President Trump on Thursday signed an executive order aimed at helping cities clear homeless encampments. The order attacks the housing first approach that a South Bend nonprofit is taking as it plans to start building a new homeless intake center this fall.
New Day Intake Center Executive Director Sheila McCarthy says intellectually she had long believed in the housing first approach, the idea that you can’t start to help a person living on the street with addiction or mental illness until you give them housing. She says her belief is solidified after seeing it work for more than 800 people at the Motels4Now project in a hastily converted former Knights Inn.
“People are not chaotic and not acting out when they have a room that they can be in, with temperature they can control, and access to plumbing, and a bed, and a place to put your things," McCarthy says. "We've seen the efficacy of that, that when people have a place to stay, and are able to get stable, then they are able to get a doctor, able to get medication, and that self-medicating that they've been doing, they let go of because there's an alternative in place, because you're surrounded by people that care about you, you're able to care for yourself and keep yourself clean and well-organized. So it's really housing first, with support, that's successful."
Trump’s order makes it easier to involuntarily commit people so that they are forced into treatment or care. McCarthy agrees that it’s too hard now to get people mental health treatment because they must voluntarily commit. But she fears involuntarily committing more people will just mean sending them to jail because there aren’t enough care facilities.
”It’s just too hard to get into the state mental hospital so we need some alternative that’s not jail, and this executive order purports to address that need but my fear is that it will not do that.”
New Day has raised $13.4 million of the $14.3 million they need to start building Phase 1 of the intake center on Old Cleveland Road this fall. McCarthy says they hadn’t planned on seeking any federal grants for construction but since New Day will follow the housing first or low-barrier approach, Trump’s order could hurt their chances of getting federal money for operations once it's built.
