16th Annual Homeless Memorial To Be Held Dec. 18

From the Homeless Services Center:

Santa Cruz County will once again join communities around the nation in honoring individuals who died while homeless in 2014. The Memorial will be held on Thursday, December 18th at 10:30 a.m. at Homeless Services Center Dining Hall at 115 Coral Street in Santa Cruz.

The memorial is a joint project of Homeless Persons’ Health Project, River Street Shelter/Encompass Community Services, and Homeless Services Center.

Family, friends, service providers, and community members will come together on Thursday to honor the lives of the individuals for whom they knew and cared.

The Memorial, which has been held annual since 1999, provides the opportunity to consider the preciousness of life and shows the real-life consequences of inadequate access to affordable housing, comprehensive health care, mental health and substance abuse disorder treatment, and income support for those without a home.

The Memorial will include a short service, a reading of names to honor those individuals who died, and the hanging of memorial flags, which represent the more than 600 individuals who died while homeless or after long periods of homelessness in Santa Cruz County since 1999.

Homeless Memorials are held on or close to Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year, when the days are the shortest and it is often the coldest. At this time of year, it is even more difficult for those experiencing homelessness.

To date, 38 individuals have died this year while experiencing homelessness in Santa Cruz County. An additional 22 people died this year who were in housing at the time of their death, but who had had long periods of homelessness earlier in their lives.

These individuals died from a number of causes including drug overdose, chronic alcoholism, suicide, homicide, and a variety of health issues related to the homeless lifestyle.

The number who have died while homeless this year is the same number as those who died while homeless in 2013. Homelessness causes, complicates and exacerbates serious health problems, and as a result leads to premature deaths of thousands of people in communities across the country each year.

According to the National Health Care for the Homeless Council, homeless persons have a higher risk of death than people in the general population. In Santa Cruz County, the average age of death of those who died while experiencing homelessness in 2014 was 51.

Compared to the average life expectancy of 80 for most Americans, on the average people who die while homeless die almost 30 years younger than those with adequate access to housing.

The Memorial ensures that each person’s life is celebrated and that no one’s passing goes unnoticed.

Community members are invited to join together to let the memory of each person and the circumstances of their death guide us in ongoing efforts to improve health and access to housing for all of our community members, recommitting ourselves to ending homelessness in Santa Cruz County.

The Homeless Persons’ Health Project (HPHP) is a program of the County of Santa Cruz Health Services Agency and provides services throughout the County to over 3,000 homeless or marginally housed adults and youth. HPHP’s Coral Street Homeless Clinic provides primary and mental health care to homeless individuals. HPHP also provides benefits support, including helping people sign up with MediCal, intensive case management, payeeships, as well as access to substance use treatment and permanent supportive housing programs.

Founded in 1986, Homeless Services Center creates pathways to housing for individuals and families experiencing homelessness in Santa Cruz County. HSC strategically focuses its efforts on data-driven solutions to increase the rate at which participants end their homelessness and reduce chronic homelessness in Santa Cruz County. For additional information, visit www.santacruzhsc.org.

Encompass Community Services (formerly Santa Cruz Community Counseling Center) has been serving Santa Cruz County since 1973. Our mission is “building on the strength of people working together to create healthy change in their lives and community. We deliver quality human services guided by the values of diversity, partnership, and the power of workplace democracy.”

This year we served over 7,500 Santa Cruz residents with culturally-sensitive, bilingual services. We do this through our four service components: Child and Family Development Programs, Youth Services, Community Recovery Services, and Community Support Services. For additional information, visit www.encompasscs.org.