Seriously?

Homeless to get free passes during DNC

'DENVER – A plan for Denver's homeless during the Democratic National Convention in August includes some freebies.

The Colorado Coalition for the Homeless says some options include movie passes, tickets to local attractions and free bus fares.

The plan is also to expand the availability of homeless shelters both day and night.

Published reports say city managers are being motivated by security concerns, and it is not an effort to clean up Denver's image under the media spotlight.'

Ha.

Hundreds Line Up Overnight For Opening Of New Homeless Shelter

'SAN FRANCISCO—Traveling from as far away as park benches on the other side of town, hundreds of rabid temporary housing enthusiasts lined up overnight Friday in hopes of being among the first admitted to the city's newest homeless shelter.

"I got here around 3 a.m., and already there was a crowd of people slumped over out front," said Jerome Ashford, a die-hard fan of having a roof over his head. "I had a feeling it was going to be popular, but this turnout—it's just insane. If I can't get in tonight, I don't know what I'll do."

Since last Tuesday, men and women of all ages have left the familiar comforts of air-conditioned bus stations and ATM lobbies to brave the elements outside the much-anticipated Mission District shelter. While most arrive with nothing more than three partially smoked cigarettes and a slice of bologna wrapped in a handkerchief, others have come fully prepared for the long wait with shopping carts full of supplies.

"I haven't been this excited since the bakery down the street threw out an entire trash bag of bagels," said Lawrence Jones, who took the week off from collecting aluminum cans and selling his plasma to a nearby blood bank to wait outside the shelter. "Sure, I haven't showered in a public fountain in days, and I miss the warmth of my alleyway back home, but in the end, it'll all be worth it."

Although the prospect of sleeping outdoors for nothing more than the most basic of human necessities might seem extreme to some, many in attendance say they've been looking forward to the shelter's grand opening since first reading about it beneath a blanket of newspapers.

"I started begging for subway fare the moment I heard the news," said Wendy Slovic, 41, adding that there was "no way" she could wait a couple of weeks for the crowds to thin out. "Say whatever you want, but I wouldn't trade my place in line for all the scratch tickets in the world."

For some, the anticipation of lying on a cot or having three meals a day is so great that blacking out at night has become an almost impossible task. Still many others, who have been eagerly counting down the days since fishing an old wall calendar from a dumpster, can hardly put their growing elation into words.

"Where is my soul, they took my soul away," said Michael "Bone" Zahn, who for the last week hasn't left his place at the front of the line even to use the restroom. "Broken windows like spiderwebs, a stone on a rocking chair, rain rain rain rain—begone, you cloth demons!"

Among the clamoring mass of refuge fanatics, the most devoted arrived early Sunday morning in full costume, including old shopping bags that had been fashioned into makeshift footwear and heavy ash-colored makeup covering their faces and hands. Some even carried a variety of creative signs with them.

"Back when I started lining up to get into shelters, there were only 10 or 15 of us at most," said Samuel Robins, 63, gesturing at the teeming crowd of shelter enthusiasts on hand. "To see how far things have come in the last decade alone. It's unbelievable really."

"Many of the kids here today weren't even alive when the first shelter was built on this street," Robins added.

Despite the growing excitement, a number of mega-fans who have spent the last week sleeping in front of the shelter, and the week before that sleeping behind the shelter, said they are trying to keep their already high expectations in check.

"I know it probably won't live up to the picture I have in my head, but it's still hard not to get your hopes up," harmonica musician Johnnie Brooklyn, 39, said. "You want it to be amazing—for there to be hot food on hand, maybe even hot water—but at the same time, you have to be realistic about these sorts of things."

"Man, hot water would be nice, though," Brooklyn added.

While the mob scene in front of the shelter has caused a few minor disruptions, including one incident in which a passerby was asked for spare change 143 consecutive times, only a handful of residents have reacted negatively to the swelling crowds.

"To be honest, I feel sorry for them," said Beverly Sherman, an administrative coordinator for Wells Fargo Bank. "To have so little in your life that you think nothing of camping out on the streets for days on end—it's depressing."

Added Sherman: "Seriously, these people need help."'

There's homeless in Aspen?

3 'ghost cabins' available for homeless

'ASPEN (AP) - The Forest Service is offering the Aspen Homeless Coalition three "ghost cabins" in the White River National Forest.

The only problem is that the cabins near the ghost town of Ashcroft must be dismantled and moved.

The Vail Daily reports they are among eight structures being removed from the area.

The coalition - made up of area law enforcement agencies, representatives from the religious community and mental health and substance abuse case managers - has 60 days to decide whether to take them, or they'll be auctioned off.

Coalition member Nan Sundeen says the group is interested, but she's uncertain whether they can be used.

Sundeen says the cabins are old, not up to code, and have no utilities.'

I would hate to have bought a loft...

and have my view be of homeless people waiting to get in to the shelter.

20 years to a better Denver

'Drug' says it all.

East Colfax here in East Denver/Saudi Aurora, is an infamous stretch of neighborhood known for its prostitutes, and by-the-hour motels. Westword has an interesting article this week on how gentrification is making even more people homeless.

The area wasn't that bad when I was a kid. I used to live a few blocks north between Colfax, and then Stapleton Airport.

But eventually, in '86 due to my bro getting in to trouble in school, my mom decided to sell the house and move. Problem was, she closed on our old place before the deal went through on the new place.

Then after that deal fell through, we actually hotel-surfed like the people in the story. We even stayed at the Sands hotel for a few weeks, but it wasn't as bad as it sounds like it got.

So, that was my summer/fall of '86.

Who knew ten years later, through a series of events, I would be homeless again, and sofa surfing.

You know, when I get down on things going on in my life these days, I need to remember how good I actually got it.

'Amy Limon was born near Trinidad in 1941, the fourth child of an eventual eleven born to her Apache family. She was ten when her two older brothers were drafted to fight in Korea and her older sister married off at fifteen, bumping Amy up to the woman of the house, caretaker for her younger siblings and alcoholic parents. Amy was epileptic, but that didn't slow her down. In addition to taking care of the household, she started washing dishes at bars and restaurants after school and on the weekends.

She was still in high school when her drunk father made a move on her, showing her his penis. Her mother refused to believe her, but her sisters confirmed that he'd tried the same thing on them -- only they'd been too scared to speak up. Amy wasn't scared, though. She's not afraid of anyone, she says, so she reported her father to the authorities, and he bounced between a state mental facility in Pueblo and prison. While he was locked up, Amy married a man who was in the Air Force.

When her father was released, in 1959, Amy followed her husband to Denver, where he was stationed at Lowry. Afraid they'd be lost without her, Amy's mother and her seven younger siblings all piled into the car and moved to Denver, too.

Amy and her husband had four children -- one a daughter who lived only three months. By 1973, they had fallen out of love and divorced. Amy moved to an apartment with the children. She found work in a halfway house, taking care of people on their way out of mental institutions. She didn't love the work; taking care of people was all she'd ever done, and she was getting sick of it. But at work she found love: another Air Force man of Mexican-American descent who'd served four years in Vietnam and was one of the facility's residents.

Julian Limon had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and was bipolar, but he was always friendly with Amy. When he was released from the halfway house, he married her and moved into her apartment in Westminster, where they lived happily until Julian went off his meds one day in 1986 and was sent back to the institution. No longer able to afford the apartment on her own, Amy went to a women's shelter in Denver. A few weeks later she moved into Halcyon House, a subsidized apartment on Arapahoe Street, where she was still living alone when she had a stroke ten years ago. The stroke put Amy in a wheelchair. But by then her husband's condition had improved enough that his doctors allowed him a conditional leave so that he could live with her and take care of her. Her son helped, too, but five years ago he was killed in a gang shooting, an innocent bystander.

By last October, Amy's husband "started acting his bullshit again," and she knew he was off his meds. She woke one morning unable to find her wheelchair. She called for her husband but got no reply. He'd taken her chair cruising and left Amy stuck in bed. So she started sleeping in her chair. Then Julian had another episode, beating on the walls and making a mess of the place. Halcyon House managers told Amy that if she wanted to stay there, her husband could never come back. "But what if God makes my husband well again?" she asked.'

Neato

Not that he died, but the people's response.

Killer’s thwarted last-meal wish inspires charity

Public fulfills request for pizza for homeless after Tennesseean’s execution

'NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A convicted murderer put to death in Tennessee this week got his last meal wish after he died.

Philip Workman had turned down the usual final meal of his choice traditionally offered the condemned, asking instead that a vegetarian pizza be given to a homeless person.

Prison officials refused to send out a pizza, and Workman died Wednesday by lethal injection.

But news accounts of his request touched a nerve with the public.

Nashville's Union Rescue Mission received 170 pizzas. Media reports said listeners to a radio station in Minnesota also ordered pizzas sent to another organization for troubled youngsters.

Dorinda Carter, spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Correction, said, "Taxes are to be spent on specific things for the care of the inmates." But she acknowledged there was no regulation against carrying out Workman's request.

An official at the mission said "the pizzas were enjoyed greatly by our clientele."

Workman, 53, was convicted of killing a Memphis police officer in 1981. He was robbing a Wendy's restaurant and got into a gun battle with police. He wounded one officer and shot at a second, but he contended another officer's bullet accidentally killed police Lt. Ronald Oliver.'

That was quick.

There's still a lot of panhandlers though.

New program raises $84,000 for homeless

'DENVER (AP) - A new program that raises money for the homeless by encouraging people to put coins in old parking meters has added to a total of $84,000 collected so far in a fundraising campaign.

People have put about $2,000 into three dozen special parking meters along sidewalks in downtown Denver. Each meter also has a yearlong sponsor donating $1,000.

The parking meters were installed early last month.

Another $23,000 has been raised through donations to canisters at Denver-area King Soopers grocery stores.

The money goes to programs through Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper's Road Home initiative - a 10-year effort to end homelessness.

The parking meter program is modeled after one in Baltimore. The idea is to put the money into the meters instead of giving it to panhandlers.'

Noticed these today.

It's a nifty idea to help with the homeless/panhandling issue. The city is adamant about not giving money to panhandlers, so one effort is this:

Meters' change to help homeless

'Denver parking meters are being reincarnated as fundraisers for the homeless, with homeless advocates hoping that passers-by will fill them with the spare change - approximately $4.5 million annually - they now distribute to panhandlers.

The goal is to steer contributions into food and services. Two quarters help pay for a homeless person's public transportation. A $1.50 donation buys one meal. A $20 donation provides a homeless family with one day's worth of food, shelter, clothing and employment help.

Credit for the project goes to Denver Public Works manager Bill Vidal, who read about a similar program in Baltimore. With his staff's help, Vidal retrieved 50 parking meters from what he called "our home for retired parking meters, before they become scrap metal."

Each parking meter can hold about $60 in change. Public-utility workers will collect the cash during their regular bimonthly rounds.

Even before the first of the distinctive red and black parking meters was unveiled on Monday, the project raised $36,000 from 36 businesses and individual sponsors.'