SALT LAKE CITY — Three days a week, in front of Salt Lake City’s Public Safety Building-right in the heart of downtown, you’ll find a free tai chi class run by a local retired couple.
“Where else can you take the homeless groups that you see and put them all together and hear a pin drop?” said Marita Hart.
Over eight years ago, Bernie and Marita Hart started this wellness program for transient people dealing with mental health problems.
“It’s just a research project, really,” Bernie said. “I mean, it's just fortunate. And we have a really wonderful research project where we can test ideas of new ways of helping people dealing with mental health and addiction issues.”
For 30 minutes, a group of over 50 individuals, mostly unhoused, silently move their bodies under tall beams of steel.
The program has become a well-known community gathering space amongst many homeless individuals who congregate downtown. Most who attend say it’s a way to make friends and build a routine.
Thirty-four-year-old Shary, originally from Kearns, has been a regular at SLC Street Tai Chi for two months.
“I like the people here. Then we got a lot of good people that came. And I like that we get coffee in a burrito, that's definitely awesome. And I really like that they do this because it gives you something to look forward to during the week that is positive and productive.”
An idea born from skiing
When asked where the idea came from, Bernie did not hesitate.
“Skiing,” Bernie said.
The Harts were originally teachers on the slopes, serving as ski instructors at Snowbird Ski Resort for over 15 years. They say this current program was born from addressing people's fears while learning how to ski. The tai chi became a vehicle to do that.
“So we started experimenting with those ideas and the teaching was skiing with the idea of if you could make somebody feel through physical activities, not through words, safer by through what they do. They could learn quicker and easier…It's a self-learning physical activities program. That morphed into what you see here.”
“It encourages memory and balance,” Marita said.
But the lessons taught were meant to go far beyond the slopes.
Measuring Success
“From a sociological perspective, it's really fascinating for me to see such a community being built, and especially among the population that often gets rejected from the community," Dan Poole said.
Poole is an associate professor of sociology at Salt Lake Community College. Over the last few years, his class has been helping the Harts collect data such as demographics and measuring how the activities in the program are helping improve memory and function.
“And then, you know, it's interesting to see how obviously, everything that's going on with all of his different measures of balance. And basically, he's trying to give people small wins, to help, you know, boost confidence and things like that, and over time to learn complicated things like the tai chi, that we'll be doing later on”
A holistic program
But Bernie emphasizes that their actions aren’t just about Tai Chi.
The program also offers free coffee and breakfast burritos, other activities like breathing exercises, bongo boards, unicycles, stilts and cornhole- in all, a holistic approach to helping others find stability in many aspects of their lives.
“We never asked them in, we never say come, Bernie said. “They come on their own. And when they come, they want to be part of and to be part of you have to learn. And the learning process starts because of their desire to be part of something that they haven't been part of for years.”
Mohammed Elamin was diagnosed with depression and says SLC Street Tai Chi is the only reason he leaves his house.
“Actually we come here to socialize, we will meet friends, we talk about all what we want to talk about, the exercises, get coffee, get water…
The free program has also given Mohammed an opportunity to be a leader amongst his peers.
“ I have to do the checklist. I have to look at the food, I have to look at the coffee, I have to look out the water. I have to look at the people and I have to watch how to improve the exercises.”
For some newcomers, it's a new place to call home.
“ It gives us something to work to look forward to, said Erenest Marquez, a first timer at SLC Street Tai Chi. “ You know, I mean, we're still part of something, I guess, you know, so to speak. Being homeless, you can feel like you're ostracized, or you're not part of something. And to come here, you know, and the police station kind of lets you know that people still care about you.”
“It gives me peace and confidence,” Sherome Whittsett said. And then small, even small things I can accomplish in life. You know, because I've had a lot of setbacks and a lot of tragedies and, and I've overcome them.”
The future of the program
“I want to change how the whole country deals with homelessness. I want to change how the whole country deals with mental health issues. In addition problems. If this is new science, it provides an opportunity to explore new potentials, new ways of dealing with people that the system has not been able to help. And what you saw today was the system that I'm proposing, doing what you saw out there, it's not me or Marita who did it. It's a system and the system can be duplicated anywhere in the country."
“Then we can really retire,” Marita said.“We're gonna die doing this."
“No, Im gonna change it while I'm still alive so I could die in peace,” Bernie said.
