Helping the homeless: Group recommends street teams, other changes as winter looms

For years, Rich Merkouris has seen on foot what most of us drive by.

The pastor and now city councilor tries to get down to what he calls “the new loop” once or twice a week.

He walks from the railroad tracks running through downtown out to Interstate 229, from 10th to Sixth street, through the Whittier neighborhood and the areas around social services organizations on the east end of downtown.

Along the way, he sees resourcefulness among the homeless – “finding a space or spot they’re going to be” – along with a clear need for resources.

“Not every week but multiple times a month, there’s always a really difficult situation where there’s a child involved or a senior who really shouldn’t be in this situation.”

When he can, Merkouris tries to help on his own. Sometimes, it’s finding the person a hotel room for the night and then following up the next morning to connect him or her with organizations that can help.

There’s no one-size-fits-all approach.

“It’s case by case,” Merkouris said. “And there’s definitely more (homelessness) today. There’s more activity in the walks I take.”

And while he estimates he has been doing this for 12 years, “in the last year there have been different instances where I have felt unsafe,” he acknowledged. “That’s never happened before. There’s a little more belligerence right now than there has been previously.”

He points to substance abuse, one of several reasons he has found that people become homeless. Life circumstances, mental illness and prior criminal records contribute to homelessness for others.

He estimates three or four of every 10 homeless people he meets have come from outside Sioux Falls fairly recently.

“It has happened since COVID,” he said. “The population increase overall … and there’s definitely a criminal justice aspect to this in how we’re handling (housing for) felons and sex offenders.”

Earlier this year, Merkouris helped organize and now chairs a homeless task force. It seemed, he said, like the community recognized the need to address homelessness but didn’t have a clear sense of the steps that could or were being taken in response.

“This task force was not meant to end homelessness in Sioux Falls,” he said. “This task force was not established because good work was not being done in our community.”

It was, however, meant to bring clarity to the situation, what is being done and what more could be, he continued.

For the past several months, the 13-person group has honed in on recommendations it now will take to the City Council.

“One of the things we’ve really walked away with is a housing-first approach,” said Jessie Schmidt, who has served on the board of the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House since it opened seven years ago. “We need more housing for our chronically homeless.”

Minnehaha County has one 33-unit “Safe Home” for the chronically homeless on North Minnesota Avenue that could be expanded if funding can be found. The former Children’s Inn space is being envisioned as a way to house homeless families.

In the short term, though, there are concerns about capacity in existing shelters this winter.

The maximum capacity of the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House is 155, and “we have a very large concern about what happens if we hit 156, and we have hit that several times since the middle of October,” Schmidt said.

“We just can’t let any more than that in. It’s a hazard for everybody. When people get up and leave in the middle of the night, we allow others to come in. There has got to be some emergency shelter situation. I have no idea what the answer to that is, but … it’s a big, big concern of those of us at the Bishop Dudley House.”

That capacity can be even fewer depending on who is staying, she added, with certain beds designated by gender.

The public also needs to understand not all homeless use the Bishop Dudley’s services, she continued.

“Not everyone wants a situation that’s different than what they are in right now,” Schmidt said. “As hard as that is for so many of us to understand, that’s the reality for some folks.”

Street team approach, panhandling get a look

One of the tactics recommended by the task force is to contract with a selected organization for a two-year pilot project that would create a street outreach team.

 Merkouris has visited Minneapolis and Rapid City, which each use the approach, “and the one thing that stood out was the people that went, their training and ability to connect with these individuals and ask the right questions,” he said.

“They come across very relational, versus ‘Hey, I’m taking you to this spot.’ That was a consistent approach, and people were trained very well to engage with individuals on the street.”

The task force also has learned 78 percent of the homeless community is Native American, underscoring the need to find individuals who can connect with the population.

“We’ve had good conversations with organizations in Sioux Falls, but trying to find the track record is going to be difficult. To find people with lived experience with the Native American community is the key,” Merkouris said.

“We want clear metrics for success and effectiveness, and it’s kind of tricky to determine what that’s going to be,” Schmidt said. “Do street teams reduce calls for 911? Can a street team go when there’s a call of a person down instead of sending police? Homelessness is not a crime, and sometimes I think we look at it that way.”

There also may be conversations about adjusting the city’s panhandling ordinance, including editing signs discouraging drivers from giving money to include how to donate directly to organizations that support the homeless.

The task force has learned of panhandlers who use the money they make from drivers to stay in a hotel and buy drugs, Schmidt said.

“That’s what an addiction does – it sucks you back in over and over again, so giving money to someone with a sign telling you anything will help, well, it’s not necessarily helping. It can add to the problem,” she said. “I think it gives us a moment of relief that we think we’ve done something good for someone when we’re maybe just enabling a destructive behavior.”

Winter outlook

With daytime temperatures that will be below freezing by the weekend, Kari Benz, the director of the Department of Human Services for Minnehaha County, said there is enough capacity to avoid an additional emergency temporary shelter.

“We currently have two emergency shelters, and the number of guests in those shelters continues to fluctuate — as it always does — yet both shelters are not consistently at or above capacity,” she wrote in a message to the task force. “At first blush, it may appear there is a potential need for a temporary, short-term emergency shelter over the winter months to address the individuals that would be identified as the most difficult to shelter due to their mental health, addiction and behavior challenges.”

Funding and facilities would be other challenges, she added.

Instead, Benz said she has met with the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House and the Union Gospel Mission — which does have availability among its estimated 150 beds — to encourage greater collaboration.

Going forward, homeless individuals may start at the Bishop Dudley House, but the plan will be to transition them to the Union Gospel Mission, where there are more services available to help them become self-reliant Benz said.

There are a limited number of individuals no longer able to be served by one or both shelters, she said. There are five people banned from ever returning to either shelter, six banned from one or the other and two who might be able to return after a waiting period. Of the 13, several are incarcerated, and the county is working on updates for others.

“This is a manageable number, and one we can work with,” Benz said.

The next steps for the task force will be a recommendation to the City Council.