Spotlight: Housing for People Experiencing Homelessness
The death of millions is a statistic. And that resonates with me so much when thinking about how to introduce this discussion because I believe that singular stories of people caught in the cycle of homelessness can humanize this issue to a point where we can grow to understand it and to have compassion about it. And then and only then can we begin to understand how to break that cycle. In the early 90s, I was a volunteer for something called the Partnership for the Homeless in New York City
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 3:30
I enjoyed focusing on the healing environments, the quality of the patient and their environment, and how it helps healing, the quality of the environment and how it helps the staff and the health care workers and how important it is to have a well designed environment to help them do their jobs, which is very challenging. A few years ago, I had the opportunity to move over to an agency called Housing for Health
Deb, thank you for this introduction and thank you for what you are doing. I want to go back to a phrase you used in terms of what you studied, which was healthcare design. I've never heard of it, and I know that it's what you're doing, and it's the focus you you pivoted towards. Can you give us a background of healthcare design on a macro level, across different verticals within the industry of healthcare design?
Swell Team
@Swell · 0:15
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 4:23
Sure. So healthcare design is a specific part of interior design. It's a specialty, usually with hospitals, cancer centers, Pediatrics, rehabilitation, all different types of therapy, clinics, wellness centers, and healthcare design focuses on a healing environment. So long ago, it was the belief that an environment has to look clean. So everything was just white and metal and cleanable and a very clinical type setting
Dead. This is so fascinating. And your last sentence about improved state of wellbeing is so interesting when we look at this in terms of creating spaces for people who have experienced homelessness who are trying to transition within a program and that's set up for them. So at the base level, when people think about homeless communities, they see them living at the base level, outside, in the elements with bare shelter and no comforts whatsoever
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 5:00
I come in with my knowledge of the interior environment and try to guide these operators through the operators of the facilities through the process, because that's not their area of expertise. But I try to marry what their needs are to run a facility and the residents that are coming in and their needs, and we want it to flow as best as possible. It is very challenging to get people off the streets, and that's a whole nother conversation. That is what these I call Angels do
You have these meetings where you talk about your cases and what's unfolding and what kind of people are in that room? What kind of experiences do they have? What kind of licenses do they have? What kind of industrial professionals are around that table when you bring a new, a new person into the system
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 4:50
And it is it is not, however, from lack of housing people, unfortunately, it is going to get worse. There's just too many reasons people are falling into homelessness, and unfortunately, covet is not helping. It's going to make it even worse. So brace yourself for seeing more and more of it. We have many challenges. Everyone's heard of NIMBY's, not in my backyard
I'm so glad you brought that up, because I think a lot of people do see outside their car doors or their porches, they see things getting worse and they're wondering who's doing what and why is there ever going to be a change like you're saying, it's probably going to get worse before it gets better. And you brought up a lot of points in this last swell
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 2:55
They're not as independent. So in these ERC facilities or these boarding care facilities, I worked on one in the Tahunga area, and I used a lot of artwork. Guy used a lot of warm colors. I made their rooms feel more like it turned out to be a lovely, positive facility. And when the residents moved in, they had never I heard from the operators, people making comments like, oh, my gosh, I've never been in such a nice place
That's really amazing. You're doing such a service that I think is probably skipped over in a lot of other places. And to that end, I have a question about professional development and about the network of people who serve the homeless around not just this state, but around the whole country and perhaps internationally. Are you connected with organizations? And do you attend conferences, of course, virtually at this point, for people who are specifically in your area of health design
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 4:45
So there's not a lot of people that specifically do what I do. But there are a lot of people, a huge network of people working on the homeless problem. Mainly, I would say, architects that are trying to develop architecture community, which does include designers, which they are trying to develop more affordable housing models pop up structures, different types of looking into different types of building models that are maybe more affordable, quicker to set up
Wow. It's such a complicated system. And thank you for trying to help us see the little parts of it that work and how we can move into feeling at least a little more understanding of and compassionate for the system system that's trying to support the solution. I'm going to open this up to the public. I hope we get some great conversation going on, and I have a question for you to continue this conversation. Hopefully with the world is at a very base level
Deborah Lever
@DeborahLever · 3:22
Now, this is important to support the agencies that are doing the work. An individual giving a dollar on the off ramp or packing up lunches for a few people is nice. But the problem is bigger, of course. And if you can support the agencies that are doing the work and ask the agencies that are in your community, what could you do?