding to the services base that he maintains attracts the homeless to town. Finally, the killing of UW-Madison student Brittany Sue Zimmermann brought reports that police were targeting homeless people in the investigation.
The media spin on these events, sometimes inflammatory, has heightened feelings of alienation among the homeless, their advocates say.
Dean Loumis, director of Housing Initiatives, said arguments like those in Blaska Blog, that the homeless should be put to work on public projects before receiving aid, work against civil discourse.
"A tone like that throws a bomb into the conversation," Loumis said. "It emboldens people to target the people most vulnerable in society."
Blogger Dave Blaska, who intoned "They shall be called vagrants" on one posting, protested in a phone interview today that he didn't cause the problems of homelessness.
"If you have policies that enable anti-social behavior, you will get anti-social behavior. And that's inculcated in the social services milieu," he said. "We need to have some tough love approaches."
"What's the difference between tough love and not having compassion?" Lee Klokow wondered out loud this morning at Cleveland's Diner on East Wilson Street. Klokow recalled that he was homeless, living in shelters in the mid-1990s until he got into a program to treat his mental illness and a 12-step recovery program for addiction.
When a moment of clarity comes, if there's a helping hand, homeless people struggling with addiction and mental illness can turn their lives around, he said. Otherwise, "they're destined for a life of degradation."
MEDIA HOUNDS
The homeless people he sees don't seem any different from when he was one of them, Klokow said. "It's more media hysteria than reality."
Ketcham pointed to the use of the word "beggar" in a Wisconsin State Journal front-page headline as one way that media have heated up the issue. Police remarks that they were talking with homeless people in the Bassett neighborhood morphed in news reports and their online permutations into an assertion by police that a homeless suspect was being sought.
Some of those in the transient community are a focus in the Zimmermann investigation and more than two dozen have been questioned, police spokesman Joel DeSpain said today. "We've also focused on students, commuters, business owners, and anyone else who was in and around the neighborhood in the time frame of the homicide,"
UW-Madison student Brandon Hubbartt said people do jump to conclusions about people who look like they're homeless, "but I don't see how you can help but jump to conclusions." And looking at people who spend time in the neighborhood just makes sense, Hubbartt said at the counter of The Curve diner today.
"But how do you think they feel if they're being questioned and they didn't do anything?" asked fellow student Abby Strickler.
That kind of treatment is nothing new, said Kristen Petroshius, a founder of the Operation Welcome Home advocacy group. "As soon as the murder happened, people in our group were stopped on the street and questioned. They were a little offended - just because they're carrying a backpack, they're suspected."
Police roundups won't do anything to solve the problems underlying homelessness, Ketcham said.
'You can have all the sweeps you want, it won't change anything because poverty is growing. The income gap is widening," she said.
The Capital Times :: FRONT :: A1
Thursday, April 10, 2008
By PAT SCHNEIDER
Homeless people "are our brothers, our sisters. They are members of our community," says Linda Ketcham, executive director of Madison-area Urban Ministry.
She was preparing for a noontime press conference at Community Action Coalition of South Central Wisconsin called in response to what advocates perceive as a growing tendency to demonize the homeless in the wake of two recent deaths. "We're concerned about the stereotyping, the profiling, the scapegoating that's going on now," Ketcham said.
"We have a shared responsibility as a community," she said, "I think that's what's been forgotten here."
It started after the killing in January of Joel Marino at his home near Brittingham Park as police sought a "person of interest" who frequented State Street. Then it became known that downtown landlord Fred Mohs cut off parking for the members of First United Methodist Church when they refused to stop offering their building as an overflow shelter for homeless men, adding to the services base that he maintains attracts the homeless to town. Finally, the killing of UW-Madison student Brittany Sue Zimmermann brought reports that police were targeting homeless people in the investigation.
The media spin on these events, sometimes inflammatory, has heightened feelings of alienation among the homeless, their advocates say.
Dean Loumis, director of Housing Initiatives, said arguments like those in Blaska Blog, that the homeless should be put to work on public projects before receiving aid, work against civil discourse.
"A tone like that throws a bomb into the conversation," Loumis said. "It emboldens people to target the people most vulnerable in society."
Blogger Dave Blaska, who intoned "They shall be called vagrants" on one posting, protested in a phone interview today that he didn't cause the problems of homelessness.
"If you have policies that enable anti-social behavior, you will get anti-social behavior. And that's inculcated in the social services milieu," he said. "We need to have some tough love approaches."
"What's the difference between tough love and not having compassion?" Lee Klokow wondered out loud this morning at Cleveland's Diner on East Wilson Street. Klokow recalled that he was homeless, living in shelters in the mid-1990s until he got into a program to treat his mental illness and a 12-step recovery program for addiction.
When a moment of clarity comes, if there's a helping hand, homeless people struggling with addiction and mental illness can turn their lives around, he said. Otherwise, "they're destined for a life of degradation."
MEDIA HOUNDS
The homeless people he sees don't seem any different from when he was one of them, Klokow said. "It's more media hysteria than reality."
Ketcham pointed to the use of the word "beggar" in a Wisconsin State Journal front-page headline as one way that media have heated up the issue. Police remarks that they were talking with homeless people in the Bassett neighborhood morphed in news reports and their online permutations into an assertion by police that a homeless suspect was being sought.
Some of those in the transient community are a focus in the Zimmermann investigation and more than two dozen have been questioned, police spokesman Joel DeSpain said today. "We've also focused on students, commuters, business owners, and anyone else who was in and around the neighborhood in the time frame of the homicide,"
UW-Madison student Brandon Hubbartt said people do jump to conclusions about people who look like they're homeless, "but I don't see how you can help but jump to conclusions." And looking at people who spend time in the neighborhood just makes sense, Hubbartt said at the counter of The Curve diner today.
"But how do you think they feel if they're being questioned and they didn't do anything?" asked fellow student Abby Strickler.
That kind of treatment is nothing new, said Kristen Petroshius, a founder of the Operation Welcome Home advocacy group. "As soon as the murder happened, people in our group were stopped on the street and questioned. They were a little offended - just because they're carrying a backpack, they're suspected."
Police roundups won't do anything to solve the problems underlying homelessness, Ketcham said.
'You can have all the sweeps you want, it won't change anything because poverty is growing. The income gap is widening," she said.
Submitted by wnpj on Fri, 04/25/2008 - 3:51pm.