DECATUR - Bill Sulicz, 52, had two reasons for joining a march and ceremony Thursday evening to mark National Homeless Persons' Memorial Day.

He has been homeless off and on since 1996, five years after he was forced to resign from a city job in another state. "My life has been disorganized ever since," he said.

He also wanted to remember Jerry, someone he used to see at the Oasis Day Center and, born in 1976, the youngest of 13 homeless people known to have died in Decatur in the past year.

Center Director Nancy Rude read their first names and gave their ages during a candlelight ceremony in Central Park, but Sulicz believes the message would have been stronger if she had also said how and why they died.

"It's like somebody's got to get run over by a car before they'll put in a traffic light," he said.

Organizers did just about everything else they could, however, to call attention to the plight of the homeless.

About two dozen people, escorted by Decatur police cars, stopped traffic as they marched from Oasis to the park, repeating a chant written by Mary Beth Moeller, administrative specialist for Homeward Bound.

"We are neighbors, you and I; hear our voices, hear our cry. We march today to bring to light; friends of ours no more in sight. Our message now we loudly send; homelessness today must end."

Numbering close to 40 by the time they gathered in Central Park, participants listened to Lore Baker, director of Homeward Bound, talk about how poor health leads to homelessness and vice versa.

"I'm very saddened we lost three clients in the past year," Baker said. "It sickens me to see people constantly pass away from things like diabetes and kidney failure - things that don't kill those of us who have health insurance."

Sally Kates of Urbana, downtown to do some Christmas shopping while visiting her sister in Decatur, decided to take part so she could remember a homeless man living in Champaign who died at Carle Foundation Hospital in September from injuries suffered in a fall.

"The homeless feel invisible," Kates said, "but they are significant people, and they all have a story."

Theresa Churchill can be reached at tchurchill@herald-review.com or 421-7978.