HomeMy WebLinkAbout012725 Weather_ hypothermia_ homelessALERT: BE CAUTIOUS This email originated outside the organization. Do not open attachments or click on links if you are not expecting them.
I am late today because I was helping homeless residents get warm clothes and hygiene supplies. Last night I found the sign of someone asking for 25 dollars to get their propane tank
refilled. People are not coping well, not drinking enough fluids or dressing properly to stay warm ironically because they don't have the heating supplies like propane hot hands candles
to stay warm enough to want to hydrate and clothes themselves. When a person's temperature drops with the temperature in the environment even if they have water or liquid they won't
drink it because it's going to make them feel colder than they already do. So their body temperature drops lower because they don't have enough warm blood to spare from the body core.
Add to this the psychological bullying from law enforcement that sweeps will happen any day, and people are pretty freaked out, not coping, depending on who they are they start crying,
or they start threatening people, or they decompensate wandering around with no blankets hats and may lay down anywhere because they are too exhausted to stay warm. There will be homeless
in their cars whose batteries will die either because they are draining it to stay warm or it just dies because it is cold. Jefferson County, the city have not done anything for homeless
as the temperature drops to make sure they have the proper heating supplies to get through the cold which they knew before hand would be colder than average this year, they said their
offices didn't have time to apply for grants to overnight people outside or money for propane hot hands candles etc. folks out at the Evans Vista camp are asking for a bulk order of
Ozark rechargeable hand warmers, propane, we have a woman in our camp with stage 3 cancer, there are three men 2 in cars, 1 now in shelter, but he was in a tent, who have all had open
heart surgery. And the list continues with folks living with mental or physical disability which makes living outside even more impossible, meanwhile there are at least 6 subsidized
units that have been empty for three months. It's time to stop the cherry picking, the consumer fraud, the negligence and the indifference.