Serving homeless is city’s dilemma

Lisa Snedeker

Monday, Nov. 2, 1998 | 11:06 a.m.

It's a quiet Wednesday evening in downtown Henderson.

But not in the kitchen of St. Timothy's Episcopal Church, where volunteers are bustling -- piling steaming spaghetti and meatballs on plates, slicing hot garlic bread, and dishing out fresh coleslaw. Topping it off are pieces of pie and cake, with candied apples on the way from a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints youth group.

As dusk deepens, from out of the shadows figures head toward the warm light and welcoming smells and sounds spilling out of the open doorway leading into the kitchen at 43 W. Pacific Ave.

Don Carter stands on the porch watching the organized chaos through the doorway and takes a long drag off his cigarette.

"I was just like anyone else out there," he reminisces. "I used to race quarter horses. I've raised three sons and owned two businesses. I was well respected in my community."

When he moved to the valley five years ago, Carter said he was looking for a new start after divorcing his wife of 25 years. A healthy interest in gambling ensued, and tonight Carter will once again find himself staring at a ceiling of stars from his sleeping bag rolled out in the desert.

"There is no difference between us (homeless) and anyone else except that doorknob," he said.

But right now he is focused on the task at hand -- feeding some 60 people who for one reason or another have found themselves with no place but the desert to call home.

Carter, who volunteers his time, was put in charge of the kitchen about a month ago by the Friends of the Desert, a nonprofit, loosely organized group that serves hot meals out of the church three nights a week, sandwiches and coffee on Mondays and Fridays and lunch on the weekends.

Carter said it is important to provide meals every day, because it allows people to look for work instead food. He added that the meals also provide hope.

"If I've got a meal to go to, I can take a chance to try to get a job," he said.

As the men, some women and a few small children make their way to St. Timothy's, they file past various storefronts with signs in their windows that read "Please Don't Give Money to Panhandlers."

Among those storefronts is a gourmet coffee shop that is one of a number of businesses that donate food to the Friends, illustrating Henderson's paradox.

"We are happy to give them food, we just don't want them panhandling and running off our customers," one of the coffee shop's owners explained.

There is no homeless shelter in Henderson, so once the hungry are fed at St. Timothy's, they have no place to go. Downtown businesses, which struggle to compete with newer strip malls along Boulder Highway, for months inundated the Henderson Police Department with complaints of panhandlers harassing customers.

The response, said Police Chief Tom Burns, was twofold: A crackdown coupled with cooperation with Henderson Allied Community Advocates -- an umbrella group for the city's homeless and needy services -- that resulted in the posters.

"City ordinance prohibits panhandling," he said. "We ignored them for awhile. Then we took a zero-tolerance approach toward some of the petty crimes they were committing, because they didn't go away."

As part of the plan, police officers give pamphlets to the homeless that provide the names, addresses and telephone numbers of resources that are available throughout the valley as well as outline some of the city's laws.

"Our mission is to help them get back on the road to not being homeless," Burns said.

Carter said he thinks the posters send a conflicting message.

"Part of the community just wants to have the homeless go away," he said. "But you just can't keep pushing them around (from community to community). The problem has to be solved here and help people help themselves."

Barbara Heyer, one of the volunteers from St. Peter's Catholic Church who supports Carter's theory, added she wants to see a shelter built in Henderson.

"Henderson doesn't want homeless people," she said. "They are humans, they are not spirits. Where do we want them to go?"

Liz Pero, who recently took charge of the Friends, said she knows some of the downtown businesses aren't crazy about what the group is doing at St. Timothy's.

"Homelessness is something everyone wishes would just go away," she said. "A lot of businesses don't want to see the homeless, but there are an estimated 18,000 in the valley.

"It is pretty stupid to put up (no panhandling) signs," she said. "But it's just the mentality."

Burns verified that businesses have been vocal about panhandlers downtown.

"We have seen an increase in complaints especially from downtown businesses (about panhandlers) in the past five months," Burns said.

He added that just feeding people is not the answer to the homeless problem that is reaching epidemic proportions across the valley.

"You are just enabling them, you are not helping them," he said.

Giving Life Ministries, which works with the homeless coalition, does not feed anyone on the premises but it does give out a week's supply of food to the homeless and the needy on Tuesday and Friday mornings through its Emergency Assistance Program, according to John Bagwell, associate pastor.

While the primary function of the decade-long program at 416 Perlite Way has been the food pantry, it also tries to help individuals break out of the cycle they find themselves in.

"We have a short interview program where they fill out a form to assess their needs," Bagwell said. "We help with IDs so they can get jobs."

The ministry, which also serves Boulder City and Searchlight at times, receives grant money only for food, so any other help it can provide is strictly through donations.

"Our main thrust is to help the homeless and the needy get through the rough parts," Bagwell said.

As part of coalition, the ministry is involved in a community group effort to help the homeless. The group is made up of government and city agencies as well as individual groups to provide a central family resources center and network. No one from the group could be reached for comment.

"They really do good work," Bagwell said. "We try to get people to go there first instead of coming to us. We are just another agency to help out."

Burns explained that the homeless coalition brings together all the fragmented efforts -- with the exception of the Friends -- in the city to help the homeless.

Burns said the police department is working with all the groups and agencies concerning the homeless.

"We're never going to solve the homeless problem," he said. "But we will help the needy and help the ones who want help."

Pero said the main goal of the Friends is just to feed hungry people.

"Janet (who founded the group) couldn't stand that people were eating out of dumpsters," she said. "If we didn't feed these people, the city would see crime go up."

Pero said that while the Friends used to work with the coalition, she was not sure, being new in her role, as to why they no longer do.

Because the Friends is not funded by grants, it can immediately help people, according to Pero.

"There is an incredible amount of help in Henderson," she said.

Pero said what is happening at St. Timothy's has been an eye opener.

"It's like a little miracle house," she said. "I would see homeless people and never talk to them, but some of them are worth talking to. They just slipped and they can't get up."

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