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Homeless count raises awareness

JANESVILLE — I knew it would be cold and dark.

I didn't expect it to be scary.

But combing a deserted Schilberg Park in Milton at 1:30 a.m.—even with three people in tow—is just, well, creepy.

I can't imagine spending the night in a place like that, exposed to the January wind and the whims of man.

But every night, people in Rock County do just that—including at least 21 people Wednesday night, according to the Rock County Homeless Count.

The biannual count, ordered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, helps determine need and grants for Rock County not-for-profits, said Marc Perry, director of planning and development for Community Action of Rock and Walworth Counties.

Plus, it raises awareness about homelessness in Rock County, Perry said.

"Just because you don't see people like you see in some urban cities, urban communities, doesn't mean they're not there," he told volunteers Wednesday.

Organizers from 8 a.m. Wednesday to 8 a.m. today collected information from emergency shelters, transitional housing and organizations handing out motel vouchers. From 11 p.m. to 4 a.m., a group of 63 volunteers—a record for the count—fanned out across the county to search for people living on the streets.

I was invited to participate as a member of Janesville's Young Professional Group. My team of four was sent to Milton and Edgerton.

We found no solid evidence of homelessness in four hours of searching, despite looking in gas stations, parks, alleys and parking lots. But we did find footprints in the snow leading to shelters at Milton's Schilberg Park and Edgerton's Racetrack Park that made us think people had tried to seek refuge there recently.

Other groups found more.

A group led by Billy Bob Grahn, a former homeless man and current director of the Red Road House shelter for recovering addicts, found 12 people living along Turtle Creek in Beloit.

They saw tents under bridges and clothes hanging from bridge supports.

"There were a lot of encampments, more than I've ever seen," Grahn said.

Annie Showers-Curtis, a junior at Janesville's TAGOS Leadership Academy, joined Grahn's group. She has been homeless before—she lived in the House of Mercy and with relatives when her mother got too sick to work—but the search Wednesday still affected her, she said.

"It kind of freaked me out a little bit, really, and made me sad," she said.

Wednesday night's total of 21 was down from 24 in September and 44 last January. Perry thinks the decrease might have something to do with the opening of a men's homeless shelter, GIFTS, in Janesville last winter. Twenty-three men stayed in the shelter Wednesday night.

People living on the street are just one side of homelessness, Perry said. Many families stay in shelters, such as the House of Mercy in Janesville or Twin Oaks in Darien, or transitional housing, such as YWCA Transitional Living. Many homeless women are victims of domestic abuse, and children often get caught in the middle.

The number of people living in emergency shelters and transitional living Wednesday night was not immediately available. On Sept. 25, 117 people stayed in emergency shelters or received motel vouchers and 147 lived in transitional housing. Another 130 couldn't access services.

Unfortunately, many of those people end up with nowhere to go, Perry said.

"We have a finite amount of funding and a finite amount of space, so some people end up sleeping on the street," he said.

As I ate pancakes at Perkins with my friends after the long night, I kept thinking about those people with nowhere to go. I hope they found warm breakfasts, and I hope the community finds ways to help them.

Because the thought of so many people living on the streets is scary.