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Photos by Lillian Reid
Dale Green’s voice is low and resigned as he stands outside of Tempe First United Methodist Church in the early morning shadows, hands stuffed in his jeans pockets.“I used to be a crab fisher out of Dutch Harbor (in Unalaska, Alaska), and then I found out I was epileptic,” Green said.
After having a seizure, he lost his job as a fisherman and has struggled with on-and-off employment since 1996 — Green was only 22.
He said his family members know of his situation, but are unable to help because of their own financial struggles.
Green is merely one of dozens of homeless men and women who attend the Urban Outreach program based out of Tempe First United Methodist Church several times a week, and he is one of hundreds of homeless in Tempe.
Urban Outreach is a nonprofit program located at the church on University Drive and Forest Avenue that assists the homeless. Social work senior Erin Gauvin, who has interned at the program since January, said Urban Outreach provides 10-minute morning showers three days a week on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays as well as an evening program one night a week. She said food is served each week.
Though it is based in the church, Urban Outreach is not religiously affiliated.
Reverend Dave Summers of United Methodist said Urban Outreach was founded in 1993 with just the shower program, and it expanded in 2006 to include the other services.
“When we started getting interns from ASU in 2006 and we’re able to do so much more,” Summers said. “We were able to add a lot of capacity. They helped us write grants and do intentional work with the homeless.”
Because the full-time staff only includes Director Kim Van Nimwegen and a rotating case-manager, Gauvin said the program relies heavily on volunteers and their connections with local organizations, including ASU.
ASU’s involvement with the program has branched out to include the College of Nursing and Health Innovation, the School of Social Work and even the Student Recreation Center.
“The ASU nurses do their psych-rotation through Urban Outreach,” Gauvin said. “They do it at the veterans hospital and then at Urban Outreach.”
Julie Kipper, associate director of campus recreation for the SRC, also confirmed via email that the SRC washes the towels used for the Urban Outreach shower program every week.
“We recognize a need and see if ASU can meet it,” Gauvin said.
Aside from the partnerships established with interns and ASU resources, Gauvin said the volunteer base consists of more than 200 people, many of whom are ASU students.
Social work senior Ivan Zovko volunteers once a week at Urban Outreach with the evening program.
“It makes me a little more compassionate for people just knowing that people have hard times with things,” he said.
Zovko said he’s gotten to know some of the regular guests, such as a man named Brent who writes Michael Phelps jokes and tells him a new joke each time he sees Zovko.
“One time he wrote them down, just like a whole list of jokes, and they were actually really funny,” Zovko said.
Gauvin said the program is a subculture of sorts and their goal is to make homeless citizens feel comfortable and accepted at the program.
“(Once) they realize that the services are given in an encouraging environment then they might be more open to other services and progressing forward,” Gauvin said.
She compared the gatherings of homeless people that attend the programs to being in high school.
“There’s a certain quality of life that you’re all sharing,” Gauvin said. “It’s not that everyone gets along, it’s just like any other group that you have the same problems. So much of their life becomes survival.”
Ruth Fanning, who said she has been chronically homeless for about 10 years, works just to keep her four children in her life.
Her eyes welled up with tears when she described the time when her oldest son forced her to move her stuff out of his apartment into storage.
“I’m panicking, I’m freaking out because now my oldest son doesn’t want to have nothing to (do with me), who’s stayed with me through everything,” Fanning said of the incident.
She said abusive relationships, divorce, drugs and alcohol have all contributed to her relapses into homelessness. Now Fanning is in touch with her children, but no longer speaks with the rest of her immediate family, she said.
“None of them came out looking for me,” Fanning said. “Holidays came and went.”
Fanning said she’s currently looking for jobs and is hoping to find housing by January.
While Urban Outreach eases the difficulty for people like Green and Fanning, Gauvin also said raising awareness of the reality of homelessness is a major obstacle.
She said having homeless people in Tempe is a greater burden, even financially, on businesses and the community than it is a burden to do something about it.
“We have to make a decision as a community whether we’re going to support these people,” Gauvin said.
Green said he spends most of his time alone, avoiding homeless shelters and typically spending his days in Moeur Park at Mill Avenue and Curry Road, reading his Bible.
“That’s the only thing that keeps me sane,” he said. “Hearing something good.”
Gauvin said Urban Outreach can always use more volunteers and resources from the community, particularly with funding cuts in mental health care and high unemployment. The guests who attend regularly said the resources it offers, from food to clothing to computer-use, keep them going.
“This place really helps a lot,” Green said. “A homeless person doesn’t go hungry.”
Reach the reporter at sksmith9@asu.edu
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