Anthropology

317
Keenan Plate and Kathleen Lan5o

In its annual Homeless Point-in-Time Count & Survey - Sites: Barriers for service providers
Report, the City of Chicago counted 5,889 people sleeping - Franciscan Outreach Shelter Service providers, such as shelter employees, have a
in shelters, on the street, and on public transportaIon on - Pacic Garden Mission severe lack of funding which in turn exaggerates issues
the night of January 26th 2016. In spite of a homeless - StreetWise Headquarters within agencies of having no substanIal provider
populaIon numbering in the thousands, the City of Chicago - Streets of the Chicago Loop networks, having an overburdened sta, and a reliance
does not issue a comprehensive and tangible human - Methods:
on community derived resources. This then impacts the
services guide for homeless people in the Chicago area. Our - 40 hours of parIcipant observaIon
- 18 interviews ways that people in need of service can access these
research will present results from a semester-long project resources, and the quality of resources that can be
- 11 unstructured with people in
that used ethnographic models to explore how people provided.
shelters or on the streets
experiencing homelessness seek access to organizaIons - 7 semi-structured with providers
that provide food, shelter, clothing, and other human - Asset Map of social service agencies and Barriers for the homeless
services. CiIes like Portland, Oregon, and Nashville, other similar resources on the Chicago The homeless face barriers to resources that include a
StreetWise February 20 2017 Issue
Tennessee have comba5ed this lack of accessible North Side lack of comprehensive resource informaIon, an inability
informaIon by developing pocket-sized resource booklets to access prevenIve resources prior to becoming literally
that contain a comprehensive guide to the ciIes human homeless, and failing outreach programs. Other barriers
service organizaIons. These booklets contain resources include systemaIc failings such as a poor housing market
such as: medical care, legal care, employment services, in urban center like Chicago, segregaIon and
shelters, soup kitchens, and addicIon recovery services. The disproporIonate racial representaIon in impoverished
goals of this research were to be5er understand Chicagos living condiIons, and inadequate government funding for
homeless populaIon and to determine whether or not the social services and housing subsidies.
city of Chicago and its homeless populaIon would benet
from a similar resource guide. Lack of comprehensive resource informa8on
We found that people in need of resources are oaen
unable to gain access to quality resources, on their own
or through agencies alike. Internet access is a
requirement for nding resources independently, and the
quanIty of incomplete resource lists on the internet are
hard to sia through. Individual caseworkers take on the
burden of creaIng networks and referral lists on their
Franciscan Outreach Shelter Pacic Garden Mission own, feeding into their own burnout as well as the usage
of incomplete resource

In our research, we found some controversy in the very

deniIon of homeless. A widely accepted disIncIon in the
term homeless comes from Peter Rossi who proposed a Chicago is a massive city with hundreds of social service
deniIon that disInguished between the literally homeless providers. We did not have the Ime or resources to
and precariously homeless (1987). Literal homelessness or conduct a thorough assessment of all Chicagos resource
visible homeless is dened by those who have no access to providers. Another limitaIon in our work is the small sub-
permanent convenIonal dwelling.. Precariously homeless Recommenda8ons Discussion set of homeless people we were able to interview and
describes those with limited and temporary access to observe. Our work focused on the reality of the literal
convenIonal living spaces, such as those living with friends Push for preventa8ve measures Establish social safety nets homeless in small areas of Chicago.
or family, or in low-income temporary housing faciliIes. DesIgmaIze of social services
Source: Rossi, Peter H., James D. Wright, Gene A. Fisher, and Georgianna Willis. "The Urban
Homeless: EsImaIng ComposiIon and Size." Science 235, no. 4794 (1987): 1336-341.
Outreach from providers Place greater emphasis on outreach
StreetRoots
Increase networking between providers pocket-sized
Causes of booklet of
homelessness,
Directly-accessible informa8on Create comprehensive, physical resource guide Portland social
list taken from about resources Address failures of 3-1-1 services and
Franciscan resources.
Outreach
AssociaIon Keenan Plate Supervisor
Kathleen Lan<o
intake form.
Philosophy: Social JusIce Emphasis Anthropology BA Ruth Gomberg-Muoz
Loyola University Chicago, 2017 Loyola University Chicago, 2017 Department of Anthropology
kplate@luc.edu klan5o@luc.edu rgombergmunoz@luc.edu