I grew up next to the railroad tracks in the 1960s. Among my earliest memories are trains passing with men in the boxcars or occasionally riding on top. Many, I presume, were heading, if not to greener pastures, then downtown to the flophouses and residential hotels of the Gateway District, known as Skid Row. That was the face of homelessness in that era.
Today, rail cars are sealed and the downtown hotels are long gone, but there are more homeless people than ever. Homelessness has become more democratic, if you will. Families, young people and single women have joined the ranks of the homeless in force.
But, more recently, the face of homelessness is increasingly the face of an adult 55 and older, the fastest-growing segment of the homeless population. With their numbers up some 60 percent in Minnesota since 2009, they now represent one-third of the homeless adult population.
Many homeless seniors never dreamed they would end up like this. But divorce, widowhood or estrangement from family often means diminished social connections. Loss of work, due to downsizing, disability or the changing nature of needed work skills, not only robs them of a sense of personal worth, but is financially catastrophic and can lead to lost housing. Their personal safety net, taken for granted through the years, unravels — and thus the spiral to the streets.
For most older homeless women and men, this is their first experience on the street, and they are wholly unprepared.
More than just lacking dignity, life for homeless seniors is not healthful. Some 71 percent of older homeless have a chronic physical or mental health condition. On a recent visit to a large downtown Minneapolis shelter, it became clear what this has meant for the homeless and the agencies that struggle to serve them.
Wheelchairs and walkers were everywhere. Cancer, diabetes-related amputations, and assorted respiratory conditions were common. Diseases of the brain, including dementia and depression, seem especially cruel for the homeless to live with. Shelter staff members, as usual, make due with the barest of resources. Bunk beds, long a staple in shelters as a way to squeeze in as many people as possible, don't work so well for those with mobility limitations. Special diets, refrigeration for insulin and other medications, and accommodations for those who need to get up frequently in the middle of the night all must be addressed. Shelter workers on the night shift may or may not be qualified to determine appropriate care or whether hospitalization is warranted in a crisis.
The health care system doesn't help, with patients routinely discharged to shelters. While hardly conducive to recovery, it beats the street, where the indigent too often end up.
