With the supportive but commanding air of a high school coach, Johnny Griffin stood in front of a cadre of 10 downtown beautification workers and gave them their marching orders. On Wednesday morning, the mission was to salt sidewalks and shovel out curbs by bus stops. The crew — nine men and a woman — soon split into two groups to fan out from Listening House, a drop-in day shelter that relocated last November to refurbished digs in downtown St. Paul, at the former home of Red’s Savoy Pizza.

“Remember, when you’re out there, you’re representing Listening House,” said Griffin, the nonprofit’s facilities manager and a longtime advocate for the homeless, while encouraging self-care against the elements. “I know it’s like 18 degrees out there. Y’all little feets and foots might get cold, your little fingertips. I understand it.”

As the crew spread out downtown, each carried a shovel or a bag of salt and a different story.

Rodney Watts, 47, a referee for high school basketball and amateur athletics, said he had fallen behind on rent and lost his apartment in January. Watts said he has already lined up steady employment — he’ll ship out with a traveling construction crew next week to install playgrounds across the Midwest — but the Listening House “St. Paul Work Now” program has kept him and others busy this winter.

“It’s a good program if you put your mind into it,” said Watts, one of Work Now’s latest recruits. “Since I’ve been coming down here, I’ve been getting back on my feet again.”

Work Now

That was a common refrain on Wednesday among the salters and shovelers clad in purple Work Now vests and hats.

Since early February, Listening House has recruited rotating crews of workers from among the ranks of the homeless or recently-homeless to complete four- and five-hour clean-up shifts downtown, four days per week.

At $20 per hour, it’s enough to put $300 into a person’s pocket over the course of a few days work, which might not sound like a fortune to most.

For some, it’s a goldmine.

“You know how much it helps to have a $300 check every week if you’re living in a homeless shelter?” said Willie Britten, 33, as he walked down East Seventh Street near Metropolitan State University, hunting for detritus and snow-covered curb cuts alongside his team for the day.

A $285,000 investment in clean-up — and people

Not long ago, the city of St. Paul and Ramsey County designated that $750,000 in federal pandemic relief money from the American Rescue Plan Act would be dedicated toward creating “no barrier job” opportunities for the homeless and others in precarious housing situations. Of that, about $285,000 was set aside for a pilot program.

Listening House responded to the city’s request for proposals, and worked with St. Paul Parks and Recreation and St. Paul Public Works to identify where the departments needed the most help. They settled on downtown clean-up in the areas not already serviced by the city’s Downtown Improvement District.

For the past two months, operating mostly on foot or by bus, crews have picked up litter along bus stops and other public corners of blocks stretching from the Burger King off Bates Avenue and East Seventh Street to the area surrounding the Minnesota State Capitol. Three workers to date have been trained to service the downtown skyways.

Ultimately, the nonprofit “designed the program, the training, and all the administration,” said Deputy Mayor Jaime Tincher, in an email. “I have such high hopes for this effort and have already been inspired by what has been built. … Our long-term goal would be to find ways public, private and philanthropic support can keep this effort going.”

Participation

That said, with a population as diverse as the transient and homeless, not every moment has been smooth sailing.

Listening House Executive Director Molly Jalma said about 100 to 150 visitors have signed up to participate in Work Now on a rotating basis. An orientation on Tuesday drew another 30 potential recruits, but not all were ready to work. Technically, most were not.

“How many have a Social Security card? An I.D.? A phone number where they can be contacted? We probably had three,” said Jalma, with a patient smile. “So let’s work on getting that I.D. Listening House does that anyway. As far as getting them set up with a bank, people often owe the bank money. But what we find is it’s usually less than what they think it is. Let’s get that $200 paid off.”

To get rid of bench warrants, she said, it’s often as simple as “a phone call and a fine.”

Challenges and new opportunities

Jalma said she has no illusions about the challenges faced by the community she serves.

Citing conflicts between homeless residents and shop owners located by the nonprofit’s previous location on West Seventh Street, a group of Dayton’s Bluff business and property owners once filed legal action in an unsuccessful effort to stop Listening House from moving into the neighborhood.

There are Listening House visitors who might hang out at bus stops, not thinking twice about littering. A reputation as a litterbug would be a deal breaker to participate in the Work Now program.

“You can’t do both,” Jalma said.

Then there are Listening House visitors who “drink from the moment they wake up,” she acknowledged. If she smells booze, they’re not ready to clean streets that day. They’re encouraged to return another day, instead — an incentive to sober up for a bit, and a reminder that the workplace, any workplace, has rules.

“It’s not about being punished,” she said.

‘Keeping me afloat’

The city’s $285,000 grant likely will take the program into October, though Tincher said based on the results to date, she expects more of the $750,000 in ARPA funds to be released to keep it running longer.

Whether Work Now continues under Listening House or another organization, Jalma hopes to see it expand to University Avenue and possibly the high-litter areas around light rail stations, though working around train tracks could require more supervision and safety training. She also hopes to see some of the workers get hired by the city and other downtown employers after proving their chops.

Jalma and several members of the Work Now crew attended St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter’s recent “State of Our City” address at the Xcel Energy Center. Among the proud participants was Britten, who had once spent two years living out of downtown shelters while juggling janitorial work at Target Field at night and a job at a Dollar Store by day.

Britten, who has had his own apartment for a few years now, recently obtained certification to operate heavy machinery with the hopes of someday soon launching his own landscaping and snow removal business. So far, finding a job operating a forklift has been slow going.

“This is keeping me afloat,” said Britten, who looks forward to the day when he can hire his peers at Listening House to help him staff his own company. “I’m not going to forget these guys.”

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