Executive Director of United States Interagency Council on Homelessness; For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When The Rainbow is Enuf; CEO of Pathways to Housing National; Homelessness on Kaua‘i
Executive Director of United States Interagency Council on Homelessness: Matt Doherty
You don't have to look far into Hawaii's recent past to see the numbers of homeless people in the state have steadily increased. This year's Point in Time Count shows about 6,200 were homeless in 2011. By 2015, that number swelled to 7,600. We've watched the Kakaako encampment grow this year and take center stage. We saw Governor Ige create a new leadership team this summer to pull together a better strategy, and we've heard many of those involved talk about best practices. But where do they come from and what can Hawaii learn from the ongoing experiences of other places around the nation? Today we started a weeklong series to look at those efforts. Throughout the week, we'll also get reactions from the mayors of Hawaii's counties and our state's new homelessness coordinator. We started at the national level with Matthew Doherty. He heads the US Interagency Council on Homelessness. His agency provides community technical assistance and support to ensure that individuals, families, youth, and Veterans can get or regain permanent housing and the services they need to remain stably housed.
- Intro Music: Homeless by Keep The Change
- Outro Music: The Fog Is Lifting by Moonlit Sailor
For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When The Rainbow is Enuf: Jeanne Wynne Herring
Jeanne Wynne Herring is a theater director and performer who speaks with candor about the ways her own experience of homelessness and a diagnosis of bipolar disorder have affected her work and her life. As she prepared tomorrow evening’s Mano’a Valley Theater staged reading of For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When The Rainbow is Enuf, we spoke with her about her recent struggles. There’s only one performance of For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When The Rainbow is Enuf and it takes place tomorrow evening at Mano’a Valley Theater.
- Intro Music: Lilo by Lauren Auilina
- Outro Music: If I'd Have Known It Was The Last (Second Position) by Codes In The Clouds
CEO of Pathways to Housing National: Sam Tsemberis
For the last five years, Hawaii has heard a lot about Housing First. That's the model developed by psychiatrist Sam Tsemberis to provide immediate access to permanent supportive housing to homeless people with mental health and addiction problems. It came out of Pathways to Housing, which was started in New York in 1992, and has since spread into a national initiative. As part of our weeklong series looking at homelessness in Hawaii from the outside in, we wanted to know how well Hawaii's use of the Housing First model compares to other cities. Dr. Sam Tsemberis has been charting Hawaii's progress and he joined the show with an update.
- Intro Music: Got Django by Hot Club of Hulaville
- Outro Music: Something Inside So Strong by York Road Project Homeless Choir
Homelessness on Kaua‘i: Mayor Bernard Carvalho
From county to county around Hawaii, homelessness looks different, and countering it may also look different. This week, as part of our series to ask what lessons we can learn from places around the country, we want to provide Hawaii's mayors a chance to respond. We start with Kauai. In the Point in Time count this year, Kauai was the only county to post a decrease with roughly 40 fewer people counted than last year. Mayor Bernard Carvalho joined the show from Kaua‘i to tell us more.
- Intro Music: Something Inside So Strong by York Road Project Homeless Choir
- Outro Music: What It's Like by Everlast
