Drunks, drug addicts and people who are too lazy to keep a job.

The image of a homeless person is what some homeless people fear the most.

Pete Monnier said only a handful of the people he has shared a homeless shelter with fit the stereotype.

Most, he said, do not.

"It hurts your heart to see people who truly cannot help themselves," said the

47-year-old who described himself as severely and chronically depressed. "There's a percentage of people who choose not to help themselves and who take and take and take.

"For most of us, all it takes is to get sick and not be able to work. That could happen to anybody."

When it does happen, some in the community fear, the downtrodden are drawn to Davenport, because of good shelters and homeless services.

"But, by far, the major portion of people in our shelter are from the Quad-Cities," said Sandy Walters, co-director of Humility of Mary Shelter.

Here are a few of them:

Randy Schwarz, 55

When he no longer could take care of his mom by himself, Randy Schwarz sold his family's Sherrard, Ill., house to pay for assisted living for her. A week before signing closing papers for the house, Schwarz lost his job.

That was five years ago.

"I went to the men's shelter in Rock Island for about nine months," he said. "I moved to Humility of Mary Shelter (in Davenport) for about a year. They understood my situation. They could see I was putting forth some effort."

The effort paid off.

Staff at Humility of Mary Shelter, formerly John Lewis Community Services, could see that Schwarz qualified for the federal Housing First program. To get into a Housing First unit, a person has to be "chronically homeless," which means living for more than a year in a shelter or being homeless four times in three years.

Applicants also must be working toward a goal.

After more than a year in his own Housing First apartment, Schwarz's goal changed.

"I had been working for Scott County in exchange for them paying my rent," he said. "I worked at the Bicentennial Building and the courthouse, keeping the parking lots clean, cleaning windows, emptying outside trash, raking leaves and shoveling snow - whatever was needed."

One day in late July, while working for the county, he realized he was having more and more difficulty catching his breath. "I went to CHC (Community Health Care), and they put me on a heart monitor," he said. "The next thing I knew, they were hauling me out in an ambulance."

His problems with diabetes and depression were compounded by an emergency double-bypass surgery. His new goal is to work on being accepted for disability and continuing, for now, to qualify for Housing First.

"The best part of having my own place is that it's nice to go to sleep when you want and get up when you want," he said. "Plus, you don't have to share a room with anybody. Everybody pretty much takes care of each other over there (at the apartment complex)."

But the situation is not perfect, given Schwarz's dislike for interruptions when he is enjoying quiet time alone.

"I don't want somebody knocking on my door at 11 at night, asking for a cigarette or to borrow five bucks," he said. "At one time, they had me going to group therapy. Why would you do that to someone who doesn't like being around people?"

He admits, however, that he does like being around the people at Humility of Mary Shelter who have helped him.

"They've got some dedicated people, and I don't know where I'd be without them," he said. "I don't think of them as workers anymore. I think of them as friends."

Ken Horn, 48

He made the trip from Kansas City, Mo., to Iowa City a day too late.

"I was offered a job in Iowa City, but the guy hired somebody else the day I got there," Ken Horn said. "I'm finding it very hard to find work."

The Marine who served in Beirut and Lebanon from 1980 to 1986, looked to a veterans assistance center in Iowa City for help. That is where he learned about a possible opening in one of the veterans bunks at Humility of Mary Shelter in Davenport.

When the cab-driving job in Iowa City went to someone else, Horn hit a dead end. That was three weeks ago, and he has been homeless since.

"When I first got out of the service, it wasn't nearly this hard to find work," he said. "I've always been able to find something. I'd never been to a homeless shelter before.

"It's going OK. It was rough at first, getting adjusted. I'm going to keep hammering away, though - keep looking."

He hopes his next stop is a return to Iowa City, where he is awaiting a voucher that could get him into a veterans' housing program there.

For now, he is adjusting to living with five other men in dorm-like quarters.

"In the military, you don't have friends," he said. "You have brothers. That's for a lifetime.

"I'm a bit more cautious about people here. You have to be cautious in an environment like this.

"But I'm grateful to be here for now."

Ron Randolph and Lynette Smith

Theirs is a "so-far-so-good" kind of success story.

Ron Randolph and Lynette Smith left Chicago about four months ago, because they didn't feel safe there.

Even though they didn't have jobs or families in the Quad-Cities, they figured their chances of making it were better here.

The pair has been together for seven years and plans to marry soon. They spent their first two months in Davenport, living at Humility of Mary Shelter. Smith was disabled in a fall from a three-story building and walks with a crutch, but Randolph has been pursuing full-time work with the help of shelter staff.

A Navy veteran, he has two part-time jobs and interviewed last week for a full-time job. He found out about the position after posting his resumé online at Goodwill, he said. If he gets the job, he expects to make about $8.25 an hour and said he will continue to use a city bus to get to work.

"They are one of those success stories where they sort of succeeded in spite of themselves," said Jason Bilbrey, assistant

program director at the Humility of Mary Shelter. "They had to be pushed out of the nest, but they did it. So far, so good."

Although they now have their own place, Randolph and Smith spend much of their free time at the shelter.

"That's really common," Bilbrey said of the return visits. "Some folks we don't ever see again, but some of them, I'll continue to see for years."

Michelle Smith

She was sitting in the grass across from Humility of Mary Shelter, reading her Bible.

The book is one of her few belongings.

Asked how much money she has in all the world, Michelle Smith answered, "Less than $5."

In fact, she doesn't have enough money to pick up her $8 blood pressure and heart medications at Community Health Care. She hasn't filled a prescription in six months.

"She'll be checking back into shelter in the next day or two, and she will be homeless, and that will result in a voucher for CHC," Bilbrey said.

Although she will be getting her medication and will have a place to live temporarily, Smith had hoped for more. Her upcoming stay at the shelter will be her second.

A graduate of Assumption High School, Smith earned a certified nursing assistant's degree from Scott Community College and worked in nursing homes. That is where she injured her back, spending years lifting patients.

She last lived at her father's home in Davenport, providing his care, until he died in November at the age of 91. Although he had worked for more than 40 years as a machinist at the Arsenal, there was nothing left when he passed.

Smith said she lived outside for a time, "with blankets and a fire by the river." She also lived in a car before finding shelter at Humility of Mary and then Salvation Army. But she didn't like it there and now is returning to Humility of Mary.

Her husband, Earl, does not like the shelters, so the pair lives apart while he looks for work.

"I'm back here, and I haven't accomplished anything," she said of her return to Humility of Mary. "I don't want to live here.

"It's frustrating to go from a shelter to a shelter. You want to go from a shelter to your home."

Pete Monnier, 47

Until his Social Security checks come, the city of Davenport is paying his rent.

Pete Monnier is one of eight people living in apartments under the federal Housing First program. He cannot pay his modest rent until his first disability payments begin to arrive, which is supposed to be any time now, he said.

"I'm not allowed to work at all," he said. "I've got health issues, and I'm not able to keep a job. I'm severely and chronically depressed."

He also has been chronically homeless, which is a prerequisite to qualifying for Housing First.

"It's nice here if you've got no place else to go," he said of his small apartment. "You can make your own meals. You have more responsibility. But I won't be there all my life."

Monnier has goals, and one of them is to give back to Humility of Mary Shelter, which he called a "night and day" improvement over the former John Lewis Community Services operation there.

"It seems to me like the staff is more thorough, and they're very smart with their resources," he said. "If the shelter had closed altogether, we would've just went to other communities and magnified the problems there."

His hope is to lessen the problem.

"My goal is to use my Social Security and disability payments to move on and open up a spot for the next guy," he said. "It's not a forever thing, but it's a chance to help you learn to help yourself.

"I'm looking forward to somebody else getting the blessings I've been getting. You can't just take, take, take. I'll stay a couple months after my payments come, so I can build a little equity, because it's expensive to live on your own.

"But I won't be greedy. I'm thinking about the next guy."

(Times photographer Jeff Cook contributed to this report.)