Homeless Families

DALLAS -- Florine Clark, a former trial lawyer, is executive director of the Jewish Coalition for the Homeless.The nonprofit organization operates a child-care center for homeless families called the Vogel Alcove. "It's innovative, and we know it works" to help homeless families make a new start, she said.Like Ms. Clark, a number of business and professional people have made the transition that management guru Peter Drucker describes as moving "from success to significance."Mr. Drucker was talking about volunteer work.

Jacqueline King never thought that happy stories like hers really happened. Being homeless with three children had made her rather cynical."Being in a situation like this makes it hard to believe in fairy tales," Ms. King said. "It actually makes things look kind of hopeless."Although she says it still seems like a dream, Ms. King and her family will be sent on a special shopping spree Wednesday at the March Mammoth Sale, sponsored by the Johns Hopkins Children's Center. Vendors have arranged the shopping spree for the family and are donating desperately needed clothing items.

A delay in improvements to Moores Mill Road in Bel Air could soon benefit a group that assists homeless families.Holy Family House Inc., a non-profit volunteer group started by the county's 11 Episcopalchurches, is considering leasing a house that sits on land the county bought when it purchased property so Moores Mill Road can be widened. The road runs between Route 543 and Hickory Avenue.The group wants the house to be used as a transitional shelter tohelp homeless families become financially self-sufficient, said BillWhite, a member of the Holy Family House board of directors.

THOUGH THEY face problems most children don't even know about, homeless children are remarkably robust and resilient, a new Stanford University study has found. Reasonably healthy and surprisingly well-adjusted, homeless children not only attend school fairly regularly but act like "little adults" helping their parents figure out how to pay bills, find food and places to sleep.But the study also shows there are limits to this resilience. Even after short bouts of homelessness, children are damaged psychologically and physically, in ways that often do not show up until after their families find permanent housing.

Although they face problems most children don't even know about, homeless children are remarkably robust and resilient, a Stanford University study has found.Reasonably healthy and surprisingly well-adjusted, they not only attend school fairly regularly but act like "little adults," helping their parents figure out how to pay bills and find food and places to sleep.But there are limits to this resilience. Even after short bouts of homelessness, children are damaged psychologically and physically -- in ways that often do not show up until after their families find housing.

The first homeless families already were camped out in the hall yesterday, a day before Light House, Annapolis' long-awaited 30-day emergency shelter, was to open.With homeless shelters filled throughout the Baltimore-Washington region, some people were ready to stand inline to get one of the 12 beds.A crew of volunteers finished converting an old convenience storeon West Street into the emergency shelter earlier this week, said Timothy McGuire, the Light House caseworker.Today, after more than a month's delay, Light House officially will open its doors.

''While women weep, as they do now, I'll fight. While men go to prison, in and out, as they do now, I'll fight. While there is a drunkard left, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I'll fight. I'll fight to the very end." -- General William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army.EVERY DAY of the year, the volunteers and staff of the Salvation Army of Greater Baltimore continue their founder's pledge by fighting poverty, hunger, deprivation, abuse and all forms of human suffering.

As Baltimore embarks on a project aimed at improving the way services are delivered to homeless families, officials learned yesterday that the city could receive an additional $300,000 from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.The foundation selected Baltimore last fall as one of nine cities across the country to participate in its Homeless Families Programs and awarded the city $300,000, including 140 vouchers for housing from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. But yesterday Steven A. Schroeder, president of the foundation, announced that if the participating cities develop effective programs with the initial grants, they will get more money in two years.

It used to break Muriel Moore's heart each day to turn away homeless women, often with children in tow, from the Baltimore Rescue Mission shelter in East Baltimore.The shelter could only hold about 15 women and children, and had to turn down more than 700 requests for shelter last year.Yesterday, Mrs. Moore, who runs the women's section of the shelter, helped preside over the opening of a significant new addition to the mission's stock of beds. The new, narrow four-story building in the 1200 block of East Baltimore Street will eventually sleep 80 to 90 women and children each night.

An innovative residential program to help homeless families is scheduled to open this summer in two abandoned buildings at the Rosewood Center in Baltimore County.Using a combination of federal, state and county resources -- as well as donated services from local developer Willard Hackerman -- the program is supposed to provide counseling and other services to help homeless families find and resettle in homes.Up to 24 families will stay at the center at any given time, living in apartments for an average of six to nine months while they receive job training, drug counseling and other services from county agencies, said Christopher Tawa, administrator of development finance at the state's Community Development Administration housing program.