Tick Tock Sheptock

Dearest Mayor Muriel Bowser: What I initially thought (as I wrote my Dec 20th post ) would be a five-post series of open letters to you and anyone who might do a Google search so as to judge your performance as mayor has turned into at least a seven-post series with the addition of the previous post about ICH communication and this one (which will have a portion that delves further into the communication issue). I also plan to write about: 1 -- the perception of hopelessness that Michelle Obama recently articulated , what it means for the poor and homeless and how people's perception of me and other advocates can play a role in forcing positive change, 2 -- a KRISTY GREENWALT timeline: what we/I hoped for both before and when her position was created by the council, how her relationship with myself and other advocates has (d)evolved, how you might "fix" her and how her replacement might improve upon her performance 3 -- how and why you might avoid or advance you...

Dearest Mayor Muriel Bowser: In my previous post I visited the matters of how DC's Inter-agency Council on Homelessness (ICH) grades its performance vs how the public perceives what the media says about homelessness and of what this could mean for your 2018 re-election bid (especially if the DC primary comes AFTER the mid-May article about the homeless census). To be sure, you know a thing or two about the way in which the general public understands what it is told by politicians and the media -- how that, no matter how accurately a politician, reporter (in some cases) or subject matter expert explains a matter, the truth is lost through several communication turnovers as people try to remember and regurgitate what they heard or read. Even so, Aristotle and others have written about the "wisdom of the crowd" -- the principle whereby numerous incorrect guesses (of things like the weight of an ox at a country fair) average out within a percentage point of the correct...

I'm proud to say that I was instrumental in reuniting a homeless woman and her daughter (now 30) who hadn't seen each other in 25 years. The daughter did a Google search which turned up her mother's name and mine in the same article. The daughter then contacted me by e-mail (as my personal/contact information is very easily found through a Google search). I connected her to the man who wrote the article and he completed the connection. Here is a blog post I did in 2009. JOE YOUNG, the reporter whose article started the process whereby MYRA DIGGS and her daughter were united last month (right before Christmas), asked me in 2009 to post his article on my blog. Little did I know that it would lead to this reunion of a mother and daughter who hadn't seen each other in 25 years..... Everything below this line was written (or copied and pasted) April 28th, 2009: The following is an article by Joe Young, a writer for the Washington Informer and Afro. It is part of a se...

Page 54 of the October 2008 issue of Hill Rag contains an article about DC Mayor Adrian Fenty which aptly describes what I know to be true about him. As he indicated during a meeting that he held with ONE DC ( a grassroots organizer)on October 8th, 2008, he can be headstrong and assertive. (I attended that meeting as a collaborator, though I am not a member of ONE DC.)However, what stood out to me was a certain consistency that I see in how one can get a meeting with the mayor. In order to help you to better understand what I am about to explain, I must take you back about 6 weeks and explain an earlier attempt to meet with the mayor. On August 19th, 2008, approximately 30 people -- homeless people, homeless advocates and supporters from local churches and the DC community at large -- did a walk-around at the Wilson Building (City Hall). It consisted of us going to the offices of the various city council members to present our cause: keeping Franklin Shelter open for the homeless ...

I am sorry to say that the Franklin situation has taken a turn for the worse in that 2 employees, James Rolle and Garland Caraway, have begun to perpetrate some bold-faced lies which are designed to create emnity between myself and the other Franklin residents and could lead to anyone who might believe them turning violent against me. I have published this post so as to let people know, just in case anything goes down. You can also help to correct their lies. This morning as I was leaving Franklin Shelter, Franklin staffer and Catholic Charities employee James Rolle started in on me by saying,"You know that you're the reason that they're closing this place?" Sitting beside him was the 500 lb. employee named Garland Caraway. (Garland was the one who tried to prevent Councilwoman Yvette Alexander from entering a government-owned building on 9/11 so as to see first-hand that the building is not nearly as decrepit as Mayor Fenty makes it out to be. He also told me th...

Mayor adrian Fenty avoided us like the plague for as long as he could. Those of us involved in the effort to save Franklin School Shelter thought we'd never get our chance to speak with the mayor about the issue. Then, about 2 dozen of us protested outside of his house on the evening of August 21st, 2008. He arrived a half hour or so after we did. He was visibly upset by our visit. However, he agreed to a meeting with a few of us. On Monday, August 25th, 4 homeless men met with the mayor and his director of the Dept. Human Services, Clarence Carter. They were myself, Skip Hawkins, Orlando Smith and D'juan Bean. The mayor had 2 others with him who were obviously not highly influential people. They both sat against the wall, while the 6 of us sat at the board room table. I had been informed prior to the meeting that the mayor might play with his cell phone or blackberry as a show of disinterest in the meeting. He actually didn't do that. We kept him engaged througho...

Councilwoman Carol Schwartz and Candidate Michael Brown spoke to a room of approximately 100 homeless men and 1 homeless woman this morning at the Father McKenna Center which feeds homeless men out of the basement of St. Aloysius church on North Capitol. This speaks volumes to the fact that DC homeless are being recognized and respected by their local government these days. After all, we work, pay taxes and vote too. Ms. Schwartz emphasized the fact that she wants to keep Franklin School open as a shelter, at least until better living arrangements are available to the residents. She also took some time to explain the complicated, if not crazy, way in which committees have been assigned to the various council members. For example, Carol Schwartz's Committee on Government Operations oversees the surplussing of public property. However, Councilman Kwame Brown's Committee on Economic Development oversees the disposition of public property. Therefore, you end up getting sent fr...

Many are they who could tell you of just how disenfranchised the homeless often feel. They often receive promises from politicians, especially during election season. All too often those promises are broken. Even the cabinet members that are appointed by elected officials tend to make and break promises. Then there is the shelter staff to deal with. Some have a genuine concern for the people that are placed under their care. Others couldn't care less about their homeless clients. Then again, there are the homeless advocates who care but have limited resources and influence. All-in-all, the homeless have good reason to feel disenfranchised and to assume that there is no way out of their predicament. I was a facilitator at a meeting which was held at One Judiciary Square on December 9th, 2006, by members of Mayor Fenty's transition team. The purpose of the meeting was to gather the concerns of the homeless community and take them to Mayor-elect Fenty. More than 80 homel...

This was my first ever blog post on June 21st 2008. I just added some hyperlinks on August 8th, 2014. Judging by the contents of this post, I'd say some things never change (or not by much anyway). ORIGINAL POST with hyperlinks added: On Thursday, June 12th, I attended the ICH meeting at the CCNV Shelter . During the first of 2 comment periods, I described the lack of effective communication between the homeless and DC Government. A colleague of mine asked me to type my words so that they can be published. I've obliged.My explanation went something like this: I attended the December 17th ICH hearing at the MLK Library. During that hearing, a man named Chris raised the idea of the homeless and DC Gov. sitting across the table from each other and having complete and comprehensive conversations. He mentioned how that the homeless come to meetings like this one or to the ICH hearings and voice their concerns. However they never get any answers to their questions or respons...