Avia Collinder, Sunday Gleaner Writer

WALTER MITCHELL, a 35-year-old unemployed gardener, says that all he needs to go back home are enough sheets of zinc and pieces of lumber to rebuild his house in Cross Roads, St Andrew, which was destroyed in a fire some years ago.

Mitchell is one of over 100 men and women who find solace at the Marie Atkins shelter in downtown Kingston, which is run by the Poor Relief Department.

The Poor Relief Department says, contrary to popular belief, at least a half of the hundreds who roam Kingston's streets in the day and sleep wherever they can in the nights, are mentally stable.

"Not all are mentally ill. Most are just unable to afford to pay rent. Others are drug addicts and deportees," one poor relief official discloses, adding that some beneficiaries are people affected by hurricanes - including Gilbert in 1988 - and have not been able to return to their homes.

Increasing crime rate

A good 50 per cent, however, are people in need of care for mental illness. The official notes: "There are also clients who have been to Bellevue and whose families do not want to take them back home. "The Marie Atkins night shelter sleeps approximately 110 person each night. These include many who used to sleep in the St William Grant Park last year and, because of increasing crime, have had to seek shelter elsewhere," says the poor relief official

"We place an extra 50 in the dining room on the office side. They sleep on extra mattresses which we provide," the official adds.

Hundreds more make their home throughout the Corporate Area, some of whom are picked up and taken to the drop-in centre at Bellevue where they are bathed and given a change of clothing.

Downtown, users of the shelter are given one meal each morning and they also get lunch when the Poor Relief centre receives donations from Food For the Poor. Then, most get an evening meal from the Salvation Army, which serves the indigent on Peters Lane in Kingston.

John Williamson, executive director of the William Chamberlain Centre, run by the Salvation Army in Kingston, tells The Sunday Gleaner, "We are providing roughly 500 meals a day downtown, including lunch and an evening meal as well, when more come.

"We serve approximately 200 for lunch and 300 in the evening. These are a c****ination of the homeless and some who have no income. There is a mix of all ages, but 70 per cent are older Jamaicans."

No low-income homes

Sixty-one-year-old Joseph Wright, who was unable to find a home after leaving prison, is grateful for the evening meal on Peters Lane. He relates, "From I come down here (Hanover Street) I just stuck. From my mother die, everything with my relatives breakdown."

At the Poor Relief centre, rehabilitation efforts include sending them back home or getting them employed. However, employment for the indigent, who are often low skilled, is very difficult to obtain.

Wright who works as a watchman, tells The Sunday Gleaner, "I could get a place to rent, but I am not living in certain areas. I don't want to be extorted," noting that although he had been attacked by gangs five times in downtown Kingston, living in the inner city would be much worse.

According to the poor relief officer, there are no low-income homes for persons in the lower socioeconomic grouping. "We have watchmen and days workers who cannot afford rent in Kingston. They do not want to go back to the country. They say there is no employment there."

The officer discloses that some shelter residents are enrolled in the Programme for Advancement through Health and Education, which provides them with $1,300 once every two months, but she says beneficiaries are encouraged to be independent.

Acquiring skills

Williamson says the charitable organisation wants to help people acquire skills that enable them to get jobs. "Soon, we hope to give some who come for meals training in computer skills, résumé development and basic literacy. We are also hoping to establish some business to employ some of them as well," says Williamson. "The solution to any economy is to get people to work."

"I wish there was a way out," states 43-year-old Carl McEon, who has been living in the Salvation Army shelter since 2005. Deported from Ohio, in the United States, where he lived since age six, he says he wants to complete studies in chemical engineering which he had started. He survives by "hustling here and there", but says he craves permanent employment. "I would give anything to be self-sufficient," says McEon.