Why Community Matters More Than Programs

[00:00:00] Foreign. [00:00:23] Welcome back to Sheboygan. Stories on housed and unheard of. I'm your host, Scott Labonte. [00:00:31] I don't have a guest again this week, something that's been on my mind a lot lately. [00:00:36] Today's episode is more of a reflection. I guess. [00:00:41] Over the years, I've come to believe something pretty strongly. [00:00:46] I believe that programs are important, services are important, organizations matter. [00:00:53] But community matters more than programs. [00:00:57] Programs can start and stop. [00:00:59] Grants run out, buildings close. We've all seen that staff changes. [00:01:07] But when a community begins to care about the people in it, that's when real change starts to happen. [00:01:13] And lately I've been seeing a lot more of that here in Sheboygan now, kind of thinking about the programs and having limits and stuff like that. Programs operate within systems. [00:01:26] They have rules, they have funding restrictions, they have capacity limits. [00:01:34] Sometimes people don't qualify for these services. [00:01:38] Sometimes they miss an appointment. [00:01:40] Sometimes they're simply not ready yet. [00:01:44] And when that happens, people can fall through the cracks between programs. [00:01:50] Now, programs can provide services, they can provide structure. [00:01:56] But community provides something different. [00:01:59] Community provides belonging. [00:02:02] And belonging is something you can't really put into a grant application or a program guideline. [00:02:09] When people feel seen, when they feel like they matter, that can be just as powerful as any service that we can provide. [00:02:20] So when we hear the word community, it can sound like this big abstract idea, but in reality, it shows up in really small ways. [00:02:32] It looks like a business owner learning someone's name instead of just seeing them as that person outside. [00:02:38] It looks like someone offering a warm space on a cold day. [00:02:44] Maybe it looks like an employer giving someone a second chance. [00:02:49] Could look like a volunteer who shows up week after week simply because they care. [00:02:56] Most of the time, the biggest changes don't happen in offices or meeting rooms. [00:03:00] They happen in simple human interactions. [00:03:04] They happen when someone decides to treat another person like a neighbor instead of treating them like a problem to solve. [00:03:14] And those small moments add up over time. [00:03:21] One of the things that has honestly made me super proud lately is seeing how many people and organizations in our community have stepped forward. [00:03:30] Businesses, community members, other organizations, people recognizing that caring for our unhoused neighbors isn't something one organization should carry alone. [00:03:42] Now, when we started Pay It Forward, we didn't start it because we thought we had all the answers. Quite opposite. And I think I've mentioned that before, when we went into it and when we first started, we had no clue what it was going to look like, what we were going to do. I guess even what our end goal was we just knew because we saw a gap and wanted to do something about it. [00:04:11] When we started the Facebook page way back when, and we started seeing where that gap was, and we started seeing where people were falling through the cracks and where, I guess, the services weren't reaching our people or meeting our peers, we looked at it and said, well, somebody needs to do something about that. [00:04:33] And instead of sitting back and waiting and hoping somebody would do that, we realized we're somebody. [00:04:41] We can do something again. [00:04:44] We had no clue what that was going to look like. [00:04:49] We had no clue at that point what we were doing. We were winging it. [00:04:53] We made a lot of mistakes over the years. [00:04:57] We learned a lot of very valuable lessons out of those mistakes. [00:05:02] And we realized that the real hope was something bigger than just one center. [00:05:07] The hope was that the community itself would begin to take ownership of caring for its people. [00:05:14] And lately I've been seeing more and more of that happening. [00:05:19] Now, along with that, I've noticed something else, too, Something that honestly gives me a whole lot of hope. [00:05:27] I think our mindset in our community is starting to shift as well. [00:05:33] Over the years, conversations around homelessness haven't always been easy. [00:05:37] There's been frustration, there's been fear. [00:05:41] There's been a lot of misunderstanding. [00:05:44] But lately, I'm seeing something different. [00:05:47] I see it on social media. [00:05:49] I hear it in everyday conversations. [00:05:52] I notice it when I'm out around town. [00:05:55] People are asking questions. Instead of jumping to conclusions, they're listening more. They're beginning to understand that homelessness isn't just one story. [00:06:07] And that was kind of, I guess, why this whole podcast came out, trying to relieve some of that stigma, reduce some of the stigma that goes along with being homelessness, hopefully to educate people and to help people recognize mental health struggles and understanding that there's trauma. And this trauma can often lead to putting you out on the streets. [00:06:38] Realizing, too, that housing alone doesn't solve everything. And I've stressed this, and Kathleen has stressed this, putting somebody into an apartment or into a house or something doesn't solve everything. [00:06:52] Sure, it gets them off the street, but it opens up an entirely new world of difficulties and new struggles. And sometimes people just aren't ready for that, too. [00:07:04] Our hope is that when somebody does get into a home or into an apartment or something, that they're successful. [00:07:11] It's not always the case. [00:07:15] I've noticed, too, that there's a whole lot less of the why don't they just get a job Thinking. [00:07:24] You know, I've mentioned that a few times before that. There is a lot of our home, our peers who are homeless, who are employed, who are working and are trying to change their lives and working to take that next step. But that's a hard step, especially when you're just living in survival mode every day. [00:07:44] When you're unsure where you're going to sleep or what you're going to eat or where you're going to go. And then you got to come up with the first month's rent, last month's rent, possibly so security deposit. [00:07:55] You're in survival mode and you're concerned with just getting through the day. [00:08:04] Coming up with that money, even if you're working, is probably sometimes the last thing you're thinking of, knowing it's there. But there's other things that are a little bit more pressing at the time. [00:08:18] I'm also seeing more people recognize something important. [00:08:22] The people we talk about on this podcast, they're our neighbors. [00:08:29] They walk the same sidewalks, they ride the same buses, and they shop at the same stores. [00:08:36] And when you start seeing people as neighbors, instead of statistics, the conversation changes. [00:08:45] The biggest changes I've seen over the years haven't come from new programs, though. [00:08:50] They've come from relationships. [00:08:53] As I mentioned before, somebody remembering somebody's name instead of just that person on the street or the person that's outside, someone asking how a person is doing when you're walking down the street, smile, acknowledge them, say hello, ask them how they're doing. They're not going to bite you, I promise you. [00:09:16] And people feeling comfortable walking into a space. [00:09:21] I've seen a lot on the Nextdoor app. This is, I guess, where some of the. I don't know if you're familiar with the app or not, but there's a lot of conversations on there that usually bashing our peers living on the streets. There's not a whole lot of love for our neighbors on the streets on that app, but I'm beginning to see that change. [00:09:48] There's been a lot of scuttle, I guess, about the people that hang out in the library during the day. People are afraid to go in the library because there's people in there. There's homeless people sitting in the library. [00:10:02] Yeah, probably every time that I've been in there, they're usually up in front on that one table, all sitting together, just talking amongst themselves, hanging out. [00:10:14] It's been pretty quiet. [00:10:17] They're for the most part, respectful. I'm not saying that they're 100%, but you're gonna get that with any walk of life. [00:10:25] It's not always our homeless peers that are causing the troubles in there. [00:10:31] But like I said, I've seen that shift happening. I've seen that where people are starting to maybe recognize that they're not as bad as originally thought. That, you know, they are people too, and maybe they're not going to bite if you walk in. [00:10:49] I had to laugh there one time. I think I had mentioned it in one other episode about somebody had said they were in the library and they were chased and harassed by some homeless person. [00:11:00] And I chuckled. [00:11:01] It's possible. [00:11:04] Harassed, perhaps. [00:11:06] Chased, probably not. [00:11:09] I'm not saying it didn't happen. I'm not trying to discredit, you know, the thing, but I know most of our homeless peers and chances of them chasing anybody. Nah, I don't know. I find that one kind of hard to believe, honestly. [00:11:30] Kind of. I strayed a little bit. [00:11:33] Getting kind of back to where we were here. [00:11:38] Programs offer services, but relationships offer dignity, right? Relationships offer dignity. [00:11:50] And dignity is something that every person deserves. Relationship, regardless of their circumstances. [00:11:58] And I know I've stressed that a lot, and Kathleen has stressed that in some of our episodes and, you know, when I've had her here as a guest as well. [00:12:07] Being homeless doesn't define you. It doesn't define who you are. It is simply a circumstance you were going through. Something you are experiencing at that moment in time of your life that does not define who you are. [00:12:25] And I think that, you know, when I, as I mentioned, kind of getting back to the whole mindset shift, I think people are starting to realize that, too. [00:12:36] Makes me proud. Makes my heart happy. [00:12:41] Now I'm proud of what pay it forward became big became. [00:12:47] You know, as I mentioned before, we had no idea, I guess when we started what the end goal was or what it was supposed to look like, it kind of evolved into its own entity. It kind of. [00:13:00] It guided us as to where it needed to go. [00:13:04] But what makes me even more proud is seeing how the community has started to step up and care in their own ways. [00:13:16] But here's the thing. [00:13:17] No single organization can solve homelessness. [00:13:21] It takes all of the organizations. It takes the community, it takes the city. [00:13:28] It takes people who care to make a difference. [00:13:34] A compassionate community can make sure that no one is invisible. [00:13:40] And I am starting to see that. [00:13:48] Now. If the biggest thing that came out of this work is that more people in Sheboygan are starting to see our unhaus neighbors with compassion instead of judgment, then that's something that I'm incredibly proud of. [00:14:03] I'm proud of the work that was done. I'm proud of what it became. I'm happy to see organizations stepping up, communities stepping up, and. And really helping out to make a difference. [00:14:21] I'm. I'm sure I mentioned it in one of the other episodes to probably in a couple of them. I. You know, and when we closed our doors, when. When everything shut down, on how much I struggled with that, how. [00:14:39] I don't know, it was troubling. [00:14:41] I didn't deal with it well. [00:14:44] There were still gaps in the systems. There were people falling in these cracks. There were people that still needed to be helped, and we couldn't do that. [00:14:57] And then Kathleen and I sat one night and we were talking, and she looked at me and she said, you know, what if we were never meant to be a forever organization? [00:15:11] What if we were never meant to be long term? [00:15:16] And I, of course, you know, I stopped and I looked at her and I'm like, huh? [00:15:20] You know, I kind of gave her that deer in the headlight looked like, you want to bring that around to, I guess, expand on that a little? [00:15:31] And she looked at me and she said, now think about this. [00:15:36] She said, before we started that, before Pay It Forward came about, none of this was happening in the city. [00:15:46] There was warming center, stuff like that, open very minimally in the winter, in the very cold, cold days, the cold snaps, there were no lunches. There were no organizations stepping forward. There was. [00:16:03] Our peers experiencing homelessness were more of an inconvenience than anything. They were problematic on the streets. [00:16:13] And she said, maybe, just maybe, our sole purpose was to shed light on the gaps and the cracks in the system and really bring awareness to the fact that we have a homelessness problem within the city. [00:16:34] And I thought about that for a little while, and it's possible. It is definitely possible. [00:16:42] Maybe we ran our course. Maybe we did what we were supposed to do. [00:16:48] I guess I don't know. I guess I do know is seeing the community and the organization step up the way they are really makes my heart happy. [00:17:00] I am proud to call Sheboygan my home. [00:17:06] And with that, I guess I can close this out. [00:17:10] Thank you for listening. Thank you for being part of this. Thank you for being a part of our journey in this crazy world. [00:17:20] If you find any value in these conversations, please follow the podcast on whatever platform that you listen on and share this podcast with somebody else. [00:17:30] I know it's kind of a localized podcast. It doesn't really resonate with anybody outside of Sheboygan. You know, they don't deal with it, they don't get it. But I don't know, maybe some part of it might. [00:17:45] Might touch on somebody outside of here, that. That maybe they can make a difference somehow, too. [00:17:52] But don't forget to like it. Share it. Get the word out. [00:17:56] And again, thank you for listening. [00:17:58] I really do appreciate it. [00:18:01] And as always, keep your heart open and pay it forward.