For unhoused Nashvillians, the price of getting help is a ‘time tax on the poor’

This story first aired on our daily show, This Is Nashville. Listen to the entire episode on housing for the unhoused, here.

It’s an early morning in December. Over a breakfast of tater tots and soda, Tammy and her adult son Ray – whose last names we’re withholding for safety concerns – are shuffling through what feels like a mountain of paperwork. It’s the first step in  a really long process towards Section 8 housing.

Services for low-income Nashvillians are decentralized, and it often takes a lot of work to get just a little bit of help. Some advocates refer to this as a “time tax on the poor,” meaning a person seeking help will have to spend  a lot of time visiting multiple government and nonprofit offices just to get a little bit of  assistance on food, utilities, housing, transportation, health care coverage and financial aid. 

Navigating Nashville without a place to call ‘home’

Tammy and Ray have been living outdoors together for about five years. 

“After I lost my husband, I kind of hung on there for a while and then I had two jobs to survive,” Tammy says. “Then I lost those and I had no choice. I didn’t wanna have foreclosure or nothing on me. So I sold my home and we’ve just been downhill trying to survive.”

Tasha A.F. Lemley

Outreach worker India Pungarcher helps Tammy and Ray apply for Section 8 housing. Since December, Tammy and Ray have found temporary housing.

India Pungarcher is an outreach worker with Open Table Nashville helping Tammy and Ray get started. Since she has all of their identification and information, she’s able to work on more than one thing at a time. And she dives right in. First up is a year-long bus pass for each of them. This short application goes fast, but after they get the pass, most of the work will remain on Pungarcher. 

Frankly, she says, she’s annoyed. 

“We’re supposed to keep track of, weekly, where people are going and what they’re using this for … to find housing, to go to a doctor’s appointment, and things like that. And that’s just so burdensome on the caseworker’s end,” she says. “People are using a bus pass to survive, to go to the grocery store, to do all these things just to get around. We shouldn’t have to prove and document everything.”

Beginning the long haul to housing

Pungarcher starts on what’s called a VI-SPDAT for Tammy and Ray, or Vulnerability Index — Service Prioritization Decision Assistance Tool. It’s a long name for a long and intimate questionnaire meant to identify risk and help to prioritize housing assistance.

First she calculates their income, vouches for their living status, and collects original documents like birth certificates. Tammy says it makes her nervous to get rid of original documents. Pungarcher assures her she will “quite literally” guard the papers with her life.

The first VI-SPDAT category they work through is about where Tammy and Ray stay at night and how long they’ve been unhoused.

The next category is about risks. Questions fly fast: health issues, trips to the ER, interactions with local police, domestic violence, incarceration and assaults.

“Does anybody force you or trick you to do things that you do not want to do?” Pungarcher asks.

It’s a lot. And then an abrupt shift to, “Ok, do you have planned activities, other than just surviving, that make you feel happy or fulfilled?”

There’s a long pause. 

“Well, there’s nothing happy out there,” Tammy says. “It’s just a struggle trying to get from day to day to have money to eat or something to drink. Or those things. It’s just a struggle every day.”

“You know, it’s day by day for me,” Ray says. “To eat, to get to the next day and wake up, be warm and repeat the next day, I mean…” 

Pungarcher marks a “no” for each of them.

The more vulnerable someone is, the faster they might be placed in housing, Puncharger explains. Though faster may not be very fast. 

“I will say this is just to get on a list to be considered for Section 8,” Pungarcher says. “Then once your name comes up, you have to submit an application for the Section 8 program. So that is a huge long packet that asks for even more details and proof of all of these details.” 

She keeps going on, and on. Basically, after this, the packet is submitted to MDHA, the Metropolitan Development and Housing Agency. If it’s approved, there’s a briefing they’d have to attend to get their voucher. After that they’d have 90 days to find an apartment. And to find an apartment, they’d have to submit applications to each complex. 

Pungarcher ends with, “so this is just to get on the list to be considered for the voucher.”

Tammy and Ray kind of stare at Pungarcher. They gloss over. And then Ray visibly sinks into the booth. His shoulders are slumped.

“Just hearing you say that just, like, took hope out of me,” he says. “I mean, yeah, like I’m still gonna be out here a while.” 

So, that’s it for this December morning. Pungarcher submits this round of paperwork and, for now, Tammy and Ray will head back to their campsite. As we’re leaving,  there’s harmonica coming in over the restaurant speakers. It’s Blues Traveler — Run-Around. I can’t help but think it’s just a little wink to their situation. 

Some hope, for now

The good news is that just two months after Tammy and Ray met with Pungarcher at Hardee’s, they were approved for Rapid Rehousing and moved into a temporary unit. They’ll stay there for up to a year while they continue to work on permanent housing. Two months may not sound very long, but it was two months in the cold, wet, snow and storms of this winter. And two more months after five years living outdoors.

I visited Tammy on her first night in the new place. It looks like a small hotel room. There’s a double bed that takes up more than a third of the width of the room. And they’re looking to add a twin bed so neither has to sleep on the floor. There are trash bags everywhere filled with all of their belongings. They haven’t unpacked yet. It smells good – like detergent – and there’s a sense of hope.

“We’re moving forward,” Tammy says. “I’m not going backwards. I know God’s on my side now, and he’s answering my prayers and I am here. I’m going to keep moving forward.”

Tasha Lemley is a multimedia producer for WPLN’s daily show, This Is Nashville. Email her at [email protected].