Las Vegas’ rising homeless ranks part of trend

Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2001 | 10:51 a.m.

SUN STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

The growing numbers of homeless people in Las Vegas are part of a national trend, a new study by the U.S. Conference of Mayors shows.

With unemployment rising and housing costs still high, cities around the nation are experiencing increased homelessness, the study says.

Shelters are overflowing, and more people this year are sleeping on floors in dingy social service centers, living in cars or spending nights on the streets. Las Vegas, which was not surveyed in the study, is estimated to have about 10,000 homeless people. Local shelters operated by the Salvation Army and Catholic Charities have closed in the last year. Even with the November opening of an emergency tent at the MASH Village shelter, dozens of men, women and children still sleep across the street from that shelter.

In New York, Boston and other cities that were included in the study, homelessness is at record levels, a consequence of a faltering economy that has crumbled even further as a result of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The survey found that requests for emergency shelter had increased an average of 13 percent over last year. The report said the increases were 26 percent in Trenton, N.J., 25 percent in Kansas City, Mo., 22 percent in Chicago, 20 percent in Denver and 20 percent in New Orleans.

"This report just underscores the need for Southern Nevada to take responsibility and help the less fortunate -- not only during this holiday season, but throughout the year," said Erik Pappa, spokesman for the city of Las Vegas. "And it shows that the problem is national in scope and not restricted to the Las Vegas Valley."

An unusual confluence of factors seems to be responsible for the surge. Housing prices, which soared in the expansion of the 1990s, have not gone down, even though the economy has tumbled. So fewer and fewer people can afford places to live.

A stream of layoffs has newly unemployed people taking low-wage jobs that might have otherwise gone to the poor. In addition, charitable donations to programs that help the disadvantaged are down considerably, officials around the country said, because of the economy and the outpouring of donations for people affected by Sept. 11.

Layoffs have also hit Las Vegas in recent months, with an estimated 15,000 out of work or working reduced hours. At the same time, charities such as the Salvation Army report a downturn in donations and food pantries such as Catholic Charities report difficulties meeting what they describe as an increased demand.

"This is an unprecedented convergence of calamities," said Xavier De Souza Briggs, an assistant professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. "It's really a crisis."

Shelters and city officials said people were staying homeless for longer periods, months instead of days in many cases. More than half the cities surveyed reported that in the last year people had remained homeless longer, an average of six months.

There is no total number for the homeless nationwide.

An increasing proportion of the homeless are families with children, compared to the chronically homeless who often have serious mental illness or substance abuse problems. Requests for shelter from families with children increased in three-quarters of the cities surveyed. In more than half, families had to be broken up to be accommodated in shelters. Las Vegas is no exception to this pattern, with less than 40 rooms available for families in two different shelters. Some newly homeless have jobs but do not earn enough to allow use of a home. Low-cost housing is so tight that one-third of the vouchers for the Section 8 subsidized-housing program are being returned unused, the Housing and Urban Development Department says.

Several experts and advocates for the homeless predicted that the number of homeless would increase in coming months.

Sun reporter Timothy Pratt contributed to this story.