The Rural Appalachian region of southeastern Ohio is stricken with lack of jobs, transportation, resources, housing, and healthcare options. All of these factors affect the communities that are a part of the rural Appalachian area. A community is defined as a combination of social units that share common functions important to the locality (Kirst-Ashman & Hull, 2012, p.128). “For example, one may think of a community as having specific geographical boundaries, like a city, or as denoting a group with shared interests and beliefs, such as the social work community. The community may be seen as a target for change, as the problem, or as the context within which change occurs” (Kirst-Ashman & Hull, 2012, p. 129). One community that is in need of a context for change is the homeless individuals in the southeastern Ohio counties whom experience a mental illness, disability, or economic instability.
Deinstitutionalization in the mental health hospitals around the United States, has been occurring over the past few decades at an increasing rate. This is where the hospitals are beginning to shut down and send individuals back into the community; this is one of the major issues affecting homelessness in people who experience mental illness. Another reason for the mental health population who are homeless is because the difficulty they may face maintaining jobs and working in general. A study done on “919 found that the top reasons for the individual’s homelessness included economic factors at 45.0%, family problems 30.4%, 5.1% said because of drug and alcohol issues, 2.4% said they liked to move around, and 1.7% said it was due to deinstitutionalization” (First, Richard J., Rife, John C., & Toomey, Beverly G., 1994, p. 101). This shows ...
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Martinez-Brawley, E. E. (2000). Close to home: Human services and the small community.
Washington, D.C.: Washington, D.C. : NASW Press, c2000.
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Good Works, INC. A Community of Hope. Athens, Ohio: Good Works, INC., 2013. Print.
Kirst-Ashman, K. and Hull, G. (2012). Understanding Generalist Practice (6th edition). Belmont, CA: Thomson Brooks/Cole. ISBN: 0-840033-3826
Martinez-Brawley, E. E. (2000). Close to home: Human services and the small community.
Washington, D.C.: Washington, D.C. : NASW Press, c2000.
Harrison, Erica. "Homelessness Among the Seriously Mentally Ill: What We Can Do to Help." Clarityhumanservices.com. N.p., 5 Mar. 2013. Web. 13 Nov. 2013.
Imagine a man on the streets, who society has forgotten. This man emits the smell of garbage; he has not bathed in months. This man sits quietly mumbling to himself. To the outer world he is just one of the many homeless, but little does society know that this man has a mental illness as well. Homelessness and mental illness are linked. These two happenings have similar beginnings. Homelessness is influenced by drug and alcohol disuse, being homeless at a young age, money problems, and trauma symptoms. Mental illness is caused by many of the same things, but it can also happen at birth. The effects that each entity has on a person are comparable. Rehabilitation is a necessary process if a victim of homelessness and or mental illness wants to rejoin society. Homelessness and mental illness have similar, if not the same causes, effects, and rehabilitations.
Gundersen, C., Weinreb, L., Wehler, C., & Hosmer, D. (2003). Homelessness And Food Insecurity. Journal of Housing Economics, 12(3), 250-272.
As per the State Housing Authority, the issue and trend of homelessness has changed particularly throughout the most recent three decades. Public homelessness first turned into an issue in the 1970's and now it is normal to see individuals congregating before sanctuaries and thinking about park seats. Soup kitchens are generally stuffed to limit. Safe houses have multiplied their ability since 1993 and they dismiss individuals consistently because of absence of cots (Kenyon 1991). During 1987, Congress passed the Stewart B. Mckinney Homeless Ass...
...erging Adult Homeless in Two U.S. Cities. National Association of Social Workers, 58(2), 173-175. doi: 10.1093/sw/swt006
Yet, according to the National Resource Center (NRC) on Homelessness and Mental Illness, 80% of the homeless population is off of the streets within 2 to 3 weeks. The NRC is the only national center specifically focused on the effective organization and delivery of services to the homeless and the mentally ill. It is important to note that the NRC reports 10% of people are homeless for 2 months and only 10% are chronically homeless. This fact shows that many people want to get back to ordinary lives and will work hard to do so, in spite of Awalt’s
Although most people know what homelessness is and it occurs in most societies, it is important to define because the forces of displacement vary greatly, along with the arrangement and meaning of the resulting transient state. The Stewart B McKinney Homeless Assistance Act of 1987 defined a homeless person as “an individual who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate night-time residence or a person who resides in a shelter, welfare hotel, transitional program or place not ordinarily used as a regular sleeping accommodation, such as streets, cars, movie theaters, abandoned buildings, etc.” Resent surveys conducted in the U.S. have confirmed that the homeless population in America is extremely diverse and includes representatives from all segments of society, including: the old and young, men and women, single people and families, city dwellers and rural residents, whites and people of color, employed and unemployed, able workers and people with serious health problems. The diversity among people that are homeless reflects how difficult it is to generalize the causes of homelessness and the needs of homeless people. Robert Rosenheck M.D., the author of Special Populations of Homeless Americans, explains the importance of studying homelessness based on subgroups, “each subgroup [of homeless people] has unique service needs and identifying these needs is critical for program planning and design.” Despite these diversities, homelessness is a devastating situation for all that experience it. Not only have homeless people lost their dwelling, but they have also lost their safety, privacy, control, and domestic comfort.
Many believe that a common thread among the homeless is a lack of permanent and stable housing. But beyond that, the factors leading to homelessness and the services that are needed are unique according to the individual. To put them into one general category ? the homeless- suggests that people are homeless for similar reasons and therefore a single solution is the answer. Every homeless person shares the basic needs of affordable housing, adequate incomes and attainable healthcare. But a wide range of other unmet needs cause some people to become or remain homeless which include drug treatment, employment training, transportation, childcare and mental health services (Center 8.)
Homelessness is one of the biggest issues society (Unites States) faces today. Homelessness is caused by lack of affordable housing, economic situations and decline in federal funding for low income families and the mentally ill. A homeless person is defined as an individual who lacks housing (without regard to whether the individual is a member of a family) including an individual whose primary residence during the night is a supervised public or private (shelters) facility that provides temporary living accommodations and an individual who is a resident in transitional housing. This definition of housing is used by the U.S Department of Healt...
Gulcur, Leyla, Padgett, Deborah K., and Tsemberis, Sam. (2006). “Housing First Services for People Who Are Homeless with Co-Occurring Serious Mental Illness and Substance Abuse.” Research on Social Work Practice, Vol 16 No. 1.
Rosenfield, S., (1988). Homelessness and rehospitalization: The importance of housing for the chronic mentally ill. Journal of Community Psychology, 19(1). 60-69.
The homeless population in the United States does not only include the humans out on the streets, but also the ones in living in vehicles, emergency shelters, transitional housing, and other unstable environments. Over six-hundred thousand individuals are currently homeless in the U.S. In our current society, people often become homeless due to circumstances beyond their control. Humans often face abrupt personal and public challenges within their lives causing change and displacement in their housing status without notice nor a choice. In relation to personal reasons for homelessness, individuals who identify as LGBTQ and victims of domestic violence encounter many different situational problems leaving them displaced. Furthermore, there has been a sharp increase in unaffordable housing recently causing other people to suffer issues in a more public manner.
"Overview of Homelessness In America." Homelessness In America. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 May 2014. .
As the number of homeless people in America continues to rise, homelessness has become a central issue in the County of Orange. A homeless person can be defined as an individual who lacks a fixed, regular and adequate nighttime residence and has a primary nighttime residence that is a supervised, publicly or privately operated shelter designed to provide temporary living accommodations. (“U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development”) Whether homelessness is a result of individual choices, drug abuse, poor work ethic or the expensive cost of living, one thing is for sure, statistics show that the homeless population in Orange County has increased 54% over the past four years. As Orange County has 5 of the
Hopper, Kim. “Housing the Homeless.” Social Policy 28.3 (1998): 64+. Academic OneFile. Web. 29 Oct. 2013.