The Emporia Gazette

May 28, 2012

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Through a string of circumstances, Emporia resident Alice Salazar found herself in a situation she never saw coming — homelessness. After getting back on her feet and back into housing in Emporia, Salazar is striving to help other homeless women by reaching out and telling her story.

Michael Paddy, executive director of the Emporia Rescue Mission, has worked with the homeless for more than a decade in two cities other than Emporia.

“Each case is unique,” he said.

Paddy said he doesn’t like the term “homeless.” To truly help a person, it must be done on several levels.

“Just because you sit there in a home, it doesn’t make them better,” he said. “You meet their physical needs but not their emotional and spiritual needs.”

Salazar found herself on the streets in 2007. She went from living in a home to homelessness to where she is living now, a small apartment, with a few pieces of furniture, a small television (no cable) someone loaned to her, a few dishes and some food.

For six years before losing her home, Salazar said, she had been living with her best friend, Lee Easter, in Emporia.

“He was my best friend,” Salazar said. “We didn’t live together as husband and wife. ... He took care of me.”

Salazar said Lee saw her through a stroke. He saw her through a lot of things. In March, Salazar again fell ill. She was at the Bazaar Cemetery in Chase County visiting graves when she began having severe pains in her stomach. Later, she found out that her stomach had ripped from a stapling surgery she had 27 years earlier. Salazar was taken to the hospital. A week after she got sick, Lee died while she was still in the hospital, recovering from surgery to repair her stomach.

“He just drops dead,” Salazar said, through tears. “I had no idea he was sick. He wasn’t supposed to die. He was only 47. How do you just drop dead? There went my life.”

When it was time for Salazar to leave the hospital, she had nowhere to go. She wasn’t allowed to keep the home she had shared with Lee. She had a choice to go to a nursing home because of her medical condition, but didn’t want to.

“I’m not going to a nursing home,” She said. “I’m 51 years old.”

The next months of Salazar’s life were spent on and off the streets. She lost her car, she said. She lost everything.

“I have lost everything,” she said, as she looked at the small apartment she shares with her cat. “I went from being a homeowner to this.”

Salazar said she had a hard time finding help when she was without a home.

“There is nothing out there,” she said. “I don’t know. I always lived good. This year I just lost everything. All I have left is Lee’s cup and his picture. My life is gone.”

Salazar said the issue of homelessness is widespread in Emporia.

“Emporia doesn’t realize,” she said. “Wake up! Wake up!”

In his work with the Emporia Rescue Mission, Paddy oversees the men’s shelter, located on Merchant Street, and the Abundant Harvest soup kitchen, on Whittier Street.

He said the population that comes for services at the food kitchen is about a third senior citizens, a third women and children and a third either men with the mission or other single men.

There’s a lot of need in Emporia.

“We served 8,500 meals last year,” he said. “There’s a great need.”

Paddy said there are several niches in Emporia to help with various needs, but to his knowledge there are no overnight shelters for women like the Emporia Rescue Mission. He said sometimes there is a place women can stay overnight, temporarily, but not a place like the mission. He said the question is, is simply staying with another person, in a basement or a spare bedroom, adequate?

“It’s sufficient,” he said. “But it’s not what we want.”

Capt. Jeremiah Burris of the Emporia Salvation Army said the organization can provide temporary emergency shelter for people who are in need of housing.

“We can go up to two days in a hotel,” Burris said. “We house them for two days until we can get some more permanent long-term housing.”

Burris said the Salvation Army helps people in many situations such as disasters, domestic violence and general homelessness.

“Sometimes we have to refer them outside or we can transport them to another shelter,” Burris said. “Depending on the case, if they have the means of maintaining (rent), we do the first month’s rent. That’s not all the time.”

Burris said the organization has to be careful with how it spends its money.

“You want to be wise with the money to make sure we put it in the right place,” he said.

Salazar said she is going to start helping people by reaching out.

“I’ve already called people who are willing to help,” she said. “I’m going to push for this.”

F In Tuesday’s Gazette, read about Plumb Place, a home for women in Emporia.