When does helping the homeless become enabling?

On May 17, Governor Neil Abercrombie and his coordinator on homelessness, Marc Alexander, announced a 90-day plan to tackle homelessness that would provide mental health services and help people move into housing. The plan took effect immediately and will conclude on Aug. 17. "This puts the pressure on us to deliver," the governor said.

The governor also said he hoped to convince churches and others who feed homeless in public parks not to do so because such efforts give homeless an incentive to stay where they are.

No additional state funds have been allocated for the plan. Instead, it strives to maximize use of funds already budgeted for homelessness, and attract both federal funding and money from private foundations. Nor does the plan address additional affordable housing or job training; measures to address these issues would come in a later plan that focuses on longer-term initiatives, the administration said.

“According to 2007 data,” the governor’s plan notes. “Hawai‘i has twice as many people who are homeless per 100,000 people as the national average. Data from 2010 indicate that almost one third of the sheltered homeless are children; more than ten percent are veterans; and over 60 percent have lived in Hawai‘i for more than ten years. Almost half of the families who are homeless include someone who is employed, and almost 30 percent are Hawaiian or part Hawaiian.”

The administration also has called on churches and other organizations – such as the Church of Living Ohana, Family of the Living God, which regularly feeds low-income people, senior citizens and the homeless at Aala Park in Honolulu’s Chinatown – to stop feeding homeless people in parks and other places where they congregate, saying it enables homelessness and draws more homeless people to specific areas. However, Bob Erb, chief executive of Kingdom of Heaven Ministries, said his group will continue to serve meals every night at Kapiolani Park despite those concerns.

Some organizations that provide services to the homeless agree that feeding them in parks actually encourages them to continue their way of life. The Institute of Human Services, for example, used to feed people at Aala Park but now has refrained from that practice, recognizing that it is enabling their homelessness.

In April, the 11th U.S. Circuit of Appeals in Atlanta ruled unanimously that restrictions on feeding the homeless in city parks are proper. The decision approved an Orlando, Fla., ordinance that limits a group to only two days of feeding a year at each park in its downtown district, which includes the signature Lake Eola Park. Supporters of the governor’s plan and his appeal to organizations to cease feeding homeless in the parks have pointed out that the court’s decision could empower the state to prohibit the practice.

Click here to download the four-page 90-Day Plan on Homelessness in Hawaii.