Leader-Telegram assistant news editor Julian Emerson and photojournalist Marisa Wojcik spent the winter of 2013-14, a historically cold winter in Eau Claire, with the city's homeless population. They spent time with those people without homes wherever they were, at such places as the Sojourner House shelter; at The Community Table soup kitchen; at Positive Avenues, a drop-in center for people with mental health issues; in vehicles where they lived; at L.E. Phillips Memorial Public Library; and out on the cold streets.

 

The idea for covering the topic originated from the journalists' viewing homeless people periodically wandering the streets of downtown Eau Claire. A street ministry program operated by Plymouth United Church of Christ in Eau Claire in conjunction with others also prompted the journalists to ponder the challenges of spending the winter as a homeless person.

 

In many ways Eau Claire is like other Midwestern cities its size. It's a place where people generally feel safe. It's a place with quality schools. It's the kind of place people come, or stay, to raise families. It's the kind of place where people are plenty busy but avoid the traffic congestion and frantic pace of big-city life. It's not Chicago or the Twin Cities or Milwaukee.

 

It's also the kind of place where people tend not to think about homelessness. That's a problem faced by those big cities. But Eau Claire is home to homeless people. And, according to the agencies that provide services to the city's homeless residents, the police and homeless people themselves, that number is growing.

 

Emerson and Wojcik learned plenty about homeless people in recent months. They learned firsthand about the challenges of spending arctic days walking the streets, how such an existence wears on body and spirit. The learned about the mental health issues that plague many homeless people, often making even simple tasks challenging. They learned how Eau Claire's homeless residents have a propensity to take part in all sorts of deplorable behaviors. They learned how those same people can be amazingly generous, sharing what little they have with others. They learned that homeless residents, like the rest of us, try to make it through each day the best they can amid challenges.

 

In covering Eau Claire's homeless population, Emerson and Wojcik sought neither to demonize nor glorify those city residents without a roof of their own over their head. They sought, as best they could, to depict them as they are, good bad and otherwise.

 

The journalists don't pretend to be experts on the subject of homelessness. They don't believe they have a solution for this societal problem. But Emerson and Wojcik hope their depictions of Eau Claire's homeless residents in the May 11 and May 18 issues of the Leader-Telegram and online educate readers about the city's homeless population and its impact on the rest of the community. They hope their accounts personalize those people without homes of their own. And they hope the stories they wrote, the photographs they took and the videos they shot prompt readers to reflect on homelessness in a way they hadn't previously.