A list of the homeless dead is by nature incomplete, steadily unfolding. The lives of the homeless are often cut two or three decades short due to exposure, easily treated chronic diseases, addiction, or violence. On Dec 21, the names of 67 homeless people who died in and around Washington over the year were read at a vigil marking the local observance of National Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day.
And on Dec. 31, the battered and strangled body of Street Sense vendor Leroy Studevant, 56, was found near a creek in Northeast D.C.
District police are calling their inquiry into his death the first homicide investigation of 2012. At the Dec. 21 vigil, as candles flickered in the sanctuary of New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, others who had gone before him were recalled. Phyllis Jackson was remembered for her deep spirituality; Luther Hill for his military service and Cliff Carle, Jr. for his work as a vendor and photographer for Street Sense.
The service was coordinated with National Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day vigils in at least 152 other communities, from Wasilla, Alaska to Palm Beach Florida.
Every year since 1990, the National Coalition for the Homeless (NCH) has organized the vigils. They are always observed on the winter solstice, which marks the longest night of the year.
In addition to local advocates, this year’s event drew two top federal officials, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Sec. Shaun Donovan, and US Interagency Council on Homelessness Executive Director Barbara Poppe. They offered words of condolence but also stressed recent progress being made to address homelessness on local and national levels.
Both highlighted strides being made toward a national goal of ending homelessness among veterans by 2015. In 2010, over 76,000 veterans experienced homelessness. But since 2008, more than 32,000 have been housed with the help of federal rent subsidy vouchers. And efforts are underway to retrain veterans for peacetime work and to address the mental health and substance abuse issues that sometimes contribute to their homelessness.
“You and I cannot change that our brothers and sisters died homeless. What we can change is our future,” said Poppe. “We know what is needed and we know what works. We have decreased veterans’ homelessness by 12 percent in just one year. We can apply this wisdom to all populations.”
Donovan told the story of Clayton McGee, a formerly homeless veteran who managed to overcome addiction and turn his life around.
“Clayton’s name is not one of those we mourn tonight,” said Donovan. “Thanks to HUD and Dept of Veterans Affairs and thanks to his own determination Clayton now has a home to live in with the treatment and job training he needed to rebuild his life.”
Outreach efforts did not save the life of local Vietnam veteran Luther Hill, also listed as “Sarge,” on the memorial service roll.
His body was found on the cold morning of Oct 30, slumped in his wheelchair in the doorway of the old Hecht’s warehouse on New York Avenue, not far from a city shelter.
A hypothermia alert had been declared in the city on the night of Oct 29 and Hill’s death raised questions about the adequacy of the city’s system intended to protect the homeless from the cold.
A report on Hill’s death by the city Department of Human Services concluded that Hill had not been turned away from the nearby New York Avenue shelter on the night he died. But some advocates wonder if more could have been done. An official from the city office of the Chief Medical Examiner said Jan 3 that Hill had died of the effects of acute and chronic alcoholism. The manner of his death was deemed accidental, the official said with “part of that being hypothermia because of the cold.”
