ST. LOUIS (KMOV) -- It’s evident that times have changed: St. Louisians are losing their homes or living with family and friends. Some are living on the street. The economy is reshaping the face of the homeless.

(Vickie's Views: The American nightmare)

An example is Jeffrey Williams, who signed up to protect his country and returned home needing a protector.

Williams, 48, suffers from schizophrenia, diagnosed not long after he was honorably discharged from the military.

"I had trouble readjusting to civilian life,” he said.

When he returned home to St. Louis, he worked a series of jobs. His despair and chemical imbalance soothed only by alcohol and drugs: initially weed, then crack cocaine.

"It was like I lost all sense of direction, because all it ever made me do was want some more,” Williams said.

Williams’ appetite now is for even more stability. He has been sober for a year and lives in his own apartment. Ironically, from his new place he can see an old one -- the lobby of a building where he says he often spent the night high on drugs.

His change began at St. Patrick Center, a St. Louis-based organization that provides services to the homeless.

"I had no idea the center was this big. A lot of people don't. They think homelessness ... soup kitchen and shelter,” he said.

St. Patrick Center is where many of the homeless find help. Each arrives with a different story, but quite often there is a common cause: mental illness, drug abuse, veteran.

“Most people ... think homeless people are homeless because they want to be homeless. What we find is it's usually a lack of education. It's a lack of people holding expectations, asking them to achieve and giving them real opportunities to find that achievement,” St. Patrick Center CEO Dan Buck said.

Buck said a disproportionate number of the homeless is African-American. Across the United States, that number is 80 percent.

"Here in St. Louis City, the population ratios are higher, but we still look at 80 percent of homeless people. Eighty-four percent of people who come to us for help are African-Americans. What's wrong with that picture? We are failing a population, and sometimes it seems people don't really care,” he said.

Larry Rice, the director of the New Life Evangelistic Center, is a familiar voice for the homeless and is often criticized for his refusal to hide the homeless in a growing and revitalized downtown.

"One of the things that is really hard is that I have never before seen ... the war on poverty become the war on the impoverished like it is right now. Police officers (are) pulling over church groups handing out sandwiches,” Rice said.

At St. Patrick Center, Williams will learn computer skills and continue to build on the past few years of success while using his faith as an anchor.

"They say if you have to reach way down, Jesus can pick you up. I will honor and give grace to God. And I will keep struggling and stay clean and sober no matter what,” Williams said.