Original Article Published by Journal Star | Andy Kravetz, December 20, 2020
PEORIA — Those who work with the homeless want to thank the Peoria area for its generosity so far this year. But they stress, please do so responsibly.
“It’s not that we don’t want people to donate. We love the generosity and the caring, but we don’t want to make more problems for the camp,” said Kshe Bernard, one of the co-founders of LULA Peoria, a registered not-for-profit street-outreach group that goes every day to help those men and women who lived on the the city’s streets.
Why is being ‘overrun with resources’ a concern?
During their trips to and from the encampment under the Murray Baker Bridge, the city’s most visible and largest site of non-sheltered homeless people, Bernard says she’s found loafers, women’s flipflops, dress shirts and four whole rotisserie chickens.
It’s not just a waste of resources — or in the case of the chickens, food — but it’s also a possible health hazard.
“There are unintended consequences when an encampment is overrun with resources,” said Kate Green, who heads the Home for All Continuum of Care, the federally mandated umbrella agency overseeing homeless-care services in Peoria.