Huffington Post

May 18, 2012

From Huffington Post:

For the last few weeks, Chicago has been bracing for a new kind of storm — the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, summit that’s occurring this weekend. For all the hassles that accommodating the event entails, though, it is a chance for host countries to showcase their most global, diverse, culturally vibrant communities. This week, it’s Chicago’s turn. Let’s really give them something to see.

I’m not talking about our parks, our food, our museums or our sports teams. I’m talking about the roots of Chicago, which are still visible today.

As it’s always been, Chicago is a city of immigrants. One hundred twenty five years ago, when Jane Addams opened the doors of Heartland Alliance, the organization I lead, immigrants came here with little more than the clothes on their backs. They helped lay the foundation of the city we know today — they organized for fair labor practices, built railroads and stockyards and opened successful small businesses.

The foundation they laid, though, has been critical in making Chicago the global city that it is — with all the successes and challenges that entails.

Those global challenges are something we deal with every day at Heartland Alliance. We work in more than 20 countries around the world, and here in Chicago, with those who have fled poverty, danger and persecution.

We work to heal the wounds of genocide, war, torture and slavery, and we help refugees and immigrants settle in their new homeland.

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Huffington Post

March 13, 2012

From Huffington Post:

With campaign season in full swing, it seems everyone has a panacea for what ails us. And while I wish such a simple solution to the division of our indivisible nation existed, the reality is more complicated, requiring first and foremost that we understand the gravity of the situation.

This month, I gave a speech as part of the TedX series on this very topic. This post is adapted from that talk, hoping to shed light on the reality of poverty in America — that it’s everywhere, has no age, race or creed, and affects us all, whether we live in poverty or not.

The face of poverty is one like Charlene’s, a single mom working hard to raise two daughters on minimum wage, with bills for her eldest’s asthma medication mounting and an unenviable decision before her — pay the electric bill or buy food?

I care about Charlene’s future — and her children’s — not just because it’s my job or because that’s the mission of the nonprofit where I work, but because as a human being, I am inextricably linked to Charlene. That’s why I’d like to share eight facts about poverty that will provoke your head and haunt your heart. These facts and stories are not meant to overwhelm you, but instead, inspire you to see the world differently, to see that the fate of one impacts the fate of us all. And ultimately, show how you have the power to impact change on a life in need.

Read More »

Windy City Times

March 7, 2012

by Joe Franco

From Windy City Times:

The mission of Heartland Alliance for the last 125 years has been to advance human rights and respond “to the human needs of endangered populations—particularly the poor, the isolated, and the displaced—through the provision of comprehensive and respectful services and the promotion of permanent solutions leading to a more just global society.”

Heartland was also one of Chicago’s first responders during the beginning of the AIDS Crisis. Rev. Sid Mohn, president of Heartland, began a program for those diagnosed and living with AIDS that seemed revolutionary at the time.

“We saw AIDS as not just a public health issue but also one of social justice,” said Mohn. “We wanted to treat this new ‘gay disease’ with both non-discrimination and a recognition that we needed organized systems of care not normally available to those with HIV before.”

Heartland partnered with Cook County Hospital to provide one of the nation’s first specialty clinics for those with AIDS/HIV. Heartland also became a fierce advocate of equal protection for those who were being treated. “We had to be sure that those people, the most vulnerable, who are normally ‘cut out’ of the table were not cut out at that table,” said Karen Batia, the executive director of Heartland Alliance Health.

Since Heartland intervened, the face of AIDS has changed as have the funds made available to sustain their innovative programs. “We offered a holistic approach to those living with HIV. We offered not only the basic health needs but acupuncture, recreational outings and a community nurse,” said John Dinauer, a case manager with the behavioral health unit for Heartland. “But things change. Funding changes. HIV changes. The money for our approach went away though we did try as long as we could to keep it going, We just ended our art therapy sessions but we think within time, that program will return.”

Currently, Heartland operates more than 140 scattered-site housing units for those with HIV and AIDS. “We understand that providing housing, real, viable housing for those most marginalized who are living with AIDS is an important part of their actual treatment,” said Dinauer. “My job as a case manager is comprehensive. Housing is a part but so is making sure our participants have healthcare and some sort of income. We also operate the Rafael Center to make sure our participants have some place to come to during the day.”

HIV prevention has also been a recent objective for Heartland with the establishment of “Promise.” “This is community-based intervention. We are reaching out to the unidentified community. These are predominantly African-American men who have sex with men. First, we identify advocates in the community then take those advocates’ stories and disseminate them through those men who may be at risk. This is more than just distributing condoms. This is peer-to-peer intervention with counseling on safer-sex and testing,” said Dinauer.

Batia, with Heartland Alliance Health, stressed the importance of medical care that went beyond the basics. “We recently merged with Vital Bridges so that folks would have access to quality, fresh foods. This is not a food bank with canned and non-perishables but actual grocery centers where people can come and ‘shop’. We offer nutritional counselors to make sure that the nutritional needs of folks are met,” said Batia.

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Windy City Times

March 7, 2012

by Joe Franco

From Windy City Times:

The Rev. Sid Mohn grew up on a rural Pennsylvania farm in roots deeply entrenched in both the conservative Dutch environment that he lived and in the Anabaptists that enveloped him. To Mohn, his entire childhood was spent connected to the church and he very early on felt a call to work within that establishment.

“It wasn’t until much later,” said Mohn, “that I came out and struggled deeply with the irrationality to continue to seek ordination in an organization that was predominantly exclusionary to gay men and lesbians.”

Mohn’s Anabaptist pedigree—their solemn critique of unfair or unjust social policy—took over.

“Just because society and the church oppose or condemn LGBTQ people is no reason to stay silent. I felt that I needed to complete my seminarian training,” he said.

The Presbyterian church rejected Mohn but the United Church of Christ actually asked him to serve and he was ordained a minister in that congregation.

“Getting a job full time in the church was just not possible. I believe I became ordained to not only say ‘there are gay men who are being ordained’ and as a symbol that there were openly gay people in the clergy,” said Mohn.

Mohn’s training and upbringing made work with the Chicago-based Heartland Alliance immediately attractive to him.

“I saw the service of people who are marginalized and typically the most excluded as the best opportunity,” he said. “I believed that I could translate my own person experiences with the social exclusion of so many.”

Mohn became president of Heartland in 1980. In 1981, the disease we now know as AIDS began to take its very early and immediate toll on large numbers of gay men—and others.

“I instantly recognized that this new ‘gay disease’ as it was branded at the time, had both public health and social justice issues that had to be dealt with,” said Mohn. “I wanted to insure that those living with AIDS and HIV had the respect they deserved as well as having all of their rights to treatment with dignity protected. I also recognized that at that time, there were no organized systems of care available to those living with AIDS and that only some hospitals had emergency care that could handle this new crisis. We at Heartland sought to define a continuum of care to respond to the multiple needs of those with HIV, such as basic healthcare, nutrition and housing,”

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Chicago Tribune

February 16, 2012

From Chicago Tribune:

Luz Pagan, a single mother who was featured in a Tribune story last month about the working poor, started a new job Thursday and received enough financial help from the paper’s readers to cover her rent for a year.

Touched by her story, Tribune readers offered everything from money and household goods and clothing to leads on possible jobs. including one she applied for and landed.

A Hinsdale resident who asked to remain anonymous sent the Tribune a check for $6,900 so Pagan could pay her rent for a year. She lives with her 12-year-old son in a $575-a-month studio apartment on the north side and said Thursday she’s looking for something even less expensive.

“Hopefully, it gives her a bit of breathing room and takes a little pressure off, although I know she’ll still have a tough road ahead of her,” the donor wrote.

Pagan, who turned 45 on Monday, was moved to tears when the Tribune presented her checks that it received on her behalf for $6,900 and $500.

“Oh my god,” she said, turning away after starting to cry. “It’s shocking to know there are people willing to help. This is the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

Two other readers sent her two checks directly for $100 and $250.

One of several job leads came from Andy Raphael, a partner at LaSalle Process Servers LP. He needed someone to do office work, help with clients, and deliver legal documents. He wanted to know if she was a U.S. citizen (yes) or a felon (no.). For such positions, he often puts out feelers to local law schools.

She was one of two final candidates. And on Feb. 7, she learned she got the job. Thursday marked her first day at the family-owned business in the Loop. She’ll work 9 to 5 with starting pay of $12 an hour, a nearly 40 percent boost from her previous parttime retail job; last year she earned about $7,000. And this job comes with benefits, including health insurance.

“It was so close, but she seemed like she’d go the extra mile to get the job done,” Raphael said of why he hired Pagan. He initially was concerned Pagan might come across as “timid.” In serving legal papers, he said, “They might call you a few choice words.”

Raphael said mostly she’ll be dropping off papers to downtown businesses, including secretaries, lawyers and registered agents, who are more accustomed to receiving them rather than people at home who can become confrontational and emotional.

Pagan, who had worked nearly three years as a part-time cashier at a discount store in Chicago, said she had been searching for a full-time job “forever” to become more financially stable.” “I’m really happy,” she said of her new job. “I’m excited.” She quit her part-time job Wednesday.

Read More »

Huffington Post

February 1, 2012

Read Sid Mohn, President of Heartland Alliance’s latest Huffington Post column.

From Huffington Post:

Today is a new day in Chicago. This week is the first in more than 120 years that Chicago will be without Jane Addams Hull House — one of the preeminent social service agencies in the nation.

It’s a sobering thought — that after so much time, an agency of such size and importance can disappear. It also calls to light how important it is for each of us to support the nonprofits whose work we value.

My organization — Heartland Alliance, a social service and anti-poverty organization in Chicago — considers the closing of Hull House a loss of family. We were birthed out of the same era, share Jane Addams as our visionary founder, and are rooted in a similar mission of providing new opportunities to lives in need.

This is a difficult time for all of us, though and, unfortunately, Hull House isn’t the only nonprofit facing trouble. The AP reports that nearly 60% of nonprofits have seen their income flatten or decrease in the last year. Heartland Alliance’s own survey of local nonprofits discovered the same issue — that nearly 50% of them had reduced hours, cut services, or laid off staff. Nearly 40% had to shutter needed programs. Food banks, shelters, after-school programs — all find themselves pushed to do far more with far less.

To me the tragedy here isn’t the closing of such an iconic organization or the resulting stress on Hull House’s nonprofit peers. The tragedy is in the lives of their participants, who were given a real opportunity — for some of them maybe the first in their lives — to rise up and take hold of a new life only to have support systems disappear.

If my 30 years in the nonprofit world have taught me anything, though, it’s that funding streams are only one piece of the puzzle. Giving people hope is another. So is the ability to approach a problem holistically, remembering that what’s before you isn’t a laundry list of problems to be solved, it’s a human being who will take the reins and drive themselves forward, given the tools to do so.

Read More »

The Chicago Tribune

January 23, 2012

Once-homeless brothers trying to adjust to warm rooms, caseworkers’ rules

From The Chicago Tribune:

After 30 years of living like ghosts on the streets, sleeping under a bridge and drifting through warming centers, Frank and Anthony Nowotnik are learning to live inside.

There are advantages, including heat and hot water, that come with the move indoors.

But nearly every day, the 43-year-old twin brothers feel the pull of their old life under the bridge. The shopping cart that held their belongings. The bottle of vodka that they tucked under their heads at night. The dull, rhythmic thump of the cars passing — bump, bump — on the expressway overhead.

“I miss it. I actually do miss it,” says Anthony, of the years the brothers spent living under the highway. He folds his rough hands and looks down.

“The freedom,” adds Frank.

They had lived on the streets since they were 13, two men amid the roughly 1,700 homeless people who shun the city’s shelters and instead survive on the margins — parks and underpasses, abandoned cars and cardboard boxes — places the twins call “out there.”

Now the brothers have a home at Pathways Safe Haven, a place of last resort for the most desperate homeless. But the transition inside hasn’t been easy.

Thrown out of two housing programs in the last year for excessive drinking, the brothers are trying to face down their demons and scrambling once again to gain a foothold inside. The stakes are never far from their minds: At least 50 homeless men and women died in Chicago last year, most of them while living on the street. If not for a place to stay, Anthony says, “I probably would have been dead too.”

Now, they pay their rent, have bank accounts and stop at the dry cleaners to have their shirts pressed.

But every night, they open their windows and spread their blankets on the floor. They can’t get used to the warmth of the indoors. And it’s difficult to sleep in a bed when, as Anthony explains, “I’m so used to sleeping on the ground.”

For the last year, that is how the twins have lived — reconciling inside and out — caught between two worlds.

They know they can live on the streets. Now, they wonder, can they navigate a world on the inside?

Read More »

the Journal Sentinel

January 10, 2012

From the Journal Sentinel:

By Tom Daykin of the Journal Sentinel

An apartment building aimed at homeless families, and families at risk of becoming homeless, was unanimously recommended for approval by the Milwaukee Plan Commission Monday.

The development, with around 35 units, would be built at the northwest corner of E. Center and N. Buffum streets by Chicago-based Heartland Housing Inc.

The project, which also needs Common Council zoning approval, was opposed by nearby homeowners Carolyn Peters and Kyla Fernandez at Monday’s hearing. They raised concerns about more traffic in the neighborhood, and about developing a city-owned lot that’s been used as a community garden.

Heartland, a nonprofit developer, will seek federal affordable housing tax credits to help finance the project. Those credits are given to developers in an annual competitive process.

Developers that receive the credits agree to provide apartments at below-market rents to people earning no more than 60% of the area’s median income. The Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority usually announces in April which developers receive credits from that year’s allocation.

The four-story building would include a community room, business center, child care center, 17 parking spaces and an outdoor playground. Community Advocates, a Milwaukee social services agency, would provide on-site assistance to residents.

Heartland and Community Advocates officials say the development is badly needed because of the high number of families in Milwaukee that are facing homelessness.

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The Journal Sentinel

December 13, 2011

From The Journal Sentinel:

An apartment building aimed at homeless families, and families at risk of becoming homeless, is being propposed for Milwaukee’s north side.

The development, with around 35 units, would be built at the northwest corner of E. Center and N. Buffum streets by Chicago-based Heartland Housing Inc.

Heartland is seeking an option to purchase a vacant, city-owned lot for the development. The city Redevelopment Authority board on Thursday will review that option request. The 30,000-square-foot lot would sell for $30,000.

Heartland, a nonprofit developer, will seek federal affordable housing tax credits to help finance the project, said Michael Goldberg, executive director. Those credits are given to developers in an annual competitive process.

Developers that receive the credits agree to provide apartments at below-market rents to people earning no more than 60% of the area’s median income. The Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority usually announces in April which developers receive credits from that year’s allocation.

The development would have units ranging from two to four bedrooms, Goldberg said. He said the project budget, and the amount of credits being soughts, are still being determined.

A Department of City Development report said the preliminary estimated budget was $10.6 million.

The four-story building would include a community room, business center, child care center, 17 parking spaces and an outdoor playground, the report said. Community Advocates, a Milwaukee social services agency, would provide on-site assistance to residents.

Heartland has done two other Milwaukee developments: the 24-unit Prairie Apartments, 1218 W. Highland Ave., which opened in 2009, and the 38-unit Capuchin Apartments, 2502 W Tamarack St., near N. 25th St. and W. Fond du Lac Ave., which opened in August.

Both of those projects have studio units and one-bedroom apartments for homeless individuals, and people suffering from chronic mental illnesses.

The latest project is being proposed because of the great need in Milwaukee for apartments for homeless families, and those at risk of becoming homeless, Goldberg said.

My colleague Annysa Johnson has a detailed story about that problem in today’s Journal Sentinel.

Read More »

November 23, 2011

Rapidly shrinking middle class pushing more elderly into poverty

November 23, 2011|By Janet Kidd Stewart, Special to the Tribune

Sid L. Mohn is president of Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights in Chicago and serves on the board of the Chicago Commission on Human Relations. We asked him about the elderly in this economy.

Q: How many of Chicago’s elderly are poor?

A: On a national level, the poverty rate for the elderly (65 and older) is 9 percent using the traditional measure, and 16 percent using a supplemental measure (developed by the Census Bureau). If we were to apply the supplemental measure to poverty levels in Chicago, the rate would be above 20 percent, or about one in five.

Q: What’s the difference between the two calculations?

A: The traditional measure was developed in the early 1960s and was centered on how much a household spent on food. It didn’t take into account all of the supplements that individuals receive through housing subsidies, low-income tax credits, child care subsidies. The supplemental is a contemporary measure of the wide array of expenses — such as food, rent, health care — and is much more relevant. The Census began using this supplemental measure just within the past year. It has been subject to debate by researchers because of concern it would likely raise the poverty rates in general.

Q: What does the change mean for older Americans?

A: Historically we have claimed people under the age of 18 have extremely high poverty rates and the elderly have the lowest. (But) when you use the supplemental measure, you find that the poverty rate for people under 18 goes down, and the rate for those 65 and up dramatically soars. Most elderly, by receiving Social Security and pension income, have an income rate that is just above the poverty level. But when you take into account how much of their disposable income they spend on health care costs, particularly medication, and housing, they drop below the poverty line.

Q: Are elderly people in Chicago dropping from the middle class into the ranks of the poor, as suggested by some national trends?

A: Very much so. Elderly individuals were relying on investment income, and now with the loss of investment income, they are living below the poverty level. In Illinois, as is the trend in all the United States, there are growing income disparities. The middle class is shrinking at a very rapid pace. Unless we make considerable changes, our city will have a small number of very affluent elderly and very many who are impoverished.

We need to ensure critical safety nets like Social Security, Medicare and food supports remain in place. And we need to address the situation of jobs, so that middle-income individuals are able to retain their middle-income status and create the nest eggs required for living in retirement.

Q: How is your organization responding to the needs of the elderly?

A: We need to try to prevent homelessness. When an elderly person is evicted, it takes a minimum of six months to stabilize them because of the physical and emotional trauma of being displaced from their home.

Most individuals we work with are renters. We intervene and begin negotiations with a landlord to try to delay eviction, help the individual in doing an appropriate budget, and we do have grants to cover emergencies such as back-due rent that can help people overcome a crisis. By spending $500 on emergency prevention, you end up saving $5,000 that would have been spent assisting a homeless individual reconnect with housing.
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Q: What about spiraling health costs?

A: We work with the elderly in ensuring that their medications are the most appropriate and least costly. We provide health care to homeless and low-income populations through a series of primary care clinics located on the North and West sides.

We’re also focusing on nutritional education, working with the elderly to improve their organic health so they will reduce unnecessary expenditures on health care. Individuals start skipping one meal a day as their medication costs go up. One meal a day becomes two a day, then (they’re eating one meal) every other day. The perspective is that pills are more important than food, and with limited money, pills become the priority. But with a lack of food the body begins to weaken and causes increased health maladies. Therefore, the costs to all of us in terms of higher health care expenses is the outcome.

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