Rural homeless people face unique challenges

While homelessness is considered an urban concern, it also occurs in rural areas. The story of Barbara Trivitt and her children Eric, 13, and Jennifer, 15, (at left) highlights the issue of rural homeless, writes Emma Brown (who also took the photo) of High Country News, a magazine focusing on the American West.

"Federal homeless aid is hard to come by all over the rural West; needy people are dispersed, and it’s impractical to provide a full range of services in every tiny town," Brown writes. "Meanwhile, federal funding structures favor cities and leave rural organizations wanting."

Philip Mangano, head of the Interagency Council on Homelessness, coordinates the federal response to homelessness. He told Brown: “Rural folks need to get beyond the idea that someone’s going to come from Washington to solve their problem. They have to be strategic and creative in fashioning a solution.”

Brown follows Trivitt over the course of Thanksgiving week, as she and her kids live out of her Jeep Grand Cherokee at an RV park in Coos Bay, Ore. By week's end, Trivitt has lost her Jeep to repossession despite saving up $200 from her minimum-wage job. A local politician puts them up in a local motel for a week, but after that, their prospects are slim. In the West, rising housing costs and dwindling federal housing programs make finding an affordable home difficult — especially on minimum wage, Brown explains. (Read more)

To get this story, Brown obviously had to find to Trivitt and gain her trust, but there was more to the reporting than that. Here are some helpful links for researching the issue:

• The Department of Agriculture Rural Development Web site has information on lending and other financing related to rural housing.
  
• The Department of Housing and Urban Development has a Web site devoted to homelessness that includes information for those who are homeless plus national facts and figures. It includes plenty of links to other great sites, too.