COVID may increase youth homelessness across Twin Cities metro Katy Read, Star Tribune
Bob and Sue Downs remember many of them vividly.
The boy found huddled in a culvert under a street in downtown Chaska on a 10-below night, body temperature dangerously low. The boy who sneaked into the Chanhassen Dinner Theatres and hid under a stage. The boy who slept under a Chanhassen bridge among scary dudes for six weeks after his mother, who struggled with mental illness, kicked him out for eating the last slice of pizza. When I speak to teachers, I tell them, These kids are in your classroom, and when they leave your classroom they don t go home, said Bob Downs, himself a retired middle-school teacher. The teachers eyes get wide.