Tick Tock Sheptock

You read the title properly. After having had many people suggest over the years that I run for mayor or for a council seat, I've finally decided to go for it. Since I don't care to argue with a dozen other council members and I prefer to be able to ram policies and bills through so we can actually get things done, I would only run for mayor. Since I began advocating for DC's homeless in mid-June 2006, I've critiqued all four mayors the city has had from my arrival in DC in the summer of 2005 and forward -- Tony Williams (1999-2007), Adrian Fenty (2007-2011), Vince Gray (2011-2015) and Muriel Bowser (2015-2019). It makes sense for any of them to challenge me to do better than them; but, none has done that. Even so, I'll make as though they did and show them how much better I can do as the only anti-gentrification mayor that the city has had since at least as fr back as 1999 when the late Marion Barry left that office. Who knows??? This may be the moment that God ...

************************************************************************ You read the title correctly.  My mother, Joanne Elizabeth  (Tedesco)  Sheptock and my Father, Rudolph Peter Sheptock, Sr  (who never changed "Sr" to "I" when my nephew was born),  raised 37 children.  They had seven biological children and  adopted 30 . My brother Jonathan (whose first name is my middle name) passed away in 2007 as my eldest sister Mary Grace sat beside him in the hospital. In addition to 36 surviving sons ad daughters,  my mother has at least 46 grandchildren, 11 grandchildren and many sons- and daughters-in-law  (me having asked most recently around Thanksgiving 2015). She spends her days keeping up with  over 100 people . Dad died on September 13th, 2000, with my older brother Robert having taken a leave of absence from his job at Shands Hospital in Gainesville, Florida to help care for Dad in his last days. It also helped that Mo...

Will she show STRENGTH during another major conflict in DC??? (1968 vs 2018) It might be her ONLY ticket to re-election. [P]oor people tend to stand up for their rights more readily after partaking in a war.  As was the case earlier today (August 14th, 2017), people often ask me how DC Mayor Muriel Bowser is doing when it comes to addressing homelessness -- a central piece of her political platform. I explain to them that she's doing something ; but, she's getting further and further behind the ball. If they have the appetite for a longer explanation, I explain to them that she now has to accomplish a net decrease of 2,500 homeless people per year through 2020 in order to meet the goal of her five-year plan; whereas, that number was 1,460 (or so) on October 1st, 2015 (the official start date of the plan). With me having more of a propensity than those who compile the data  concerning DC homelessness do to tease out all of the messages that those numbers hold, I...

A quick history of the ICH DC Government's  Inter-agency Council on Homelessness (ICH)  -- a group of dozens of government agency heads, homeless service providers and advocates -- was formed as a result of DC's  Homeless Services Reform Act (HSRA)  of 2005 which govern's the city's homeless services. In the fall of 2006 the ICH held four inaugural hearings at which an estimated total of 300 homeless people weighed in on what should be done to address homelessness. Many of their comments were recorded in  THIS DOCUMENT . In September 2013 I was one of several people who gave input concerning what the job description of the ICH's first ever director should be. In all honesty, I was hoping for a  benevolent dictator  who would put some fire under the tails of homeless service providers and move them quickly toward sensible solutions. With the ICH having held its first meeting in June 2006 when DC counted 6,157 homeless people, going down to ...

Republished under A DIFFERENT TITLE (and heavily edited)