SIUSLAW NEWS | WEDNESDAY, JULY 8, 2020 | 5A
SHELTER from page 1A
The SSSS formed in 2019,
but as the team began to
look for volunteers in the
Siuslaw region in the midst
of a pandemic, the need for
helping students in unstable
living situations has become
more vital.
“The number of homeless
is going up,” Mann-Heintz
said, quoting statistics giv-
en by the Department of
Education during its “Sup-
porting Students and Fam-
ilies Experiencing Home-
lessness During COVID-19
Pandemic” webinar. “They
said that between 2015 and
2018, the national average
was three percent homeless.
Between 2019 and now, it’s
5.6 percent. So that’s nearly
double the number of home-
less people. To me, that just
speaks to the importance
of having a safe shelter and
having assistance.”
The definition of home-
lessness for schools is broad-
er than one may usually
think, and it’s been an issue
in the Siuslaw Region for
quite some time.
“It’s defined as a person
who has an unstable place
of residence,” Mann-Heintz
said. “That includes being
homeless. It also includes
being doubled up. Being in
a temporary situation like
camping in an RV or a trail-
er or a tent, something like
that. Doubled up is living
with family and friends, but
not necessarily a permanent
place. And it includes couch
surfing. Particularly our
young people end up couch
surfing from place to place.”
Another common form of
unstable housing is families
living with grandparents.
“With some families,
that’s an okay arrangement,”
said Mann-Heintz. “But
some people who are dou-
bled up can have a change
of circumstances. Maybe
one of the grandparents
becomes ill or has a stroke
and suddenly they can’t deal
with having the whole fami-
ly there. So then it becomes
an unstable situation, par-
ticularly if the grandparents
are the ones who own the
home or are paying rent.”
The seasonal nature of
employment in the commu-
nity can also cause issues.
“We have more people
here between March and
October, and then a lot of
people leave, go somewhere
else, and then come back,”
Mann-Heintz said. “What
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(From left) Sharon
Dengler, Linda Moy,
Robben Lyons, Whitney
Sciotto, Suzanne Mann-
Heintz, Ann Lathrop and
Dave Moursund, rep-
resentatives from Safe
Families for Children of
Lane County and from
Florence’s Safe Shelter
for Siuslaw Students,
celebrated their new
partnership to develop
a network of host homes
in west Lane County
with a luncheon at Fresh
Harvest on June 27.
that does to students is it
causes this transiency. And
it’s very hard for students
to maintain their focus on
getting good grades and un-
derstanding what’s going on
and getting credit for class-
es.”
While the causes of stu-
dent homelessness are var-
ied, SSSS has worked to
implement strategies to help
ease the burden.
“We’re trying so hard to
provide a stable place for
children and their families
to be,” Mann-Heintz said.
The first strategy to help is
simple: providing short term
emergency vouchers to local
motels for families who find
themselves in difficult situa-
tions.
“Maybe they have a place
but it’s not going to be avail-
able for a few days,” Mann-
Heintz said. “Or they’re
getting social services from
Siuslaw Outreach Services
(SOS) and are going to get
money for deposits, but they
have to wait to be approved.”
The second strategy is a
network of host homes that
can temporarily take in chil-
dren when families are hav-
ing difficult times. The stays
at host homes are not meant
to be long term, with the av-
erage time being less than
three months. SSSS is work-
ing in conjunction with Safe
Families of Lane County on
the project.
“The goal of Safe Families
is to keep families together,”
Mann-Heintz said. “97 per-
cent of the children that go
into a host home are then
returned to their natural
families. They work very,
very closely with the Oregon
Department of Human Ser-
vices, which acknowledges
that too often, children end
up in foster care unneces-
sarily when it could be dealt
with on a shorter term ba-
sis.”
The reasons parents
would turn to Safe Families
are varied and complex.
“I heard about a woman
who had two preschoolers
and was expecting a third
child,” Mann-Heintz said.
“The doctor said her blood
pressure was too high and
she needed to do bed rest for
the remainder of her preg-
nancy. So she was able to put
her preschoolers with Safe
Families and a host home
for a period of eight weeks.”
The mother was also
able to use the time to find
a new place to live, as the
house her family was living
in lacked heat and hot water.
Without having to care for
her preschool children, she
was able to find a new place
to live.
“During that eight week
period, she really turned her
life around. Safe Families
was able to help facilitate
that,” Mann-Heintz said.
Another example was a
single father who had to
serve time for unpaid park-
ing tickets and place his son
in a host home, while anoth-
er parent went into rehab for
a short period to deal with
substance abuse issues. In
many of these circumstanc-
es, the children risked being
sent to foster care perma-
nently, but Safe Families
prevented that.
“There’s a whole range of
reasons families find them-
selves in these situations,”
Mann-Heintz said.
While the host family
cares for the child, a range
of support personnel is put
into place in what Mann-
Heintz called the “Safe Fam-
ilies constellation.”
“There’s a family coach,
which is a person that acts
as a liaison between the
family that’s taking care of
the children and the family
that’s placing the children,”
she said. “They’re the ones
who arrange for visits at
a neutral place, for phone
calls. If the family in need
has things they need to work
out, the coach helps with
those things.”
There’s a family friend,
which helps bring normal-
cy to the situation including
picnics in the park or help-
ing shuttle kids to school
when issues arrive.
“And then there’s the re-
source friend, somebody
who doesn’t have what it
takes to do one-on-one care
of children anymore, but
could easily take the family
out to dinner once a month,”
Mann-Heintz said. “Or who
could perhaps take the child
school supply shopping.
Maybe help with a winter
coat.”
The constellation creates
a level of support for the
volunteer host family so
they are not burdened with
having a new child in their
home.
“We’re just beginning that
process,” Mann-Heintz said,
stating her program was
looking for volunteers to
sign up.
Volunteers with SSSS will
get regular training, and
have total control over the
kind of students they allow
in the home.
“If a child sounds too dif-
ficult for a family, it’s okay
for them to say, ‘I don’t think
I can handle that,’” she said.
“But most of the calls in
Lane County are for chil-
dren under six. If a person
wants babies, they’ve got
babies.”
Background checks are
required, as well as a home
study to ensure the environ-
ment is safe for children.
“There are processes in
place to try and maximize a
positive outcome to any sit-
uation,” said Mann-Heintz.
“Whether the placing fam-
ily or the host family has a
problem, it’s all voluntary
and it can be ended at any
time.”
The third strategy SSSS is
working on is the Mommy
Mentor program.
“The grandmother in
me got excited about this,”
Mann-Heintz said. “This
is somebody who proba-
bly already has children of
their own, or is interested in
helping a young mom who
needs a little bit of support.
The Mommy Mentor is sup-
posed to make contact twice
a month. It could be a phone
call, a visit, an outing. It can
be as simple as checking
in and seeing if there’s any
problems. It could also be
the young mom saying, ‘I re-
ally need to have some time
to myself.’ So the Mommy
Mentor will just come over
and hang out with the baby
to give the mom a break.”
Mann-Heintz saw the
need for the strategy while
working with Lane County’s
90by30 initiative, noticing
that many young families in
the Siuslaw Region live away
from family support.
“They’re isolated. This
is to provide a more expe-
rienced person to come in
and say, ‘How can I help you
make this easier?’ The first
year of life can be stressful.
There’s lots of reasons why,”
Mann-Heintz said.
Finally, SSSS is working
with the Siuslaw Vision to
create the Western Lane
Emergency Response Net-
work (WLERN), which acts
as a resource hub to match
parents in need to those who
are able to give.
“For example, say I’m a
mom and I need to have
diapers and I don’t have di-
apers. So I send a message to
WLERN, which will relay it
to an advocate. The advocate
will relay it to organizations
or people who say they can
provide diapers. And then
somebody will say to the ad-
vocate, ‘We have 36 diapers
that we can get to this mom.’
The advocate then arranges
the diapers to be delivered.”
It’s a streamlined way to
connect generous providers
in the community to those
in need.
“I’ve gotten calls from
people who say, ‘I got this
$1,200 check from the gov-
ernment and I really don’t
need it. What should I do?’
This is a means by which we
can facilitate that,” Mann-
Heintz said.
SSSS has other plans for
the future to help local fam-
ilies, including the develop-
ment of Home With a Heart,
a shelter that would be able
to house small families or
unaccompanied minors.
“We’re working on devel-
oping that aspiration, but it’s
probably a little bit down the
road,” Mann-Heintz said.
The program has already
created multiple partner-
ships in the community
to get all strategies off the
ground, from Siuslaw School
District, SOS, Florence Food
Share, Boys and Girls Clubs
of Western Lane County,
First Step and Cross Road
Assembly of God. SSSS has
also received grants from
the Western Lane Commu-
nity Foundation and the
Saint Mary’s Men’s Club to
develop the host home pro-
gram.
But what the program re-
ally needs right now is vol-
unteers to get the strategies
in motion.
Mann-Heintz encourages
anyone interested in volun-
teering or donating to call
her directly at 541-590-0779.
They can also visit safeshel-
terforsiuslawstudents.org,
which has further informa-
tion on the program.
On Friday, July 10, the
program will be hosting an
online Zoom meeting going
over the program as a whole.
The hour-long meeting be-
gins at 4 p.m. Those interest-
ed can call Mann-Heintz or
email her at safeshelterk12@
gmail.com for a Zoom invi-
tation to the event.
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