The Elm Street Shelter, located in Saint Johnsbury Vermont, provides the homeless from ages sixteen to twenty-one with a place to get a good nights rest.  Hope Lakus, the shelter supervisor, says the shelter is there to answer questions these youth may have, “So we’re here to help them to where they don’t have to worry about being homeless cause if your homeless that’s all you’re thinking about where I’m going to sleep, what am I going to eat, what am I going to do when I wake up. You don’t know these things”.
The shelter is only one of two in the state of Vermont and serves the local counties of Essex, Orleans and Caledonia which make up the Northeast Kingdom.  But according to Lakus the homelessness of youth is found statewide, “We’ve worked with Brattleboro, they’re attempting to put together a youth shelter in Brattleboro as well the need is across the state it’s not just centrally localized”.
However, the shelter needs help in terms of getting items that keeps the youth services program operating.  Marion Stuart, the Youth Services Executive Director, has a wish list of what is needed for the shelter, “This is a home like atmosphere so everything we have on this wish list with regard to kitchen supplies, backpacks, bedding, pillows, twin sized mattress covers, twin sized sheets, those are all things that all homes needs”.
The shelter also teaches the youth life skills, such as cooking for themselves, teaching this basic skill leads to the shelters biggest request according to Lakus, “We don’t have a lot we have cuppards that have really old stuff in them, so really anything that we could have supplies so that we could give them the life skill of cooking for themselves of how do you make a meal, how do you even boil water.  A lot of them don’t have those skills to be able to use them, those skills is a great success for us”.
The youth are also expected to cook, clean, and take on the responsibility of finding a job during the day. 
News 7’s Joe Reedy has he story.

 

 

For more information you can go to http://www.nekyouthservices.org/