'Merry Christmas, Now Get Your Butt Out Into That Cold and Snow!'

Nothing gets in the way of kicking someone out of the Sheridan Community Homeless Shelter.
They advertise case management, but it doesn’t take much program development to learn how to say, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
I am hopeful that not very many people know that Volunteers of America, the managers of the shelter, is listed as a church. It is not exactly the hallmark of the Gospel that people in need are readily dismissed, with no concern about where they might go from here.
For example:
It was a cold Wyoming Christmas Day when a female resident, a veteran, returned to the shelter. She had stayed the night with a friend in town. The rules say that residents have to get permission to be gone overnight, otherwise be in by the 10 p.m. curfew.
This young woman said she wasn’t aware of the overnight rule.
This is quite likely, as no staff at the shelter has ever been trained in how to do an intake. Each one does what he or she thinks is right. During the calendar year of 2007, the staff never had training on registering residents, to get everyone on the same page.
The shelter dictator told the woman she would have to leave.
Christmas morning she was kicked out into the snow.
“They didn’t care whether I had another place to go or not,” she told me.
Out! Out! Out! This is how my local shelter treats people in need.
Nothing in the policy and procedures of the shelter indicates that a resident must be kicked out if they are absent overnight. It may be done at the pleasure of the director. And what a pleasure it apparently is for her.
The shelter gets federal per diem grant money to take care of veterans. The story of this woman’s treatment is offensive on so many levels.
I can’t believe this is allowed to go on.
If you would like to voice your concern, click on the little envelope below and email roger-casey@mail.va.gov This will send this post to Roger, and gives you a chance to comment to him. Roger is the initial contact person for the VA Per Diem Grant Program.