Addressing homelessness in Newport County, Rhode Island, and the Nation: Guest View
Beyond Newport's mansions and stunning coast, communities of people struggle each day to find affordable childcare, housing and to put food on the table.
At the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center, we proudly serve and empower Newport County residents by alleviating these struggles as best we can. Homelessness is a growing concern. Together with Newport Mental Health and CODAC Behavioral Healthcare, we are in our second year of hosting our Overnight Warming Center, for those who do not have a bed at the McKinney Shelter or another place to sleep. During the winter months, we open our doors to people in need from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., seven days a week. Our local partners are essential to making this program viable while we continue to offer 25 programs in education, hunger relief and a wide variety of community programs.
For most of December, we dedicate our community room, where the Warming Center is facilitated, to Santa's Workshop providing toys to over 1,300 kids in need. Despite falling temperatures, we are unable to host the Warming Center until after the holidays. Thankfully, Fr. Kevin Beesley and St. John's Parish opened their doors to those in need of a warm place to sleep until we opened on Dec. 28. We are very grateful to St. John's for stepping up andaddressing this critical community need.
The Warming Center is expensive and intricate to run, requiring highly trained professionals working overnight, prepared to deal with any emergencies or complications. These positions are staffed by our partners at CODAC and Newport Mental Health's Rhode Island Outreach team. Thanks to support from the Newport Police and Fire Departments, we have safely handled any issues. Because our Breakfast Program begins weekdays at 7:30 a.m., we must clean the space for each morning's program transition in just 30 minutes. It's a tight squeeze, but wemake it happen.
According to the Rhode Island Coalition to End Homelessness, last year Rhode Island's unhoused population surged. Numbers rose 35% from 1,810 in 2023 to 2,442 in 2024. While it is difficult to gather data around homelessness, unhoused people are increasingly visible in our community.
Our partners at Newport Mental Health reported five people who sought their services for affordable housing in 2023. In 2024 that number grew to 40 people. At the MLK, the level of need has grown steadily since the pandemic. Our Breakfast Program averaged 20 to 25 participants daily prior to the COVID-19 crisis; it has more than doubled with 75 to 80 people now in need of a morning meal. Most of the people in our Breakfast Program are unhoused, and the growth we have seen over the past few years is indicative of the status of housing in our community.
Our Warming Center is not a shelter. During January's first cold snap, the Governor's Office erroneously listed us as a 24/7 Warming Shelter open statewide. While we know there is need for this assistance, our Center isn't equipped to provide such aid along with 25 other programs. Those using the Warming Center sleep on mats on the floor with a blanket. We only have room and staffing for 25 people. We are at or close to capacity each night. To date, 73 individuals have used the Center.
With less than 4% of our funding coming from federal, state or municipal support, sustaining programs is a challenge. We want to help everyone, but we simply don't have the resources to accommodate those in need beyond Newport County while continuing to offer our other programs.
We must bring light to the irony that tourists come from far and wide to see the extravagance of a city where many residents struggle daily to house and feed themselves. Homelessness is a complicated, ever-pressing issue in Newport County, the state of Rhode Island, and the nation.
Warming Centers like ours only provide temporary relief for a much bigger problem. What can we do as a community, as a state, and as a nation to not only provide relief, but to provide an avenue for the homeless to find affordable housing, health care and potential careers? As the number of unhoused populations rises, relief will no longer be enough.
This is not just a problem for Housing Hotline or any nonprofit working to help the unhoused. This is not just a problem for CODAC, Newport Mental Health, or the MLK Community Center. This is an issue for our entire community. We have a crisis to solve.
Heather Hole Strout is the executive director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center.
This article originally appeared on Newport Daily News: Addressing homelessness in Newport County, RI, and beyond: Guest View
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