VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Youth Homelessness is a problem in the Resort City.
During the Virginia Beach city council meeting, Mayor Bobby Dyer issued a proclamation for National Youth Homeless Awareness Month.
Two organizations, Stand Up for Kids and Connect with a Wish, work to raise awareness for the issue in Virginia Beach.
“Stand Up for Kids Helps homeless and disconnected youth ages 12 to 24 by means of a drop-in center, pay for grades program, an emergency shelter, storage units, food and friendship,” said Nicole Pixler, Stand up for Kids executive director.
Pixler will share a speech before council following the proclamation, pushed for by City Councilmembers Robert W. “Worth” Remick and Michael Berlucchi.
“There are teens in crisis in our backyards,” Pixler said. “It’s a real problem here. It’s an uncomfortable problem. No one wants to talk about it but with uncomfortability brings change. We need change now more than ever.”
In 2007, November was declared National Homeless Youth Awareness Month.
“There’s a huge need. Homelessness in youth is greater than I’ve ever seen before,” Pixler said. “Unfortunately, we have kids that are coming out of jail. We have kids that are aging out of foster care. We have kids that are being put out for how they identify with their sexual orientation, you name it. The need is great. I’ve never seen a need bigger since coming off of COVID.”
“In 2023, we served over 3,500 youth. Those are non-duplicated numbers. Those are disconnected youth, which are kids that live in the hotels [with one or both adults or a guardian]. They could be disconnected in a hotel. They could be on the street homeless youth. They could be kids that just need a meal and some homework help.”
She added: “Youth homelessness is different than adult homelessness. If you’re a youth and you are couch hopping, you don’t have a stable place to stay. That’s considered being homeless, both homeless and disconnected youth. In 2023, we had over 50 youth in and out of our emergency shelter, which is only ages 18 to 24.”
Connect with a Wish founder Joy Rios joined Pixler on the council floor to discuss the homeless youth exiting foster care.
“With our population of the kids are in foster care, if they hit the streets … they are scooped up quickly by either traffickers, drugs, gangs. They’re so vulnerable to that,” Rios said. “That time between being homeless and someone picking them up is brief. We need to not let them hit the streets ever, which is why we spend a lot of money on hotels. … There’s a big gap between when they turn 21 or when we find out they’re homeless to actually permanent housing.”
Rios calls the fostering youth initiative voucher “a gift” created for youth aging out of foster care.
“It’s an arm of Section 8 through U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development,” Rios said. “For the population of foster care kids, once they age out, 40% of them are homeless. … It’s a big problem. This is a gift. However, it’s a gift that came with a lot of hurdles. It’s not easy to do. It required a case manager.”
“Virginia Beach applied for these vouchers several years back. They kicked it off. It’s really a lot to manage because the kids are ageing out at 21 and yet they need a case manager past 21. Their social workers only work with them until they’re 21. The voucher is 36 months. To receive the vouchers, it is required that they have case management during those 36 months.”
Through the voucher, the organization has been able to house more than a dozen young adults.
“We’ve been able to house 18 kids in the past year and a half with the help of the Department of Human Services, the fostering future social workers and the housing department here in Virginia Beach… We work together,” said Rios.
Other issues include the affordable housing crisis.
“The homelessness is the issue, and the affordable housing locally here is our biggest issue.
Connect with a Wish hopes to build a 19 unit apartment complex to prevent foster children from becoming homeless.
“Connect with a Wish is working on the Take2Community, which would house these kids instead of us searching all over Virginia Beach to try to find somebody to accept the voucher,” Rios said, “and then hope that they receive wraparound services that we provide in the case management, we could do it all under one roof.”
Now, the staff is working to find a location for the complex large enough for studios and two bedrooms.
“Take2 would resolve many of our issues,” Rios said.
To learn more about Connect with a Wish visit connectwithawish.org and Stand Up for Kids, visit standupforkids.org/hampton-roads.