An inside look at Madison's homeless shelter for men
In 2007, when Donna Acif began volunteering at Madison's emergency shelter for men at Grace Episcopal Church, she started hearing stories about a man named Larry.
Larry had been banned from the shelter - in downtown Madison on Capitol Square - because he had lice and scabies. Told he couldn't come back until he got a doctor's note saying he was free of the vermin, he simply stayed on the streets, often sleeping just around the corner on the church's steps. Asif eventually tracked him down.
"He slept on the streets for two years until I came across him," says Asif, who is active with the Madison Homeless Initiative and has advocated on homeless issues for years. "He was waiting to die. He had no idea what to do."
But Larry's problems were not unmanageable, Asif found. He just needed someone to listen to him and help him. She got Larry medical care, cleaned him up, gave him clothes and blankets. She helped him get into transitional housing and then, in August 2009, an apartment, where he lives today.
Larry, who's in his mid-50s, calls Asif a "god-send." Asif regrets that he never found help at the shelter. "He could have been taken off the streets two years earlier," she says.
No one expects a homeless shelter to be a Fendi Replica Handbags cheery or an uplifting place. But many homeless people and their allies say the shelter at Grace Episcopal, run by Porchlight Inc., is unacceptably bleak. It's a main focus of efforts to alter how Madison treats its homeless.
"Is it better than nothing? Yes," Asif says. "So there are many guys very appreciative for what they get. It will keep you alive, but it may also take away your dignity and break your spirit. It's not a place of rest or hope, but of insult and injury And it doesn't have to be that way."
The Rev. Jonathan Grieser, rector of Grace Episcopal Church, does not criticize Porchlight, but says he has also heard complaints and is concerned.
"It's offensive to me, and it should be offensive to everybody in the city, that guys have to stand in line for two hours in the tag heuer replica cold before getting into the shelter," he says. "When we baptize people into the church, we promise to respect the dignity of every human person. And that's my bottom line."
Porchlight's executive director, Steve Schooler, acknowledges there are problems with the shelter, which he's working to address. "We really do care for the people we serve here," he says. "We try to do the best we can."
The question for Madison: Is that good enough?
I'd been hearing stories for months from homeless people and their friends about how awful the drop-in shelter is. Among the common complaints: It's filthy; you catch lice and crabs there; you have to wait in line for hours; the staff is mean; fights and theft are common. Some report mistreatment, particularly from the shelter's night manager, Jim Willis. They say people are kicked out for seemingly random reasons.
I loathe those first-person stories by journalists who pretend that by sleeping in a homeless shelter for a night, they know what it's like to be homeless. But in this case, there was no other way to see what the place is like. So one night in late January, I spent a night at Grace.
In the winter, the shelter opens at 5 p.m., but guests are not allowed on church property until 15 minutes prior. The homeless, hoping to secure a choice bunk, begin lining up o
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