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SUNDAY, JUNE 21, 2015 | WEST HAWAII TODAY
12A
UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL WITH THE HOMELESS
HOPE SERVICES TEAM GOES DEEP INTO RURAL PUNA TO FIND THOSE IN NEED
A spike in Hawaii
County’s homeless popu-
lation in the past year will
likely come as no surprise
to those who spend time
in downtown Hilo.
In early February, how-
ever, the Tribune-Herald
took a firsthand look at a
different side of homeless-
ness on the Big Island — a
rural population, largely
hidden from view.
The sun hadn’t risen
when a Tribune-Herald
reporter went for a ride-
along with three outreach
workers from HOPE
Services Hawaii, a state-
wide nonprofit organiza-
tion providing services to
the homeless.
In the field, the out-
reach workers use only
their first names —
Leilani, Alison and Leiala
— when contacting cli-
ents and potential clients,
so this story will do the
same.
The women’s mission
was the annual point-
in-time survey to count
homeless
individuals
on the Big Island for
Department of Human
Services, and the day’s
focus was the lower Puna
coastline. They provided
snacks and bottled water
to survey participants.
The main question was:
“Where did you sleep on
the night of Jan. 25?”
The final tally of that
islandwide survey was
1,241 homeless individu-
als — 43 percent more
than the 869 total last
year.
Out of the 1,241 home-
less, 220 were housed
either in emergency
shelters or transitional
housing.
Leilani, the expedi-
tion’s leader and driver,
has been homeless and
has dealt with the judicial
system after an arrest on
drug charges. She cred-
its Big Island Drug Court
and the Office for Social
Ministry (the former
name of Hope Services)
for her rehabilitation, say-
ing, “They helped me go
in a different direction.”
She and the others
proved adept and intui-
tive outreach efforts when
making contact with
homeless people.
“What we do is try to
gain their trust,” Leilani
said. “If they’ll take my
card, even better.”
Just before dawn,
Leilani
drove
down
Pohoiki Road, and sud-
denly, Alison exclaimed,
“There’s one!”
Leilani pulled over
near a dark van, unseen
by the reporter, obscured
in the underbrush just
off the roadway. Its lone
occupant was a friendly
woman who said she had
come four months earlier
from Oregon and had
been unable to find hous-
ing she could afford.
Afterwards, Leilani said
the woman’s story isn’t
uncommon.
“They think it’s just
sandy beaches and palm
trees when they come
to the islands,” she said,
shaking her head. “Boy,
are they wrong.”
A few minutes later, the
sun was a horizontal sliv-
er to the east, and Leiala
spotted a tent through
some trees adjacent to
an older-model white
car with its trunk open.
Leilani pulled off onto a
gravel path overgrown by
weeds.
“Good morning, sorry
to bother you, we’re from
HOPE Services,” Leilani
said to the three peo-
ple there, a 61-year-old
woman, her son and his
girlfriend. All took the
survey, the snacks and
water, and said they had
applied for subsidized
housing. The woman said
she had lived out of the
car for the past two years.
“After you’ve been doing
this for awhile, you know
what to look for,” Leilani
said. “You see cars stashed
like this.”
Leilani then drove to a
secluded stretch of shore-
line known as “Gilligan’s
Island.” She skillfully
piloted HOPE Services’
4-wheel-drive vehicle over
a pitted, bumpy, rocky
path — as well as a couple
of downed tree trunks —
and onto a stretch of sand
where the vehicle sunk in,
but kept its footing.
The
HOPE
team,
accompanied by the
reporter, got out of the
vehicle and trekked over
the sand for a while, in
search of more homeless.
All three pointed out tents
and makeshift palm frond
shelters that were hard
for untrained eyes to spot.
As it turned out, no occu-
pants were found.
Later, at Kaimu Korner
Country Store, Leilani
encountered John, a per-
sonable man who told
her his home in Kalapana
Sea View Estates burned
down and he had been
“camping out” in a tent
ever since. While he didn’t
consider himself home-
less, he was houseless, and
took both the survey and
Leilani’s card.
A bit later, the outreach
group saw a smiling man
along the roadside, and
Leilani pulled over. As
it turned out, the man,
James, was deaf, but he
and the women found a
way to communicate. He
was also homeless, took
the card and the appli-
cation, and filled out a
survey.
The next individual
Leilani pulled over for
wasn’t as accommodat-
ing, accusing the HOPE
BY JOHN BURNETT
HAWAII TRIBUNE-HERALD
‘No surprises’ in
homeless count,
experts say
The leader of a non-
profit group providing
services to the home-
less said there are “no
surprises” in the drastic
increase in the number
of homeless people on
the Big Island.
“We know it’s on the
rise as more and more
families and individ-
uals lose their income,
lose their jobs, and have
no other resources to
maintain their hous-
ing,” Brandee Menino,
chief executive officer of
HOPE Services Hawaii
Inc., said Friday.
Jeremy McComber,
HOPE Services’ opera-
tions director, said the
group, which operates
as part of the Roman
Catholic Diocese of
Honolulu and was for-
merly known as Office
for Social Ministry, has
about 20 programs for
homeless individuals,
and is the “largest pro-
vider of (transitional)
shelter on the Big Island,
with about 600 beds
around the island.”
The total homeless
count of 1,241 homeless
taken in a weeklong sur-
vey conducted early this
year is probably on the
low side, Menino said.
“It’s a difficult task to
get an accurate count
in a single week, given
our land mass and rural
areas,” she noted.
Menino added that
the biggest challenges
faced in trying to get an
accurate count of the
homeless population
are “not enough time
and volunteers needed
to canvass and cover the
large land mass.”
“We need more vol-
unteers from all areas on
the island that know their
neighborhoods to help
identify households living
in unsheltered situations,”
she said. “Many households
living in buses, tents, cars
and substandard housing
— tarps, pallets, skips, no
running water, power, etc.
— do not consider them-
selves homeless.”
Although counting
the homeless in a week
on an island with a
land mass of more than
4,000 square miles is a
daunting task, Menino
said the organization is
“improving the way we
do business.”
“This year, we targeted
the count and sought out
those who were already
registered with our
agency — we went off a
list from our database
— and reached out to
community associations
in addition to our usual
canvassing efforts of the
entire island,” she said.
The burgeoning pop-
ulation of homeless on
the Big Island is like-
ly to continue rising,
said Kaui Alexander,
HOPE Services’ care
coordinator.
“A lot of families are
just one setback away
from becoming home-
less. A job ending or a
health problem that aris-
es can quickly lead to the
inability to not be able to
pay rent or utility bills,
afford child care, put gas
in the car, and families
are left having to make
tough decisions.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@
hawaiitribune-herald.com.
BY JOHN BURNETT
HAWAII TRIBUNE-HERALD
Leilani, a HOPE Services Hawaii outreach worker,
fills out a survey from answers given by Santino, a
young mother living in a van on a relative’s property
in Leilani Estates.
JOHN BURNETT/
HAWAII TRIBUNE-HERALD
Menino McComber
workers of being “from
the government.”
“If they don’t want to
engage, you say, ‘Thank
you very much,’ and move
on,” Leilani said. “Safety
first.”
The final stop of
was in Leilani Estates,
where a young woman
named Santino lived
with her husband and
their young son in a van
behind a relative’s home.
She worked in the food
service industry, but
the couple didn’t earn
enough to afford hous-
ing, they said.
“She’s
hardworking,
and she’s devoted to
her family,” Leilani said.
“Hopefully, they can get
back on their feet.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@
hawaiitribune-herald.com.
