SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO.com) — If you are homeless near downtown in the Whittier neighborhood, chances are you are either doing a lot of sitting–or a lot of walking.
On the south end of Indiana Avenue, about a half a block south of the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House and across from the state office building on 10th Street, there are the sitters.
You can drive by nearly any time during daylight and there will be a group of primarily Native American men and women sitting on the corner by a liquor store. Also, chances are that some of them are inebriated or on their way to inebriation.
They are a block from the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House, an accommodation for homeless people, and a block from The Banquet, which feeds people meals for free most days of the week.
Then there is Keith.
He is a 58 year old Native American man with long black hair. From when he gets up in the morning–often from an out-of-the-way place in one of the city’s alley’s–to when he finds another safe place on the street to sleep–he is walking. And walking. And walking.
“I’m out here all day wandering around doing what I got to do,” Keith said. “Do what I have to do to protect myself. I don’t hang around that crowd and I don’t care about the crowd where you just came from. (The people sitting at the corner of 10th and Indiana.)
Keith says it’s dangerous on the streets.
“It depends on your personality and who you are because there’s a lot of people that are stronger,” he said. “Then they run in gangs or take advantage of weak ones.”
Keith doesn’t mean gangs like the Crips and the Bloods.
“Like four or five people come upon you and they want to drink and you got nothing,” Keith said.
Keith thinks the people down the street on the corner don’t want to change their lives. He says he wants to change his. He says he hasn’t always been this way, homeless and on the streets.
“I’ve been homeless for a year now,” Keith said. “I lost a daughter in March, she committed suicide when she was 23 years old. And after that, I just gave up on things.
Keith also said he got divorced, lost his house, lost his job, and lost his car.
“I lost everything,” Keith says.
But Keith hasn’t given up hope.
“I’m sure well within a couple months, I should have my own place,” he said.
While Keith thinks City discussions about portapotties and more police presence in the area are good, he’d like to see more.
“I think they should give these homeless people a chance to least have a home to live in,” he said. “I think they would do something for themselves.”
About five minutes after the above conversation, KELO.com News spotted Keith walking–a block or two away from the interview location.
More walking. And walking. And walking.
