Columbus police in February found a man huddled in the back bedroom of his home, using a blanket and boiling water from a Crock Pot to keep warm.
He needed food, shelter and clothes, and he no longer had the means to provide for himself, according to Columbus Community Outreach Coordinator Glenda Buckhalter. Fortunately, the Building Bridges of Hope Foundation helped the man with his immediate needs, Buckhalter said, and helped place him on the road to self-sufficiency. Even more fortunately, she said, that foundation far from stands alone in helping the Golden Triangle’s poor and vulnerable citizens.
Representatives of 15 agencies serving the Golden Triangle’s homeless, impoverished and otherwise vulnerable populations met Thursday morning at Trotter Convention Center to talk about their programs and revitalize a networking effort to help more people, more efficiently. Among those present were Lowndes County Helping Hands, the Homeless Coalition, Safe Haven, Salvation Army, United Way, Community Counseling, Sally Kate Winters Recovery House and MUTEH (Mississippi United to End Homelessness). Columbus city officials, including Mayor Robert Smith and Police Chief Tony Carleton, also attended.
Buckhalter, who became the community outreach coordinator in 2013, said local assistance organizations met as often as monthly in the past, and she would like to see that return. Plus, she said she is compiling a resource guide of organizations and the services they provide so people in need can find the right program faster.
“We have always networked,” she said. “We depend on each other very heavily…. It’s very important that we have our services connected to one another so we can make sure we get people the help they need.”
Buckhalter said she received about 50 calls per day for assistance through Building Bridges of Hope — a foundation funded through city and grant funds as well as private donations — and she estimated that local assistance organizations help thousands of residents per year.
When she receives a call, she said her main objective is to take care of their basic needs, whether it be food, clothes or shelter. In some cases, she said she helps place someone in need in a hotel or other temporary shelter and then works with MUTEH’s Rapid Rehousing Program to find the person a permanent dwelling. In those cases, she said the foundation — sometimes through partnering with other programs — will pay a person’s security deposit and utilities in advance, then fund up to three months of rent.
“Most of the ones who come to us have nothing,” Buckhalter said. “They just have the clothes on their back. We have a lot of unemployed, and we have a lot of single mothers with children. … Our objective is to not let them pay for anything if we can help it (until they get on their feet).”
The help, though, does come with responsibility. Buckhalter said Building Bridges requires those helped to complete Greater Good workshops — which teach budgeting, career planning and personal responsibility — and the program also helps those people earn their GED or find jobs.
Buckhalter said her organization, along with many others on hand Thursday, also used the United Way’s charity tracker software, which allows agencies to see what help a person has already received when they walk in the door.
“That way, if someone comes in and says they haven’t received any help from anywhere else, we can check the Charity Tracker and we’ll know for sure,” she said.
Homeless Coalition co-director Anne Harris, an Episcopal minister who has lived in Columbus for three years, said she learned on Thursday about more available programs for the Golden Triangle needy than she ever knew existed. Since she said faith-based organizations are typically the “first line of defense” for those in need, it helped to have a better road map of where to send people for services her church or the Homeless Coalition could not provide.
Harris also addressed the coalition’s effort to build a homeless shelter in Columbus, and in the meantime she said the organization continued to work, just like the Building Bridges foundation, on rooting out temporary and permanent housing options for the homeless.
“In a perfect world, there would be no homeless,” she said. “But we don’t live in a perfect world.”
Smith called Thursday’s program enlightening and informative, adding it would strengthen his office’s efforts to help those in need.
“Each individual agency had an opportunity to get up and talk about what they do, and there were some agencies here today who weren’t aware of some of the programs the other agencies offered,” Smith said. “This certainly helps me, because so many times the first number they call is the mayor’s office.”
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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