Homeless advocates, Occupy to join for rally

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Affordable housing and homeless advocates are joining with Occupy Providence to draw attention to the growing problem of homelessness and high foreclosure rates at a rally expected to end with tents being pitched at the Rhode Island Capitol.

Activists plan to march on Saturday afternoon from Burnside Park, where Occupy demonstrators have an encampment, to the Statehouse, where they will highlight a three-pronged legislative agenda. Their priorities include a dedicated funding stream for affordable housing programs, a bill allowing foreclosed homeowners to rent back their properties rather than be evicted and a homeless "Bill of Rights."

According to the Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless, about 4,400 people in the state experienced homelessness last year. A count in September found nearly 200 people sleeping on the streets, a finding advocates call conservative because the tally took place on a single night and many individuals may have been missed.

The numbers have climbed in part because of the state's sagging economy and chronic double-digit unemployment rate.

"The long and the short of it is we're in a dire situation right now, because we've lost so much funding for homeless prevention and affordable housing at a time when the number of people coming into the homeless system has risen year after year after year," said Jim Ryczek, executive director of the Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless, one of the rally's organizers.

The event aims to draw attention to an issue that has shot to the forefront of the nationwide Occupy movement in recent days: foreclosures. Rhode Island has the highest foreclosure rate in New England and one of the worst in the country, according to HousingWorks RI.

Roughly one in 10 homeowners in the state have either been foreclosed upon during the last two years or gotten seriously behind in their payments.

"We can sit back all day and talk about major economic reforms ... but there were a few things that stood out that Occupy brought to the surface just by existing, and they had to do with homelessness and foreclosure," said Mike McCarthy, an Occupy activist from Providence.

Occupy activists have worked closely with the Rhode Island Homeless Advocacy Project to help homeless people in the park — some of whom were there long before the Occupy encampment — get the services they need. Homelessness and housing became two signature issues for the movement, McCarthy said, and holding an event with other advocacy groups is a way to rally forces and put forth a concrete legislative agenda.