A year ago, Tou Chang set up his tent with about 30 others at an encampment behind the abandoned Kmart on St. Paul’s East Side.
It’s one of at least two St. Paul encampments with Hmong and Karen residents. A second, near Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, has at least 60 residents and roughly half are Hmong.
A series of viral Facebook videos posted this summer highlighted the issue of homelessness in Minnesota’s Hmong community, where mental health and addiction carry a stigma and the cost of living has made housing precarious for a growing number of families.
Chang, who has been unhoused for a few years and spent some time at another encampment by Hmong Village, said time has blurred for him during that period. When a cousin recently reminded him they were both 43, he realized how much he lost track of time.
On Tuesday, he joined other residents at the Kmart encampment for a Hmong meal delivered by volunteers from Hmong Haven of Minnesota. Despite the warm fall, Chang couldn’t help thinking about the winter ahead.
“When it’s cold, anything you touch, it’s like touching knives,” he said, of Minnesota winters as an unhoused person.
Hmong Haven of Minnesota formed about two months ago to serve both St. Paul encampments with a large Hmong population by providing food every Tuesday, offering prayer, and connecting them with services.
Volunteers are currently raising funds to help donate winter clothing and essential items for those at the Kmart and Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary encampments. They plan to deliver the winter donated goods on November 2.
There are no plans to close the two encampments, according to Casey Rodriguez, the communications manager at the city of St. Paul’s Department of Safety and Inspections.
The Homeless Assistance Response Team has made visits to the two encampments for outreach. Oftentimes, basic gloves and hand warmers are handed out to camp occupants during the winter time, Kahari Smith-Brewer, HART program coordinator, said in an email.
Smith-Brewer also said there is no indication that the Hmong population living in camps is growing. The city tracks unhoused occupants by identified gender, but there is no data collected on specific ethnic backgrounds.
Families struggle to respond
Chang said his situation of being homeless started “out of my hands.”
Because of his criminal background, he couldn’t secure a permanent full-time job. He also said that his mental illness took a toll on his family, causing conflict and leading them to kick him out.
“Everyone is out here for a different reason,” he said.
Substance abuse, mental illness, shame and the high cost of living, such as rent, are factors in the community that lead to homelessness, said May yer Thao, president and CEO of the Hmong American Partnership.
“I think it boils down to not our culture, because our culture is that we take care of each other, I think it’s the lack of education around mental health challenges, around chemical abuse challenges,” she said. Without the resources or knowledge to help those in crisis, it tears families apart, she added.
At 63, May Xiong said she is the oldest resident at the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary encampment. “I make very little, it’s not enough for rent,” she said in Hmong. “You only eat and live day by day.”
Xiong said not having a fridge to store food and running water are the biggest challenges. Chang said he woke up one morning and half of his personal belongings were stolen.
Gendreau Yang, 18, said he deals with a mental health condition that makes it difficult to maintain stability. He left the Union Gospel Mission homeless shelter after a year when he didn’t find the support he needed. Now, he lives under a tarp at the Bruce Vento encampment.
“Nothing goes right, except this time right now,” he said of the Hmong Haven volunteers bringing food and spending time with them.
Chang said living with others dealing with mental illness and substance abuse can make it harder to find a path to stability.
“Putting a lot of people with mental illness together out here, that doesn’t really work because how do we fix each other?” Chang said. But when he went to stay at a shelter, he said that the place reminded him of prison.
Volunteers mobilize to help residents
When Kabo Yang’s brother asked her for a ride home, it was the first time she saw where he lived: a tent.
She discovered another of her brothers also lives at the Bruce Vento encampment.
“It hurts my heart. It really made me sad,” Yang said. “I mean, they have a lot of support from us, but I never knew they lived down there.”
Yang began visiting the camp to check on her brothers, and connected with other camp residents and volunteers. After hearing stories from the Hmong occupants, and realizing that language and cultural barriers were also an issue, the volunteers established Hmong Haven of Minnesota to make sure residents had access to support.
The organization also plans to partner with Hmong community groups to offer services, such as housing and employment assistance. Currently, the funds are directly from volunteers. They hope in the future to secure a building that will serve as a shelter.
About a dozen volunteers visit the two encampments on Tuesdays. They cook, serve, and pack meals, bringing familiar Hmong dishes to camp occupants. They also sing prayers, pass out brochures for medical services and offer rides to clinics.
Neng Vang, the founder and CEO of Hmong Haven, said that some of the volunteers bring young kids and older folks to help, reminding the Hmong occupants of their families. She also said communicating in Hmong is comforting for them.
“That brings a lot of joy to them,” she said.
A social media backlash
A few months ago, a series of videos were posted on social media and YouTube showing interviews with some Hmong occupants. Some of the commenters were making negative assumptions and criticizing efforts to help.
Vang said they’ve faced some backlash from online comments because of the stigma on substance abuse and lack of knowledge about mental health issues. “We just try our best to ignore them.”
Sue Lee, who is associated with the Lao Family Community of Minnesota, a nonprofit for supporting Hmong Minnesotans, said they do not offer services targeting unhoused people.
Thao added that Hmong American Partnership also does not offer those services.
“Because we don’t really focus on housing, we don’t have the capacity nor the expertise to work with housing around homelessness and to work with the homeless population,” she said. “We haven’t been able to step into that space to be helpful.”
Thao has met with unhoused Hmong people at some St. Paul facilities, but said that oftentimes they refuse help. She said shelter providers and housing agencies often don’t realize that homelessness is an issue facing the Hmong community.
Years ago, Thao said she first heard about homelessness in the Hmong community happening in California so she knew it was a challenge. But when she moved back to Minnesota three years ago, she saw homeless Hmong people for the first time.
A few weeks ago, a colleague in Milwaukee reached out to her because they’re starting to see homeless Hmong people, too, she said, one sign that it’s a growing issue.
“I don’t know if it’s like a second awakening for some Hmong community members to understand that we still have many community members who are barely surviving, even though it looks like so many of us are now middle class,” she said.
“We still have so many who live in poverty, and maybe the greater community has not seen that because they’ve moved their lives forward.”
