The Purpose of This Study
The name was inspired by Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. This study has two purposes: First, to explore the perceptions of poverty in the United States and examine the different characteristics of poverty. Second, this study will also study the correlation between gentrification and extreme poverty in the Greater Miami area. This paper prioritizes the awareness of the unseen sides of Miami through my experience participating in food distributions with STEP. All of the observations that have been recorded in this paper are from a small scale and only introduce elementary elements of what extreme poverty is like through a volunteering lens.
STEPs To An Equitable Miami
Students Together Ending Poverty (STEP) is a Miami-based student organization solely focused on spreading awareness on homelessness and other related issues in the Miami-Dade area.
According the organization's mission statement, "Students Together Ending Poverty promotes education and awareness of poverty issues on campus and throughout the community. Members work together to make a difference through thoughtful action and meaningful service to initiate positive change."
STEP’s main demographic is the Miami-Dade community, but specifically, individuals/families that are living in low-income communities and/or compromised by socioeconomic dilemmas. The organization has a variety of initiatives for different groups of people, but mainly for the homeless community surrounding the UM community.
Why Did I Choose This Organization?
I’ve been doing volunteer work for as long as I can remember. I’ve participated in hurricane rescue drives for our Bahamanian neighbors, food drives, beautification projects, and so much more. My love for volunteerism stems from the fact that I came from a community of primarily Caribbean and Hispanics which highly values solidarity for each other. Community service is often promoted in my community and when people have the time to volunteer, there is an atmosphere of support and welfare. Not only are we improving the lives of our community, but we have become more like one, big and authentic melting pot.
After reading The Future of Service-Learning and Community Engagement: Asset-Based Approaches and Student Learning in First-Year Courses, I wanted to chose an organization where I have a direct impact on the individuals I'm serving no matter how small, which is what attracted me to STEP. I wanted to learn more about my new home and the social issues that the community faced, which is extreme poverty and homelessness. I was quite hesitant at first given that COVID-19 changed everything, I didn't know what to expect and neither did the organization. Still, I've wanted to be an active member and help serve underrepresented members of the community as I can. Not for the sake of feeling good or hours, but actually focus on slowly improving the well being of individuals, whose livelihoods were stripped from them by the burdens of poverty, one baby step at a time.
Let's Address... What REALLY Is Poverty?
When one thinks of poverty, an image of a soiled-faced elderly man wearing grimy rags sitting on the sidewalk of the Ritz-Cartlon hotel with a cardboard sign saying "HOMELESS" would come to fruition. After all, you're not wrong—but also not correct.
According to the United Nations, "poverty entails more than the lack of income and productive resources to ensure sustainable livelihoods." Apart from having limited material possessions, factors such as malnutrition, lack of access to high-quality education, and other components that warrants a comfortable lifestyle, are also used to measure poverty levels. When you put it into perspective, there is no definitive meaning of poverty. Not everyone has the same needs, but what truly matters at the end of the day is that everyone deserves to live a safe and happy lifestyle.
Types of Poverty
In an advanced society like the United States of America, poverty—across all fifty states—has been a steady issue since the Great Depression. Even though there are different interventions to help curb poverty levels, it is apparent over time that this topic has manifested itself (or at least, people began to realize) into a systemic matter. Poverty can no longer be described as a state of being poor, instead, it is a system containing different socioeconomic factors—such as wealth inequality, gentrification, etc—that consistently keep certain groups of people from obtaining/maintaining social mobility for a course of generations. Concentrated Poverty is best defined as an accumulation of poverty within a specific neighborhood or among a specific group of people in that neighborhood (Iceland and Hernandez 1).
Individuals and families can fall into poverty for many reasons—in some cases, poverty may be a generational cycle. The Habitat for Humanity of Broward classifies two types of poverty: Absolute and Relative Poverty.
Absolute poverty measures the amount of money needed to satisfy one's basic needs: food, water, shelter, health care, etc. This kind of poverty is often confused with extreme poverty, which would be the complete inaccessibility to meet basic needs. The organization apprised that absolute poverty is not the finest way to measure socioeconomic inequality and disparities in society since individuals, families, even communities, all have different "social and cultural needs".
Relative poverty is the condition "in which people are deprived of the minimum amount of income needed in order to maintain the average standard of living in the society they live in." In other words, these individuals have money, but not enough to suffice society's standards. This type of poverty is used to compare the socioeconomic status/social standings between members of society. For example, this concept is perfect to examine the effects of gentrification, which is rampant in South Florida, especially in Miami-Dade County.
Gentrification: Where The Money Is and Where People Are Kicked Out
The modern term of gentrification originated from London during the 1960s when the city underwent an economic boom, when German-British urban planner, Ruth Glass, described the sociocultural shift in low-class neighborhoods as upper-class Londoners moved in, “One by one, many of the working-class quarters of London have been invaded by the middle-class...until all or most of the working-class occupiers are displaced and the whole social character of the district is changed.” (KQED 3).
In the United States, gentrification and displacement of long-time residents are most intense in the nation’s biggest cities—much like the East Coast, especially New York—and rare in most other places like the Midwest (Wiltse-Ahmad 3).
Miami is no exception from gentrification. With the reputation and financial bliss for wealthy individuals the area possesses, the process is inevitable. Gentrification is changing the Miami metro more rapidly than in most other U.S. Regions, according to a recent study by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition (Lopez 1). The Greater Miami area has the fourth-highest “intensity” of gentrification in the U.S. between 2013-2017, the report found (1). Most of the gentrification occurs in Miami-Dade County, where neighborhoods such as Wynwood and Coconut Grove are currently undergoing a socioeconomic renovation. Households in Miami-Dade have a median annual income of $41,818, which is less than the median annual income of $61,937 across the entire United States (Data USA 46). Residents who once could afford to live in these neighborhoods have been pushed out, forced to move further from jobs and community to find housing they can afford as Miami costs have skyrocketed (Lopez). Other areas like Edgewater, and increasingly Little Haiti and Little Havana are losing their distinct cultural, neighbor character and are now home to high-end stores, restaurants, and art galleries catering to both national and international affluent residents (Gutierrez 3).
Raining on My Parade: How COVID-19 Amplifies Extreme Poverty
When coronavirus diffused throughout the United States in the first quarter of 2020, the entire nation went into widespread hysteria, quite similar to the Red Scare in the early twentieth century. As it became clear that the coronavirus was a national emergency, most businesses shut down as stay-at-home orders were put in place (Amadeo 1). Because of this, many people—especially those who work in the service industry—have lost their jobs. Homestead and Florida City are among the poorest in the state of Florida and are heavily impacted by the pandemic (Brasileiro et. al, 7). With many of its residents working in the service and agricultural industries (7), the severity of the pandemic stripped them of their livelihoods. Food, rent, utilities, and housing have become the greatest needs amongst residents all over Miami-Dade County (11).
Economic insecurity has always been a problem in Miami-Dade (12) which can eventually lead to homelessness. There are around 3,245 homeless individuals across Miami-Dade and the numbers have been shrinking over the course of two decades (Bojnansky 1). Tent encampments are a common sight underneath highways in places like Overtown and Downtown (1). As of late, the City of Miami has created a plan to crack down on tent encampments by “sweeping” them off the streets (2). The plan also called for the installation of cameras at 10 sites where homeless people are known to congregate, including four in downtown Miami, four in Overtown, a spot in Little Havana, and one near Jose Marti Park (2). The city document states that cameras are being installed to “deter and detect illegal dumping around homeless encampments” to record drug use and drug sales and to “identify unpermitted feeders.” (2). Different community organizations have criticized the City of Miami for criminalizing the homeless community instead of finding ways to provide affordable housing. Nonetheless, the City of Miami continues to sweep in hopes of removing the visibility of tent cities that are common in Overtown (7). As of January 2020, the latest demographic survey by the Miami-Dade County Homeless Trust, nearly 57% of Miami-Dade County’s homeless population was Black (10).
Working With STEP: Food Distributions
The only in-person event that STEP was able to run throughout the spring semester was the weekly Food Ministry Drive. As it all began with one student giving meals to the homeless community surrounding the University, STEP members partnered with the residential dining halls to hand out hot, leftover takeout meals to economically insecure individuals around Miami every Friday and Saturday night. Although the concept of food distributions represents what STEP wants to achieve—which is the serve socioeconomically disadvantaged members of our community—a lot of risk goes into these kinds of operations.
The Set Up | Participants
Most of my research was done through observational study during an event simply called the food distribution. Every Monday, the volunteer coordinator sends STEP members an email encouraging them to participate in the weekly food distribution that is held every Friday and Saturday night from 8 pm to around 9:30 pm. Students can pick either Friday, Saturday, or both even though the last option is not mandatory. Those who are interested must fill out the Google Form as well as a virtual permission slip before Friday to join. Because of COVID-19, only a limited number of people can participate (also including E-board members). Although there are over a hundred members in STEP, not everyone is willing to volunteer given that it was the weekend and time is something that is highly emphasized and valued by the E-board members. The E-board members make it known that if you don’t show up, then you cannot attend other distributions. Once again, anyone can be a participant as long as you are in the club. Based on personal observations and conversations with some of the STEP members, the people who usually attend these weekly events are recurring members, students who have English 106, and students who are required to complete volunteer hours for disclosed reasons.
The Meals
Fridays and Saturdays are also the days where the dining halls typically do late-night dining (instead of regularly closing at 8 pm, the halls closes at 10:45 pm), in which an E-board member would wait for the dining employees to give them hot, leftover food in takeout containers. There are three kinds of meals: vegan (without any dairy sides like Mac and Cheese but instead with vegetables; without meat), vegetarian (can come with dairy sides), and regular meals with chicken or another other meat as the main dish. Having different varieties of meals can help us ensure that the people have options to choose from. The food originates from one of the two residential dining halls such as Hecht-Stanford and Mahoney-Pearson. Hecht-Stanford tends to give more meals than Mahoney-Pearson. Occasionally, one of the E-Board members would receive a bag full of bottled water (specifically Dasani, which is a common brand around campus, and among the most disliked water brands) from the dining halls, however, for unspecified reasons, the dining halls are wary about giving out water. Plastic Utensils are the latest additions, usually matching the number of meals.
When it comes to security, the E-board members advised us to tell the individuals that the meals came from an anonymous donor instead of the UM Dining Halls. Because of this rule, participants are barred from wearing any UM-affiliated clothing. This measure was to ensure that no one from the outside comes onto the university’s campus, begging for food. As disdainful as it sounds, from their perspective, it made sense. After all, we are in the middle of a Pandemic that has caused so much mental and emotional strain on a lot of people. We are already risking our safety bringing hot meals to them and giving off our location would bring a bigger risk for an entire community.
Location(s)
There are two common locations where the food distribution happens: Dadeland South and the “Civic” Center. These locations were chosen based on the concentration of homeless people around the UM area. Dadeland South is the area closest to the University of Miami and is easily accessible by the Miami Metrorail. However, the problem with using the Metrorail is the waiting time (which is approximately 10-20 minutes, depending on which train you’re riding) and sometimes the trains may be late for several reasons (plus plenty of people ride the train which is a safety concern). The other common location is the “Civic” Center, also known as the Health District, which is an ambiguous term used by the E-board members. The actual Civic Center is located in the heart of Miami and takes about twenty-five minutes by car. The reason why the Civic Center is described as ambiguous is that there is a higher concentration of homeless people and the area is much bigger compared to Dadeland South. Having a car makes the trip a lot more flexible since there are no waiting times and the members are within the comfort of each other instead of in a cart full of random people. In Dadeland South, we just walk around the area looking for economically insecure people. One of the members knows where to find the people they commonly come into contact with, however, as of late, the local government has put the hammer down on economically insecure people sleeping around in metro stations and shopping plazas. Because of this, it’s been difficult to find people which could lead to the food getting wasted. I personally dislike Dadeland South because we are all walking in the dark without a car and it is fair game from there.
The “Civic” Center is the most anticipated spot for STEP, simply due to the vast amount of area that can be covered. To get there, we drive through the expressway to downtown Miami. Normally before we even reach the Civic Center, we drive around the Health District to find anyone in need of food. Since it’s nighttime and there is a lack of sufficient lighting around the area, we have to be extra attentive and make sure that we don’t mistake any person to be economically insecure. This is why we typically avoid areas where people normally sit around like bus stops and churches. Common characteristics we see amongst economically insecure individuals are if they are sitting or sleeping on a flattened cardboard box underneath a streetlight, carrying a shopping cart, or if they are resting at an intersection (they are usually with other people too). Tent cities are a common sight in the downtown area, including Overtown, and they are usually underneath the highway. This is the area where the majority of the food distribution happens. Depending on the number of people who are out of their tents, the passengers would come out to get the food from the truck and the driver would stay in the car as a safety precaution. We’d approach these individuals, greet them, and ask if they would like a hot meal. If they respond yes, we would give them one meal and the utensil pack (we would also ask them if they would like water too if we carried a bag). The E-board members emphasized that we remain calm and not appear hostile towards the individuals. We were also told that we shouldn’t guarantee anyone that STEP will have a meal every week since our only supply comes from the dining halls. After all, the administration and the higher-ups are not aware that students are giving away takeouts to people outside of campus. Everything is a big risk.
Special Acknowledgments
The foundation of this study was inspired by the Speaker Series curated by STEP’s executive board. The purpose of the Speaker Series was to bring in representatives from different community service organizations in Miami-Dade County and have them speak about the objectives of their organizations. Miami-Dade is home to a handful of organizations that provide different forms of aid from shelters to food (and that within itself is quite worrying) to underprivileged communities. The organizations that came and spoke so far are Camillus House, Lotus House, Little Lighthouse Foundation, and the Coconut Grove Food Pantry. A common goal amongst these organizations is that they work hard to ensure that the unfortunate members of the Miami-Dade community get the help that they need. What I enjoyed about this series is that each organization had its own niche. Lotus House, an organization that I was working with, specializes in women and families who are displaced normally by domestic situations but other elements too. Coconut Grove Crisis Food Pantry is an interfaith organization originally established in a church and specialized in providing groceries to Grove residents (although anyone is welcome). Camillus House helps with those who have been homeless for a long time, but like the Coconut Grove Crisis Food Pantry, their demographics are becoming a lot broader.
From what I’ve heard from each representative and what I researched on my own time, I noticed that these organizations are tackling very specific issues that contribute to poverty. For example, Lotus House’s main demographic is women and children escaping extreme domestic situations that force them into a cycle of poverty. The fact that Lotus House has nearly 200,000 beds and is continuing to see more newcomers coming into their facilities, highlights a growing concern of domestic violence against women and children in households. Camillus House helps people who suffer chronic homelessness, but that shows another issue: what exactly is shoving these people onto the streets and keeping them there? The Food Pantry provides groceries to residents in Coconut Grove in midst of growing food deserts across low-income communities. Without these organizations, we could only imagine an uglier sight on the streets. But at the same time, these organizations are only temporary solutions and there are limitations. Shelters like Camillus House can only house a limited number of people and the Food Pantry may not be accessible to some residents given their location. Although community service is celebrated and encouraged in schools, the real issues must be addressed and tackled by the government.
Power of Privilege
When people think of the word privilege, they tend to think the word is utilized in a way to bring people down or make them uncomfortable. To say that one is privileged heavily implies that all the things that person has worked for were handed to them on a silver plate and though that may be true to some people, I like to think of privilege as a spectrum in terms of variety. Especially nowadays when privilege is often tied to race and nationality, privilege is a flexible concept, and in some form, almost anyone can be/or is already considered privileged.
Being aware of your privilege is key, especially when you’re volunteering in a service event that targets economically insecure individuals. It would be incredibly unwise to wear earbuds or text on your iPhone 12 Pro Max while handing out hot meals to someone who does not have a proper bed or sometimes a blanket. The E-board members make it known that we are prohibited from bringing such items outside of the car because not only is it distracting (let alone dangerous), but it removes the sense of authenticity of the service. The people that we’d served are already aware of their unfortunate situation, which goes for all economically insecure people. They are already aware that they lack a home, job, family, basically almost everything in Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. They are aware that their lives are completely different from ours based on materialistic and economic items, which is why items like AirPods serve as a slap in the face. But even amongst the homeless community, every person has a sort of privilege. Some of these people have families who would eventually find them and take them home, some would even find long-term housing inside a shelter and perhaps receive services to get them off the streets for good, while some may never see those opportunities. As sad as it sounds, it was a harsh reality for many people, especially seniors.
You Can Gentrify the Community, But You Can’t Gentrify A Community
If there’s anything that I learned from this experience is that a community that works together can strive together. There is a lineup of tents in Overtown close to a church. We normally don’t stop there to give food since we can easily be outnumbered and it was minutes away from a church that we’re sure has some sort of affiliation with those people. Nonetheless, while suffering from economic distress, these groups seem to find comfort amongst each other. Since there are a bunch of tents, I highly doubt that all of those residents were related. Sometimes you can even tell by the spacing between each tent, and often times there is a row of tents on opposite sides of the ride that somewhat stimulates a neighborhood. We usually find other tent lineups underneath the freeways by Camillus House. Whenever we handed out food around that area, if we had extras, one of the people would give us directions to find the next person to give a meal to. There is a misconception that people who happen to be homeless are junkies who do not want a job and only spend the money they have been given on drugs and alcohol. I have never believed that was the case before joining STEP and that is still not the case. The amount of humility and consciousness that these people value made me realize that communities are such an important aspect to society. You could be stripped of all of your prized possessions from your job to your family, and there will always be someone else looking out for you.
That is the strength of Miami.
So...Now What?
Gentrification in the Greater Miami Area won’t disappear at the snap of a finger, let alone poverty and rampant homelessness. Like most social issues, it all begins with awareness and small baby steps to guarantee change. With the impact of COVID-19, an organization like STEP can only do so much to educate the UM community about the side of Miami that no one sees.
Recommendations
- Improve food distributions- Once the threat of COVID-19 simmers, there need to be more improvements with the food distributions to ensure that all the members feel and are safe. Such as searching for new routes and recorded them to make the trips more organized.
- Donating Water- Although the purpose of food distributions is to give out meals, sometimes individuals ask for water and even turn down the meal for a bottle of water. Dasani is a common brand on campus and is not a well-preferred brand amongst the general public. So, similar to how STEP receives meals, the dining halls can donate any remaining water bottles after takeout closes.
- Feminine Hygiene- Throughout our runs, we've encountered countless of women, and one time, a young woman was in need of a pad. STEP usually does not offer any other accommodations but food and sometimes water, but it was quite a sight for me to see. On a small scale, STEP can host monthly donation drives where students can donate feminine hygiene products like pads and tampons, so we can give them out to any economically insecure women along with meals and water.
Future Research
- A meta-analysis surrounding the foundations of gentrification and concentrated poverty in the Greater Miami area is needed to fully correlate the two social phenomena. This may take decades since the study will need to include historical contexts beginning with the urbanization of Miami.
- More research on how the government can effectively get economically insecure individuals off the streets and curb poverty without breaking ethical codes.
Work Cited
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Dolven, Taylor. “Miami Tourism Broke Records in 2018. Here’s Why Officials Think 2019 Will Be Even Bigger.” Miamiherald.com, 2 May 2019, www.miamiherald.com/news/business/tourism-cruises/article229946509.html.
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Writer, Erik BojnanskyMiami Times Senior, et al. “City of Miami Doubles down on Homeless Sweeps.” The Miami Times, 14 Apr. 2021, www.miamitimesonline.com/news/city-of-miami-doubles-down-on-homeless-sweeps/article_2e78aecc-9c9a-11eb-8d27-b718e6c44a45.html.
Writer, Erik BojnanskyMiami Times Senior, et al. “The Politics of Homelessness in Miami.” The Miami Times, 3 Mar. 2021, www.miamitimesonline.com/news/the-politics-of-homelessness-in-miami/article_66e2bb08-7c2f-11eb-959e-ef743d6c9d46.html#:~:text=Thanks%20to%20the%20Homeless%20Trust,that%20only%20892%20remain%20unsheltered.
Credits:
Created with images by Frantisek_Krejci - "poverty black and white emotion" • Leroy_Skalstad - "man portrait homeless" • Myriams-Fotos - "homeless man beggars homeless" • Niky_filipova - "alarm clock clock analog" • buy_me_some_coffee - "man depressed sad" • JacksonDavid - "hands hand together" • yanivmatza - "miami beach ocean bridge"