Stable place sought for homeless students
Village planning staff working with members of group dedicated to helping homeless youths
Second step would accommodate overnight stays
Officials with the High Mountain Youth Project of Lincoln County are looking for a structure that could serve the needs of homeless children.
But village zoning rules may present larger obstacles than finding money for the project.
"We are here representing the High Mountain Youth Project of Lincoln County, New Mexico," Laurie Benavides told village councilors during the public forum portion of the council meeting Tuesday. "Louisa Rodriguez from the high school and I were here in 2014, as a loosely organized task force formed to address the needs of high school students experiencing homelessness in our county."
Since then, the group incorporated as a nonprofit 501.C3, she said.
Rodriguez said 38 Ruidoso students were identified as homeless during the 2015-2016 school year. That figure broke down into 12 students in ninth grade, eight in tenth, five in eleventh and six in twelfth grade, with a few more in the middle school and elementary grades, she said.
"We haven't started school yet this year," she said. "We just started registration and one of the guidance counselors already identified one."
Project treasurer Leon Krantz said the group is looking for a place where homeless students can feel safe and stop "couch surfing at friends' home or sleeping in their cars, or out in the open. These children don't have a home most of us are used to. They don't have a place to wash their clothes or eat regularly. There's only so much Ramen noodles they can eat and stay healthy. A lot are pass that.
"The real key is can we provide some sort of a resource for them here in Lincoln County that allows them dignity and to have a home type atmosphere, even though it is not their parental home. We're looking for recognition among the people in Ruidoso that there is a problem. Speaking from my own experience, I was not aware. An article in the Washington Post not long ago called it a world problem. It's about time we recognize it here and do something about it. That's the whole goal behind the project."
The group is following a two-step plan, he said. The first step is to find a facility that could be open from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m., to give homeless students a place to go and to study with an uplifting atmosphere, and where they can enjoy an evening meal. The next step will be overnight accommodations.
"For the past three months we have been looking for a facility to accomplish this, but there are a whole lot of rules and regulations about what we can and can't do and what have to offer before we can open," Krantz said. "There are some (rules) in the village giving us some real problems. We have to have a commercial use. The problem is trying to find a house that looks like a home and start it within the next couple of months. Before we go into any permanent facility, we will have to have some zoning changes and we'll be back here."
The group formed about two years ago and primarily through word of mouth has raised $20,000, plus enough to hire a grant writer to apply for the larger sums of money needed to operate such facilities, he said.
"We have a bunch of dedicated people who believe these young people are entitled to a safe place to study, live and sleep, and have food, to feel like they are wanted and have value," he said. A stable base would increase their ability to stay in school and graduate and have a beneficial life, Krantz said.
Village Planning Administrator Bradford Dyjak said he's been working with the group for a couple of months and Community Development Director Greg Cory has helped on site selection.
"There are some zoning issues that came up during our conversations and I advised the group to pursue higher density residential and commercial zones," Dyjak said.
In the two lower density residential zones, a group home that provides overnight stays and meals for unrelated family members is not a permitted use, and even the higher density residential zones or commercial zones would require a conditional use approval.
"That could be achieved with suitable property," he said.
In the interim, they identified property within single family residential district that could be used if the operation was more of a daycare situation, Dyjak said. A conditional use could be granted for daycare.
"There are a number of factors to consider if they continue to pursue the other option in single-family residential zones," he said. "There would have to be a zoning amendment to change that, and councilors must consider the potential effects on the surrounding residences."
The zone amendment would have to be written very narrowly, not to open it up to potential unintended uses such as halfway houses and prison or rehabilitation transition homes, he said.
Some opportunities in commercial properties exist that the group could pursue and he will help them continue to explore, Dyjak said.