ST. LOUIS • Nothing can lift your spirits better than a good, hot shower.
Anyone knows this. Jake Austin knows this. He’s a pastor who has worked with homeless people most of his adult career, and grew up around the soup kitchen his parents operated out of a little church in Mount Vernon, Ill.
So one day in fall 2014, when Austin, 31, was distributing soap and hygiene supplies to the homeless in downtown St. Louis, he offered a bar of soap to a man who came up to the table. The soap is nice, the man said, but where would he use it? He had plenty of clothes and food, but he hadn’t had a shower in two months and had a job interview in two days.
Austin was embarrassed he hadn’t thought about this earlier. “People can get food and clothes, but if they haven’t had a shower in three months, they can’t get a job even flipping burgers,” he said.
People are also reading…
Austin then came up with an idea: Shower to the People. He bought an old box truck he found on Craigslist for $5,000. He’s worked to raise money to convert it into a portable showering unit with two shower stalls with bumped-out curtains for privacy while changing and two sinks inside. A bank of sinks on the outside will allow people to brush their teeth, wash their faces and shave.
The truck will connect to fire hydrants, and a generator on the outside will run a water heater on the inside.
Austin figures if the truck is parked in one place for six to eight hours, it would be long enough to give 60 people showers. The truck would move to different locations throughout the week.
He knows of only one other organization in the country that does this, a group called Lava Mae in San Francisco that converts buses into shower units.
Austin is setting his own course here. He got nonprofit status for his endeavor. He’s getting the proper permits and support from City Hall, and hopes to have the Shower to the People truck rolling and out on test stops within a couple of weeks. Its grand debut will be June 4 in Soulard.
Austin is the program director for Focus Gateway City, the local branch of Focus North America, an Orthodox Christian group providing homeless services. This is one of its programs, but the shower unit is not for evangelizing, Austin said: It’s for getting people clean.
He said so many groups want to provide all kinds of services for homeless people, and get burned out or run out of money trying. “I decided I’m going to do one thing really well, and that’s hygiene,” he said.
It’s not just a private dignity issue, he figures, it’s a public health issue.
Where do homeless people wash up otherwise? In public library sinks, or in the river, or with a hose in an unknowing someone’s backyard. The St. Louis Dream Center has showers available on Wednesdays and Sundays, and the city-run shelter at the 12th and Park Recreation Center has showers available on Sunday — it can’t have them available other times when it’s open to the public, said Eddie Roth, the city’s social services director.
He applauds the Shower to the People effort.
“It doesn’t take much imagination to understand how the absence of bathing facilities would be profoundly demoralizing, or how rejuvenating and humanizing a gift a hot shower would be if we didn’t take it for granted,” said Roth.
Austin has been overwhelmed by the support he’s received so far. Pipe-fitter’s Local 562 apprentices installed plumbing on the truck. Faultless Healthcare Linen has agreed to launder towels. Apache Village RV Center donated labor and finishing work. Countless groups have donated soap and shampoo and are holding towel drives.
His friend Collin Loveless did marketing and designed the Shower to the People logo — a red, upraised fist holding a bar of soap. Loveless, who was passionate about working with the homeless, was killed by a drunken driver at Interstate 170 and Delmar Boulevard a year ago. Austin wants “In memory of Collin Loveless” written somewhere on the truck. He’s looking for someone to wrap the bold red graphics on the side panels, and make the truck look professional yet approachable and fun.
While people gather to get a shower, Austin wants to reach out and find out more about them, and connect them with other services available in the area. He also wants to gather demographic information to help advocates come up with new ways to help.
He also wants to employ homeless people by having them make soap, which they will use on the truck and sell in local stores to raise money for upkeep. If the truck here is successful, he hopes Focus North America will roll out similar units in cities nationwide.
“If we can get people regularly clean, we can give them some hope,” Austin said. “Get some hope in their bones, they can take the next steps. They can keep climbing.”