4.4: Type of Communities

Neighborhoods and the Unhoused

Not all communities are created equal. The educational opportunities, the outcomes, the ability to earn a living wage, the air, noise, chemical and garbage pollution, the ability to get together and socialize, all of these and more will impact a child and their socialization. Let's look at some neighborhoods you can find in the United States and how the experiences the children will have will differ

Neighborhoods

Moorpark: The neighborhood of Moorpark has the town square in the center where every Friday night during the summer months there is a Farmers Market where the local farmers can sell their fruits and vegetables and people can dance. There is a bingo hall that is crowded and the place to be on Wednesdays and Saturdays. There are two churches in town and most everyone attends one of them. If someone is sick or has a baby or a death in the family it's announced there and the town sets up a dinner train where they bring dinner to the family for a month. The school is in good condition and many of the mothers don't work so they are able to volunteer in the classrooms and donate supplies and their time. They get together in the spring to plant flowers and the school vegetable patch. There are a few clubs and church social events for the children and teens in the community and everyone knows everyone.

Piedmont: Right on the edge of the train tracks is a neighborhood that has small houses and apartments that have been there for 50 years. Many of them have tarps covering the roofs to keep the rain out and you can often see children playing in the dirt outside and near the tracks with sticks and bricks. There is a river nearby where many of the older children fish for their families dinner that night. Both parents are working and the kids are left alone after school to take care of themselves and get dinner on the table. The school has not received adequate funding since opening so there is no air conditioning, and the books are several years old and falling apart. Not many teachers want to teach there due to the lack of resources. There is a heavy police presence and a high percentage of domestic violence. There isn't much to do during the weekends except work or catch up on chores.

Glenntown: The houses are mansions set on beautifully manicured lots with a clubhouse and golf course as the neighborhood hang out. Most families are two parents with either both parents working high paying jobs or the mother staying at home. The schools are rated the best in the state and there is a private school that many of the parents use instead of the public school. Most children are enrolled in a variety of clubs and after school sports. There has been crime, but restitution not jail time has been the punishment. The neighborhood puts out a weekly newsletter and in the spring the announcements of college acceptances are listed with most being Ivy Leagues.

Levenson: There are apartments, businesses and skyscrapers as far as you can see in Levenson. The main form of transportation is the subway and you need to walk fast if you are walking the streets. It's not safe for children to be by themselves in the neighborhood so any playtime is structured and set up with other families. The school is underfunded, but it's the only green space the children have unless the parents can take them to the park several subway stops away on the weekends. There is a mix of families and income levels. There are pockets of high crime and gang activity, and other parts of people trying to make it day to day. Most people stay to themselves and don't interact with others in their community.

All of these examples show how a neighborhood setting can influence mobility, social experiences, play, education, crime, and exposure to experiences. The sizes of the community, the diversity of the community and the relationships we build within communities are all part of the child's socialization and will differ greatly when they come from different communities.

Unhoused

The unhoused or homelessness is a complex social problem, and the characteristics of homelessness vary geographically (Gregory, Johnston, Pratt, Watts, & Whatmore, 2009). Homelessness has increased dramatically in the Global North since the 1970s especially among the most vulnerable populations (Takahashi, 1996).

Homelessness, or the threat of homelessness, is not just people living or sleeping on the street. Sometimes homelessness is not visible, but it still exists where people are living in abandoned buildings, living in tenements, using emergency shelters, using family or friends as places to stay or even “couch surfing.” The line between being housed and being homeless is often not clear, as people can find themselves in a cycle of moving between temporary “homes” (e.g., staying with family or friends) and shelters for the homeless. As well, many people live in housing that does not meet health and safety standards (e.g., the presence of mold; inadequate electrical or heating systems). All of these living situations put people at risk of poor physical, mental and emotional health.

Homelessness is usually publicly stigmatized, and government policies that affect homeless people and their rights and access to public space are often harsh (Mitchell, 2003).

The Causes of Homelessness

Homelessness is an outcome of the complex interplay of structural factors, systemic failures and individual circumstances (Gaetz, Donaldson, Richter, & Gulliver, 2013):

1. Structural factors are where the cost of living has increased but without an adequate increase in income, particularly for those in the lower income brackets or those on social assistance.
2. Systemic failures occur when people fall between the cracks of a country’s systems of care. For example, when people are discharged from hospitals or correctional facilities into emergency shelters or when youth transition out of the child welfare system.
3. Personal circumstances may come into play when individuals and families experience catastrophic events such as job loss, illness or a house fire. Traumatic events or health problems can add to the risk of becoming homeless when housing or income is in short supply.
4. Family violence and conflict, particularly for women, children and youth, may push individuals to flee their homes in order to protect themselves.

Note

People Making a Difference

Feeding “Motel Kids” Near Disneyland

Just blocks from Disneyland in Anaheim, California, more than 1,000 families live in cheap motels frequently used by drug dealers and prostitutes. Because they cannot afford the deposit for an apartment, the motels are their only alternative to homelessness. As Bruno Serato, a local Italian restaurant owner, observed, “Some people are stuck, they have no money. They need to live in that room. They’ve lost everything they have. They have no other choice. No choice.”

Serato learned about these families back in 2005, when he saw a boy at the local Boys & Girls Club eating a bag of potato chips as his only food for dinner. He was told that the boy lived with his family in a motel and that the Boys & Girls Club had a “motel kids” program that drove children in vans after school to their motels. Although the children got free breakfast and lunch at school, they often went hungry at night. Serato soon began serving pasta dinners to some seventy children at the club every evening, a number that had grown by spring 2011 to almost three hundred children nightly. Serato also pays to have the children transported to the club for their dinners, and he estimates that the food and transportation cost him about $2,000 monthly. His program had served more than 300,000 pasta dinners to motel kids by 2011.

Two of the children who eat Serato’s pasta are Carlos and Anthony Gomez, 12, who live in a motel room with the other members of their family. Their father was grateful for the pasta: “I no longer worry as much, about them [coming home] and there being no food. I know that they eat over there at [the] Boys & Girls Club.”

Bruno Serato is merely happy to be helping out. “They’re customers,” he explains. “My favorite customers” (Toner, 2011).

For more information about Bruno Serato’s efforts, visit his charity site at Caterina's Club.

Attributions:

"Homelessness and Poverty in the First World" by LibreTexts is licensed under CC BY.

"Poverty" by Whitney Sarah Payne, LibreTexts is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA .