I have lived accross the street from the Ozanam Inn for about eight (8) years, at 842 Camp Street. During that time, I have learned a lot about their soup kitchen clients. Through observation, interaction, conversation, research, and after having hired and worked with about forty (40) of these men over the last eight (8) years, I learned a lot about who they are.
So-called "Homeless Experts" downplay the significance of the number of mentally ill and/or addicted persons who are living on the streets. Further, they do not even address or estimate the number of criminals who use shelters as a base of operations. They say that among the people living on the streets, an estimated 30 percent suffer from serious mental illness. Of these at least half are also addicted to alcohol and/or drugs (usually cocaine).
Contrarily, Sociologist Anne Hendershott (2002) notes "that 65% of the homeless singles in New York City shelters tested by urinalysis showed positive results for drugs or alcohol. Of that group, 83 percent tested positive for cocaine." In fact, according to the 1996 study by Tulane University Medical Center School of Public Health Medicine and Project Reach, 39% of the 263 homeless adults interviewed reported substance or chemical abuse. Of the homeless men who have multiple medical conditions, nearly 70% suffer from substance abuse and 40%, mental illness. Although the data are not readily available, the number of mentally ill and/or addicted homeless people in New Orleans is significant.
So-called "Homeless Experts" depict the homeless population as people who may have been living on the margins for years and suffered a setback that put them on the street" - trying to find their way to services like temporary shelters, support services, and meals. However, the 1930's style soup kitchen in today's society does nothing to end homelessness and in fact helps to perpetuate the unstable state of the homeless individual.
On any morning, one may observe as many as 200 people eating breakfast at the Ozanam Inn. Sundays and Thursdays are "hot breakfast" mornings. Of these soup kitchen clients, perhaps as many as forty (40) people, or twenty (20%) percent of those who arrive for breakfast, are homeless, helpless, and/or mentally ill. The other 160 people are usually workers who arrive on bicycles, in pick up trucks, or in cars to get a free meal. During renovation of my building, many of my workers ate at Oz because it was "free." These clients are usually the least problematic for the neighborhood.
Usually, the serious social deviants and the career criminals who use OZ as a base of operations don't get up for the 6:00 a.m. breakfast. Some show up because they are up from the night before, hung over, or still drunk! Most show up at about 7:30 a.m. Some arrive looking for drugs, while others arive to sell drugs. Others come to find criminal associates. Still others hope someone will give them a job if they hang out on the street and wave down passing pick up trucks. They are NOT homeless -- OZ should not support them in their criminal endevors!
Monsignor Bezou, Pastor of Saint Patrick's Church in the 1950's, helped found the Ozanam Inn. Back then, Saint Patrick's Parish had become a "SKID ROW," with thousands of rooms for rent by the day or by the week. Residential conditions were so vile that Monsignor Bezou's parishioners could not arrive at St. Patrick's for Sunday morning services without having to walk over hundreds of drunks on the way to church. The drunks were everywhere, sleeping on the sidewalks, passed out in the gutters, and using abandoned cars for toilets. The stench from public defecation and public urination was unbearable. Monsignor Bezou saw the problem and understood the solution. He planned to get the parish cleaned up and redeveloped. He knew that his church could not survive with only drunks and panhandlers as parishioners.
Today, "Skid Row" no longer exists. The Ozanam Inn is a 21st Century anomaly! OZ is no longer Christ’s mission in the midst of the impoverished and needy. The impoverished and needy have moved on, but Oz has not. Ozanam Inn makes the unsupportable claim that "the Ozanam Inn was here first." According to Carl Howat, their Executive Director, OZ will remain in our neighborhood forever, despite the fact that the people they "pretend" to serve no longer live in our neighborhood. Using this fallacious logic, OZ perpetuates and justifies the politically useful myth that a "LARGE HOMELESS POPULATION" will always congregate in the CBD.
Homeless advocates traditionally claim that emergency shelters and soup kitchens must be centrally located in the downtown area because "that's where the homeless are." The so-called "IDA experts'" state that homeless are on the streets downtown because services they seek and food are available there. In New Orleans, neither is true. Skid row no longer exists. The so-called "IDA experts'" picture of New Orleans' homeless and service providers is distorted. Ninety (90%) percent of these programs and services have "decentralized" and relocated outside of the DDD, with clusters in and around the medical center and in mid-city along Tulane Avenue.
The so-called "IDA experts," with their background in homeless services, perpetuates the service providers' myth. They depict New Orleans' homeless problem as a clash between "haves and have-nots" and of NIMBYism ("not in my back yard ism"), with the inevitable public response being inappropriate police action against the homeless, with little specific attention to the uniqueness of New Orleans and even less historic perspective on the issues, the efforts, and the evolution of the problems that exist today in our city. They imply that anyone other than the "caring and talented homeless service provider" is ignorant or confused with respect to the causes of homelessness and the attendant issues, and that neighborhood residents and business owners can not (or do not) distinguish between the truly needy homeless and the serious social deviants. They reluctantly admit there are problems with "inappropriate street behavior" and that some incidents may involve clients of the homeless shelters and soup kitchens. They are quick to defend their peers and to blame the discord among stakeholders and the climate of mistrust on the "small number of residents in the warehouse district."