IndividualsForJustice 9/4/2013 Good morning to you members of the City Council, we come before you not to praise you but to demand that you finally do something positive about the people living on our streets. You know that last year we lost over 56 human beings who died alone waiting for some help. By the way, this is a low figure because it only reports people who actually died on the streets and not those who died in hospitals, on someone’s couch or in so many other places. You have before you six suggestions coming from a man who is homeless/houseless and seems to have caught your attention. These six recommendations are not written in stone, they should be seen as a blueprint to finally getting serious about achieving the worthy goal of ending homelessness/houselessness. We use the word houselessness because many can’t get into housing because of their credit background. Let me tell you a story of two guys who have enough money each month to sustain a dwelling but can’t get past the credit checks or regulations that allow apartment owners to charge money to check them out, refuse their application and keep their 40-50 dollars. If our assistance programs can’t get these two off the streets and into some type of livable unit, we don’t have a system, we have what I call a dog and pony show. It may help the politicians cut ribbons but has little impact on the problem of really doing something that will have a major impact on homelessness/houselessness. Just about every study I have read says you must put the homeless on any committee you set up to deal with this complicated problem. They have good ideas out there but you have to be present to hear them. Many people have come before you with suggestions, yet you still do not have a committee which includes the very people you are trying to serve. Please have one of your staff read the following report called, “The National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty” and would you look in the Executive Summary page 12 under recommendations: nlchp.org/content/pubs/11.14.11%20Criminalization%20Report%20&%20Advocacy%20Manual,%20FINAL1.pdf You should be able to see the first recommendation is to include members of the homeless population on the committee, but you refuse to do this basic thing. As long as we have 1600-2000 human beings being turned away because there is “No room at the Inn,” we should be outraged, and ashamed. Many of us stand ready to help, not just criticize, that is the worth of the six points brought to you today and other suggestions including Lightning’s noble fight to get the county to use the jail sitting empty as a place for centralized services. Wapato is now a monument to stupidity, but could be a model for creativity. Again there are many possibilities out there but you have to let the people in and listen to what they say. I will be over there each and every week to remind you that more have died and they could have been saved. Thank you for your time!
Posted on: Mon, 02 Sep 2013 18:58:54 +0000
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