Commentary : The Alcoholic Homeless Deserve Beds for Treatment, Not Contempt

Americans supposedly always support the underdog. There is one underdog we not only seem not to support but also to kick when he is down.

I’m speaking of homeless alcoholics. They clutter our landscape and our lives, and we want them to disappear. But where can they go?

In all of Orange County, we have just 29 detoxification beds for indigents and a few more than 100 long-term recovery beds. That is scandalous. All of us for years have mouthed the enlightened statement that alcoholism is an illness. But in what other illness do we allow the patients to wander the streets in misery and degradation? In what other illness do we look upon the sufferer with disgust and abhorrence and grab his or her belongings with a pitchfork and toss them onto the trash heap? In what other illness do we arrest the person for showing symptoms?

Anyone who knows anything about alcoholism realizes how difficult it is for an alcoholic to get his illness under control--even with the support of his family and friends and with money to pay for treatment.

Imagine what it must be like to fight this alone, homeless, hungry, constantly ill and on the street?

Street alcoholics are not pleasant. But no one loathes them more than they do themselves when they are sober and take a look at what they have become.

We have many homeless alcoholics living in the environs of Share Our Selves. I know most of them quite well. We give them food and clothing but seldom shelter. We fear that the motels we use will refuse our referrals of families and more “desirable” homeless people if we send them our street people.

I’ve seen some of my alcoholic friends beg us for “laundry money,” knowing we know what they’re really saying is that they have no more wine and they have to have a drink or they’ll have a seizure.

I’ve tried to get a young alcoholic woman into medical detox and was told that she would be hospitalized only if she had a seizure in the emergency room, because Indigent Medical Services pays for medical detox only under those terms. I’ve seen some of my alcoholic friends after months and years finally ask for help to get into a program--only to find that there was no room right away but “keep calling back until a bed’s available.” Of course that doesn’t work--they have very little ability to keep their resolve.

For the last few years, homelessness has been a real issue in most big cities. Now it’s a problem in such places as Orange County. We have taken some valid steps to house homeless families and homeless women but have added no new beds for homeless men. And the shelters that have been opened have strict restrictions against alcohol and drug abuse.

Most of the fund-raising rhetoric for shelters for the homeless usually stresses that the program is for those who can make it, who are capable of working, not for bums and bag ladies. No one wants them.

Even such enlightened cities as Costa Mesa are responding to the pressure of outraged citizens and are beginning to enforce curfew laws in their parks and public places. The homeless cannot sleep in public places at night. Every city and every neighborhood wants them to go someplace else. SOS has been asked by some not to serve homeless alcoholics, because our food and clothing attracts them to our center and jeopardizes other programs.

No one wants them, but where are they to go? They are the lepers of our society. But they possess dignity and worth simply because they are human beings, and we should provide the services to give them a chance to get out of the street and back to health and productive lives.

At recent county budget hearings, it was pointed out that the county does not spend a penny from the general fund on alcohol programs. Fees, fines and state and federal money that pay for the county’s alcohol program exceeded the program’s actual cost by $530,000 during the last fiscal year. That money is spread over the entire Health Care Agency; 25% of it is used for indirect costs for the County Administrative Office.

I suggest that the county use some of that money or some other source to pay for at least 50 new detox beds.

I have listened and believed the last few years when we have been told about the leanness of the county budget and the impending shortfalls. We lowered our expectations, minimized our requests and diminished our hopes for better programs.

I understand that once again the budget is balanced without severe cuts. I think a way can be found to add these detox beds and follow-up care, just as creative ways are found each year to balance the budget.

It is a perfect time politically to open detox centers. The county says it has tried, but cities haven’t permitted them. Santa Ana’s mayor and police have stated the need for detox centers. There could be real cooperation between the county and Santa Ana and other cities to create not only detox centers but follow-up programs to help our county’s homeless alcoholics to become productive again.