Cork Simon: Reaching out to the homeless

IT’S just after six on a dark, damp and freezing morning in Cork on the third Thursday of January; a man is sleeping under a duvet in the doorway of one of the country’s largest estate agents.

If Noreen Twomey and Kevin Coughlan from Cork Simon’s outreach team see any symbolism in someone sleeping rough in sub-zero temperatures outside this particular door in the middle of Ireland’s greatest housing emergency, they pass no comment.

Instead, they gently tell the man to go back to sleep, but to be sure to call into the Cork Simon shelter later for some breakfast and a bit of warmth. In the middle of a cold weather warning, this is a kindness which will be repeated as they work their way across the city.

For over 20 years, Cork Simon’s outreach team has been out meeting rough sleepers five mornings a week. Early one morning in August, at the height of last year’s heatwave, The Echo went out with the team on their rounds, and they met 26 people — 21 men and five women. That morning, the sun was splitting the pavements by 9am.

On this January morning, after a bitterly cold night, the streets are slick with rain and by 9am the temperatures are barely above zero. Today, Noreen and Kevin will meet 13 people, 11 men and two women.

In doorways on our main streets, in alleyways behind some of the city centre’s best addresses, and outside some of our finest churches, they will meet and chat with people who sleep out on the coldest nights of the year, and they treat everyone they meet with warmth and respect, knowing them all by name, and in all but one case, being welcomed as friends.

It is still dark, and about a mile from the city centre the sloping pathway down to a piece of public land is covered in black ice. Noreen and Kevin are anxious to check in on a man who has been sleeping out in a tent on scrubland on the hillside, but the tarmac is lethal at this hour. It is bitterly cold.

We inch down along the grass margin until we reach a point where the grass runs out. Reluctantly, the team gives up. Noreen says there would be no point returning here in daylight, as the man in the tent will be long gone. They decide to head back for town.

The sun is up now, but there’s no warmth at all in it. Under the great stone portico of one of the city’s churches, a man is lying in a sleeping bag. He gives Kevin dog’s abuse for waking him, and he curses Cork Simon, saying they have never helped him, throwing in a bit of unprintable (and completely untrue) defamation about Cork Penny Dinners while he’s at it.

Kevin walks away, and when he is well down the steps and out of earshot he says the man has a lot of difficulties in his life, and has had various issues with homelessness services over the years. Noreen says it’s always a balancing act.

“You have to respect his right to be left alone, but at the same time, the one morning could come when he might need to see a friendly face, and we might be able to help him. It’s a tough call, but we do our best.”

Some of those who sleep rough even when shelter is available can be dealing with childhood trauma, or may be trying to stay away from other people who may be dealing with addictions, and some may be avoiding people with whom they may have had disagreements.

In Fitzgerald Park, it’s coming up on 8.30am and the pavement is still like glass as Kevin and Noreen look to see if anyone has been sleeping overnight in the park. While we pick our way along the grassy areas, a young woman and her two small children enjoy skating along the icy ground.

On the Mardyke, a pleasant, heavily bearded man in a tee-shirt and open checked shirt seems to enjoy a superhuman invulnerability to the cold. Initially, Kevin and Noreen think he might be willing to speak to The Echo, but he declines politely. He still says hello in a very friendly way, offering a smile of great warmth.

Later, in a desolate, post-industrial wasteland barely a mile from the city centre, we pick our way across broken ground, through half-frozen puddles and black, sludgy mud, between ruined, burned-out, and disused warehouses. Outside one, acrid white smoke pours out of a metal barrel which lies on its side, a square hole cut in it. It probably gave heat last night, but now all it does is poison the air all around.

Noreen and Kevin knock on the metal door of the abandoned warehouse and are invited inside by the couple, a man and a woman, who make their home there with their dog. They would be entitled to accommodation, Noreen says, but they cannot get accommodation for the dog, a companion for over 10 years.

Through the open door can be glimpsed a string of small, battery-powered lanterns hanging from the ceiling, their light is golden and warm. There was running water here until recently, and electricity too, Kevin says, and someone had designed a working shower from bits of scrap piping.

“People are extremely resourceful, and they’re so clever in organising themselves to stay as safe as possible,” Noreen says.

The outreach team works closely with the community gardaí, sharing information on where people are staying to ensure that people sleeping rough are checked in on regularly.

Homelessness figures in Cork have hit record highs in recent months, with the latest Department of Housing report showing that 503 adults were in homeless emergency accommodation in Cork city and county last December, which represents a year-on-year increase of 14% on December 2021, and an increase of 31% on December 2020.

The city’s cold weather strategy remains in place all winter, with more resources and emergency beds made available. The night before The Echo went out with the outreach team, there were 15 people in Cork Simon’s Nightlight service — where beds are set up in the canteen as an emergency overflow measure — on top of the 46 people resident in the shelter. Many nights a further 15 or 20 people will stay in the shelter just to get in from the cold.

“Resources are just stretched to breaking point at the moment,” Kevin says.

“Really, we’re just trying to find anywhere to put people.”

Noreen agrees: “We’re completely full, overflowing, we’ve brought everybody in for the cold weather, we’ve people on couches, people on mats, people under the stairs, anywhere we can possibly put people, and we still met 13 people today.”

Kevin adds that there are inevitably more people they haven’t met.

“Think of all the people in this last week who’ve become homeless, we’ve seen evictions go back up, or just think of the hidden homeless who don’t want to be found. We’re missing people, as well, unfortunately.”

One thing they both emphasise is how important it is that members of the public contact the outreach team if they have concerns about people sleeping rough.

“We’re always anxious to get people to call into the day centre, it’s a one-stop shop, we have a GP, a nurse, addiction counsellors, hot showers, bedding, clothes, any issues with services or payments, we can help,” Kevin says.

Noreen adds: “There’s no need to make an appointment, you can just walk in.”

In the shelter, we meet Josiah. He’s a tall, strong young man from central Europe, and he tells us he is the man who was sleeping in the doorway of the estate agents. He says he is not homeless, but rather is “houseless”.

He says he is sleeping rough for religious reasons.

“Home is where the heart is,” he says, adding that he has been on the streets for more than two years.

Another man, Terry, tells us his relationship fell apart four years ago and “the domino effect” meant that he ended up homeless. He says he has never slept rough in the cold weather, but quite likes to do so in summertime.

“I always come into the shelter in the winter.” He says he is finding ways to express himself through art, and he is learning to play the piano in the City Library, a place in the heart of town where all are welcome.

“The genius of the library is that you have the catalogue of music and you can stick on the headphones and listen to anything and then try and replicate it and indulge in music, it’s brilliant,” he says.

“They have a small piano and you can put on the headphones and play away.”

The housing crisis has exacerbated the pressures on homelessness services like Cork Simon, and the team says that previously the profile of those in homelessness would tend to be people dealing with childhood trauma, mental health or addiction issues, but now they are meeting people in full-time jobs who have nowhere to go.

Couples in full employment who have no prospect of finding a home are now turning to homelessness services.

“We’re at a point where people working in homelessness services, and services in general, aren’t far off of homelessness themselves,” Kevin says.

“This is not so much trauma or addiction-based homelessness, this is a societal issue, this is now a full-blown housing emergency, and the cost of living on top of that is just petrol on a fire.”

‘It’s scary the first time you have to sleep rough’: Brendan’s story

I’ll be 43 this year. I left home when I was 18. My family wanted me to grow and survive on my own and be a bit more independent and stuff like that, so I left home and I lived in a few different places for different periods, like five years here and maybe two years there, in different places. This was all in Cork city.

My parents always helped me get a place, but as times moved on, I found it hard to get places on my own, and the market changed too, I found it harder and harder to get a place in my price range.

The drink wouldn’t have helped me either, or it could have been mental illness. I’d be sitting in my room before I got kicked out and I’d be hearing voices threatening me, and I’d say ‘I’m gonna go get a drink’ and it’d more peaceful and calm for a while but then the voices would come back.

It’s scary really the first time you have to sleep rough, because if it’s cold and it’s raining, you can’t sleep because it’s so cold and you’re also getting soaked. That can be awful like, you just have to try and find the right place in off the streets.

Do you remember there a while back there was torrential rain for nearly a week, with heavy showers and the wind was blowing as well? I was sleeping out in that. I got destroyed, and the wind was howling so I couldn’t sleep at all.

The services are fairly good for people that are out on the streets. There’s free hot food from Penny Dinners, and people come around and do soup runs and stuff like that, so you’re able to survive. What’s difficult is that you have nowhere to put your belongings.

It’s very dangerous as well on the streets. I often woke up with empty pockets and my wallet was gone. They can rob you in your sleep, and they could even kill you in your sleep. I have a friend who was sleeping rough and he woke up one morning and two girls were defecating on his person. A disgusting thing to do to someone. It is a lottery on the streets.

Lately I’m thinking I’m gonna try and give up the drink, and if I can’t do it on my own, I’m gonna get some help. Because it’s ruining a lot of my life and I think I do much better when I’m sober.

Simon have been very good to me, and they provide you with a solid foundation to try and rebuild your life. They give you a roof over your head, and I hope I’ll be able to further my education, get a fairly good job, save up some money and get a bank account. I’m very grateful to them, because I know I couldn’t do this without Simon.

The names of service users quoted have been changed. The Cork Simon Outreach team: 021 4278728.