Portsmouth vigil honors homeless lives lost: 'We have to fight this'
PORTSMOUTH — Charles, Kim, Laurel and Robert — four Seacoast area residents who died this year after experiencing homelessness — were remembered Thursday evening. Housing advocacy leaders, city officials and community members paid tribute to them on the longest night of the year.
The Homeless Persons' Memorial Day vigil was led in Portsmouth by Cross Roads House shelter staff in front of the North Church as darkness fell. Held on the night of winter solstice to highlight the struggles of unhoused people, the occasion was marked nationwide on Thursday. Vigil attendees across America read the names of homeless people who died in 2023.
In Portsmouth, a bitter chill hit exposed ears, faces and hands in the closely huddled gathering. Temperatures hovered around 30 degrees Fahrenheit as Cross Roads House Executive Director Will Arvelo asked people to close their eyes and picture themselves spending the night outdoors in a tent, sleeping bag, cardboard box or huddled against the corner of a building.
"That’s happening all over our community, all over the state, and it’s happening all over America. We have to fight this,” he said.
Vigils were held across New Hampshire Thursday night in solidarity, including in Concord, Dover, Keene, Laconia, Lancaster, Lebanon, Mancehster, Nashua, Newport and Peterborough, according to the New Hampshire Coalition to End Homelessness.
The coalition released its annual State of Homelessness in New Hampshire report for 2022 in early December. It shows the rate of homelessness went from 331 per 100,000 residents in 2020 to 432 per 100,000 residents in 2022, an increase of just under 31%.
“Homelessness is a critical issue in New Hampshire, and the numbers of people who are unable to access safe and stable housing continue to rise,” the coalition reports. “We encourage everyone to attend one of the vigils being held across the state to honor those who have passed on and demonstrate support (for) finding solutions to these tragic preventable losses of human life.”
Cross Roads House shelter manager Missy Leeman told the Portsmouth crowd that Charles and Kim, two of the four local residents who died this year, were past residents of the Lafayette Road shelter.
Kim was a doting grandmother, and Charles was a Boston sports fan who had secured an apartment one month before his passing, Leeman added.
“I think it’s very important for everyone here to always remember how difficult it may be, and that homelessness could actually be at anyone’s door step,” she said. “Take that into consideration. Respect the dignity of each human we may have on the street that has a story.”
Electric candles beamed in the crowd as Joanne Muckenhoupt, associate director of development at Cross Roads House, read aloud the names of the four deceased local residents and shared brief biographies of each.
Lissa Gumprecht, Cross Roads House’s director of development and communications, read a proclamation from Gov. Chris Sununu marking Thursday as Homeless Persons' Memorial Day. She also shared a speech given on Thursday in Washington D.C by U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness director Jeff Olivet.
Olivet’s remarks were given at a Homeless Persons' Memorial Day remembrance in the nation’s capital.
“When will our nation live up to our standard values of equality and opportunity for all? When will we cure ourselves of the greed, racism, bigotry and discrimination that impacts so many people without homes, so many disabilities, so many people of color and so many LGBTQ+ people? When will the bounty of this nation be shared with all people? Our towering achievements, our gleaming monuments, our nation’s world of power and wealth rises while the distance between our peop;le grows,” Gumprecht read in part.
A Point-In-Time Count taken in New Hampshire in January, taken on behalf of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, found there were 2,441 people experiencing homelessness statewide. Among that total, 338 people were unsheltered, while the remainder were sheltered.
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Portsmouth honors homeless lives lost as winter solstice arrives
