PORT ANGELES — Daniel Seavey sat amid the hubbub of the Project Homeless Connect exposition at the Vern Burton Community Center on Thursday morning, a bag filled with blankets and clothes at his feet.
Seavey, 49, said he is homeless, has a degenerative back condition and lives on $322 a month in state disability benefits.
He lives in west Port Angeles in a 10-foot-by-10-foot gazebo that he wrapped in plastic and furnished with a hand-made cot and a barrel stove.
“Sometimes my back hurts so bad I can’t go out in the woods and get firewood, so I got extra blankets,” Seavey said, adding that the property manager lets him live on the premises.
Seavey lost his job at High Tide Seafoods in Port Angeles five years ago when work got slow, he said.
A short time later, his roommate kicked him out, and he’s been homeless ever since.
Now he listens to his radio all day.
“My radio is my lifeline,” he said while the sound of people giving and getting advice echoed in the Vern Burton gym.
By the time expo organizers shut the doors, 76 participants had identified themselves as a homeless while 324 individuals, including the homeless, sought help.
“We had at least 40 kids, in addition to the 324 adults who came in,” said Cindy Burdine, Serenity House of Clallam County deputy director for family services, who co-chaired the event along with Jill Dole, coordinator of Clallam County’s Homeless Task Force.
The 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. expo — the first-ever in Clallam County — began with a 9 a.m. rally sponsored by the Clallam County Homelessness Task Force that featured Paul Carlson, Northwest Regional Director for the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness.
He praised the 150 volunteers who turned out for the event, which was organized by Serenity House and Clallam County Health and Human Services.
Carlson also lauded the task force for establishing a “strong network” of providers and for its role in reducing homelessness.
Homelessness down
Actual homelessness declined in Clallam County by 40 percent — from 1,055 in 2006 to 605 homeless in 2009 — according to the one-day Point in Time tallies of the homeless conducted every year.
But an estimated 2,670 residents experienced hopelessness in all of 2009, according to the Clallam County Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness – 2005-2015.
The expo’s purpose was twofold:
• Provide a central point for the homeless to be counted as part of the Point in Time Census, na annual national count. The results in Clallam County will be available next week, Burdine said.
The count is necessary to receive homelessness assistance funds.
Clallam County received $200,000 in 2009 generated through document recording fees.
• Link the home-hungry, or those threatened with homelessness, with referral services and social service providers.
Key to both these groups receiving help were the questionnaires that participants completed beforehand.
They chose among 24 “wants” such as medical screening, housing assistance and veterans services.
The list also included acupuncture, veterinarian pet care and tribal services.
“They are not expecting a lot, and they are not asking for a lot,” intake volunteer Betty Barnard said.
“They just want help.”
Medical, housing requests
Medical and housing requests were among the most common that Barnard saw participants check off, along with transportation.
They received a map identifying 40 tables and help stations where they could obtain advice, then walked into the cavernous room past a booth where, by the end of the event, 45 participants received free haircuts.
“I saw someone go to one table to get her ID, then the next table to talk to a lawyer, then she headed over to get a haircut,” Burdine said.
“They were really accessing as many services as they could.”
At a clothing table staffed by St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store Manager Barb Townsend and fellow volunteer Ann Gray, 56 people took free socks and underwear or paid $1 or $2 for coats, pants and shirts in the expo’s first 90 minutes.
“We could use a lot more pants,” Townsend said.
Other participants could have used serious help with mortgage payments.
Mortgage payments
Kathy Wahto, executive director of Serenity House of Clallam County and a Task Force member, received two calls early Thursday morning from homeowners intending to attend the homelessness expo who were desperate for help with mortgage payments, she said.
Barnard processed one event participant who was in danger of losing her home after the woman’s husband, whom she had been taking care of, died following a long illness.
And Port Angeles lawyer Mark Baumann said he referred one woman who had mortgage troubles to the Port Angeles office of the Northwest Justice Project, a publicly funded legal aid program.
Baumann said the woman, unable to find work for a year, expected to be homeless by Feb. 31 if she doesn’t get help.
“It’s a big problem statewide,” he said.
Seavey used the expo to connect with an attorney, with whom he discussed getting Social Security disability benefits.
He also picked up some clothes.
As homelessness goes, Seavey may be one of the luckier ones.
Seavey said he is allowed to use a utility shop on the premises where he is staying to watch TV and use the bathroom.
“At night, I warm up a bit, lock it up, and go back to camp,” Seavey said.
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Staff writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
