Hill Health Center News Release

 

For release      16 December 2005

 

Information:  Robert Kilpatrick               503-3276 (w)

245-4533 (h)

 

rkilpatrick@hillhealthcenter.com        www.hillhealthcenter.com

 

 

 

 

Candlelight Vigil to Remember the Homeless

 

The first day of winter – the longest night of the year - will be the setting for this city’s first candlelight vigil to commemorate the homeless people who have died in the last year.

 

New Haven will join the more than 125 cities that will observe the 15th annual national commemoration day of the tragedy of this preventable condition.  On Dec. 21, New Haven area people are urged to come to the New Haven City Hall Atrium for a one-hour candlelight vigil starting at 1 p.m.  Hot refreshments will be served.

 

The event is sponsored by the Hill Health Center’s Homeless Health Care Program.  Its coordinator, Toni Harp, said, “I think the important thing to remember is that these deaths were entirely preventable.  If our cities make affordable housing, living wages and accessible health care their top priorities, we will not have to hold any more memorial services for people who died without housing  - because there will be no more people who die without housing.”

 

Judith Rothstein, Hill Health Center therapist, said, “During the past 23 years as a professional human service provider, I have never experienced so much sadness and frustration as during the past four years, watching our clients and patients struggle towards recovery, to find insufficient supportive and/or affordable housing to meet their needs. Of course, there are many that have been fortunate enough to obtain housing. However, I can’t help but thinking, ‘There, but for the grace of God, go I.’ ”

 

Doris Cherry, case manager for the Homeless Health Care Program, sums it all up with a quote from the scriptures:   “We should always remember the poor, even though the poor will always be with us. Everyone has a part to fulfill. If each one would do what he can in helping his brothers, there would be fewer hungry, fewer without clothing and certainly fewer homeless.”

 

This is the first time that New Haven has joined the National Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day that was begun in 1990.

 

Rothstein stated that about 1,300 persons may be homeless on any given night and about 3,800 homeless persons over a two- year period. Currently, she said, single parent families are the fastest growing homeless population, and single homeless women increased 25% over two years.

 

“The City of New Haven and government-supported agencies provide more emergency shelters and supportive services throughout the greater New Haven Area to New Haven residents, and persons from surrounding towns, cities and states than other surrounding areas,” Rothstein said.

 

“The homeless population could consist of any persons or families with a history or currently experiencing average to major health problems, including substance abuse, physical and/or mental health, financial and vocational problems, job loss and/or family trauma”, she said.

 

“The chances of survival and productive lifestyles increase enormously when homeless people are sought out and engaged in services and treated with dignity and respect,” Rothstein said. 

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