Faith, nonprofit leaders call for 'unity' to serve unhoused Las Crucens

LAS CRUCES - People from community organizations called for "unity," increased collaboration and more affordable housing as ways to better serve the city's housing insecure and unhoused populations.

The comments were made during a panel discussion at "Faith for the Unhoused," the second meeting of its kind. Local faith and nonprofit leaders met at City Hall Thursday to discuss their efforts assisting the homeless as well as how to improve services. The meeting was hosted by District 4 City Councilor Johana Bencomo. Mayor Pro Tempore Kasandra Gandara was supposed to attend, but ended up being unable to.

Faith, community and nonprofit organizations are "all on the frontlines," Bencomo said. "They're all doing the work on the ground, when we're talking about folks experiencing homelessness."

City Manager Ifo Pili spoke about the upcoming launch of Lift Up Las Cruces, the city's new program to combat poverty through a combination of community collaboration and infrastructure investment.

The discussion began with some technical training about software that could help improve the local referral system between religious congregations, nonprofit organizations and social service providers in town. Then, representatives from various organizations which assist the unhoused spoke on a panel about their services.

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Representatives from the Mesilla Valley Community of Hope, a nonprofit which assists the homeless and housing insecure populations, said the need for affordable rental units cannot be overstated. Erin Boyd, housing programs manager with MVCH, said she knows of clients who have received rental assistance vouchers but can't find rental units on which to use them.

Boyd also said fixed incomes like Social Security are quickly being diminished by rising cost of rent.

"Our biggest challenge that we're fighting with is that with the increase in market rates, and different things like that, and the economy changing … we just can't keep up with it," Boyd said.

"It's just not sustainable for individuals in our community right now," Boyd continued. "So we really need to push for more affordable housing."

The city council has tentatively set $5 million in affordable housing initiatives as one of the projects they'll ask voters to fund in this fall's general obligation bond election.

"In the first meeting, we brought out the need for unity," said Henry Young, executive director of the Gospel Rescue Mission. "None of us can do it by ourselves alone … Unless we all work together, we're not going to see a lot of progress."

Lorenzo Alba, the executive director of food pantry Casa de Peregrinos, said he also sees an imminent need for more affordable housing. But he said the increased concern around homelessness and poverty is not confined to Las Cruces.

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"It's not just here. It's happening everywhere," Alba said. "Phoenix is just terrible. It's unbelievable what's going on over there. But we don't hear about it, right? We don't hear about it. Now, it's coming alive and well here, right? We're seeing it. It's in the media. People are talking about it. You know, we needed that. We all needed that."

"We needed to really paint the real picture of what's happening in our own community," Alba continued. "So we could all get on our horse and start moving forward with it."

Alba said it's important not to "take religion out of it" as the community works toward reducing poverty. He said religious congregations were the genesis of some of today's nonprofits.

Michael McDevitt is a city and county government reporter for the Sun-News. He can be reached at 575-202-3205, mmcdevitt@lcsun-news.com or @MikeMcDTweets on Twitter.