Volunteers Are Fine, but We Need Voters

* No doubt I would not write this letter had our agency been mentioned in your recent series of articles on homelessness in the Valley (July 5).

I have no quarrel with the articles. Most of the professionals quoted and the agencies identified are friends of ours, with whom we regularly share clients and other problems.

Here let me blow our horn: A generalist office, we see about 35,000 people annually. We provide food, clothing, emergency shelter, transitional housing, employment assistance, counseling and case management. The last on the list is becoming increasingly important as we work more and more with families on the verge of homelessness, or just fallen into it.

There’s not enough transitional housing, as you noted, or affordable permanent housing. As of the 1990 census, there were 396,160 households in the Valley (leaving out Burbank and points east), and 61,805 receiving $15,000 or less per year. Median rent is $706, which means that a lot of people are paying 50% to 70% of income on housing and utilities.

To boot, there aren’t enough jobs that provide the money for housing--and Aid to Families with Dependent Children doesn’t do it either, never mind general relief, some $200 a month with food stamps.

It’s an aggregate and systemic problem. At this point comes my criticism of your work: “How Can I help?” No, not by sending food or volunteering for a couple of hours a week. Instead, the answer is political advocacy and job creation--more macro-level stuff. If we had to depend on donated time or food, we’d serve maybe 10% of the people we actually reach. What we need much more of are voters who’ll say: This has got to stop, this homelessness, this joblessness!

JEROME NILSSEN

Van Nuys

Nilssen is area director of Lutheran Services of Southern California .