Programs focusing on how eviction and homelessness affect the Chippewa Valley got underway last Tuesday and will wind up on Saturday.
The series’ final event will deal with City-County Health Department programs to support safe and sanitary living conditions, how to report a complaint, and what the Health Department looks for during complaint and housing inspections. It is scheduled from 10:30 a.m. to noon on Saturday, in the Eau Claire room at the L. E. Phillips Memorial Public Library.
Programming for this “One Book, One Community” series of events revolved around Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, a book by UW-Madison alumnus Matthew Desmond. Through the stories of eight Milwaukee families, the book illustrates the human impact of a shifting economic and policy landscape and documents the increasingly frequent experience of housing instability for poor, renting families.
The book was selected as one of the 10 best books of 2016 by the editors of The New York Times Book Review. It gives voice to the experiences of families whose lives have been impacted by an increasingly untenable housing situation.
“One Book, One Community” is a reading program designed to encourage both literacy and civic involvement by encouraging the reading of a single book highlighting issues relevant to the community. It traces its origins back to 1998 at the Washington Center for the Book, and has expanded to include communities nationwide which have embraced the idea of civic unity through the reading of literature.
This year’s program here is a collaboration between the city’s Phillips library and the McIntyre Library at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, with assistance from the public library’s Friends group. The five-day stretch of programming is intended to provide opportunities for community members to discuss the book, learn more about eviction and homelessness in the Chippewa Valley and find out what community members can do to help.
A related story, on the ongoing Clear Vision Eau Claire’s Poverty Summit, can be found here.
“We’re hoping folks will start reading Evicted as individuals, but feel like a part of the community by the time they’ve finished the book and participated in the programs,” said Isa Small, programming manager at the public library. “It’s easy to see eviction and homelessness as ‘big-city issues,’ but many smaller communities are also affected.”
Small added that nearly 300 families and individuals in Eau Claire County were evicted in 2015 and roughly 360 students in the Eau Claire Area School District are homeless.
Two discussions of the book led off the programming on Tuesday. Library Director Pamela Westby and Eau Claire City Manager Dale Peters led an evening discussion in the Eau Claire room of the public library. A similar discussion at noon, on the UW-EC campus, was led by John Pollitz, director of the McIntyre Library,
Westby noted that “literature reminds us what we have in common” and said she is looking forward to seeing how literature can be used to help the community in its efforts to address homelessness.
“By selecting Evicted as the ‘One Book, One Community’ book, we’re aiming to provide the community with the necessary tools to understand how homelessness affects our community and the vocabulary to participate in a meaningful discussion on how to address it,” she said.
Small added that “there are some wonderful groups dedicated to addressing homelessness and poverty in the Chippewa Valley, including Clear Vision Eau Claire, Progressive OutReach to our Community’s Homeless (PORCH), and the Eau Claire Area School District Homeless Program, and others. It’s our goal to supplement those efforts and bring the discussion to an even broader audience.”
Desmond received his doctorate from UW–Madison in 2010. He is an associate professor of sociology and social studies at Harvard University and an affiliate of the Institute for Research on Poverty at UW–Madison. In 2015, he received a MacArthur “genius” grant.
A Wednesday panel discussion at the McIntyre Library featured three UW-EC faculty members and Leader-Telegram reporter Julian Emerson, who has written extensively on homelessness for the paper. Faculty panelists, who shared their research related to topics covered in Evicted, included Peter Hart-Brinson (Sociology), Jason Spraitz (Criminal Justice) and Mallory Knipe (Social Work).
A Thursday (Feb. 2) panel discussion at the public library focused on how eviction, homelessness and poverty impact the Chippewa Valley.
Panelists scheduled to participate included City Council President Kerry Kincaid, Tina Tryggestad of Affinity House and two Eau Claire County government representatives, Tom Wirth of the Department of Human Services and Elizabeth Giese, director of the City-County Health Department.
Affinity House provides local addiction treatment for up to 18 women at a time. It is a program of Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan.
Fifty copies of Evicted were donated by the Friends of the L.E. Phillips Memorial Public Library for use in this program, and 100 more copies are available for checkout through the MORE consortium of libraries (see www.more.lib.wi.us).
More information is available from the Information and Reference desk at the public library, by emailing the library at librarian@eauclaire.lib.wi.us or by calling 715-839-5004.