Struggling to connect

By Sharon Salyer

Herald Writer

To office workers facing the daily blizzard of phone messages, it might be hard to imagine that to some people voice mail is nothing short of magic.

Just ask Steve Hite, who earlier this year was homeless because of alcoholism and was living at a local transitional house run by the Christian Armed Services Association.

While there, he signed up for Community Voice Mail, the electronic phone message service available to those who don’t have their own phones, including women in domestic violence shelters, the elderly and disabled, working poor and the homeless.

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Voice mail is a vital tool allowing those without phones to make the connections with jobs and housing necessary to help rebuild their lives, Hite said.

"That’s the true magic of voice mail," he said. "It seems like such a small thing. I can tell you, it’s huge."

Mechanics who do freelance tune-ups or people who work in landscaping can use the voice-mail system to hook up with jobs, he explained.

Clients are assigned a password, and access the phone messaging system through a toll-free number. Messages can be accessed from any phone, 24 hours a day.

Hite, 52, was able to beat his alcoholism and earn a certificate in June from Edmonds Community College to assist those with drug and alcohol addictions. He now helps clients with those problems as a case manager for Evergreen Manor in Everett.

It wasn’t just living in the transitional shelter that made it difficult for him to get messages from potential employers.

"There’s a lot of concern about confidentiality in those houses," to protect those trying to overcome their problems with alcohol, Hite said.

So anyone calling the shelter’s one phone would sometimes get evasive answers — "I’m not sure he lives here" — when they asked to speak to one of the residents.

"Those are well-intentioned phrases that are open for any kind of interpretation," but can be off-putting to potential employers, Hite said.

Hite worked as a real estate broker and property developer before his battles with alcohol led first to DUI convictions that landed him in jail, then divorce, and finally to living in motels for a year.

"I found myself just like the clients I work with," Hite said, "no place to live and the bulb had kind of gone out.

"You get used to less, and then even less, and then all of a sudden camping out a couple of weeks out of the month is OK."

Homelessness has many causes, he said, and is not just the result of drug or alcohol addictions. Public housing and subsidized rent programs are overwhelmed with applicants. Housing prices in the Puget Sound region are so high that many families pay 40 to 55 percent of their income on housing, he said.

Voice mail is the key that can unlock doors blocking the poor from access to housing and jobs.

"It’s just a tool," Hite said of voice mail’s role in making such changes. "A real handy tool."

You can call Herald Writer Sharon Salyer at 425-339-3486

or send e-mail to salyer@heraldnet.com.

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