From the Washington Post’s coverage of a homeless rally outside the doorstep of Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells:

(Make that the least-flattering photo not involving a piece of drug paraphernalia…)

A crew of about 50 volunteers interested in seeking out and helping the homeless recently descended on District neighborhoods—not unusual in a city known for both its thriving political culture and underclass. But the do-gooders who wandered the streets between 12 and 6 a.m. didn’t hand out plastic-wrapped ham sandwiches and bottles of water. Nope, all these volunteers had to offer were three pages of semi-invasive questions.

It’s part of the opening salvo of Mayor Adrian Fenty’s Housing First program, which “turns the traditional approach to providing homeless services on its head,” according to the Web site of Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells, who supports the effort. The idea is to find the most needy and troubled citizens and get them right into city-provided shelter. To that end, the D.C. Department of Health and Human Services has begun acquiring housing vouchers so that it can shelter 400 of the most vulnerable members of D.C.s homeless population by the fall. The digs doled out will be permanent and scattered throughout the city, as opposed to traditional warehousing strategies.

But how does the city discover who the most vulnerable are? By hitting the streets in the wee hours, when the homeless—and perhaps drunk people—are the only ones out and about. After rousting potential clients from their sleep, volunteers asked them questions that feed into a vulnerability index developed by based on the research of homelessness expert Dr. Dennis P. Culhane. The index rates a person’s vulnerability by looking at things like the length of time an individual has remained homeless and the individual’s history of cold-weather injuries.

Adam Maier, director of the Ward 6 Committee on Human Services, joined up with volunteers conducting interviews on a Tuesday night in the Union Station area. (He blogs about the experience here.) Over the phone, Maier says the process went smoothly: “I was very surprised at how I didn’t get turned away; the whole night there was only one person who was distrustful,” he says.

Maier adds that every person interviewed, whether they responded to any questions or not, received a five-dollar McDonald’s gift card. —Rend Smith

CORRECTION: Due to errors by reporter Rend Smith, an earlier version of this post misstated the name of D.C.’s Department of Human Services and said that Dr. Dennis Culhane developed the vulnerability index used by the department. In fact, the department’s vulnerability index is based on Culhane’s research.

On June 4, the North Columbia Heights Civic Association held a meeting regarding the park at 11th and Monroe. All were welcome, and all were heard, as evidenced by this item in the very comprehensive minutes: “Anonymous resident (self-described drunk who hangs out in the park): people in the park aren’t that bad, come on into the park, we welcome kids, we welcome the church.”–Brian Reed

And the hits just keep on coming, folks. Washington City Paper contributor Arthur Delaney has won the Street Sense David Pike Excellence in Journalism award for “Median Man,” his District Line story (Sept. 7, 2007) about “Billi,” a man living off I-395 under the 9th Street overpass. Thousands of commuters passed Billi every day, as he made his life dropping furniture from the overpass and collecting weeds he thought were good to eat. He was eventually kicked out.

Delaney, who has been writing for City Paper for several years, has penned some sweet stories about people in nontraditional D.C. dwellings. If you like “Median Man,” check out “Crash Time” about a gentleman living in the Days Inn parking lot at New York Avenue and Bladensburg Road. “I put the seat back and went to sleep,” says Terry Gibbs. “I slept like a baby, and I’ve been here ever since.”

The Street Sense award honors Pike, a 40-year journalist, former board member, and volunteer for D.C.’s respected homeless paper who died unexpectedly last year. The ceremony is this Thursday at the National Press Club, where Delaney will be asked to say a few words alongside keynote speakers Courtland Milloy of the Washington Post and Phil Mangano of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness.

Nice work, Arthur!

Vets can’t get a break. They come home from Iraq, and we stick them in sub-par medical facilities. Then, we ignore their emotional needs. And sometimes, rarely but occasionally, they go crazy.

That right there seems to be a fairly accurate summary of coverage of suffering returning soldiers. In the last year, the media and the entertainment world has jumped on this topic.

Dana Priest and Anne Hull have led the charge with their spotlight on Walter Reed. (Priest has a story out today about soldier suicides.) James Gandolfini produced his “Alive Day Memories” documentary featuring wounded Iraq War soldiers. And injured ABC anchor Bob Woodruff completed a compelling series of reports on soldiers with traumatic brain injuries and their inadequate medical care. It’s good stuff. But, it’s also trendy.

But, here’s one type of vet story (from a press release from the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans and U.S. Vets) that’s not circulating these days:

Formerly Homeless DC Veterans About to Lose Housing

“Fifty-one formerly homeless veterans who live at Ignatia House on the grounds of the Armed Forces Retirement Home (AFRH) in Northwest Washington must find new homes by the end of next month to make way for a $2 billion redevelopment effort on the grounds of the current housing site. The men and women of Ignatia House, some of whom have been living at the House for years while seeking employment and permanent housing, receive important health care services from the VA Medical Center which is located across the street.”

Most of the vets living at Ignatia are from the Vietnam War and the Korean War, and the average age of a resident is 57. The oldest resident is in his 70s, says U.S. Vets spokesperson Stephanie Buckley. The press release goes on to say that the “although the AFRH redevelopment plan includes space for a 100-bed facility for homeless veterans, it is unlikely that the facility can be planned, constructed and opened for many years.”

The Washington Post reported today on Mayor Fenty’s press conference heralding the removal of families from the decrepit shelter and their placement into transitional housing.

That’s good news. But city officials should have closed D.C. Village as homeless shelter years ago. Councilmember Marion Barry, who attended the press conference, should be ashamed of himself. D.C. Village, located in the far southwest corner of Ward 8, was part of his domain. He has presided over that shithole, and should have done more and worked harder to shutter that facility.

D.C. Village has been the city’s traditional dumping ground for decades. You wanna know some of the backstory on that place, go here and here and here.

So before officials start patting themselves on the back, they should remember that they let its most vulnerable citizens live in a roach-infested, fire trap located in the middle of nowhere for years.

And in the not too distant future, they will do it again.

Advocates for the folks who clean up Oriole Park after ballgames have been going after Peter Angelos for a while now. The United Workers Association wants the stadium’s cleaning-crew members paid a living wage, which in Baltimore now means $9.06 an hour. They are currently getting $7.

Angelos doesn’t own the Camden Yards stadium or hire the workers; the Maryland Stadium Authority does. But UWA knows that Angelos has enough sway with the MSA to get what he wants, and officials for the group contend that more than two years ago, during initial negotiations to settle the pay dispute, Angelos personally promised the workers, many of whom live in impoverished conditions or in public shelters, a living wage, even if he would have to dip into his pockets to make that happen. Besides, he’s gotten hundreds of millions of dollars lawyering for little people in Maryland, and he owns the team whose fans make all the mess.

For reneging on that deal, UWA members and officials followed Angelos up to Pittsburgh for last year’s All-Star game and yelled at him on the city streets through megaphones.

That tactic, embarrassing as it was for the allegedly pro-labor lawyer and champion of the downtrodden, didn’t make Angelos follow through on the living wage pledge. If anything, says the UWA, the stadium workers’ plight has gotten worse. The subcontractor that hires cleaning crews has started charging the day laborers $6 for the ride from the downtown employment offices to Camden Yards on game nights.

“That’s even though the stadium is within walking distance,” says Greg Rosenthal, a spokesperson for the UWA. “We talked to one woman who was getting charged even though she wasn’t getting any rides.”

That deduction puts cleaners’ earnings at below the minimum wage called for by state and federal law.

So the UWA has drawn its line in the sand. Angelos and the MSA have until Sept. 1 to make the living wage happen. Starting next week, the group will put together caravans of workers and supporters and take their case around the state. The first demonstrations of what they’re calling a Broken Promises tour are scheduled for next weekend, highlighted by a march down Broadway in Baltimore.

And what if Angelos et al. don’t meet their benchmarks?

“There’s the possibility of civil disobedience,” says Rosenthal. “That’s all we’re saying for now.”

Mad props to StreetSense for breaking a story no one else has: D.C.’s largest shelter will likely close in the fall and become the new bus hub for WMATA, which wants out of its current locale on M Street SE before the Nats and new traffic move in.

The D.C. Village Family Emergency Shelter sits on 16 acres in Southeast and holds half of the city’s shelter beds: 358 of 716. According to the story by Charles Jackson—who confirmed this morning he wrote the story on a tip, got everyone to confirm it, and is still waiting for someone else to give a shit—there’s a typical waiting list of 200 more who need beds. But D.C.’s not planning to replace the space. Instead, Mayor Adrian Fenty gave Jackson a bunch of vague talk about finding homeless people apartments closer to city services. A smart move, since that’s worked so well in the past.

WMATA spokeswoman Joanne Ferreira says Metro’s pushing to get it done “as soon as possible. The Nationals will be going into the Navy Yard a year from now.”

Yeah, we’d hate for those buses to be inconvenienced. But don’t worry. Tommy Wells in Ward 6 is on it—at least he is since Jackson called him up and Wells got his press person to send a statement: “I’m going to continue to ask for a timeline and regular updates on the progress of the city’s efforts.”

I’ve never been able to form an opinion on panhandlers. While on a very basic level I just can’t embrace the practice of begging, from time to time I put myself in that person’s shoes. I think, if things got as bad as that, if I had to beg on the street to get someone to give me a dollar, I would hope that someone would give it to me.

This weekend, I was near the intersection of New Jersey and New York Avenues NW queued up with the rest of the cars waiting to get on 395 when I saw an unusual panhandler. While this is a very hot intersection for panhandling or selling flowers, bottled water, and batteries, one panhandler’s sign caught my eye. “Why Lie, I Need a Beer” was scrawled in black marker on his piece of cardboard. I rolled my eyes and kept going, but I saw some people giving the guy change.

Which got me to thinking. If I were on 18th Street and saw someone standing in front of Tryst with a sign that said, “I Really Need a Cup of Coffee,” I think I’d be moved. While I can’t understand needing a beer, I can relate to needing a cup of coffee, and I think I’d go in and buy the person a cup. But isn’t it the same thing?

Photographer Ivan Pierre Aguirre sent City Desk a pair of interesting shots he grabbed at 10th and K Streets NW a couple of weeks back. Ivan, a student photojournalist, came across a hidey-hole of sorts that seems to be a favorite place for local folks to indulge in a rock or two.

Share your pix of favorite neighborhood drug hangouts with us!

StreetSense, trusted for its typical, well-meaning mix of stories, doesn’t disappoint with the latest issue.

You’ve got your “Where do homeless go in the cold?” and “Gay youths more at risk” stories. There’s some predictable railing against housing budget cuts and an interview with some federal muckety-muck.

But Page 10 offers this little gem: “Helpful Hints from the Homeless: How do you go to the bathroom when there isn’t one?” A couple of Shaw ANC habitués recently tried to convince me over a few beers that every single homeless person in the city opts to travel to a certain alley in their neighborhood to let loose. The StreetSense investigation proves otherwise.

“Depending on my location, I use a bucket or glass and have someone keep watch as I squat. It’s extremely challenging and dehumanizing,” says Brenda Karyl Lee-Wilson, who’s been homeless four years, four months, one week and six days (as of the date of publication).

“If I can’t find a secluded building, I just go right where I’m at,” says Randy, homeless for eight years.

Veronica Maynard, on the streets three years, has higher standards: “I never go any place where there is no possible use of a bathroom.”

The Adrian Fenty administration prides itself on finding new ways to deal with old problems. When it comes to the homeless, for instance, the new mayor’s staff has launched a self-esteem offensive, with some help from Oscar nominee Will Smith.

This morning, the Fenty team assembled a group of about 120 homeless people and delivered them to Union Station for a private screening of Smith’s new feel-good offering, The Pursuit of Happyness. The film tells the story of Chris Gardner, a single-father-turned-stockbroker-millionaire who did a stint in a homeless shelter with his young son before hitting it big. Attendees were also enticed by a bagels and pink lemonade for a snack and, after the movie, a chicken sandwich for the road.

As expected, there was plenty of snoring in the crowd, along with a shout of “I know how he feels!” when the landlord demands the rent and locks Gardner out of his apartment.

The reviews from the audience were generally glowing. But outside of the organizers, no one viewed it as a life-transforming event.

“Let’s face it, a lot these guys were here for something to do today,” says Marshall Pinkney, who lives in the Blair shelter and didn’t see any aspiring stockbrokers in the crowd. “I think that’s a good thing, but let’s see how long it takes for the D.C. government to get in touch with us again.”

The message of the film was not that all homeless people should aspire to become millionaires, says Moses Greene, with the mayor’s Office of Community Relations. “I don’t believe the intent was to make duplicate Chris Gardners.…The pursuit of happiness is different for everyone.”

Carlton Overton, a resident of the city’s La Casa shelter, thought the city did a service to the homeless by sharing a story about a guy who made it without government help. “I don’t believe we put enough pressure on the homeless to help themselves,” he says.

Homeless advocate Afara Speaks brokered the event with the Union Station 9 theater owners. And it’s not like she had a choice. She says that she was in Union Station one day, and “the Lord told me to come and talk to the management [of the theater]. And because of my obedience, we were able to come together and make this happen.”

Speaks has high praise for the Fenty good-feelings offensive, and she’s had another inspiration—to take the plight of D.C.’s homeless the biggest platform in the land: “Next we are going to get the Oprah Winfrey show to come here and talk to us.”