Welcome  to  Ending  Student  Homelessness, a  podcast  that  brings  together  folks  who  are committed  to  understanding  and  finding  housing  solutions. I  am  Misty  Blue,  a  researcher  at the  University  of  Minnesota's Center  for  Advanced  Studies  and  Child  Welfare, and  I've  had  the  honor  of  interviewing a  series  of  guests  committed  to  this  work. Today's  conversation  features  four  professionals  working together  to  address  homelessness in  Northwestern  Minnesota. Randy  Wilkie  is  the  Rental  Assistance  Specialist  for Clay  County  HRA. Amy  Ricios,  the  Transitional  Student  Support  and Homeless  Liaison  for  Morehead  School  District. Sierra  Neilan  Martinez  is the  Youth  Self  Sufficiency  Advocate for  Lakes  and  Prairies  Community  Action. And  Sandra  Lik  is the  family  case  manager for  Churches  United  Mica's  mission. Take  a  listen  to  this  two  part  episode where  this  group  of  professionals  is  in conversation  about  challenges  and  opportunities  to address  homelessness  within  their  respective  roles. And  in  Greater  Minnesota, all  of  you  and  I  are  recording  this  on  a  zoom  call. That's  been  our  practice  throughout  this  series. Because  of  Covid  19, we're  currently  in  a  global  pandemic. And  I'm  curious  about  how  Covid  19  has  affected your  work  here  at  the  shelter. It  has  affected  a  lot  of  things. For  starters,  we've  really  seen an  increase  in  the  number of  first  time  homeless  families. Even  with  the  eviction  moratorium, I  am  finding  people  that  have  been  evicted  and  maybe  it's because  know  their  rights around  that  and  just  don't  fight  it. Yeah.  That  increase  in  the  first  time  homeless. We  used  to  be  very  community based  and  we  were  open  to the  community  during  the  day  hours. And  people  could  come  in  and  get  meals and  get  some  clothing if  they  need  it,  different  things  like  that. And  there's  a  lot  of  people  that  we're  not  able  to  serve right  now  because  we  have  to  be  close  to  the  community. Our  residents,  our  guests  here, do  still  meet  in  the  lunch  room  for  lunch  and  dinner. But  it's  done  very  differently. It's  a  social  distance. It's  affected  everybody  in  that  way. But  we  don't  have  volunteers. Then  the  staff  are very  overworked  and  we are  understaffed  a  lot  of  the  time. I  feel  like  sometimes  we're not  able  to  serve  people  as  we  would really  like  to  just because  of  the  lack  of  those  resources. And  volunteers,  like  volunteers, are  a  huge  part  of  what  we  do. But  yeah,  due  to  pandemic, we  are  not  able  to  allow  them  to  come  in. This  is  Amy  from  Morehead  Schools. Again,  I  would  agree, we  see  some  of  the  same  things, an  increase  in  homeless  numbers. A  lot  of  this  I  would  say  due  to  job  loss  and  relocation. Some  of  these  families,  they're  from  a  different  state and  they  came  here  because  they  have a  relative  or  friend  that  has  housing  here, and  so  they  stay  with  them  and  end  up  being  doubled  up. Another  thing  I  would  echo. Yes,  we  have  the  same  issues  with fatigued  staff  not  doing  as  much  as  we'd  like  to  do. The  fact  that  our  schools  aren't  open  to  the  public. We  can't  have  face  to  face  relationships  built  as  easily. But  one  thing  that  I've  noticed  that  I  think  is very  interesting  with  the  homeless  families, that  we  have  this  deep  fear, not  just  the  homeless  piece, but  now  they  have  this  fear  of illness  they're  justified  in. Many  of  them  don't  have  insurance  or  a Dr.  that  they  are  connected  to. They  don't  have  access  to  that,  that  regular  care. If  they  qualify  for  assistance, obviously  we  help  them  get  that. But  many  of  them  are  just  new  to  this  community. You're  having  to  reapply  and  start  that  process. I  would  also  say  that  they're  stressed  with Covid  in  most  of  our  schools  across the  state  and  across  the  nation,  you  get  options. You  get  to  choose  as  a  parent, do  you  want  your  child  to  attend  school? Maybe  in  a  hybrid  model, or  do  you  want  to  do  virtual  learning? They  get  that  choice. However,  it's  a  difficult  choice, because  imagine  doing  virtual  learning. You're  a  homeless,  if  you're  living  out  of  a  car, or  if  you're  at  the  shelter, or  if  you  are  staying  with  relatives that  have  a  home  full  of  ten  to  12  individuals. Now,  you  need  to  log  in and  find  a  quiet  space  to  do  that. The  schools  do  provide  the  technology  pieces, the  Wi  Fi  access, but  that's  just  a  piece  of  the  puzzle. They  have  difficulty  having that  one  on  one  quiet  space  where  they  can  log  in, not  interrupted,  not  having to  multitask  and  do  something  else. I  think  that,  that  fear coupled  with  the  layer  of  stress  of, of  doing  school,  then obviously  being  homeless  is  a  huge  stressor  for  them. My  concern  is  that  this  is  going  to  lead  to some  pretty  intense  mental  health  concerns. As  I  will  say  right  now, I  have  a  lot  of  my  homeless  students  that  are  struggling attending  and  many  are  giving  up. They're  saying  maybe  I'll  do  school  another  time. If  they're  old  enough,  they  will  drop  out. Like  Amy  and  Sandra  said, a  lot  of  our  services  up  here  are  open  door  policy. Our  office  has  been  close  to  the  public. We  don't  meet  with  people  for  face  to  face  for  paperwork. That  has  been  a  nightmare. Luckily,  our  funders  are  going  to  be  lenient, hopefully,  when  it  comes  to  file  audits. Because  to  try  to  coordinate, to  get  what  we  need  to  do  the  file, but  to  also  provide  the  service  is  completely  chaotic. And  to  try  to  be  as  organized  as possible,  it  doesn't  help. But  I  think  one  of  the  things  I  noted here  is  it's  still  a  factor, I  think  in  the  west  central  region, but  with  the  peacetime  order. I  think  in  a  housing  standpoint, because  I  do  three  different  programs, we  are  not  seeing  as  many  people  in our  area  moving  because they  know  about  the  peacetime  order, but  that  comes  with  a  gamut  of issues,  nonpayment  of  rent, there's  a  lot  of  lease  termination  issues that  are  going  to  be  coming  down  the  pike. We  do  see  a  lot  of  folks  coming  here from  other  areas  that  have  job  loss. Like  Amy  was  saying,  I  can  piggyback  off  that, but  I  would  say  that  after  Covid  relieves itself  and  peacetime  order  is  over  in  Minnesota, we  are  going  to  see  a  major  increase  in  homelessness. We  also  are  seeing  right now  that  the  housing  market  was  fairly  tight  in  Morehead, but  it's  getting  even  tighter because  people  aren't  moving. They're  not  relocating  due  to  fear  of  being  ill. Even  if  they're  not  moving  because  of  a  bad  situation, they're  just  not  moving  at  all. That's  become  more  of an  issue  because  we're  having  a  housing  crisis  now. Because  nobody  is  moving. Nobody  can  find  adequate  housing  that  meets  their  needs. Yeah,  I  feel  like  right  now we're  rushing  to  get people  housed  and  trying  to  beat  the  winter  cold. But  I  think  futuristically  with  this  peacetime  order, it's  doing  good  and  bad. And  in  a  housing  standpoint, we're  going  to  have  a  lot  of  issues. I  think. Yeah,  A  lot  we  indefinitely. Just  basically  what  Brandy,  Amy, and  Chandra  are  saying  is like  there's  that  peacetime  order, that  eviction  moratorium  that was  in  place  at  the  beginning  to, but  there's  always  something  for a  reason  for  non  renewals and  clients  are  still  having  to  move  during  this  time. But  it's  just  very  tricky  right  now. Many  people  with  the  pandemic have  the  ability  to  work  from  home. But  really  not  everybody  that  we're  working  with, at  least  that  I've  seen,  has  been  able  to  stay  home. They've  been  in  jobs  with  service  delivery, grocery  stores  or  gas  stations, all  of  those  things  that  are  deemed  essential. And  then  also  on  top  of  that, like  they're  losing  those  jobs  at the  same  time  and  getting  behind  on  those  bills  and it's  just  piling  up  with  your  rents to  utilities  and  things  like  that. But  with  all  of  that  and  all  of  us  as  providers, mostly  working  from  home, has  been  a  really  big  barrier  on  to  how  we  provide those  direct  services  with  no  face  to face  interactions  that  I'm  not  able  to  transport  anymore. And  that  was  a  huge  part  of  my  job because  transportation  is  an  issue. It's  always  been  an  issue  that  I've  seen. It's  affected  it  really  bad  right  now. Yeah.  I  mean,  each  of  you  have  talked about  how  your  personal  role  or your  agency  role  was  at  one  point  much  broader  and  had a  lot  more  impact  due  to  covid  prevention  measures. You  really  had  to  scale  back  and  had  to  either  stop offering  the  same  services  or  being creative  and  trying  to  adapt. While  the  adaptations, they're  not  able  to  provide the  same  experience  as  they  once  were. That's  huge,  It's  huge. Then  you  also  were able  to  share  a  little  bit  about  what  you see  coming  in  the  future of  increased  mental  health  needs, housing  and  housing  solutions. If  you  had  to  say  one  thing, that  one  action  that we  could  take  as  a  state  or  as  a  community  that would  either  prevent  more  homelessness or  be  a  support  now  or  in  the  future. What  would  that  be  for  you?  Maybe.  What  is one  action  that  the  community  could take  that  could  ease  the  struggle  for people  or  be  healing  for  them  in  the  future? I  think  this  is  Amy  from  Morehead  Schools. I'll  give  my  best  guess  at this  one  because  it's not  as  simple  as  we'd  like  it  to  be. But  I  feel  like  the  first, biggest  step  would  be  to  become  aware  of  it. I  know  we're  aware  of  covid, but  to  be  aware  of how  this  impacts  the  homeless  population, I'm  not  sure  that  people  are  really  understanding  that. It's  not  so  easy  just  to  go  get  a  different  job. Maybe  your  relatives  can  help  you  pay  your  rent. That's  not  how  this  works  and  the  impact  it  has. And  the  reason  I  would  say  to  become  more  aware  is  that's the  first  step  to  realizing  that there  is  a  problem  or  a  concern. And  that  we  could  be  preventative  as  a  community. Because  I  really  would  hate  to wait  and  just  see  what's  going  to  happen, because  like  Brandy  said, there's  going  to  be  very  detrimental  things that  happen  that  will  affect  our  entire  community  and will  be  very  costly  for our  community  just  to  be  aware  of  what's  happening. And  acknowledge  and  try  to  empower other  agencies  and  the  other  members in  your  community  to  step  up  and  say, okay,  we  have  to  come  around this  not  just  for the  adults  but  for  the  children  involved  as  well. Yeah,  yeah. Remaining  in  tune  with  the  families  now and  going  into  the  future  will  help  us determine  what  we're  up  against  and how  to  confront  those  challenges  together. Yeah,  I  was  going  to  say  mindfulness  I think  is  be  mindful  and  I  wish  the  community, like  I  said,  I  am very  happy  that  we  come  from  the  community. We  do,  because  I  hear  the  struggles  in  like  maybe St.  Paul  and  Minneapolis  in  those  areas. And  boy,  we  are  so fortunate  to  have  the  resources  we  have, but  it  just  seems  like  it's  never  enough  just  to  be mindful  to  the  folks that  are  out  there  struggling  with  homelessness. One  example  for  me  is either  in  homelessness  or  even  upon  getting  housing. One  issue  right  now  with  Covid  is  daycare. Nobody  is  accepting  new  kids into  daycare  because  of  Covid. How  do  you  have  five  kids  you  want  to  go  to  school? Maybe  three  of  them  are  school  age where  you  have  two  little  ones. I  know  personally,  trying  to  be  home  with  two  kids, one  elementary  and  one  infant, and  trying  to  work  my  full  time  job  doing distance  learning  about  want  to  go  Wacko. I  can't  imagine  these  folks  trying  to  find  a  job. They're  a  single  parent,  how  do  you  even  do  a  job? I  talked  to  a  lot  of  folks  and  they  say,  well, I'm  trying  to  find  a  job  to  work  from  home. I  can't  help  but  empathize  and  think  to  myself,  girl, I  tried  it  like  I  just  want  to  say  that  I  try  it, I'm  really  close  to  losing  the  sanity  I  do have  just  to  be  mindful  of  their  struggles. Like  I  just  had  a  baby  in February  and  we  found daycare  in  the  small  community  I  live  in. By  luck  living  in  Morehead. A  larger  community  is  even  a  larger  issue. You  have  more  people  looking  for daycare  and  nobody's  taking  new  people, nobody  wants  to  take  new  people. If  there  is  a  center  open  boy, those  spots  are  going  to  get  taken  so  fast. I  think  that's  just  one  small  example  of  the Disparities  that  people  have  when  they  are  just  trying  to tread  through  the  mud  with trying  to  go  through  covid  itself. Just  such  a  struggle  makes  me  think  about  that. Yeah,  staying  present  and  mindful  is  powerful. I  appreciate  you  saying  that  for  sure. We've  talked  a  lot  about, I  think  so  many  important  examples of  where  there  are  gaps  and  challenges. If  you  could  re  envision  or  re  imagine  a  housing  system, what  would  be  one  solution  that  would  be key  to  ending  student  homelessness? More  housing,  more  affordable  housing? Even  in  our  community. We're  so  lucky  that our  vacancy  rates  will  up  with  Covid  have  been. They've  been  better  than  they  have  in  a  long  time. But  like  we  bring  it  back  to  what  we've  very  first  talked about  and  that's  being  a  sister  city  to  Fargo. The  major  difference  is  the  utilities. So  the  rent  is  fairly  lower  in  Fargo,  but  not  by  much. If  you  calculate  out  the  utilities that  we  have  to  use  in  Morehead, they  are  so  high. In  general,  the  utility  bills are  higher  for  Morehead  citizens. In  comparison,  say  unit  rent was  770  on  both  sides  of  the  river  for  a  two  bedroom. The  utilities  for  a  two  bedroom  on the  Morehead  side  are  going  to  be  $120  utility  balance, whereas  in  Fargo  it's  $50  That's a  huge  difference  in  how  much  they  can  find  a  unit. It  decreases  the  availability  in our  area  for  them  to  find  a  unit that  actually  works  with  the  rental  assistance. If  I  had  to  choose,  I  would  love  to  have more  units  be  closer  to the  FMR  because  that's  where our  payment  standards  are  then. Our  utility  allowances. The  utilities  are  so  high  for  the  city. I  wish  that  that  would  be  re  looked  at  I  guess, because  that's  been  the  deal  breaker. Yeah.  Yeah,  that  unit  rent  works. But  let's  talk  about  the  utilities in  that  house  because  it's  going  to  be  high. Then  now  it  becomes  a  situation where  they  can't  be  approved for  it  because  they  don't  have  income. It's  a  very  hard  thing  in  my  role  is  to  say, no,  I'm  sorry,  it  doesn't  work. I  think  it  would  be  important  too, if  we  could  increase  the  number  of case  managers  for  families. Homework  starts  with  home. They  do  get  a  case  manager  with  that. But  there's  so  many  other  ways they  move  out  of  here  where  they  don't. They  move  into  Morehead  Public  Housing or  they  move  on  a  homeless  to  house  voucher, or  even  paying  their  own  rent. We've  had  situations.  I  had  a  family  that  moved  into more  head  public  housing  and  they  were  only  there a  month  and  a  half  before  their  lease  was  terminated. If  they'd  have  had  a  case  manager  that  could have  walked  next  to  them through  that,  they  could  have  succeeded. I  see  that  time  and  time  again with  families  that  return  to  homelessness. It's  so  often  if  they'd  have  just  had the  supports  to  maintain and  stabilize,  they  could  have  made  it. Shandra,  I  was  thinking  the  same  thing. This  is  Amy  from  the  school, and  I'm  going  to first  say  we  have  a  lot  of supports,  other  communities  don't. I'm  aware  of  that,  but I  don't  want  to  become  those  other  communities. And  one  way  to  do  that  is  what  I  call  a  warm  handoff. When  you're  leaving  a  handoff, and  right  now,  yes, homework  starts  with  home, does  a  lot  of  that  work, but  for  families  that  may  not  qualify  for  that, they're  just  sort  of  going  at  it  alone. And  then  there's  no  sustainability  in  their  housing. All  of  that  work  that  was done  at  the  shelter  to  get  them  set  up, it  falls  apart  within  a  couple  of  months because  they  don't  know  how  to  access  a  service. They  have  so  many  other  things  going  on. They're  trying  to  their  job and  make  sure  their  rent  is  paid  that  they  don't realize  things  are  falling  apart  with  their  kids or  other  things  are  going  on  in  their  life. And  then  they  reach  to  what  they  know, they  go  to  the  default  and  they  get  into some  situations  that  aren't  healthy  for  anyone. Whether  that  be  dropping  out  of  school  or  using chemicals  or  getting  in a  really  bad  relationship  with  someone. But  they're  all  doing  this, trying  to  make  it  work  for  them, if  there  could  be  some  sustainability. And  when  I  say  that,  I  don't  mean  for a  couple  of  months.  I  mean  like Work  starts  with  home.  Like  they  stick  with these  families  for  many  months. And  that's  what  needs  to  happen, that  there  can  be  some  success and  you  can  break  that  cycle. The  other  thing  that  I  was  thinking  of, the  piece  on  affordable  housing, that  definitely  is  something  that  we  need  to  look  at  and why  that  is  such  a  gap  on the  Morehead  side  versus  the  Fargo  side, because  families  definitely  want  to stay  on  the  Morehead  side  for  various  reasons. What  I  find  happening  is they're  trying  and  they're  bouncing  from  house  to house  and  we  lose  them  again  with  case  management. Maybe  this  wouldn't  happen, but  we  lose  them. Their  kids  aren't  enrolled  in  school  for  months. I  have  families  that  haven't  enrolled  in  school  yet, and  it's  already  the  second  quarter  of school  and  they  didn't  know  how  to  enroll. They've  been  bouncing  from  many  communities, there's  got  to  be  some  kind  safety  net. Somebody  that's  going  to  partner  with that  family  for  several  months, or  even  I'd  like  to  say  years. If  it's  possible  to  keep  them gradually  teaching  them  the  skills and  then  having  them  fly  on  their  own. Think  that  responding  as  a  community  is  very  important. And  it's  crucial  that  collaboration between  our  federal  and  state  and  local  partners, it's  really  going  to  help  in this  because  if  you're  working  together  as  a  community, you're  going  to  work  better  at preventing  student  homelessness  and  youth becoming  homeless  when  you're  able  to identify  them  and  work  with  those  families  and connect  them  to  those  trauma  informed  resources  and culturally  appropriate  interventions and  to  meet  those  needs. I  think  it  just  would  allow  us as  a  community  responding  as a  community  would  create  those  individualized  services. Again,  just  investing  those  resources  to an  effective  homeless  response  system  can really  prevent  and  support a  lot  of  those  people  experiencing  homelessness. I  think  as  part  of  our  organization, we  do  own  a  permanent supportive  housing  apartment  building. And  it  has  43  units  of  which it's  about  half  and  half  of individuals  and  then  families. I  think  if  there  could  be  more  sites  like that  because  there's  staff on  site,  there's  somebody  there. 2047.  Not  always  a  case  manager, but  there  is  some  staff  there  24  hours  a  day. That  building  tends  to  seem  more  like a  community  because  it's  not  like your  average  apartment  where you  don't  know  most  of  your  neighbors. Pretty  much  everybody  there  knows  everybody. I  can't  say  that  it's  always  positive, but  generally  like  they do  become  a  support  to  each  other. So  often  I  see  families and  individuals  that  come  to  the  shelter. One  of  their  biggest  fears about  leaving  here  is  loneliness. So  often  that's  a  big  inhibitor  for  people  to  try  and even  get  housing  on  their  own because  they  don't  want  to be  isolated  from  everyone  else. Now  when  you  add  covid  in, people  used  to  go  hang  out  at  the  library  or various  other  parts  of  town  and  things  aren't  an  option anymore  to  have  more  buildings that  are  like  permanent  supportive  housing I  think  would  be  huge. Not  always  just  vouchers, because  vouchers  are  great  and they're  needed  and  they're  necessary. But  to  have  buildings  where  everybody  is  in that  same  situation  I  think  would  be  ideal. Yeah.  People  going  through  difficult  times  together, what  I  heard  is  more  affordable  housing  is necessary  and there's  the  need  for  individualized  services. There's  a  need  for  access  to  utilities  with  the  idea of  how  do  we  build lasting  relationships  both  with  each other  and  each  other, meaning  neighbors  and  community, but  also  with  support  people, people  that  are  there  to  help them  move  through  this  difficult  time. Is  that  a  fair  summary? And  I'd  like  to  add  in  about  support  services. Home  research  with  Home  is  very  lucky  that  we  have contracted  support  services  for  that  particular  program. And  I'm  going  to  tell  you,  it  took  a  lot  of  lobbying. It  took  a  lot  of  work  on  our  end  to  say we  want  more  money  so  that  we  can  support  these  folks, as  I  can  give  vouchers  out  all  day  long. But  what  is  that  doing? That's  not  doing  anything  with  Alta  support. So  we  had  continually drilled  that  over  and  over,  and  over, and  over  and  over  since  2013  when  we  had  cares  for  kids, we  finally  were  able  to  get  a  huge  bulk  of money  to  support  this  program  with  case  management. But  then  I  think  about  it  again, and  case  management  is  hard  work,  super  hard  work. You're  solving  people's  problems  all  day  long  and then  going  home  to  try  to  take  care  of  your  own  problems. A  lot  of  these  folks  aren't  paid enough  to  do  that  hard  work. That's  why  you  see  the  turnover  so  high, then  what  is  that  doing  for the  families  if  they  don't  have  a  case  manager  that's going  to  be  there  for  the  entire  time  that they  need  to  be  to  be  successful. It's  not  any  fault  of  an  agency  or  anything  like  that. It  comes  from  our  legislators, from  our  states  and  our  federal  funds that  if  we  want people  to  be  successful,  some  people  need  help. But  we  need  to  pay  those  people for  the  hard  work  that  they're doing  and  show  them  that  we  appreciate  the  work. And  I  have  no  problem  sending  e  mails  all  the  time. I'm  one  of  those  people  that  I  was  a  case  manager. So  I  know  how  empowering  it  is  to  get  like  a  rock  today, because  you  might  be  having  the  crappiest  day. And  to  get  an  e  mail  that  says, I  appreciate  you,  keeps  you  going. But  it  would  be  nice  if  financially  people were  supported  in  this  work  that  we  are  trying  to  do, in  all  different  arrays  of  programs, because  Homer  starts  with, home  is  very  special, but  it  has  taken  a  long  time  to  even  there. Even  that  is  still  has  its  moments where  it  just  doesn't  seem  to  be  enough. The  pay  needs  to  be  better  for  some  of  these  folks  that providing  that  hard  one  on  one  feed  on  the  ground  work, even  outreach  work,  trying  to  find  these  folks, I  can't  stress  it  enough. Yes.  Oh  my  goodness. Thank  you  so  much  for  joining  and  I  have  learned  so  much. I  just  commend  you  all  on  this  work  and  I  see your  passion  and  your  dedication to  the  families  that  you  serve. Thank  you  and  thank  you  for  doing  this  work. No  problem.  Thank  you  for  inviting  me. Thank  you.  Thank  you  for listening  to  the  ending  student  homelessness  podcast. This  podcast  was  recorded  on Inshan  Abbey  and  Dakota  ancestral  homelands. Indigenous  people  have  historically  and  paradoxically faced  homelessness  at disproportionate  rates  in  the  state  of  Minnesota. Please  visit  our  podcast  page  to  learn  about  ways  you can  support  local  organizations committed  to  addressing  this  issue. This  special  podcast  series  has  been  created by  the  Homework  Starts  with  Home  Research  Partnership. We  are  a  collaborative  state university  school  community  project designed  to  integrate  multi  system  administrative  data. And  analyze  it  in  order  to  produce  and  disseminate high  quality  evidence  pertinent  to  addressing the  state  and  national  challenge  of  student  homelessness.