Tick Tock Sheptock

If we're going to get there anyway, we may as well get there in a GOOD way. All of us can relate to this scenario: Someone asks that another do something for them; gets turned down; gets upset and gets what they originally asked for. It's enough to make you wonder: Why didn't the latter person grant the request BEFORE the temper tantrum ??? Sadly, this scenario plays itself out time and time again in the relationship between government and the public they are supposed to be serving. Advocates for various causes have, in times past, developed detailed agendas that included stepping up the pressure on government if and when government failed to make good on the requests of the people immediately following the first time that a request was made. They then transition from making a request at a calm meeting with a few advocates and politicians present into staging large rallies or protests at which the advocates make demands to the politicians and might create bad pr...

Well, as has been the case for the past few months, I've been so busy going to meetings and pounding the pavement that I've not blogged regularly -- and when I do, I have a lot to say. And SHARC as a whole has been doing a lot. We've asserted ourselves in such a way that neither DC Government nor the council can ignore us and we've begun to "politicize homelessness" for this generation -- with the hope of finding lasting solutions. November 26th, 2012 was a good day for SHARC (Shelter, Housing And Respectful Change). We had a friendly visit with Councilman Jim Graham who has oversight of the Human Services Committee, asserted ourselves in the mayor's executive office and got word that a homeless service for which we'd sought a pardon has received a reprieve and will be kept open through hypothermia season (until 3/31/13) as opposed to closing on November 30th, 2012. Even the sharp e-mail exchange which I had with DC Mayor Vincent Gray 's chief...

In 2011 hundreds of homeless advocates and concerned citizens came out in force to demand that the DC Council find money to fill the gap for a $20.5 million budget shortfall in the Fiscal year 2012 homeless services budget. Had they not found it, DC's homeless community would only be guaranteed shelter for the five coldest months of the year. They found $17 million. This year the shortfall was only $7 million for FY 2013 which began October 1st but the same threat was presented along with a possible reduction in funding for feeding programs and transitional housing. It was determined in the last week of September that DC Government's tax revenue was $140 million above the projection. Additionally, the Dept. of Youth and Rehabilitative Services (DYRS) and the Dept. of Child and Family Services (DCFS) have underspent their budgets by a combined $36 million which leaves DC Government with at least $176 million to put in savings or reverse budget cuts. However, with the lingerin...

NOTE: Please read the blog entry below this one, as this is a follow-up to the previous blog post. The investigation into the death of a homeless veteran right outside of Washington, DC's New York Avenue Shelter continues. As if his wrongful death isn't sad enough, those who work for DC Government's Department of Human Services (DHS) and for the shelter have gone into "self-defense mode" and seem to be more intent on covering their tracks than they are on finding out the truth. Should we expect more? also of note is the fact that the homeless and homeless advocates are gathering facts about this case more quickly than the government. DHS is doing its own internal investigation. And we all know how those things go -- self-defense all the way. On a more positive note, I was able to get the name of the deceased. The man's name was Luther "Sarge" Hill and he was ex-military. It's always good to be able to refer to a person by name, as the system ...

Saturday, October 29th was a wet, cold miserable day in Washington, DC. There was a light rain throughout the day. It felt like the temperature was somewhere between 35 and 40 throughout the daylight hours, though I missed the forecast. We even got some snow that evening and had an even colder night. DC Law defines "hypothermia season" in two ways -- by date and by temperature. DC Government's Department of Human Services (DHS) is required by law to provide enough shelter for all people who present as homeless between November 1st and march 31st. However, if it freezes before or after that time frame(including the windchill factor), they must be prepared to provide shelter to all who are in need of it and are within the city limits at that time (regardless of whether or not that person claims to be a resident of the city). But on that fateful day in October, a homeless man in a wheelchair was denied shelter and died in the parking lot behind the shelter. I've yet ...

On March 11th, during the Human Services Budget Oversight Hearing, many people listened to the testimonies of 4 young mothers who were denied shelter during the winter right along with their little ones. Several of them told of how they were given bus tokens by those who are contracted with the city to provide shelter to families with children and were then told to ride the bus all night in order to stay warm. One mother told of how she gave birth on February 10th, left the hospital on the 12th and slept in the Greyhound Station or the stairwell of an unsecured apartment building with her baby for the entire first month of his life. On April 19th, during the ICH (Inter-agency Council on Homelessness) meeting, Fred Swan of DHS (the Dept. of Human Services) explained that the budget for Fiscal Year 2012 contained a $20.5 million budget shortfall for Homeless Services -- a line item that usually runs right around $60 million. During the pre-meeting he led an exercise that was designed t...

On Friday, March 11th, 2011 DC Councilman Jim Graham (Democrat -- Ward 1) held what would turn out to be one of the most heart-wrenching Human Services budget oversight hearings that I've ever attended. Stories were told of homeless mothers and their very young children being turned away from shelter with nowhere to go. One woman sat in the hearing with her month-old baby who has never slept in a crib or had a place to call home. Adding to the sadness that these stories invoke in and of themselves is the fact that this is happening in the capital of the wealthiest country on Earth, even as our government spends billions bailing out Wall Street and beginning unjust wars for which there is no end in sight. In Washington, DC the city council holds annual budget oversight hearings for each department of the government during which they hear testimony pertaining to the performance of each department over the past 12 months. Most of the 12 counncil members (not counting the council cha...

We all still have etched into our minds the vision of former president George W. Bush standing on a ship under a banner that reads,"Mission Accomplished". Seven years later, he is still mocked and ostracized for that speech as the Iraq War rages on. Then there is the photo of Bush flying over New Orleans and looking so distant as people suffered below. Thus, he continues to be talked about for his failures -- both foreign and domestic. Some would argue that he actually DID accomplish his mission in New Orleans by willfully ignoring people whom he considered to be second-class citizens who were unimportant. This raises questions about the mission of any and all modern-day U.S. presidents and members of Congress. As a self-proclaimed Theistic Marxist, I see crapitalism and its kissing cousin named corporatism as the causes of many of our nation's societal ills. that said, I firmly believe that the governments of our nation DO have an over-arching mission and that ea...

Vincent Gray visited the homeless in Franklin Square Park on August 28th, 2010 in an effort to get their votes and has since gotten mine. I voted early in DC's general election, casting my ballot on Thursday, October 21st (a process that took less than 10 minutes due to their not being a line). VOTE!!!!! In spite of me having voted for Vince Gray already, I am still quite uncertain as to what he'll do for homeless people here in the nation's capital, which begs the question: "Why, then, did I vote for him?????" Well, the short answer is that he's not Adrian Fenty. While that is definitely a good reason in and of itself, it is not wise to vote for someone only because you dislike their opponent. It is good to know what the person whom you voted for will do if elected. I must say that I also dislike former Democratic candidate Leo Alexander due to his stance on undocumented workers (illegal immigrants). I believe that everyone should have the right...

Well, election season is in full swing now. And though many people may be unaware, homeless people vote too, having won that right due to a myriad of court cases. A federal judge in Ohio has even ruled that a homeless person may list a park bench as their address when registering to vote. The National Coalition for the Homeless has its own bi-annual election campaign -- a campaign to get the homeless who have the right to vote to do so . But getting the homeless to vote isn't easy and keeping them engaged in the political process after the candidate of their choice has won the election and then failed to deliver on his or her promises is even harder, as this only adds to the feelings of disenfranchisement that many homeless already feel. Some of the homeless laid aside their feelings of doubt and despair in the fall of 2008 and decided to cast their ballots, many of them voting for Barack Obama who ran on a platform of "hope" and "change". They seemed to...

The Committee to Save Franklin Shelter will host a MEETING TO "RECALL" (OUST) DC MAYOR ADRIAN FENTY The citizens of Washington, DC have more than a few reasons to want Mayor Fenty to be FORCIBLY removed from office early. His litany of offenses includes: 1 -- the fact that he is a flip-flop who pretended to care for the poor and homeless and has now been bought and paid for by the developers. 2 -- the fact that he ran on a platform of transparency and accountability and now heads a government that is plagued with scandals and is extremely secretive. (The amount of money lost during his term due to scandals exceeds the amount of money that has been cut from social services within the same time frame. The government could afford to care for the poor if we could get these scandals under control.) 3 -- his many broken promises which include: the promise to keep Franklin School Shelter open as a shelter, the promise to open ...

There is my blog as well as other blogs about homeless issues. Then there are the frequent news clips about homelessness and the highly contested closure of the Franklin School Shelter. Then there is Michelle Obama's visit to Miriam's Kitchen, a homeless soup kitchen. All in all, the issue of homelessness is taking center stage. As if that weren't enough, there is proof positive that the image-conscious DC mayor Adrian Fenty is running scared. See the story below..... Michelle Obama visited Miriam's Kitchen, which feeds DC's homeless community breakfast and has other helpful programs, on Thursday, March 5th. Her visit, in and of itself, was reason enough for conversation. Nonetheless, the fact that she wasn't accompanied by the mayor is all the more reason for conversation. The homeless community is extremely disgruntled with the mayor. What's more is that they got the chance to speak to the first lady without him being there. He doesn't know what was sa...

I can't count the number of times that the homeless have asked me if I knew where they could get help finding a job. Some have advised me to ask the mayor for jobs for the homeless rather than shelter or housing. Then there are the ones who've suggested that they be allowed to work on an old, dilapidated government building and turn it into affordable housing. (This idea is known as "sweat equity" and has been shot down by the DC Council in the past.) Needless to say, the homeless are an industrious lot of people; but, there seems to be either a shortage of jobs or an inability on the part of DC Government and homeless service providers to connect people to the jobs that are out there. In the past I've even heard the DC Council discuss how employers often need to look outside of DC to find qualified employees due to many DC residents being unskilled. As chance should have it, Mayor Fenty recently visited the DC Jail to promote the Central Detention Facility Employ...

DC Mayor Adrian M. Fenty touted his Permanent Supportive Housing plan as justification for closing Franklin School Shelter (which was closed on Sept. 26th, 2008). He said that he would have AT LEAST 300 men placed in PSH prior to the shelter closure. He actually met that goal shortly AFTER closing Franklin. The date on which he met that goal is just a small matter insomuch as he DID meet it. He also promised a downtown, low-barrier men's shelter with 150 beds. Franklin had 300. That half-size shelter has yet to materialize. What is noteworthy is the fact that on September 3rd only 3 people had been housed. Less than a month later, that number stood at around 250. While it is laudible effort to house DC's homeless, the nascent housing program (which was only conceived in April, 2008) was not given enough time to blossom prior to the mayor closing another homeless shelter. Furthermore, the funding for the PSH program was slashed in November due to the economic downturn. Though it...

A close friend saved the Metro section from February 4th edition of the Washington Post and gave it to me several days later. She had marked a certain article that she knew would be of interest to me. It was an article about DC Mayor Adrian Fenty entitled,"Heavy Hitters Contributing To Fenty's reelection Bid". It explained that Mayor Fenty has developed close friendships with many wealthy people -- developers and lawyers alike. It said what many of DC's poor and underprivileged already knew, having learned it the hard way -- that Fenty doesn't really care for the poor or working class people of DC. In order to understand the full gravity of the situation, you must know what he did prior to becoming mayor. Just prior to becoming mayor, Adrian Fenty was the Ward 4 councilman. As the Ward 4 councilman, he was also the chairperson for the Committee on Human Services. (Most councilmembers, though they have their respective wards that they oversee, also have a citywide ...