Thank You Secretary of State Brunner

Homeless Coalition Supports Firing of the Elections Board Members

The NEOCH staff and board have participated in observing the last two elections to make sure that homeless people were allowed to vote. We have done a great deal of work at all levels from registration to assisting people in voting. We absolutely support Secretary of State, Jennifer Brunner's decision to ask for the resignation of all the Cuyahoga County Board members of the Election's Board. They have repeatedly fallen down on the job, and failed to provide assurances to a fair and open voting process. They have allowed poor decisions by the administration of elections to stand. They themselves have made poor decisions as a board and allowed political implications to get in the way of confidence in voting. I cannot tell you how many times over the last five years the question of, "Will my vote even be counted?" comes up when we are doing voter registration drives. This was a question we rarely heard in mid 1990s, but now it is commonplace.
Here are a few reasons we feel that the Board should resign:

1. They should have cleaned house with all new leadership after all the problems in 2004.
2. They made a bad decision in picking the Diebold electronic voting system and not providing enough training for the workers in the 2006 election.
3. They did not stand up for Cuyahoga voters when Blackwell was sending out directives to keep voters away from the polls in 2006.
4. They did not take seriously the problems with the Board not following procedures when the two election workers were indicted last year.
5. They did not do enough to enforce the NEOCH vs. Blackwell lawsuit settlement in November 2006. Many precinct committee staff did not understand the settlement, and were never told about the settlement, so turned away voters without ID. Even staff sent from the main office were unaware of the settlement.
6. The Board members never provided any guidance on the role of the election observers in the 2006 election. This caused a conflict at the precinct that I monitored, and the Cleveland police had to be called to settle the dispute.
7. They provided no guidance on the privacy of the voter while they cast their vote. There is no directive from the Board about photographing voters as they are casting their vote, and the ability to cast a ballot without a cameraman filming. Many homeless people do not want to be photographed while they do anything including voting.

Overall, the Board members do not act in the best interest of voters and do not supervise the election in an effort to arrive at a fair outcomes. They have allowed partisan political considerations to taint their responsibility to the administering the signature act of our democracy. We applaud the Secretary of State for asking for the full Board's resignation, and we hope that the next Board will operate in a more open and honest manner, free of the problems of lines, cutting corners and delays in release of the results.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Guerrilla War on the Streets of America??

Images of Police in Virginia... A Threat to Democracy

The Coalition for the Homeless passed a resolution four years ago in opposition to the war. The NEOCH board at the time felt that without proper justification for the war, we could not justify spending $200 billion on a war with so many glaring domestic needs. Boy, did we underestimate the cost of the war in 2003. Over the weekend, we saw some alarming images from the Pentagon anti-war protests. All the images of police showed masked, heavily armed and body armored, storm trooper type men all with the words "State Police" and no other identifying marks. This frightening image should be illegal in the United States. The police surrounded the Pentagon with shields and gas masks and overwhelming force against a bunch of loud but non-violent demonstrators. Those that enforce the laws of the United States during an act of peaceful assembly against the government should have their faces visible and should be clearly identifiable with their names or badge numbers in big bold letters.

NEOCH has staged many demonstrations in the past, and we always had a far too many police officers babysitting us, but never any in riot gear. The issue is that anonymous police can easily venture into excessive force with peace of mind of any possibility of consequences. How do you complain about an officer hitting you with a night stick if there are 400 officers who all look the same in front of you? This is a sure sign of the growth of the police state when we see anonymous riot police defending government buildings during a protest.

There is no reason for the police to not be clearly identified except to protect themselves from individual accountability. It is not the case that police officers are targeted like in Mexico or Columbia by death squads. There is at most the possibility of minor vandalism from demonstrators, but Riot police are a threat to our democracy and the ability for "we the people" to exercise our rights to assemble, speak, and petition the government. We have seen plenty of video from Tacoma, Washington and San Francisco and many other places where police use excessive force on demonstrators and then chuckle about it afterwards. We need to take back control over the heavily armed police and make them subject to civilian oversight. Most of the time it is the police that cause the escalation in violence and not the demonstrators.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

NEOCH Annual Awards

Annual Meeting Held on the Ides of March

The Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless issued its Annual Report last night at Franklin Circle church. It will be available on our website in the near future. We elected our new Board for 2007-8, and gave details on our plans for 2007. The treasurer gave his report on the state of the NEOCH finances, and Teri' Horne did a summary of the activities undertaken over the last year. Finally, the Board elected a new executive committee for the Coalition. The most anticipated part of the Annual Meeting was the awards ceremony. There is no red carpet or band to play the winners off the stage, but it is nice to recognize people who have gone above and beyond the call of duty. In addition, NEOCH gave out one notice of condemnation to the City of Akron.

Joan Burda--Five Years of Service
We celebrated Joan's five years of service to NEOCH as the Director of Cleveland Homeless Legal Assistance Program. She has doubled the number of clinics operated by the CHLAP lawyers and is now working on establishing a pro se legal clinic on the near West Side. This facility would allow low income people to come in and print out their legal documents and file themselves court proceedings. She has served thousands of homeless people over the last five years, and the Board appreciates her dedication to the job.

Jim Schlecht--NEOCH Advocate of the Year
Jim is the outreach worker for Care Alliance, and has worked with homeless people for decades. He is also a noted peace activist and champion of those abused by capitalism. The Board proclamation cited his tireless service to protect fragile populations from the elements. They thanked him for his compassion and steadfast work for social justice in forwarding solutions. NEOCH recognizes Jim Schlecht's work to oversee the 2006 Housing Stand Down, and his work to develop a 24 hour drop-in center in presenting the Advocate of the Year award.

Bernadette Janes--NEOCH Volunteer of the Year
Bernadette volunteered with the Cosgrove Center and for the Coalition as a writer. She was recognized by the Board for her distinguished career assisting organizations throughout the community. The Board cited her countless hours working with the Homeless Grapevine in documenting the struggles that homeless people face everyday.

City of Akron--Roadblock to Progress 2006
The NEOCH Board condemned the City of Akron for their efforts to make it illegal to be poor within the city limits by passing the worst law against pan handling in the United States. For providing criminal backgrounds to the long list of barriers a person living in Akron must overcome if they fall on hard times, and for not forwarding solutions to homelessness were a few of the reasons cited by the Board in proclaiming the City of Akron as the Biggest Roadblock to Progress in 2006.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Plain Dealer Covers Homeless People

Homelessness in the Daily Paper

We have all read a great deal about homelessness over this last week. On Friday, The Plain Dealer had a very nice story about the Homeless Congress and the efforts to create some standards within the shelter system. How could homeless people want clean linens or a good meal? It took nearly three months to get consensus on the shelter standards that all those who came to the meeting could agree. It has been a very interesting process, and now the real work begins. We need to have the City Council pass this legislation as soon as possible with few changes. We need to bring some discipline to the shelters and establish a place to go to complain. Our next meeting is in two weeks, and then we move onto real solutions.

Today, there was an article about the identification program in The Plain Dealer that we helped to start a few years back. This is another one of the positive outcomes from the VISTA national service program at NEOCH that carries on long past those VISTAs having gone onto "real" jobs that pay "real" money. In the post-9/11 world it is very difficult to get a birth certificate from many states, and the costs have gone up all over the country. This program funded by the Cleveland Foundation and Fairview Lutheran Foundation sometimes is the key to someone getting a job or housing. There are some people who become homeless and only need a minor hand up and they are on their way to stability. Identification is the first step for every homeless person on their way back to an apartment.

Peace and Justice Forum...
NEOCH participated in the Catholic School's social justice forum at St. Ignatius on Friday 3/9/07 along with nearly every homeless service provider in the community. I was fortunate to be able to present along with Michelle and Greg, two formerly homeless people, to a group of students from all over Greater Cleveland. It is always hard to tell if the young people got it or not. Will one of these scholars be inspired to solve the problem of homelessness in Cleveland or even in America? It is hard to say, but it was a nice event.

To Quote or Not to Quote...
A journalist asked a question in the comments section that I thought I would address here. Anything in this blog can be used for publication as long as the proper attribution is made. We want this information to be in the community, debated and discussed.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Family Forum Reflection

Women Gather to Plead for More Attention

The Family Homeless Forum was not as well attended as we had hoped, but it was a wonderful forum with a four women doing a great presentation about their experiences. We prepared a good overview of family homelessness locally that will be on the website shortly. We intend to send the report to every elected official, foundation, and major religious institution in the area. Family homelessness is on the rise with 9,000 individuals from families who experience homelessness every year. Nearly one third of the total number of children in the Ohio school system who were homeless came from the Cleveland Public Schools last year. And the situation for families is only getting worse.

Federal policy has turned away from family homelessness, and this has caused great instability within the family shelters. Two of the 12 family shelters in the community are on the rocks and in danger of closing, and the waiting list for families getting into subsidized housing is 3-5 years. Michelle talked about how she had to wait for help because she did not have a drug problem and was not disabled. We heard from one woman about the lack of facilities for both Moms and Dads to stay together in the same shelter. One woman talked about having to make the decision to go back to an abuser, because she could not find any housing after a felony conviction. Sabrina talked about the horrible experiences within the shelters, and the fact that she had no where to turn for help.

The experience of homelessness is rough enough without prolonging that stay with silly and incorrect policies. In the past, we did everything, as a society, in our power to make sure that kids were protected from the most extreme forms of poverty. It seems that there are so many families suffering that we have just given up. We need local leadership to step forward, roll up their sleeves and begin to build more housing to keep families together.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Updates from the Coalition

The Latest Dispatch from the Homeless Coalition

Annual Meeting of the Coalition
We normally have a stuffy formal annual meeting, but this year the Board of the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless has decided the annual fundraiser from the Annual Meeting. So the 2006 Annual Meeting will be March 15, 2007 at Franklin Circle Church at 6 p.m. NEOCH will give out awards to the Advocate of the Year and Volunteer of the Year. We look at 2006 and ahead to 2007. Finally, NEOCH will elect a new board and present the 2006 Annual Report. We would love to have you join us for the Annual Meeting. It is free and we hope homeless people will be able to join the meeting. We are going to award a Roadblock of the Year to the person or organization that prevented the solving of homelessness in Northeast Ohio.

Media Wave Causes Stir
The Plain Dealer story two weeks ago with the headline about $22 million coming to Cleveland for homelessness always creates waves. It makes our meetings with homeless people difficult, because homeless people read the paper. They see a whole bunch of money coming to Cleveland and wonder why they eat pasta every night or why they cannot get housing. So, we get blamed for wasting funds or being incompetent for not solving homelessness with "all that money." We also get calls asking how they can set up a shelter so that they can get in on this federal gravy train. After I tried to convince the woman that called this week that this was not money for shelters and that public officials are not going to fund shelters anymore, she said, "I am not going to be deterred by anything you say, because God has told me to do this and I saw the article about the $22 million." There is no way to argue with God or money. Columbus only got $6 million, and they claim nearly the same number of homeless people, and so their providers are ticked off.

By dividing $22 million among the 20,000 people who are homeless every year, the funds only cover $1,100 per person who is homeless in Cleveland. 90% of the $22 million are just to keep the doors of the transitional shelters and the permanent housing programs open. Many of these funds are for very specific populations while the economically homeless have to find their own ways.

Aviation High School Has a Deadline
The main shelter in Cleveland, 2100 Lakeside, operates on the principle that anyone who comes to the door must be offered a bed. This has forced the shelter to operate an overflow facility at Aviation High School. This was a temporary solution that is now three years old. The federal government is not really happy with this solution with ex-cons, sexually based offenders, and an unknown group of people basically sleeping on the grounds of an airport. They have laid down the law--the overflow must close by November and there will be no further argument. This would seem to be plenty of time, but the County and City cannot agree and no one is talking to homeless people. This is going to go down to the wire, and the results are not going to be pretty.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Gentrification=Attacks on Poor People

Neighborhood Wars

Gentrification is insidious in that it slowly overtakes a neighborhood. It is feared by poor people, and spreads fear throughout the neighborhood. People start believing that all their problems within the neighborhood are caused by poor people. They start to believe that if they do not kick out the poor people their housing values will decrease and they will lose their nest egg or become homeless themselves. In Tremont, Ohio City and now starting in Detroit Shoreway there is this drive to "develop" the neighborhood. It is usually led by the neighborhood development corporation and by a small group who are single minded in their focus to improve property values. These are worthy goals, but it all falls down when the health of all income levels are not taken into account. There are many CDC directors who try to work with both low income and higher income households and the attempt to balance the needs of each. There are some who try to integrate the neighborhood and champion diversity. But a few who just let the developers go wild, and are hostile to poor people.

Some CDCs restrict access by non-profits who serve poor people out of a fear of attracting homeless and the downtrodden. They condemn and bulldoze property that is unsightly. They demand action by the City to make it illegal to be poor (panhandling, anti-"camping," and anti-feeding ordinances). They constantly chew the ear of the elected local official until the Councilperson finally breaks and forgets about their poorer constituents and follows the vision of the rich developers (potential campaign donors) to move away from affordable housing.

The results are:

• All the shelters get pushed to the "bad" parts of town away from bus lines, social services, and government offices.
• The innovative ideas like pay to stay places (non-profit flophouses) or sweat equity affordable housing co-ops or one stop service centers do not get tried.
• Land is left vacant or used as community garden/park space to avoid the development of affordable housing.
• It is harder to locate a place to live that is affordable to a person making service sector wages.
• When people fall out of their housing through eviction they fall all the way to shelter or the streets. There are no longer safety nets to catch people.
• Housing gets more expensive city wide because certain markets are shut off to people.

This is gentrification and the results of gentrification. The Center for Community Change does some work on gentrification. Also, the National Low Income Housing Coalition has some articles on NIMBY issues.

Brian

Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Homeless Dollars only Half the Story

HUD Announces $22 million to "End Homelessness," while Creating More Homeless People

The Bush Administration announced last week just under $22 million in funding for homeless programs in Cuyahoga County, championing an increase in funds nationally, but what is the rest of the story? Federal dollars have increased to homeless programs in order to renew, at the same cost, all the existing programs. For example, in Cuyahoga County of the $22 million given out on February 20, $18.5 million or 88% is to renew existing programs with no cost of living increases to these programs. That renewal burden has increased each year around the country, and has forced the Department of Housing and Urban Development to increase the dollars just to keep the existing services open and operational.

While HUD has had to keep homeless programs open with a larger dollar commitment, they have been conducting a full frontal assault on existing housing programs. Each year the HUD budget has proposed massive cuts to affordable housing, which only creates more homeless people showing up at the shelter doors. HUD has had no problems funding band aid solutions with shelters and expensive but limited housing programs, at the same time they have tried to eliminate their commitment to making housing affordable.

HUD’s Recent History of Reductions in Affordable Housing:

§ In the past two years, HUD has cut $3.3 Billion in funds to affordable housing.

§ They have devastated Public Housing programs including a 26% cut this last year. There has not been one new public housing unit developed for the past 10 years. Nationally, communities have actually lost 100,000 units of public housing in the last 10 years.

§ HUD has not developed one new non-elderly subsidized housing unit in Northeast Ohio for years.

§ The 2008 Budget requests cuts to the HUD Section 811 housing program for disabled people, and the HUD Section 202 housing program for the elderly.

§ The 2008 Budget request defers $20 Billion in public housing modernization until some unknown time in the future, and proposes another $415 million cut in public housing capital dollars.

I am asking all media when reporting the story of the small increase in funds going to homelessness mention the huge cuts to housing programs by HUD. While HUD champions their commitment to ending homelessness in 10 years, which happens to be two years after they leave office, they cut many of the mainstream programs that homeless people depend on to move into housing. One year of funding homeless programs in the United States is $1.4 billion dollars for the millions of homeless people in America, which compares to over $300 billion spent to fund the War in Iraq and a current $100 billion supplemental funding bill pending in Congress to support the war.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

The Meanest Guy in the State

Cincinnati Hates Homeless People

We don't get a lot of news from that geographically misplaced city of Cincinnati (should be located below the Mason Dixon), but here is a story that ran last week about a homeless sexually based offender trying to stay warm. Cincinnati politicians get elected by promising to get rid of poor people and the debates are between two candidates who attempt to be more hateful than the other guy. Here is an example:

Offender Sues for the Right to Shelter

A 57-year-old sex offender told a judge Friday that he might freeze to death because a state law bars him from a Cincinnati homeless shelter located near a school.

Larry Winslow, who has been homeless for five years, sued in U.S. District Court to block enforcement of the law so he can seek refuge at the Drop Inn Center in Over-the-Rhine.

The law he is challenging forbids convicted sex offenders from living in homes, apartments or shelters within 1,000 feet of schools or day-care centers.

"Mr. Winslow is struggling just to survive in the cold this winter," Winslow's attorney, David Singleton, wrote in the lawsuit. "He fears that he will die in the cold weather if he cannot get shelter."

The lawsuit says Winslow recently was diagnosed with walking pneumonia.

The suit is the latest challenge to Ohio's restrictions on sex offenders and where they may live.

Several suits have been filed in Cincinnati and around the state, but so far judges have deemed the law valid.

Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters, who is named in Winslow's lawsuit, said the law is constitutional. "I feel bad for him," he said of Winslow. "I know it's cold outside, but we have to enforce the law.

"There is no constitutional right to warmth."

Last year, Deters' office notified the Drop Inn Center that the shelter no longer could allow sex offenders to live there because the building is located within 1,000 feet of a school.

Winslow's lawyers could not be reached Friday, but the lawsuit says he was convicted of sexual battery in 1994 and 1996 in cases involving adult female prostitutes.

The suit states that he spends most nights on the streets and occasionally seeks refuge at the downtown Greyhound bus station. Usually, though, he is told to leave or face arrest, the lawsuit says.

"There is no rational basis to prohibit sex offenders from sleeping, at night, at a homeless shelter that happens to be within 1,000 feet of a school," the lawsuit says. "No child protection interest is served."

The suit asks Judge Sandra Beckwith to declare the law unconstitutional and to issue an order that would allow Winslow to immediately seek shelter at the Drop Inn Center.

Joe Deters was hounded by scandal out of state office then elected by the good people of Cincinnati to be the lead advocate for interpreting laws that he had trouble following while in the State Executive Branch. He said, "There is no constitutional right to warmth," which in the civilized world would be the end of your political career, but in Cincinnati is a campaign slogan for re-election. In other words, "I feel bad for him, but we are not responsible when he dies on the streets." That is a rough city to be homeless, and certainly one of the meanest cities in the United States toward poor people.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Creating Future Homeless

Walter Reed Hospital: A Nightmare for Returning Wounded

There is a fantastic story in the Wash. Post about the conditions at America's premiere Army Hospital. A Presidential backdrop for hundreds of photo opportunities while shaking wounded soldiers hands, comforting the sick, or passing out metals turns out to be a dump. There are horror stories about bureaucratic nightmare within Walter Reed Army Hospital that the soldiers have to go through to get services, Army officers are lost on a daily basis, and the requirement to cross the grounds in the cold on a daily basis for "formation" just seems cruel. It is a wonderful investigative piece that calls into question our commitment to the troops fighting in Iraq. These are the future homeless of America who are disenfranchised by the "system" and turn away from society. Right now, in Cleveland about one-third of the men's population of homeless people served in the military. We do not have many from the current war in Cleveland, but we do have vets from the first Iraq conflict and some older men from Vietnam.

Imagine enduring second and third tours of duty in the most dangerous country in the world, and then coming back to a dump of a hospital with mice, roaches and black mold. It is a slap in the face and if it were me I would see it as a visible sign that the country does not care. It certainly can mess with your head. Some of these individuals will certainly disappear and show up at local shelters. They are wounded by an insurgent fighting over a 1,000 year old dispute in a war fought for very unclear reasons, and after four years there is very little to show four our efforts, then the soldier returns to the states they must deal with deplorable conditions. If this is how they are treated right when the get back, how will a one-legged soldier be treated in ten or fifteen years? Veterans from the current war in Iraq are showing up at shelters in California and DC. I certainly hope that this negative coverage of this hospital will force the end to photo ops and red tape in order to assure quality care to those returning from the conflict in the Middle East.

Just for context, most homeless veterans in Cleveland spend some time at the Brecksville facility, which is a wonderful facility. It is clean and spacious. It has plenty of green space that gives the place a slower pace. It is a place to recover and regroup. It is no doubt one of the best places for homeless people in the region. I have heard a lot of negatives about the Wade Park hospital. The problems usually revolve around red tape and bad personnel not so much the facility. I certainly hope that the closing of the Brecksville facility will not move the Wade Park hospital to model itself after Walter Reed in Maryland.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Another Comment on Counting Homeless People

New York City Debates Counting Homeless People

On this cold snowy day, I made it to work. I made the mistake of taking Mayfield Road hill on Monday night home. Big Mistake!! It took one hour and twenty minutes to get from CSU to Cleveland Hts at 8 p.m.. Then this morning I took Cedar Hill, which actually did not have one drop of snow. It was the best plowed street in the City. I was amazed. Anyway...I made it. Someone called the office and asked why the media was not talking about homeless people on this snowy day. The simple answer is that I do not control the media, but I can tell you what goes on during these cold days for homeless people.

First, we are one of the only cities left in the United States that will accept anyone who comes to the door. We have two shelters that do not turn anyone away. Then in extreme weather conditions the shelters are supposed to not close. Normally, shelters ask their clients to leave during the day (to look for non-existent jobs or find housing that they cannot afford). Reminds me of the ancient Greek myth where Prometheus has his liver eaten everyday, but as an immortal it grows back and he starts all over again the next day. But I digress.

Anyway, the shelters keep people inside on extreme weather days. Also, during any natural disaster homeless people blend better into the mainstream. Everyone is struggling on days like today. Everyday is a struggle for homeless people, so they actually fair better on these days. The City will open the Community Centers and homeless people will use those as respite from the cold if they choose not to use the shelters. I have heard of some cities who try to exclude homeless people from disaster relief centers, but that does not happen in Cleveland. It can get overwhelming for the shelters that take anyone who comes to their door, and so there is quite a bit of communication between the shelters to exchange homeless people with a goal of keeping everyone safe and warm.

On another note... We have written about the futility of counting homeless people. One of the papers in New York City did a feature on this issue, and I thought one of the comments submitted by Picture the Homeless was interesting.

"Dear PTH Friends, Members, and Allies,

Ever since the NYC Department of Homeless Services first started its count of street homeless people, Picture the Homeless members have voiced significant concerns about *why* the city does the count, and how it plays into the stigmatization of the homeless and the focus on individuals and their "issues" instead of the systemic problems that create homelessness. This week's edition of City Limits contains a terrific response to the HOPE 2007 count from PTH elder statesman Jean Rice, incorporating the perspectives of several Picture the Homeless folks.

The text can be read here: (This is one link with no break)

http://www.citylimits.org/content/articles/
viewarticle.cfm?article_id=3267

A homeless "count" relies upon people "looking homeless" so they can be visually identified. Many people who are homeless go to great lengths to NOT appear homeless (whatever that is). Also, there is a fluidity to street homelessness that cannot be captured in one night, because during that one night of the count many people who are street homeless might be working, locked up (for BEING street homeless), or temporarily staying with friends and family. As a corollary, while the
average daily shelter population in 2005 [in New York City] was 33,687, in that same year 97,039 unique individuals accessed shelter. If the Administration put the same energy into counting abandoned buildings or irresponsible landlords citywide, and then implementing comprehensive policy solutions, they might not need to use law enforcement to make the street homeless population go down."--Picture the Homeless, New York City.

I could not say it any better. For comparison, the count in Cleveland found 2,000 people which is actually less then the number of shelter beds. Most experts believe that double that number is closer to reality on most days. The City estimates that there are 10,000 abandoned/vacant structures in Cleveland.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

The Toughest Job in the City

How Do Shelter Workers Keep Their Sanity??

We give the shelters a hard time, because we are a watchdog organization. We have to follow up on complaints from homeless people because no one else does, and nearly all have something to do with shelters. From problems with theft, curfews, and conflicts with staff are the complaints that come to us every week. Homeless people come to us for help and that makes many shelter providers uncomfortable. But over the last two weeks, providers have gone above and beyond. The stress of having over capacity for extended hours and for over two weeks is now getting critical. They all deserve a huge pat on the back, and a raise for performing in such tough conditions.

Now, with another five inches of snow predicted, we prolong the state of emergency. The shelter staff must figure out a way to keep the peace in very overcrowded conditions. They need to keep as many as 550 people from going stir crazy, and keeping all these people safe. There is a great deal of pressure to be responsible for so many with food, clean sheets, clean clothing, and a quiet place to sleep. They should all get awards for all they are doing behind the scenes. Unfortunately they never will, because they are only successful if nothing happens. Well, NEOCH staff and board congratulate everyone who is sticking it out working in the shelters during the winters in Cleveland. It takes a special person to be able to see all this human suffering every day and get up every morning to keep people safe.

Speaking of Hard Working Shelter Staff...
Lyle Draper of the Volunteers of America shelter is leaving next week for Re-Entry programming with VOA down in Mansfield. Lyle has been the director of the men's shelter over on Walton. He has kept the facility clean and has always been willing to help when homeless people needed assistance. Thanks Lyle for all your hard work, and good luck in your new job. We will miss you, and hope that the VOA finds someone as easy to work with to run the shelter.

After reading this post, I fear that one of the comments a homeless person told me might be true: I am getting soft? One of the members of the Homeless Congress insists that I, like Jesse Jackson, have lost my "heat." He tells me at almost every meeting that I am no longer willing to do whatever it takes. There is certainly worse people to be compared to then Jesse Jackson who I voted for in 1988 for President of the United States when he had some high "heat."

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

County Trust Fund

The Case for More Affordable Housing

NEOCH and the Cleveland Tenants Organization held its first meeting on the road to implementation of a County Trust Fund. We need a place to deposit funds to be reserved for the construction or preservation of housing. We have all heard of (and may have even voted) for trust fund kids. While trust fund kids have a derogatory connotation, a County Trust fund would go along way to moving people into housing. We have a team of young leaders working from Cleveland Bridge Builders on a plan for the development of a fund. The plan is to figure out the best revenue source for a housing trust fund. These funds would be locked away and reserved exclusively to build or renovate housing. They also have a goal of developing a strategy for building consensus around a campaign to create this fund.

What could this fund do for Cuyahoga County? The hope is to generate $6-$10 million per year for the development of housing. This fund could be used to:

• Repair elevators in senior buildings to keep these buildings from having to close.
• Provide $200 a month to a low income family trying to stay in their housing.
• Renovate housing for family with young children to remove the lead paint.
• Provide the 20% local match for HUD homeless/housing funds for the construction of new supportive housing project.
• Provide a piece of the funding for a place for men to pay a weekly rent while they get back on their feet in order to avoid having to go to shelter.
• Set up a sweat equity program for single men with skills to renovate abandoned housing that are eventually turned over to those men who helped to bring the housing back.
  
• Or the hundreds of other programs that would contribute to a reduction in homelessness.

This is a needed resource since both the Federal and State government have dropped the ball on the creation of affordable housing. But a new tax or an increase in taxes is always tough for the public to accept. If we can approve a sin tax for the arts then we should be able to figure out a way to pay for such life sustaining activity as housing.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

A Whole Bunch of Updates

Lots Going on in the Homeless Community

1. HUD Budget for 2007 Much Better
The federal budget that provides funds for most housing and homeless programs through the Department of Housing and Urban Development was left up in the air at the end of last year. The guidelines that were being debated would have devastated housing programs in Ohio including the loss of up to 70,000 housing vouchers, a 25% cut to public housing and a loss of an
additional 100,000 units of affordable housing. With the assistance of Toledo Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, the House passed a fair HUD budget to prevent the loss of housing and thus an increase in homelessness in America. If you talk to your Senator, please ask them to pass the House version of the HUD budget for 2007 next week. For more information go to the COHHIO website or the National Low Income Housing Coalition website.

2. Bridging the Gap Fundraiser
Bridging the Gap is hosting a special event at Johnny Mangos (3120 Bridge Ave. in Ohio City) on Monday February 12. Just print out the flyer from our website at the calendar (http://www.neoch.org/calendar.htm) and present that to the staff at Johnny Mangos. 20% of your bill will go to support Bridging the Gap housing program. Every dollar helps to move a family toward stability.

3. Homeless Stand Down Coming Soon
The Homeless Stand Down will take place at the Cleveland Convention Center on February 16, 2007. We still need items for our goodie bags including travel-size toothpaste, soap, lotion, conditioner, shampoo or toothbrushes, bandaids, combs, or bus passes. Those can be dropped at NEOCH anytime before the Stand Down.

4. NEOCH Annual Meeting
The NEOCH Annual meeting is no longer blended into our annual fundraiser. Our Annual Meeting will be March 15, 2006 after the evening meal at 6 pm. at Franklin Circle Church 1688 Fulton Rd. in Ohio City. We will have our Annual Report of activities, and mark the beginning of a new Board of Trustees. Please join us as we present a few awards to those who have advanced homelessness and set our goals for 2007-8. Please RSVP to NEOCH at 216/432-0540.

5. Check out the NEOCH website
The NEOCH website has been updated in January and there are many interesting items. We hope that you will regularly use this valuable resource. We have a copy of the Heading Home--City/County strategic plan around homelessness under statistics and strategies. We have a copy of a briefing for the City of Cleveland on the problems that they will have to deal with over the next five years regarding homelessness locally. We also have a new resource for families with children on local school contacts under "Homeless Kids."

6. County Housing Trust Fund Planning Meeting
For years, advocates have sought a local pool of money to build and preserve affordable housing. Columbus recently found a revenue source so why can't Cleveland? On Thursday February 8, 2007 at 3:30 pm. the Cleveland Tenants Organization and NEOCH will host a discussion on a plan to put a local County Trust Fund in place. All are welcome to attend in the
conference room of the NEOCH/CTO building. Please RSVP if you plan to attend to NEOCH at 432-0540.

7. The State of Family Homelessness in Cleveland Forum
We have more details on the Forum on Family Homelessness at this point. The forum is set for March 7, 2007 at 3:30 p.m. at Trinity Cathedral (East 22nd and Euclid Ave.) parking in the rear to talk about the state of homelessness for families. The issues include the instability of family
shelter budgets, the problems of oversight and protection of women from the fear of their children being reported to 696-KIDS, the break up of families in order to get into shelter, and the lack of shelter space for those fleeing a domestic violence situation. Please plan to attend and again RSVP to Sarah at NEOCH at 432-0540.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Third District Police Closing

Mayor Faces Hundreds of Angry Residents

I have to say that I was very skeptical about the closing of the Third District Police Station. Mostly, because we spent 12 years (which cooresponds to the number of years of the White Administration) in court suing the City over police conduct toward homeless people. We never got to see the inside of a court room settling all of these suits out of court, and there is no doubt that the police were responding to directives from the City of Cleveland. But we now have a Commander that we can talk to, and police that were trained to deal with fragile populations. We have two officers who act as liaisons to the homeless providers and have tried to relate to the homeless populations. So, I along with others were weary.

But, I listened to the Mayor for over three hours and I have to say I am convinced. This plan will be good for the whole City, and this is all based on factual information. I do not think that this will be good for homeless population, but for the whole City it is the only plan that would work. I stayed to ask a question about the transition plan, but the Mayor is leaving all those details to the Chief and to the Safety Director. The big fear is that they will just cast the current officers of the Third District to the wind and so all the relationships that were developed in certain neighbhorhoods will be lost. The Mayor was not budging on setting direction for placing officers in very specific neighborhoods that they are familiar. So, we will all have to wait and see.

The Mayor has amazing endurance to answer questions including, "Are you a dictatator or Why don't all your command staff including the Safety Director live in Cleveland?" He was very honest, and straight forward answering every question. He faced a very hostile audience who almost all were tied to the Third District building and the people inside that building. There was so much fear in the room that things would get worse. They were worried their businesses would suffer, property crimes would rise, and the fragile security that most people have will be lost with this plan. The most amazing aspect of the meeting were the relatively small number of African Americans who attended the meeting. Only one African American individual asked a question. I think that the Mayor did a good job of settling some of those concerns and promised to return in a year to look at the progress.

The police are way ticked off by the proposal. The FOP and Patrolman's Association are not happy at all. They want the issue to go to the voters. The Mayor did a good job in explaining that he was not going to debate this forever, and the buck stops with him. He said repeatedly that the "Proof is in the Pudding," and that if this does not work people would vote him out of office. The Third District officers do not want to be stuffed in a building on Chester Ave with no parking in a building that they believe are falling down. They implied that in the seventh most dangerous city in the United States that this will only exasserbate those issues. They worry that if a Code 1 call comes in and every car in the district that is available has to respond how will a zone car downtown get all the way across the river to Lorain Ave. in the new expanded Second District? The Mayor said that they are now going to be able to do reports from their cars so they will not be so tied to a certain building. They are also getting rid of the jails at the various districts and moving to central booking at the justice center. This would now become a County function.

The Councilmembers are not happy, and the Mayor made a very good point that he could just say the politically popular statement and then leave and do whatever he wanted. He knew that this is not popular for this neighborhood, but it is best for the City. He was clear that since he lives in the Third District it does have an impact on his life as well. The Mayor said that there were nine months for study and input, but now is the time to move forward. He said that the Chief read all the letters and took those into account and in fact responded to those concerns.

NEOCH is going to have weigh in on the transition plan to make sure that the current issues with homeless people are not lost. There is no doubt that we will be losing one of the Commanders and so it is unlikely that Third District Commander will be interacting with the shelters and homeless people in the future. The Downtown zone will now be part of the Second District, and they already have a Commander who is relatively new. This is a loss, but hopefully he will get an assignment to bring similar improvement to another section of the City. We will have to establish a relationship with a new Lieutenant who will be assigned to a new Downtown Safety Unit of 18 officers who will be assigned to the Central Business District.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Homeless Exploited and Helped

Two Interesting Homeless News Items

Cleveland Heights arrested two homeless people for passing bad checks according to the Plain Dealer. It seems that a group of criminals recruited homeless people to go to Wal-Mart to pass bad checks. People are always praying on this fragile population, and trolling the front of the shelters to basically enslave people for bad purposes. From the exploitative temporary labor agents who put people to work in the most difficult jobs and pay less than minimum wage, or the drug boys who employ homeless people as runners, or the men who patrol the women's shelters looking for women to become prostitutes. I saw the owner of Minute Men temp. services over at the bank the other day driving a Cadillac Escalade SUV with those spinning wheel rims, and was disgusted that he was making a nice living off the backs of mostly African American homeless people. Who says that slavery ended in America? Did you ever wonder why all the Minute Men staff enter in the Carnegie entrance and homeless people are fenced off and forced to enter the Cedar Road side? Reminds me of the slave entrance to the Master's house in the 1820's Deep South.

The other interesting story comes from Lorain County and the bloggers at Word of Mouth. Henery Hawk and his friends went out in the cold to a group of homeless people to provide a little help. Lorain County is a rough place for homeless people with the human services absolutely overwhelmed, very little advocacy activities, and a total disregard for the problem by elected officials. They really need help out there. NEOCH would love to try to put in place a strong network of advocates in Lorain County, but the providers are so overwhelmed that they can barely keep their head above the water. So, we salute Henery, Buck, Larry, and Brian (not me) for their efforts on such a cold day.

By the way, inspired by Word of Mouth, Wendell Robinson has decided to try to do something for others everyday and write about it. Here is his new blog. Sounds like a great idea for the rest of us to follow.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

A Day in the Life

The Highs and Lows of One Day at NEOCH

Started out the morning with a very sad case of a woman calling, because she cannot find her husband who has become homeless. They had a fire at their house, and her husband stopped taking his medication. Without his medicine he started down a path of paranoia and his severe mental illness came out. He lashed out at his wife. The husband told his family that his wife was abusing him. He left the house and she has not seen him. She was so worried and was crying looking for help.

The issue is that the shelters will not reveal if a person is at the shelter no matter who is calling or showing up. Unless the individual has a court order or has a release of information--patient/client relationship, the shelters will not give information away about any of their residents. We sent her a Street Card, and told her to hang up flyers or notes at the various shelters. We do not have a good system in Cuyahoga County for family reunification. NEOCH is trying to put together a people finder component of our website that would allow case workers and homeless people to see if there are people looking for them. This will take awhile to develop, but it is heartbreaking hearing these stories every day.

A better part of yesterday, was the Homeless Congress. We had over 32 homeless people from 9 different shelters in the community together to talk about issues. This is difficult to get a very angry population who are for the most part ignored by society to be on the same page. The membership constantly changes, and we have to do some trust building at every meeting. But they have some great suggestions and are beginning to work together. They are starting to realize that together they can make changes while separate they will forever live in shelters.

Then I got back to the office and found out that one of our former vendors was probated and on the loose. She had also gone off her medicine and had started self medicating with illegal drugs. The last time I saw her she was so different. She was a nice older woman who would remind you of Carol Burnett's character in the Mama's Family skits or that quiet older aunt who blends into the wallpaper if you saw her at a coffeeshop. After only a month or two away from her medicine, she looked nothing like her former self even her walk was different. She was angry and not taking care of her appearances or her hygiene. It was an amazing transformation, and now we have to decide on our responsibilities if she did show up at our office to her and to others.

Any non-profit has to spend a large amount of time on the mundane and the bureaucracy especially with government organizations. I have been going round and round with the State of Ohio over $400 that they claim they owe us to close out a grant. We do not agree, but spend so much staff time over such a small amount of money. Then we have the to deal with the best in 1984 style language ever thought up by agreeing to check the U.S. Department of Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control Specially Designated Nationals List or as it is commonly known the terrorism watch list for those helping to finance terrorists in order to receive any state funding. This is a 261 page document in alphabetical order that is not searchable of known terrorists and their aliases. How does any organization search this list to compare it to their own donors or their clients is beyond me? We have to sign a form that says we do not knowingly give or receive money from any of these people. Freddy Garcia is on the list, Teresa Gomez is on the list, and Oscar Hernandez also finds himself on the list. Then we also have to check the State Department list that was last updated in 2004.

If this is the best way we have of protecting against terrorists then we are all in deep trouble. With aliases, I am willing to bet that half of the players in Major League Baseball share a name with the people on the Treasury Department's Terrorism list. How is any agency supposed to search a 261 page pdf document of terrorists? Those that want to do harm to us must be laughing themselves to sleep every night that they have inflicted such fear in this country that non-profits are asked to comb through an alphabetical list of thousands of names of bad people to make sure the money we receive is "pure."

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Homeless Count Nearly Impossible

Go Behind the Numbers

Last week, the National Alliance to End Homelessness issued a report on the number of homeless people in the United States that received a great deal of media attention. First of all, the number is a dramatic under count. The media was not very accurate with the reporting of these numbers. Please check out the original report that does a good job of clarifying the statistics. The 744,000 number of homeless people in the United States is a one day figure. It is a HUD mandate for every community to count the number of homeless people in January. The National Alliance report was praised on the Department of Housing and Urban Development website. We all need to be very skeptical of any report praised by HUD--an agency which believes that it is a good idea to demand every community in the United States focus resources on single, disabled homeless people who have long periods of homelessness even if there is no one in that town that fits that description.

All the people living in abandoned properties are not counted. Cities like Cleveland (with almost 10,000 abandoned units) and Detroit, and Pittsburgh have a huge barrier to an accurate count. The last count from Cleveland barely got to the number of shelter beds in the County. As an aside virtually every shelter bed in the County is full every night of the year. The private shelters like City Mission and St. Herman's and the hundreds of others in the country do not report either. Figuring out the best times to count is also nearly impossible. How would you like if the Census showed up at 5 a.m and burst in your bedroom to count the number of residents in your house? Speaking of the Census, they have a hard time counting people who live in housing with wide spread reports of undercounts in most cities. And yet HUD thinks that they can do better at counting people than an agency constituted only to count people? HUD has the other obstacle of trying to count a migratory population that does not have a fixed place to live.

As you can tell, NEOCH does not participate in the counting of homeless people. I can see nothing useful in the exercise. I firmly believe that it is a means to cut all of our funding. I believe that HUD will eventually say that there so few homeless people counted that we do not deserve all the funding that we are getting or one city is doing a bad job of counting and that city will be punished with fewer dollars. I also have an issue that in the richest country in the history of the world we send a team out to go to where homeless people live and just count them. Even by giving out some token gift seems somehow inappropriate. Finally, in the end, no matter how rigid the standards there will always be an undercount.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Family Shelter Sanctioned by County

East Side Catholic Shelter Cannot Apply for Federal Dollars

In the first unanimous vote of the Office of Homeless Advisory in a very, very long time, East Side Catholic was sanctioned for continued administrative problems. NEOCH has tried to get into the shelter to talk to the residents, but we have not been successful. We have also written about the problems in the shelter for four years in the Grapevine. The County Review Team recommended this sanction after two and half years of working with the group. The proposal that passed the OHS advisory was:

1. The current East Side Catholic budget (2005 Federal Dollars) would receive extra scrutiny by the County.
2. If HUD grants money from their 2006 application, the shelter will not be allowed to accept the funds unless they go under the umbrella of another organization. So, an outside entity would have to manage their budget and administration or the County would not release the 2006 federal funding.
3. East Side Catholic would not be allowed to apply for funds in 2007 through the Federal Continuum of Care funding.

This all takes place when East Side Catholic was just awarded Ohio Emergency Shelter dollars. Those funds seem impossible for a group to not receive once they are granted funding. I have seen programs that no longer even serve homeless people still receive an Emergency Shelter grant from the State of Ohio. We certainly hope the new Governor will look at this policy.

We absolutely support this move by the County and feel that it is long overdue. The letter that the County sent should have been more severe with demand language not "recommend-type" language. Ruth Gillett who runs OHS is just too nice, except when it comes to NEOCH. The County is clear in trying to preserve the shelter and not lose the shelter beds. They also made sure that the funding is not lost from the Federal government. The outstanding issue is how this will impact East Side Catholic's other programs especially CMHA's Miracle Village and their recovery programs. How will these other programs survive with the agency under County sanction?

NEOCH is going to host a family homeless conference in March to talk about these issues with religious organizations to discuss these and other issues facing women with children in our community.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

New Era for Building and Housing?

Ed Rybka Attends Affordable Housing Meeting

To mark the one year anniversary of his appointment to the post as Director of the City of Cleveland Department of Building and Housing, Ed Rybka attended the Cuyahoga Affordable Housing Alliance meeting. CAHA is a place that public agencies (HUD, City, CMHA and County) meet with advocates, landlords, and social service providers to report on potential threats to affordable housing in our community. This meeting is the first Monday of every month (unless there is a holiday) at the local HUD office. This week, Ed Rybka joined us to report on his term at Building and Housing. As most are aware, there was a scathing report issued about the department. Rybka was very honest and straight forward about the problems and the fact that there are no additional resources to fix the problems within the Department.

He said that there is a great deal of institutional bureaucracy that needs changed. The biggest was the old way the Department responded to problems: complaints. Everyone in Cleveland knew that by calling your Council member or the Mayor's action line you got results. This allowed major eyesores that were not a problem to neighbors to go without oversight for years. This has changed in the last year. Now, all the departments focus on a certain neighborhood together and then move on together. Every neighborhood gets a visit every 30 days. The department has prioritized the worst abandoned properties (220) and is working on that list. They still respond to health and safety reports on an emergency basis, but not a complaint over a falling downspout to the Mayor's office.

Rybka said that they now have a database of 2,000 abandoned properties, but he suspects that there could be as many as 10,000. He also has set up a partnership with the County Senior and Adult Services to get help for seniors who cannot manage their house. His inspectors rarely come across homeless squatters--go out at night and that will change. He wants to start demolishing more buildings that are hazards. Right now they do 175 to 220 a year. He still has a lot of work, but he is trying to work through some of the issues in the report on department inefficiencies.

Brian Davis
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Condo Hell

Moratorium on Condos Until All Housed

While searching for articles on homelessness via Google News, I stumbled upon this beauty from the Washington Post:

"Million Dollar Condos to Be Built Above Church Serving Homeless."

I congratulate the fact that building luxury condos is an attempt to create a mixed neighborhood. Instead of being secluded in the suburbs, they are built amidst poverty with no intent to keep their residents' eyes hidden from the realities of an urban area. It sounds like a good attempt at creating a melting pot neighborhood.

But this isn't Sesame Street. I highly doubt that owners of $400k 1 bedroom condos have chosen their location so they can mingle with the homeless folks sleeping at their curb. In fact, I doubt any homeless people would be allowed within 100 ft of their million-dollar developments. The problem is this: there is a place for luxury condos and we need to realize that. But that place isn't everywhere. What developers have failed to realize is that WE DON'T NEED SO MANY LUXURY CONDOS, whether it be in DC or here in Cleveland. We're poor. We have loads of people without homes. What we need is safe, decent, affordable housing. We need more public and subsidized housing. We need more mixed-income housing units. We need more housing priced below $100k that is decent (no-frills). We need safe homes for families--who make up the fastest growing population of people that are homeless.

The Homeless Congress, a politically active group of homeless people representing different shelters, has it all figured out-- we could create jobs and housing by having people renovate old, abandoned buildings into affordable homes.

Condos will not make a neighborhood. Look at both Tremont and Ohio City. Sure they've been yuppie-fied, which some people see as a good thing. But it's a strange mix of the wealthy "urban hipsters" and the original poor residents who are continuously being pushed out. Enough pushing. We need to solve the problem.

In the Washington Post article, a managing broker for a real estate firm had this to say, "You don't need the soup kitchen to make it a tough sell. It's a tough sell because it's a condo, and if there's anything we need less of now, it's condos. It's like overkill."

How about building homes that our city's residents can actually have access to?

Sarah V.
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Emperor or President??

No Mail To Honor Gerald Ford--Really?

I firmly believe that George Washington would roll over in his grave if he saw the spectacle of the Gerald Ford State Funeral. Those founding Presidents were so concerned that they did not want the appearance of anything regal or any sign of royalty associated with their presidency. Washington stepped down after two terms to show that in a functioning democracy there could be a smooth transition of government. He founded the Executive Branch of government on the principle of being first among equals with humility and without all the ceremony of England. He resigned his miliary credentials so as not to appear to be a dictator, and scolded his modest staff over the appearance of any sigsn of an imperial leadership. We have gone very far away from those humble beginnings.

I can understand a state funeral for a President killed in office, but Ford was not even elected. He was appointed to the position in the grand tradition of assuming the throne of a Monarchy. He pardoned a criminal before Nixon was even charged. I do not understand why Ford or any President deserves all this ceremony. Why shut down the government when the first among equals dies? The President is so distant from the rest of us that they have become royalty without the crown. We would all benefit greatly if humility was brought back to government. Can a humble person who would reject a state funeral ever be elected President of the United States again?

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Christmas Card to the President

Everything Changed and Yet Nothing Has Changed

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Bush:

I was going to write this snarky fake card to you, because I was very angry that you were taking time off for the holidays, while we are responsible for destroying a country in the Middle East and not rebuilding a city in the Mississippi Delta. I was going to write a backhanded piece praising you both for being able to stay above it all, while everything seems to be crumbling around you. So, I started thinking about how we keep being told that everything changed on September 11, 2001, and that is the singular reason for the decisions made over the last five years. But it all does not square with reality. My world changed and the world around me changed, but my government did not change. You would be in exactly the same place as you are now with or without the 2001 terrorist attacks. Everything changed in my life, but nothing seemed to change in your life.

I firmly believe that we would still have invaded Iraq, because in the end they really had nothing to do with the attack on the United States. We could not change the weather, and so the hurricane would have still wiped out New Orleans and Brownie would still have been in the office responsible for preventing the death and chaos. The devastation of New Orleans changed me, but I don't think that it changed you. The destruction wrought on this country by Cheney and Rumsfield will reverberate down to my children's children, but the two neo-conservatives advocated extreme positions before 9/11/01. Cheney and Rummy will be producing homeless veterans long after they are gone, thus guaranteeing another generation will deal with injured war vets sleeping on Superior Ave. and nursing wounds they received in a distant land.

The problem is that I believe that you would have tried to invade our privacy much like Richard Nixon did with or without the World Trade Center attacks. Because, hell, many in your administration are long ago "fighters of freedom" from the Nixon/Ford era. Everything in my world changed, but you received a whipping boy to justify all the changes you have brought to this country. I have an extra hour to get on an airplane, you got a Congress that did not question you on anything. I never get to hear from the Islamic Center of Cleveland anymore, and you got the power to detain U.S. citizens without charge forever. I have to contend with the reality that not one subsidized housing building has been re-constructed in one of the oldest cities in North America because federal funding priorities are on one of the oldest cities on the planet.

I believe that the compassionate conservatism stuff was a way to get elected, and you would have not followed up on it with or without those suicide bombers from the Middle East. Mr. and Mrs. Bush you would have treated the media with disdain and scorn with or without the alleged "war on terror." You would have rejected real engagement with Americans opposed to your policies with or without Michael Moore. You would have swift boated honorable men who willingly served their country just to get elected and you still would have told America that if the Democrats win then our enemies win even if Osama Bin Laden had not become public enemy number one. I am now more suspicious of government and especially the Justice Department because they have the power to spy on me, hold me without charge, and even torture me without consequence, and you still go about the routine of government by pardoning one turkey a year, making a video in which your dog talks, and playing t-ball on the White House grounds.

I was never asked to sacrifice. I turned around for a minute to grieve and when I looked up the Bill of Rights was much different. It looked a lot like that redacted opinion piece in the New York Times the other day with black lines covering parts. The first year after the attacks, in fact, I got $600 back from you in a check. I don't know if I thanked you for that by the way, but I had no idea the strings that were attached to that refund. I don't know if others feel this way because the television shows are the same, the news has the same detached stories centering around celebrity, scandal and blood. My world has changed so much in the last five years it is hard to keep up with everything that has reduced my security, freedom and liberty. I know that before an Arab population attacked our country, we had big problems with the sons and daughters of slaves. Today, we have big problems with every minority group that is not lily white, and the sons and daughters of slaves are now incarcerated at unbelievable levels.

This is all unsustainable. I would not patronize you with the words of your predecessors like a "House divided..." or "The death-knell of the republic had rung..." or "We shall pay any price, bear any burden..." but it just seems like you have cast off all those noble ideas of 230 years and used them as Animal Farm style slogans. I know that you are a decisive personality and you see reflection and re-evaluation as a sign of weakness. But I also know that you love this country and have deep seated and long family loyalty to the United States. Please, I ask you in the new year to change direction to keep this country together. Family and friends of Veswald Hall, firefighter Dana Hannon and Elena Ledesma who all died in the World Trade Center had their world forever changed, and they need you to show us a new direction. You have nothing to lose, but my children have everything to lose if we don't heal some of these deep wounds opened.

Sincerely,
Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Out of Reach Report Out-HUD Funds Not

New Report Shows Need for $11.21 per hour job to Afford Housing in Cleveland

The National Low Income Housing Coalition "Out of Reach" Report came out earlier this month. It shows us with detailed numbers why homelessness is on the rise in America. With a severe shortage of housing that is subsidized by the federal government, it is very difficult for many to keep their housing when rents keep increasing. The new report shows that an individual must make $11.21 per hour in order to afford a one bedroom apartment in Cleveland. The increase in the minimum wage will allow lower income people to take 20 hours off their work week and still be able to afford housing in Ohio. A renter looking for an apartment with two bedrooms must work 79 hours making minimum wage in 2007 in Cleveland in order to afford the fair market rent. In 2006, that same individual had to work 105 hours in order to afford rent in Cleveland. Thanks to the voters of Ohio those making minimum wage will only have to work two full times jobs instead of 2.5 jobs.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development says that an individual should only spend 30% of their income on rent in order for it to be affordable. The Fair Market Rent in Cleveland for a one-bedroom is $583 or a two bedroom apartment $702. To afford the Fair Market Rent an individual must make $23,320 a year for a one bedroom or $28,080 for a two bedroom. It is slightly less in the State of Ohio with $20,606 a year for a one bedroom and an individual must make $25,596 per year to afford rent in Ohio. This translates to $9.91 per hour for a one bedroom in Ohio or $11.21 per hour for a one bedroom in Cleveland.

The worst part of this study is the Mission Impossible we have assigned to those with a disability in Ohio. We actually have a rather low Fair Market Rent compared to some parts of the country, but it is a high hurdle to find an affordable place to live with only a disability check. These individuals must find an apartment with a rent of $181 per month in the State or pay nearly all their monthly SSI check in an apartment at the traditional market rate. This is a fragile population that needs our help instead we give them $603 a month and send them out on a journey to survive on just enough money to pay the rent. I would like to see Tom Cruise try his hand at this Impossible Mission and keep his sanity.

HUD Does Not Release Funding for Homeless Programs

Right around Christmas for the past eight or ten years, HUD has released funds for all the shelters, transitional facilities, and supportive housing programs to get the positive press of December homeless stories. They give out money to ride the wave of late November/December inevitable holiday stories (see Plain Dealer Holiday Spirit) when the media suddenly remembers that there are homeless people among us. The Feds give away $1 Billion to 1.5 Billion dollars in December every year with most of that money renewing the budgets of the existing shelters in the United States.

Congress did not pass the HUD budget, and this made it impossible to get that positive publicity of releasing their Continuum of Care funds near Christmas. I have no idea how they are going to approve the shelter/homeless programs' budgets if the government runs out of money in February. Will they wait until the new Congress passes a 2007 budget? Will they approve a small partial year budget? Will they renew only some of the programs? We all wonder what will happen with the HUD budget. Maybe the media will realize that there are homeless people all year if the budget issue is resolved in February and HUD announces the release of funds at that time, but will the shelters be able to hold on during this delay?

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Free Times Article on Homelessness

"Far From Home" Points Fingers at Everyone Else

There is a good story in today's Free Times about homelessness. I wrote a letter to the editor commenting on the article that I hope will be published. I won't duplicate my thoughts from the letter here in this blog in hopes that my letter will be published. I did like the article written by Charu Gupta even though I come off looking like a bully. I think that it raises some great issues that need addressed--(not if I am a bully or not). I hope that this lights a fire under the County to actually begin to make progress. Two cities in the United States (Denver and St. Paul) have actually made progress in reducing homelessness despite the horrible federal environment. The federal government has made bad decisions and prioritized certain populations over others in a misguided and misinformed strategy to "end" homelessness somewhere over the rainbow.

I still believe that it would be best for all that Ruth Gillett move on into some other area of County government. I believe that we need fresh ideas and a new perspective. We need bold strategies involving some pain among local social services to transform themselves to meet current needs. We can no longer keep protecting the status quo and diligently following federal policies without objection. We need a new direction, which will actually lead to a reduction in the number of homeless people. Most of all, we need government to start listening to homeless people who are in fact the experts. We need homeless people at the table and we need to treat them as equals not a sideshow. I will have more to say on the issues raised in the Free Times article over the next couple of weeks.

By the way, the new Grapevine is out and on the streets. It is bright red and would look great under the tree. Buy it from your favorite Grapevine vendor at the West Side Market.

Brian "Not a Bully" Davis
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Exceptional Washington Post Story

Redefining Dad Missed A Few Problems

The Washington Post has featured a series on being a Black Man over the last couple of months with today a very good story about Redefining Dad. There were a lot of items that were left out of the story that all Dads face today. For Dads that do not have custody of their kids it is very rough to remain a part of their child's life. The child support system is unfair to the non-custodial parent--usually the Dad.

• They get no credit for gifts or other items provided to their family. Everything must go through the state system, which is hard for a parent.
  
• They pay and pay and pay, but the custodial parent controls all visits and all contact. The courts make it very difficult for Dads to participate with their children especially if they are struggling with housing or a job.
  
• The system puts the Dad into debt and if the mother accepts public money there is no chance that the Dad can have that debt reduced by the court. In fact, the Dad can be in debt for decades after their child has reached adulthood.
  
• It takes a very long time to get a support order revised if the Dad loses their job or is their salary is cut back. During all this time that they are trying to get their support order adjusted they must pay the full amount. This can quickly lead to debt that they will never be able to pay back.
  
• If the custodial parent is struggling, the Dad must move a mountain in order to get the custodial agreement re-visited. The health and welfare of the child or the ability of the child to prosper does not seem to be the concern of the court or the child support system administrators.
  

It is so discouraging for a Dad who for the most part want to do the right thing. I see plenty of Dads who want to help and be part of the life of their kids, but it is killing them. They often give up because of the debt issues and the futility of working and never being able to find stability. Politicians will not touch this issue with a 10 foot poll for fear of being tagged as supporting "dead beat Dads." Many men do not realize how quickly their debt can spiral out of control over their outstanding child support obligations. Someone needs to address these issues if Dad is going to be "redefined."

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Homeless Vigil on Thursday

The First Mayor to Attend Homeless Memorial Day

This Thursday December 21, 2006 at 5 p.m at Franklin Circle Church will be the first time in the last 20 years that a Mayor of Cleveland has attended the Homeless Memorial Day. The Coalition has organized the Candlelight Vigil for 20 years even before NEOCH existed as a Coalition. Never before has the Mayor attended the vigil to remember those who passed away over the previous year and were homeless. The previous Mayors were either at war with the Coalition, not interested or too busy. Jane Campbell attended when she was a state representative and Frank Jackson attended in his first year as Council President.

This year will be the first year that the Mayor of Cleveland attends. We will have an inter-religious ceremony, a few comments from Mayor Frank Jackson and then read the names of all those individuals we found who were homeless and passed away. We invite those in attendance to mention any other people they know who died over the last year. Everyone is welcome to attend the event. Franklin Circle Church is at 1688 Fulton Rd. near Lutheran Hospital.

In addition, we are told by State Representative Michael Skindell that the State is on the verge of proclaiming December 21 as Ohio Homeless Memorial Day. Skindell was the speaker last year and was so moved by the ceremony that he wanted the State of Ohio to recognize the day.

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Public Square: A Storm on the Horizon?

A Survey of the Number Sleeping Outside

Every year during the Thanksgiving weekend, NEOCH staff walk downtown to count the number of people who choose to sleep outside. This has two purposes: the first is to make sure that there is no harassment of homeless people in keeping with the Key vs. City of Cleveland legal agreement. In 2000, NEOCH signed an agreement with the City to stop police officers, under the direction of the Mayor, from confronting homeless people and telling them that they could not sleep on the public spaces. We signed an agreement after filing a lawsuit, which prevented police from arresting or threatening arrest of homeless people for purely innocent behavior of sitting, sleeping, standing or eating on the sidewalk. So every year we walk downtown and make sure that the agreement is in place and their is no violation. Cleveland is one of the only cities with such an agreement with homeless people, and so NEOCH staff go out to test this agreement every year. The other purpose is to count the number of people who reject the shelters during the year and look at the extent of the problem. The holiday weekend is a good baseline, because it is the smallest number that will be out for the entire year. Many family members take their relatives in for Thanksgiving while others stay in the shelters to participate in the large number of meals served during the holidays.

This year, we learned a few things on a very pleasant holiday weekend. By the way, the weather has very little impact on the number of people sleeping outside anymore. The people who reject the shelters have an extensive plan for survival with blankets, plastic and even tents. This year we saw 40 people sleeping downtown up from 27 last year--more than a 60% increase. We did not see as many people on Public Square, but saw many around the Square in various places. We saw more people in out-of-the-way locations. We walked on every street from East 20th to West 3rd from the Lake back to Carnegie Ave. to Jacobs Field. Unlike last year, we did not see anyone who was not prepared for the cold. Last year, we found a guy with no gloves, no blanket and a very thin coat lying on the sidewalk in a high traffic area. We have almost reached the number of people sleeping outside that we saw before the men's shelter opened at 2100 Lakeside.

Why are people rejecting the shelters for outside? Some do not like the rules in shelter or find it too demeaning to ask for help. Some have gotten fed up with the wait or the lack of progress in the shelters and give up. That number seems to go up every year. Only a few gave up in the first few years, but now as many as 40 people are giving up on shelters for the streets. Some don't like to be near people, others don't like the problems with theft and some just don't like the smell of being around a hundred other people. In those cold nights of Cleveland with the wind blowing off the lake, there are more than 40 people who find the streets of Cleveland more attractive than the shelters. Think about that as you shovel the snow or clear off your car this holiday season.

I think that we are going to have issues with Public Square in the near future. We did get a complaint from a homeless guy about police urging people to leave the Square. We are following up on these concerns. The Downtown businesses who have now taxed themselves to keep the sidewalks clean are not going to tolerate people sleeping on those clean sidewalks. They are all paying a pretty penny for those clean up crews, and then to have people sleeping on the sidewalk messes up their entire business plan. It seems like the two interests iof homeless people and corporate are headed for conflict. I hope that this can be resolved peacefully with the City asking the corporate community to calm down and help with real solutions instead of law enforcement activities.

A history of the Thanksgiving walk by the Coalition:
2006: 40 people sleeping outside Downtown
2005: 27 people sleeping outside Downtown
2004: 19 people sleeping outside Downtown
2003: 11 people sleeping outside Downtown
2002: 9 people sleeping outside Downtown
2001: 6 people sleeping outside Downtown
2000: 3-5 people sleeping outside Downtown*
*This is the first year that 2100 Lakeside is in operation.
1999: 42 people sleeping outside Downtown
1998: 60 people sleeping outside Downtown

Brian
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.

Doing the Most Good?

Is the Salvation Army Dissing All the Rest of Us?

First, there is another good discussion at Ohio2006 about the Voting ID lawsuit. Please check it out including the comments from one of the PD reporters.

Second, what is with the Salvation Army's new motto: "Doing the Most Good?" Is this some kind of slam against all the rest of the non-profit organizations? If they are doing the "most" good, then what is the Coalition for the Homeless or the Red Cross or Y-Haven doing? Is the good we do not worthy compared to their "most good?" Are they challenging all the rest of us? Does this have something to do with their faith that I just do not understand? What does it mean? It seems like those "#1 Dad" shirts that were featured in that Seinfeld episode. There is not a lot of room for others when you declare yourself "the most" of anything. If they are doing the "most good" then we can just go out of business, and step aside so we do not prevent them from doing so much good in our community.

I am not a big fan of the "Army," because they always seem like they cannot be told how to do anything based on their long history. This marketing strategy only reinforces in my mind their superiority complex. I have never found the length of time a non-profit has been in business to be a good thing. I am ashamed that there is a need for NEOCH in the richest country on the planet. The fact that we have not solved homelessness in the last 19 years is a constant source of embarrassment for me. The Salvation Army has existed for over 100 years and they have not eliminated poverty or reduced the human cost of natural disasters in all that time? They have these rigid structures and require funds from the local community go to the national office. They cannot be told that they need to change with a changing time. They did not understand the concept of an entry shelter that did not turn people away when they ran 2100 Lakeside. They were so convinced that punishment was a legitimate strategy for dealing with drugs and alcohol addicted individuals. The Salvation Army has a real hard time playing nice with others especially grassroots, non-traditional organizations.

Now they are doing the "most good." Please someone explain what this means, and why would it make me want to dontate to their famous red kettle.

Finally, the Woodchoppers Ball is this weekend at the Kent Stage. Sunday at 7 pm you can see some of the best guitarists on the planet doing the most good to benefit NEOCH. Please check it out and attend. This year Brian Henke will also produce a CD as part of the Woodchoppers Ball. Look for it during the first of the year.

Brian Davis
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.