A team of local residents is working to streamline efforts to help out Killeen’s homeless.
The team’s proposals were laid out Monday evening before about 60 people who gathered at the Killeen Community Center for what was billed as a Homeless Shelter Meeting, facilitated by Lan Carter.
Carter, a teacher and former Killeen ISD board candidate, said the idea is to collaborate with different agencies and locals to put in place designated services to help with those living in what has been dubbed Tent City, outside Killeen’s closed homeless shelter, as well as homeless throughout Killeen.
Carter, along with local residents Melissa Brown and Mercedes Wesley, presented to the audience a plan to coordinate donations and meal service efforts.
Also during the meeting, local Realtor Amber Mezzacappa shared a possible new shelter location or day center for the homeless.
Audience members broke up into teams, and ideas were shared on how local residents can help.
Wesley, through the Helping Our Homeless-Donations Facebook page, will oversee the planning of distributing items to the homeless. Brown will be in charge of coordinating fundraising efforts.
During the meeting, the audience heard from three individuals who live in the 20- to 25-tent community outside of the Friends In Crisis homeless shelter, which closed on May 18 due to low funding.
Joe Salinas was the last resident to walk out the door of the facility when it closed and the first to sleep outside on the sidewalk.
Being a tenured resident of the tent city in the weeks since, he has earned the unofficial designation of “ambassador” of Tent City by the other residents.
Salinas along with Rashad Watkins and Isaiah Young, spoke of their experiences of living at Tent City and what led them there. All three expressed to the audience that the residents there are not bad people, just in a bad circumstance.
“I realize now that what happened to me can happen to anyone, including all of you. I pray it doesn’t,” Salinas said.
Watkins, who recently received employment with the City Of Copperas Cove, said it is the mindset that makes people want to do better for themselves.
“I’m now able to work myself out of my situation. We are not all bad people,” he said.
Young shared with the audience that on a daily basis occupants received “false hope” from people and even had items stolen from them by people who claim to be helping.
“We are not animals and we shouldn’t be looked at that way. We want to do better for ourselves,” Young said.
For more information on helping, volunteering or the status of the homeless shelter, go to the “Helping Our Homeless-Donation Central & Meal Service Sign Up” or “What’s Happening Central Texas” page on Facebook.
— KILLEEN DAILY HERALD