Homelessness

Will St. Louis Be the First City to End Chronic Homelessness? Officials Unveil Housing Plan

Mayor Francis Slay and the city's Department of Human Services have a long-term plan to abolish chronic homelessness in the city -- unveiled this week, just days before the primary election. Officials say they have been working on "The Beginning of the End: Abolishing Chronic Homelessness," (conve ... More >>

Rethinking Homelessness

Good Samaritan Gets Robbed by Homeless Guy, Refuses To Think Homeless People Are Awful

Robbery victim (and Good Samaritan) Erv Yoder was raised in an Amish community in Pennsylvania. He no longer lives Amish, but still believes that God wants him to help poor people. That's why Yoder decided to help out an injured homeless man he met on Saturday at a Wentzville laundromat. Man, big mi ... More >>

Rev. Larry Rice Considering Lawsuit as City Shuts Street Outside New Life Evangelistic Center

The battle between the city of St. Louis and New Life Evangelistic Center head Rev. Larry Rice wages on. The latest clash began last night as the city enacts "special enforcement" on a section of Locust Street west of 14th Street, right outside the NLEC. The sidewalk is often lined in the wee hour ... More >>

Rev. Larry Rice's Integrity Village Goes Up in North County, Comes Down Same Day

After attempting to open a tent city for the homeless in St. Louis City only to have it condemned and shut down immediately, Reverend Larry Rice followed through on his promise to rebuild his homeless tent community in the County. On Saturday morning, Rice and volunteers from the New Life Evangelist ... More >>

Death Toll from Heat Wave Now at 18

Four more deaths in the region were confirmed to be heat-related on Wednesday, bringing the region's total up to 18. Last year's final count was 19, but this summer isn't over yet. In fact, the National Weather Service forecast for the next week shows the temperature rising on Monday and Tuesday, wi ... More >>

Rev. Larry Rice Opens "Day Center" for Homeless at Galleria on Thursday

Reverend Larry Rice is poised to pull off another high-profile attempt to house St. Louis's homeless -- in the Galleria mall in Richmond Heights. Starting Thursday afternoon, the ritzy shopping center is becoming, in Rice's words, a "day center." "We're going to get lunch for them, have a few ... More >>

Larry Rice Hints that He's Considering a County Location for Next Tent City

Reverend Larry Rice revealed his suit against St. Louis City today for allegedly failing to follow its own procedures for issuing a condemnation notice, and for violating his First Amendment rights. Rice believes that the city impeded his religious rights on the grounds that he was conducting worshi ... More >>

Rev. Larry Rice Intends to Sue the City Over Integrity Village Condemnation

The New Life Evangelistic Center has sent out a press release announcing that Reverend Larry Rice will file a federal lawsuit against both the City of St. Louis and St. Louis Public Safety Director Eddie Roth for shutting down his tent city, Integrity Village.

Tent City Revival: Rev. Larry Rice's Next Integrity Village Is A Secret

The Rev. Larry Rice will not quit on St. Louis' homeless population; the entirety of his public life is proof of that. So the recent city-ordered dismantling of Integrity Village, his tent city just off I-44, was certainly not the end of Rice's efforts to establish a public and free-standing communi ... More >>

Cuevas Cost: Sentenced for Homeless Counterfeit Check Scheme

​Cuevas Cost, the ringleader of a counterfeit check ring that used homeless people to pass the fraudulent checks, was sentenced to 51 months in prison today.Police from St. Louis, St. Charles County and St. Louis County notified postal inspectors and the Secret Service in 2010 of homeless people c ... More >>

Whats Up Is Down But Not Out -- Yet

Jay Swoboda, founder and prime mover for Whats Up St. Louis.​Jay Swoboda became a social activist on a whim. The economics major spotted a woman on Washington University's campus who was "really cute." Swoboda wanted to get to know her so he decided to volunteer alongside her at STONE Soup, a stud ... More >>

P-D Readers Don't Think Homeless People Deserve Books for Christmas

​It started off innocently enough. The St. Louis Independent Bookstore Alliance had a meeting to discuss holiday plans. It came up with Hope for the Holidays, a book drive sort of like the one Left Bank Books had held last year: In addition to their other purchases, customers could buy a book ... More >>

Homeless Outreach Team Gears Up for Winter, Seeks Volunteers

​With winter on its way and expected to be nasty this year, the Community Service Office at Washington University held an open meeting this week to discuss the need for volunteers for this year's Winter Outreach (WO) team. The WO finds homeless people in St. Louis and offers them a ride to one ... More >>

Lost Boys: New research demolishes the stereotype of the underage sex worker — and sparks an outbreak of denial among child-sex-trafficking alarmists nationwide

Police Not a Problem for OccupySTL; The Homeless on the Other Hand...

Albert Samaha​There is madness in Oakland, Chicago, Phoenix, Denver, Atlanta, New York. Flash-and-bang gas canisters... protesters flushed from public squares... mass arrests. But not here. At first, a cynic might think, "Of course! The last thing this city needs is a stone-throwing-police-wi ... More >>

City Wants Hopeville Gone By December 1

The mayor's office says it wants to save Hopeville residents from the elements.​St. Louis officials today announced that they're pushing ahead with plans hinted at earlier this year to dismantle the homeless camps north of downtown St. Louis. In January the city issued regulations for those living ... More >>

Catholic Charity for the Homeless Turns Down Money from Hooters

St. Patrick doesn't want your money, ladies.​Apparently, money raised by women in tight, tiny outfits isn't needed to help St. Louis' homeless population. Yesterday, the St. Patrick Center booted Hooters off its roster of sixteen restaurants participating in a fundraiser scheduled for tomorrow nig ... More >>

Outside, The City

The Inevitable Lawsuit Befalls the Food Truck Porno

Flying Pink Pig star Ron Jeremy (right) later donated his mustache to the homeless man pictured here.​Gut Check's exhaustive coverage of The Flying Pink Pig, the porno shot on location in an actual food truck, continues -- though absolutely NOT because we want the producers to send us a free scree ... More >>

Dennis Iagulli: Sexual Assault Added to Torturing and Dismembering of Homeless Man

Image ViaEe-gads: Iagulli​It wasn't enough that they allegedly tortured and dismembered a fellow homeless man and set his body on fire. Now one of the two men accused of the brutal slaying of 22-year-old Zachary Irvin this past June in an abandoned building in East St. Louis is also charged with s ... More >>

Homeless Men Created Human Slaughterhouse in East St. Louis

​Remember that gruesome scene from Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs -- the one where a victim is bound to a chair, tortured, cut up, and doused with gasoline in an abandoned warehouse? Well, that scene carried out in real life last month in East St. Louis, according to new details revealed i ... More >>

St. Louis Homeless Recieve $1.5 million

​The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development awarded $1.5 million today to St. Louis not-for-profits that aid the homeless. Catholic Family Services for Fathers Plus will receive more than $1 million of the grant to be used for funding 29 permanent housing units for single men with mental ... More >>

City Officials Blame Rev. Larry Rice for "Hopeville" Homeless Camp, Detail Eviction Procedures

Just received an e-mail from Mayor Slay spokeswoman Kara Bowlin detailing the city's plan to evict dozens of homeless people from a makeshift encampment under Tucker Boulevard to make way for a $34 million construction project.Aimee Levitt posted about the Hopeville conflict yesterday on Daily RFT, ... More >>

City Hands Eviction Notices to Homeless People Living Beneath Tucker Boulevard

In anticipation of street construction downtown scheduled to start next week, the city served eviction notices this morning to the homeless people of "Hopeville," a tent city in an abandoned railway tunnel beneath Tucker Boulevard. Image SourceAs seen on Stltoday.com, this image depicts "Hopeville, ... More >>

Committee of Homeless People Meet to Air Grievances to City Officials (But Few Show Up)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mager/ / CC BY-SA 2.0​It was supposed to be an exchange between city officials and downtown's homeless. By 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, about 50 people had filled up room 306 of the St. Louis Public Library's central branch. But for a pair of cops and a few service provider ... More >>

¡Ask A Mexican!: A Room of One's Own: Where are all the homeless Mexicans?

Gimme a brake: Readers talk red-light cameras and Larry Rice

Another Homeless Rally Planned Without the Participation of Larry Rice

  A group of homeless St. Louis residents and advocates plan to march on City Hall and the social service agency St. Patrick Center this morning. Not expected to take part in the protest is the Rev. Larry Rice, director of the downtown homeless shelter New Life Evangelistic Center and a frequen ... More >>

Love the War, Neglect the Warrior: His fame's based on his POW status, but Senator John McCain's made a point of voting against fellow veterans

RFT readers prove that it's never the off-season in Cardinal Nation

Violent Attack at Homeless Shelter Has Critics on the Offensive

Efforts Continue to Clean Debris - and Homeless - from Lucas Park

RFT readers sound off on the rift between Lucas Park loft-dwellers and Rev. Larry Rice's homeless shelter

Fried Rice: Lucas Park residents are fed up with the Rev. Larry Rice and the homeless shelter he runs

St. Louis' Homeless Soccer Team Nets Trophy

Gimme Shelter

Beat Happenings

Music news you can use

The Heat Is On

St. Louis cops are on the prowl for a ring of air-conditioner thieves.

Letters Column

Week of May 24, 2006

Running on Empty

Truck firms are so desperate for drivers that just about anybody can get behind the wheel

Think Piece

Sleeping Under the Arch

More than just a film festival

Letters

Week of March 10, 2004

Homeless Holy Wars

The defiant Reverend Larry Rice infuriates big developers and city leaders over a proposed shelter in a downtown federal building

Murder in the Cathedral

Carol Bledsoe's alleged killer had a long criminal record and deep psychological problems. Church volunteers didn't know how big a threat he posed.

Steamrollin' Swoboda

Week of February 20, 2002

Hard to Heal

Fred Rottnek, doctor to the downtrodden, tried his luck playing the boardroom politics of one of the city's most prestigious charities, Grace Hill. He lost. So did the homeless of St. Louis.

Teenage Wasteland

They have run away from home or been kicked out, and there are about 5,500 of them in the St. Louis area. They're homeless teens -- too old for foster care, too young to live on their own.