Breakfast With Justin

Mayoral candidate Justin Elicker used to work as a waiter during his college years in Middlebury, Vermont.

There he learned that when you a carry a tray one-handed at the shoulder level or higher, don’t keep your hand flat. Instead, spread the fingers out, giving you five points of contact and support for your heavy-laden tray.

Friday morning Elicker (who the night before won endorsement votes from the Ward 9 and Ward 10 Democratic committees) had a chance to rehone those waitering skills, this time serving homeless breakfasters at Liberty Community Service​‘s bustling Sunrise Cafe.

There he joined a dozen volunteers who every weekday morning help turn the basement space at St. Paul and St. James Church at Olive and Chapel streets into a breakfast restaurant that treats homeless folks with the dignity of appreciated customers.

The program began in 2015 with six ​“guests,” as the diners are called. Friday morning the crew served more than 100 guests who ordered from a dozen items on the menu.

While others helped with taking orders for bagels or hot oatmeal with cinnamon, juice, and fresh fruit, Elicker, based on his experience, was deemed an asset to join the waiter and delivery staff.

Donning rubber gloves and a hairnet, he delivered those trays-full of food to the diners like James Conners, Michael Mills, and Robert Rapinski, who waited and chatted with friends at the tables in the spacious room beneath the church sanctuary.

Elicker, who is challenging incumbent Toni Harp for the Democratic mayoral nomination, was accompanied on his visit to the cafe by campaign staffers Moses Nelson and Dominique Baez. The latter circulated with voter registration forms among the diners.

Homeless people are entitled to vote and do vote, often giving a shelter or a nonprofit with whom they are working as the official address, said Nelson.

Elicker characterized his visit as an opportunity for the candidate to show his concern for a vulnerable part of the city’s population.

He spent an hour and a half delivering food and speaking one on one with homeless people about the challenging details of their lives.

As Elicker was returning to fetch another order from the kitchen, Robert Rapinski approached him.

Elicker introduced himself, gave a brief stump moment of what matters to him as a candidate: ​“more jobs, good jobs, education, schools with opportunity.”

Then he asked Rapinski directly, ​“What’s important to you?”

“I’m 68. I’m homeless for 18 months now, and I can’t get stable housing,” Rapinski responded.

“Where will you sleep tonight?” asked Elicker.

Rapinski told him, as several other people did, that bed will be somewhere on the Green.

“Have you been to the Grand Avenue shelter?” Elicker asked.

Rapinski said he has exceeded his 90-day limit of allowable time to stay there.

“I have a disability income, but I need affordable housing,” he said.

“There’s not enough deeply affordable housing in the city,” Elicker offered.

He also called for more focus, on programs deriving from research that shows immediate interventions, within the first few days of homelessness, can make a critical difference in heading off the of chronic homelessness.

Michael Mills told the candidate that he is struggling with relapses during his program to fight his addiction, which takes place at the APT Foundation. Liberty Community Services has helped him find a room to live. His next step is to work with them on applying for Section 8 housing voucher.

“You’re unusual,” Elicker said to him, in that Mills appeared to be his own and effective advocate pulling together assistance from different resources.

“Yes, you’ve got to be willing to do your research,” Mills said. Mills praised Elicker for ​“being in the trenches. People need help. You got to start at the bottom.”

James Conners, who recently finished a one-year prison term, said he is searching for housing.

Rapinski told the candidate that problems surrounding housing need to be solved on the state and federal levels. Elicker did not disagree that the larger inequities require leadership at those levels. He said he will focus on maters over which he, as mayor, would have some control.

Elicker’s main takeaways?

“The city spends a $1 million on homeless services,” he said, ​“and I’m proud of that.” He added more focus could be put on early interventions that provide housing alternatives within the first day or two of homelessness so that people don’t have to set foot in a shelter. Some of that work is being done by homeless-focussed nonprofits such as Columbus House, Elicker added, and the city needs more of it.

“We often criminalize homelessness,” he continued. ​“When they have no place to go, it’s not right to harass or arrest them. We’ve been hassling more than we should.”

Elicker noted that many people said they felt unsafe at the Grand Avenue shelter, suggesting approaches other than shelters need more focus

Rapinski said said he does vote, although frequent robberies make it difficult to keep a valid ID. Pleasant as his conversation with Elicker appeared to be, he added, ​“I’ve heard it all before.”

Elicker also agreed with James Cramer, the director of Loaves and Fishes, a Saturday food pantry that operates out of the same space as the cafe, that the city needs to do more to coordinate the work of the various homeless shelters, pantries, and volunteer-dependent services such as Sunrise.