I exited the C train at 116th Street in West Harlem on a frigid December 1, 2005.
The street looked like the Brooklyn neighborhoods I was accustomed to: dingy
bodegas and dollar stores festooned with knock-off suitcases and self-wringing
mops. But I nonetheless felt as if I were in a foreign land. Despite my forays into
the deepest depths of Brooklyn, I had never been to Harlem, rarely venturing
north of 42nd Street.
I walked down 116th Street looking for the office of Pathways to Housing, a non-
profit organization that places homeless, mentally ill clients in permanent housing.
My contact, Daniel Babigian, a team leader at Pathways, specifically requested
that I come in on the first of the month, when the clients arrive in droves to pick
up their SSI assistance checks. Some of the clients had already done lengthy
questionnaires and interviews for a housing study and they knew the drill.
Started in 1992, Pathways is a non-profit organization that provides housing and
services to homeless individuals with mental illness, many of whom spend their
lives shuttling in and out of draconian city and state psychiatric hospitals.
Pathways pays for its clients’ housing and medication by applying for and pooling
all of their government entitlements, such as Social Security, veterans’ benefits,
and so on. The organization has been the target of criticism and controversy
because unlike many other non-profits and government agencies, Pathway has a
housing-first policy that does not require that clients be drug-free to participate.
Pathways’ clients are often at the lowest rung of the social service ladder—
homeless, mentally ill, and drug addicted, often cast off and deemed untreatable
by other organizations.
Daniel told me to look for the paper sign on the door next to the building under
construction. Half of the block was under construction. I saw some downtrodden-
looking men lined up in front of a blue building that was close to the address I was
looking for. I saw a sign taped to the door, but didn’t bother to read it. After
waiting in line with these men for about five minutes, I realized that I was waiting
in front of a soup kitchen. I crossed the street and found the right building.
I rang a doorbell and was buzzed into the building. Inside the glass door was a
dingy yellow stairwell. A man and woman were sitting on the steps, bundled up to
their eyes, trying to stay warm. I navigated around them to climb the stairs. The
woman looked up at me. “Are you the man doing the interviews?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said, “That’s me.”
“I want to do an interview. Don’t forget about me,” she said.
I nodded and continued up the stairs. This was an encouraging sign. I had spent
three weeks calling non-profit groups that serve the homeless in the city. After
being transferred to a thousand voicemails, put on hold for hours, given other
dead-end numbers to call, and generally blown off, I was getting frustrated and
desperate. I didn’t get it. I wasn’t trying to exploit anyone. My goal was simply to
collect and present profiles of homeless individuals in New York City. I realized
soon after beginning my research that offering to record their stories for posterity
was not motivation enough. Therefore I offered to pay each interviewee ten
dollars for a half-hour interview. And even then, most other organizations in the
city wanted nothing to do with me or my research. But Pathways was different.
Right away, they were interested in my idea and wanted to help.
The work at Pathways is demanding, and burn-out is common. The emotional and
physical exhaustion that working with the mentally ill often exacts is almost always
too much for even the clients’ families to endure. Pathways attracts the rebels of
social work, willing to dive into the trenches and throw the academic playbook out
the window. Most team leaders are assigned a dozen or more clients. They form
strong bonds with their clients by uniting with them to battle the hydra of red tape
and bureaucracy of government aid agencies. And they must be available 24 hours
a day. Driving to a client’s apartment in the middle of the night to conciliate the
police or quell his or her paranoia is not uncommon.
But despite these significant challenges, Pathways has proven to be one of the
most successful housing and treatment programs in the country. According to its
Web site, Pathways has an 85 percent retention rate. And even fiscally
conservative legislators who are often the first to siphon budget money from social
services programs are attracted to Pathway’s value proposition. The organization
asserts that the cost of housing and providing “extensive support services” for
each client is $22,500 per year, versus $175,000, which is the annual cost per bed
in a state psychiatric hospital.
The street looked like the Brooklyn neighborhoods I was accustomed to: dingy
bodegas and dollar stores festooned with knock-off suitcases and self-wringing
mops. But I nonetheless felt as if I were in a foreign land. Despite my forays into
the deepest depths of Brooklyn, I had never been to Harlem, rarely venturing
north of 42nd Street.
I walked down 116th Street looking for the office of Pathways to Housing, a non-
profit organization that places homeless, mentally ill clients in permanent housing.
My contact, Daniel Babigian, a team leader at Pathways, specifically requested
that I come in on the first of the month, when the clients arrive in droves to pick
up their SSI assistance checks. Some of the clients had already done lengthy
questionnaires and interviews for a housing study and they knew the drill.
Started in 1992, Pathways is a non-profit organization that provides housing and
services to homeless individuals with mental illness, many of whom spend their
lives shuttling in and out of draconian city and state psychiatric hospitals.
Pathways pays for its clients’ housing and medication by applying for and pooling
all of their government entitlements, such as Social Security, veterans’ benefits,
and so on. The organization has been the target of criticism and controversy
because unlike many other non-profits and government agencies, Pathway has a
housing-first policy that does not require that clients be drug-free to participate.
Pathways’ clients are often at the lowest rung of the social service ladder—
homeless, mentally ill, and drug addicted, often cast off and deemed untreatable
by other organizations.
Daniel told me to look for the paper sign on the door next to the building under
construction. Half of the block was under construction. I saw some downtrodden-
looking men lined up in front of a blue building that was close to the address I was
looking for. I saw a sign taped to the door, but didn’t bother to read it. After
waiting in line with these men for about five minutes, I realized that I was waiting
in front of a soup kitchen. I crossed the street and found the right building.
I rang a doorbell and was buzzed into the building. Inside the glass door was a
dingy yellow stairwell. A man and woman were sitting on the steps, bundled up to
their eyes, trying to stay warm. I navigated around them to climb the stairs. The
woman looked up at me. “Are you the man doing the interviews?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said, “That’s me.”
“I want to do an interview. Don’t forget about me,” she said.
I nodded and continued up the stairs. This was an encouraging sign. I had spent
three weeks calling non-profit groups that serve the homeless in the city. After
being transferred to a thousand voicemails, put on hold for hours, given other
dead-end numbers to call, and generally blown off, I was getting frustrated and
desperate. I didn’t get it. I wasn’t trying to exploit anyone. My goal was simply to
collect and present profiles of homeless individuals in New York City. I realized
soon after beginning my research that offering to record their stories for posterity
was not motivation enough. Therefore I offered to pay each interviewee ten
dollars for a half-hour interview. And even then, most other organizations in the
city wanted nothing to do with me or my research. But Pathways was different.
Right away, they were interested in my idea and wanted to help.
The work at Pathways is demanding, and burn-out is common. The emotional and
physical exhaustion that working with the mentally ill often exacts is almost always
too much for even the clients’ families to endure. Pathways attracts the rebels of
social work, willing to dive into the trenches and throw the academic playbook out
the window. Most team leaders are assigned a dozen or more clients. They form
strong bonds with their clients by uniting with them to battle the hydra of red tape
and bureaucracy of government aid agencies. And they must be available 24 hours
a day. Driving to a client’s apartment in the middle of the night to conciliate the
police or quell his or her paranoia is not uncommon.
But despite these significant challenges, Pathways has proven to be one of the
most successful housing and treatment programs in the country. According to its
Web site, Pathways has an 85 percent retention rate. And even fiscally
conservative legislators who are often the first to siphon budget money from social
services programs are attracted to Pathway’s value proposition. The organization
asserts that the cost of housing and providing “extensive support services” for
each client is $22,500 per year, versus $175,000, which is the annual cost per bed
in a state psychiatric hospital.
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© Copyright 2007, Erik Rhey
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