WTU Checks Out D.C. Part 3:

Theo concludes the We the Unhoused trip to the National Alliance to End Homelessness Conference in July, and reflects on the conference's urgency on the heels of the Grant's Pass Supreme Court decision. 

He speaks with three interviewees, who share how they've turned their lived experience with being unhoused into advocacy for others -- Curtis Howard, Rachel Parker, and Tawanna Simpson share the state of advocacy from across the country.

Plus: California governor Gavin Newsom and San Francisco mayor London Breed begin the slow process of using Grant's Pass to punish local unhoused residents and destroy encampments in our Unhoused News Segment.

Learn more about the NAEH conference here:

https://endhomelessness.org/events/conferences/2024-national-conference-on-ending-homelessness-and-capitol-hill-day/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Previously on Windian House.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Literally reaching young people who are experiencing homelessness can be
very hard, just because access to reliable sources of communication
like phones and things like that can be really difficult,
and so bridging both of those has been core to this,
to making sure that we can bring people into the
room and make decisions alongside them.

Speaker 3 (00:26):
In our community. We found mostly successful of just going
back to our original roots of community organizing and looking
at how historically marginalized communities have done community organizing and
recruitment and at simply meeting people in youth and young
adults and going to where they are. I think for
me is let youth lead the way. If you want
to censor youth, you have to be able to trust
and listen to them and know that they have their

(00:47):
own autonomy and can make the decisions.

Speaker 4 (00:55):
Welcome back to weed the in House. I'm your host
theo Hinders. Thank you for following along. For the third
and final part of our series, Weedian Howes goes to
Washington where I cover the National Alliance The End Houselessness
and your conference this past July. I had a lot
of conversations and I'm excited to share three final talks with.

Speaker 1 (01:19):
You this week, but first on House News.

Speaker 4 (01:26):
Our first story is about a common villain of the show,
Gavin Newsom, who vows to take funding away from cities
in California that are not clearing encampments. But you don't
have to take my word for it. Listen in to
Gavin Newsom's hateful rhetoric for yourself.

Speaker 5 (01:43):
Today, I announced an executive quarter to move the process forward.

Speaker 6 (01:47):
We're done.

Speaker 7 (01:48):
It's time to move.

Speaker 5 (01:50):
The urgency at the local level to clean up these sites,
to focus on public health and focus on public safety.

Speaker 8 (01:56):
Because there are no longer any excuses compilion dollars this
state has invested.

Speaker 5 (02:01):
To supple communities to clean off these encampments. We have
now no excuse for the Supreme Court decision to subchecutive
orders about pushing that paradise further and getting sense of
urgency that's.

Speaker 7 (02:13):
Required of local government to do their job.

Speaker 9 (02:16):
So the governor is slamming progressive judges and liberal advocates
for California's homeless problem, and specifically for preventing city officials
in San Francisco from clearing out the tent encampments. He
called the court's order preposterous and insane, and he said
he even contemplated posting publicly the judges number so residents

(02:39):
could call the judge and say, let's clean up our streets,
because the Court wouldn't allow San Francisco officials to do that.

Speaker 10 (02:48):
In his t shirt, jeans and aviators, Governor David Knew
some clearing a homeless encampment under the five Freeway and
Mission Hills with a message for county leaders.

Speaker 5 (02:57):
If we don't see demoster results, I'll start to redirect money.
I'm not interested in status quo anti any longer, and
now we'll start in January with the January budget. Counties
need to do more.

Speaker 10 (03:09):
Newsome's threat to take away state funding from counties that
fail to show improvement in tackling the homelessness crisis comes
just weeks after he issued an executive order to state agencies.

Speaker 4 (03:20):
Our next story takes us up the coast to our
San Francisco villain. San Francisco Mayor London Breed praised the
Supreme Court's Grants pass decision. Recently, she has been ecstatically
planning an aggressive sweep policy, which includes bus tickets out
of San Francisco before offering local services.

Speaker 1 (03:41):
But again don't take it from me.

Speaker 4 (03:43):
Here's the mayor laying these horrific policies out for you.

Speaker 11 (03:47):
So homeless and captains in the wake of a major
Supreme Court ruler. But there are concerns about whether the
city is doing enough to get people into shelters, and
we're starting to see signs of what the mayor calls
aggressive action to clear camp Just call comes as community
advocates and local lawmakers called on the mayor to fill
hundreds of homes they say the city is allowing to

(04:08):
sit empty.

Speaker 12 (04:09):
So I would suggest you get your facts from the
Office of Housing and Homeless Services.

Speaker 13 (04:16):
The first option that will be offered to unhoused will
be bus tickets who take them home if they accept. Now,
the new executive order came down a Thursday, which was yesterday,
from the Mayor's office, and it comes amid a crackdown
on homeless encampments after the grands Pass. Supreme Court ruling
allows city officials to enforce anti camping laws, but before

(04:39):
enforcement or even offering city services, the first thing city
workers who interact with unhoused are supposed to ask is
if they'd like a ticket home. Then workers will ask
if they need medical services, or if they want to
accept offers of shelter or supportive housing.

Speaker 4 (04:57):
Next, our aggressive sweep policies take us here in Los Angeles, California.
The Grant's past decision has caught on like wildfire here
in Los Angeles. Last Thursday, the unhoused community in Little
Tokyo were aggressively swept. At the same time, off duty

(05:18):
cop Danny bama Setta caused a major accident and struck
a pedestrian while speeding down First Street. While LAPD helped
Bamba Seta, the city moved in to trash unhoused belongings
LA's sanitation left returned an hour later to destroy the
last items of an unhoused resident who left for medical care. Next,

(05:43):
we head to Long Beach. Grant's past tentacles have stretched
out to Long Beach, California. Long Beach has started their
own aggressive encampment crackdowns. This is a developing story and
we'll share more information as we learn it. Finally, a
story from Sacramento. A judge ruled that the city can

(06:06):
close Camp Resolution, a self governed city sanctioned on house
encampment established back in twenty twenty two. It's currently home
for at least fifty residents who just received a notice
to vacate by August twenty sixth, twenty twenty four.

Speaker 1 (06:24):
And that's in House news.

Speaker 4 (06:29):
We'll be right back with more from Washington. Welcome back
to Weedian House. I'm THEO Henderson. This week we're back
in DC, but more from the National Alliance to in
Houselessness event back in July. This conference had an air

(06:49):
of urgency, alarm and forward momentum in tackling the Supreme
Court's grants passed decision, which was passed only a week before.
Our guest was trying to get their bearings on the
new landscape. My first conversation today is with Curtis Howard,
who is an unhoused lived experienced expert. You might recognize

(07:12):
him from previous episode of Willian House, and I was
thrilled to welcome him back.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
Here's our talk.

Speaker 8 (07:21):
Always good to see you, especially in these spaces. We're
here to see what it brings this year, because you know,
last year we didn't feel that the representation of the
lived experience was on point, you know, so this year
we're looking forward to see how that works.

Speaker 1 (07:40):
I agree.

Speaker 4 (07:41):
Now on the wings of everyone has heard about the
Supreme Court and the grants pass, saying I'm kind of
ear hustling and hearing a.

Speaker 1 (07:47):
Lot of conversations.

Speaker 4 (07:48):
This is this topic obviously is going to be the
buzz in this community, in this conference.

Speaker 1 (07:53):
So what's your take on it?

Speaker 8 (07:54):
Well, you know, I think it's a challenge as what
we've been dealing with with so many things. It's like
we get step up and we take two steps backwards,
and just like with statistics and everything we do around homelessness,
we find out, you know that this year we housed
such and such thousand many people, but then the same

(08:18):
amount became homeless. Are more so now with the homeless
bands and the encampment bands that they have just started,
we're experiencing the same thing with when it comes to
progress with these bands.

Speaker 4 (08:33):
I want to add something too, because I just left
one of the conference topics about medicaid, and what my
surprise was is that they are able to offer states
funding and so this kind of ticks me off because
California and other places applied for some of the grant money,
but some of the places have snatched like moneies like

(08:57):
EBT for families and unhoused people, and they can go
back and ask for funding to be able to step
into the gap of this.

Speaker 1 (09:05):
And it really bugs me on the wings of this.
It's like, now.

Speaker 4 (09:08):
You're just making it even more difficult. Now you got
to deal with the encampment mans. Now you got to
deal with starvation. Now you've got to deal with housing
insecurity and starvation. It's like the city, the state, and
the government in some kind of concert in order to
try to make it much more unattainable and much more
difficult for people just to survive. And it really when

(09:29):
I was listening to the different things that they can
offer the states, and all it requires is states stepping
up and making an application. Like then you got the
conservative states that don't make an application will make it
sound like it's a criminal offense to ask for help
for people that are struggling in their states. It's really infuriating,
and people are not really aware of how detrimental and

(09:53):
how violatile this situation is going to be if you
continue to take the legs of people.

Speaker 8 (09:58):
It's true, you make a good point because money is
being moved around right now. It's being removed and it's
being replaced, and it's being moved around and it's being
taken away from places and put in other places, and
the places that they're putting it in are not the
places where it should be. And I think that this

(10:20):
what comes in what's very important at a time like
this is that the people who are moving this money around,
they need a more maybe even a lived experience counsel.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
On where to put this money in. How you know.

Speaker 8 (10:35):
That's why lived experience is so important right now when
it comes to homelessness, because it's not just lived experience
about people telling their stories. It's about lived experience in
spaces where homelessness is important. I don't care what the
space of homelessness, it's important to have that lived experience

(10:56):
in funding. And it's just like where it's like, lived
exper only goes so far, it stays somewhere toward the bottom.
But the shot callers and the people who are on
tob that's where we need to be.

Speaker 4 (11:09):
Here's one that I've been harping on recently. And the
reason I'm really talking on is because I'm not a
younger man anymore, and I could a lot of.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
Things that used to do I can't do.

Speaker 4 (11:19):
I'm literally walking like an old man up the heels
and things during this heat wave.

Speaker 1 (11:24):
It's like one hundred and five.

Speaker 4 (11:26):
And I'm bringing this up because I've been really the
places I go, I keep saying, where are the cold
weather celtis. I'm seeing on house people out here, I'm
seeing them laid out and collapse, and I can barely
make it up the damn heel. There's no kind of
advisories out here, there's no kind of conversations, and I
keep saying this is, this is going to be. I'm
going to keep harping on this until people get tired

(11:46):
of me saying it. I'm like, I want ours as
a community to keep pushing the mayor about these damn
cooling stations because people need this. You know we got
heat waves, we know we got climate change, so there's
no excuse for us to be so shocked or when
you with our pants down when every summer that we
have in these things and we don't have no coming stations.

Speaker 1 (12:04):
True, true, And.

Speaker 8 (12:05):
And you make a good point because why do we
have to address the same issues every year? It's like,
why does this come up every year? And agenda should
not come up every year. Agenda is something that goes
on the agenda once and it gets addressed, and it
gets taken off the agenda.

Speaker 6 (12:27):
They may do a follow up.

Speaker 8 (12:28):
Just move on.

Speaker 6 (12:31):
We can have the same things on the agenda.

Speaker 8 (12:33):
I've been in meetings where we've had the same things
on the agenda for a year.

Speaker 6 (12:40):
Who does that?

Speaker 4 (12:41):
There's no strategic vision, Like, okay, we every year we
have a summer, we have hot weather. We know the
people are out here dying from hot weather. These people
are having to navigate this on the wings of their
civil rights, are being targeted on the wings of their
food money. It's going to be messed messed with. So

(13:02):
you know, you put people through the pit of desperation,
and what do you think is going to happen? That
is the basic fodder of revolutionary or very survival crimes
that people use to be able to try to survive.

Speaker 8 (13:17):
Right, Yeah, And you know, homelessness is just totally a
survival mode. You know, I'm a lived experience, formally incarcerated,
justice impacted person. I've been convicted three times, four times,
and three of those times was during my homelessness. In

(13:38):
other words, exactly, In other words, if you take away
the chargers that I got during homelessness, my record would
be good enough to apply for a government job.

Speaker 4 (13:52):
But most moose crimes that most crimes that they tack
on you are survival based. Is kind of situation that
people don't understand that and an impacts.

Speaker 6 (14:03):
People, which I found too.

Speaker 4 (14:05):
The cities now which Medica can also provide, they have
now the incarcerated the entry program that they're putting money there.
They're finally approving it, like Arizona, California.

Speaker 6 (14:17):
I don't know, I didn't quite get Washington.

Speaker 4 (14:19):
But the place at the point of it is it's
starting to be a conversational point and this is the
kind of funding. If that was put on in the gap,
maybe the first half had to do the next two correct.

Speaker 8 (14:30):
Oh absolutely, I'll look back at the times of my
struggles as a justice impacted person and being on probation
and being on parole and continuously repeating that cycle of recidivism,
pro violation, not reporting on time, failure to test because

(14:52):
I'm five miles across town and don't have a way
to get to the office. And I was charged once
with a charge called change junior address without approval that
I received four months for changing address without approval because
I became homes They said that because I didn't report

(15:15):
that that I had changed my address without approval. There
was no approval to change my address. I had to
go and then the office was ten miles across town.
So you know, these are just challenges, and there's accountability
and responsibility involved, but at least make it reasonable to

(15:37):
where I can access these things, you know, in the
midst of my survival.

Speaker 4 (15:42):
Exactly, I was going to say, but you know, you know,
I'm for accountability and things of that nature. But I
do believe that they twisted, and I think they overemphasized
that even when you're you know, you're displaced, because displaced,
being displaced out here on the streets is a whole
different reality. You know, one thing I would put money
on that you wouldn't be considered obstounded if you were

(16:05):
still housed.

Speaker 6 (16:06):
You wouldn't be having to well, you know.

Speaker 4 (16:09):
That's a big responsibility itself, trying to navigate, trying to survive,
and you know, me go to the place on May
fifteen miles away at any making sure that the beakers
on and making sure you know, you're having to attend the.

Speaker 6 (16:22):
Other needs you got to do.

Speaker 4 (16:23):
Absolutely, So no, I do think, you know, we do
have some of that, but I do think that they
twisted to make you make it all the fault of them,
Like you said.

Speaker 8 (16:32):
Yes, absolutely, and we're overdue right now when it comes
to justice impacted, because during my struggles and my justice
being justice impacted and homeless, it was never even a
discussion justice impacted people were considered unsalvageable, so they were
looking to help people that they considered salvageable people. But

(16:55):
once you became justice impacted, once you went to jail
or prison, you were no longer considered salvageable to them.
So this discussion was never had, and I'm surprised that
it's just now coming up, and I'm really glad to
be a part of it. I sit on a board
and some committees, Justice impacted committees, you know, where I'm

(17:19):
providing and having these discussions and providing the information necessary
to make these changes, and hopefully we reached the people
who are in the position to make these changes and
that they are listening.

Speaker 4 (17:34):
I was going to ask too, because never I didn't
get a chance to ask that, but I remember hearing
from Amy. I may be mistaken. We have a mutual
advocate friend. Amy's Amodio shout out to her that.

Speaker 6 (17:46):
You wrote a book.

Speaker 1 (17:47):
Yeah, so you didn't. Yes, he's very humble. He won't
tell him. So I got to put him on blast. Here,
what was your book about it? Tell us a little
about it.

Speaker 8 (17:54):
So I actually published two books. I published one called
Salemates that I wrote well in prison, but I also
wrote another book called Who's Left. And Who's Left is
more of an autobiography of my struggles. So my struggles telled,
you know, and tell being on the streets, being involved

(18:17):
in gangs, being involved with substance abusing, being in part
of the criminal justice system, and all four of those
subject matters are addressed throughout my book. So it tells
the story of my struggles in that way. But most
of my homeless struggle stories are in articles, news articles.

(18:38):
In my book Who's Left, I also discussed the struggle
that I have with homelessness and how it played a
part in everything else, because, as you know, society looks
at homelessness in a way, and the first thing that
comes up is drugs right.

Speaker 4 (18:55):
Now, that or now, I just it was on a
radio show mental illness. They cannot get off those two topics.
I'm like, dude, there is so much you missed with this.

Speaker 8 (19:05):
But mental illness, substance abuse our fault exactly.

Speaker 4 (19:11):
It always returns back to that, and it's like, oh
my god, We've got.

Speaker 8 (19:15):
So much work to do right because you know, homelessness
is first and everything else comes after that. And I
remember being homeless, and I never did a substance abuse
or alcohol until I became homeless, because it became something
for me to be able to deal with the situation.
It numbed me. It was the only thing. If I

(19:36):
hadn't done it, I wouldn't be able to be in
that situation. It would drive me mad.

Speaker 4 (19:42):
To me like when the pain was too great because
I have several I got stabbed so but and I
also have other health issues. But you know, in order
for me to kind of main pain manage, I would
drink to do that. But I think the battle really
is with generations or how we were educated about on

(20:02):
house people, because I get back to thinking about how
when I grew up, what people looked at because people
used to didn't call them home, they used to call
them bombs. I remember their words of bombs hobos. I
think that and I remember my father would say vagabond
and then that was like, if you really want to
get floss or you're really educated, and I was like,
what the hell was a vagabon? And then when I

(20:24):
really realized but then, you know, it was a preconceptual
idea of what the house bleusness is.

Speaker 1 (20:29):
And then I fell into it.

Speaker 6 (20:31):
I said, this is not aligned and to the same reality.
What's going on?

Speaker 4 (20:34):
And then when I was in for a sustained period
of time, and then I'm listening to people that I
was friends with, but people that you were considered educated
and very self aware about other social issues falling into
these very harmful conversations without lived experienced conversations that listen.

Speaker 1 (20:51):
This is just not real.

Speaker 4 (20:53):
I had a friend hip said, but it just like
being out there, and I kept feeling, this is no
they total please right.

Speaker 8 (21:01):
I saw a conversation like that online and I just
don't even come in or get involved. Because there were
so many people who had misconceptions about homelessness. And there
was a lady who was appu tee and she had
two of her legs cut off. She was in a

(21:22):
wheelchair and she was homeless, and they were going in
on her, you know, you know, and the guy who
interviewed her said, well, I passed through here yesterday and
I saw you doing some drugs, you know. And then
someone else said, see there she goes, they're doing the drugs.

Speaker 10 (21:41):
You know.

Speaker 8 (21:42):
It took away all of them for her, and just
it turned into she's doing drugs. And then someone even
said even said for her to get a job. Yeah,
they told her that Walmart hires everyone.

Speaker 1 (22:00):
Was so lady who come in and said.

Speaker 8 (22:01):
Walmart hers everyone. There was a guy who was disabled
and they give disabled people jobs.

Speaker 1 (22:08):
He just sip he packed.

Speaker 8 (22:11):
Some and stuff some huenvelopes or something, and told her
she should get up and get out there and get
a job. And I said, are you serious?

Speaker 4 (22:21):
I got one horror I want to say, went better.
I got one more horror play I was. I lived
for a short period of time and skid rolling in
Los Angeles and you see all vassages of the houselessness.

Speaker 6 (22:34):
I seen.

Speaker 4 (22:34):
There was this person that you said that as he
had lost one leg and he used to stay on
his wheelchair.

Speaker 6 (22:41):
But at night he doesn't stay in his wheelchair.

Speaker 4 (22:43):
He stays on the ground and steaks in his you know,
do you know they will stole his wheelchair? So the
next day, I'm watching him crawl trying to find a
way to be able to get some kind of freaking wheelchair,
and people up there judging him.

Speaker 6 (22:59):
You know what he should have, you know, locked it
up or.

Speaker 4 (23:02):
He should have you know, well, you know, if he
had a job, if he wasn't on again on drugs.

Speaker 6 (23:07):
This is what happened. This is what you know.

Speaker 4 (23:09):
And then of course he wasn't a veteran, but they
always look attack in this fake concern.

Speaker 6 (23:13):
Well, this is what we do do our veterans that you're.

Speaker 1 (23:15):
Sad, like, well, this is now.

Speaker 6 (23:16):
You don't have to be a veteran to be crapped on.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
You know.

Speaker 1 (23:19):
It could be a recon citizen that.

Speaker 4 (23:20):
Just had some millness, a mad situation befall you, and
you still get crapped on.

Speaker 6 (23:25):
And it's a reality. It's this notion that unhoused people
are there because of lack of rugged individualism.

Speaker 4 (23:33):
They're there because it's their fault and they like being
out there and they don't want help.

Speaker 6 (23:38):
Is it they on drugs?

Speaker 4 (23:39):
And if they don't, if it's most sympathetic, oh, they
mentally ill, you know, you know, I'm like, what mentally
ill person that you are going to hire and you know,
you are literally afraid of and calling the police at
two minutes if you see them having an outburst, you know, right,
so you know you ain't go hire them, So stop
saying that.

Speaker 8 (23:57):
Yeah, and most of that stuff comes after homelessness, you know,
most most most people who do drugs weren't doing them
until they became homelessness. Actually, more people house doing drugs
than there are homeless people.

Speaker 1 (24:11):
To them, you just don't hear.

Speaker 8 (24:14):
Yeah, all the all the house people, those are the
ones selling all the drugs and doing all the drugs.
They have the drug houses where they live, connections. When
you want drugs on the streets, you call and you
get them from people housed people.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
Those are the people who have the who have the drugs,
you know.

Speaker 8 (24:36):
So there's just so many misconceptions and and blaming accountability
issues where it concerns homelessness. So we got a lot
of work to do, you know, and and especially with
the funding as well, we need to start finding the
proper receptacles to place these uh these funds in and

(24:58):
stop moving them around and taking them away from where
they should be. And all the people coming up with
these grand plans you know, to take over homelessness. Enough
is enough. We're gonna start locking these people up now with.

Speaker 4 (25:12):
The Grand Decision Grant Pass, where you got mayors celebrating
this decision and saying like London mayor Long then bring
to San Francisco. They're gonna ramp up it and they're
gonna wrap it up. And it's like San Diego and
all of these those are places, and this is gonna
pretend badly. Like I said, like it's it's just coloring
the conversational. You could hear it in the buzz here,

(25:33):
but you know, in real time it's these we have
to keep our foot on their neck and let the nogan.
Just because they mentioned that don't mean we're gonna be
okay with this. We're gonna hold you accountable. We need
you to be accountable. We need you to open up
these services. We know now that there's funding that you
can do to offer to alleviate some of this burden.

(25:53):
You're gonna do it, or we're gonna be protesting and
doing the things we need to do.

Speaker 6 (25:57):
To make you do it. Absolutely, you know, And I think.

Speaker 4 (26:00):
That's where the before when I first heard it, I
was in you know, even though I was like, they're
not gonna overturn it.

Speaker 6 (26:08):
But when I did, it was a bit of shock.
I went through the four stages agree.

Speaker 4 (26:11):
It was pissed off and I didn't want to say
something publicly that could be banned off of social media.

Speaker 14 (26:18):
At the FBI call coming up and interview with me,
so I was like, Okay, I cannot, and people who
did ass but then, like I s I had.

Speaker 4 (26:27):
Calmed myself down and got over the revenge fantasies and
all of that, I didn't. So the point of it
is that now I've gotten my my sense back, I
feel that we can there's things we can do. There
is constantly we must agitate, agitate, agitate. As Fredick Douglas too.

Speaker 8 (26:49):
Did you know, as I've been revisiting everything that's going
on right now, I'm from the organization all of us
are none, and the lead organizer, all of us are none.
As a national organization that has we have twenty nine
chapters nationwide, we advocate for formerly incarcerated people and their families.

(27:11):
But through the advocacy that we do, we kind of
ramp it up. We don't like sit in rooms and
have these discussions every day. We go out and lobby,
we put get things legislation policy. You know, we go
to Capitol Hills shout, take some disturb some places and everything,

(27:31):
and we get things done. You know. And and I
don't know, this homelessness situation is beginning to go to
a point to where the advocacy may need to level
up a little bit to a lot.

Speaker 14 (27:47):
So I want to because he's not advocating what I
was saying, not the family guy kind of situations.

Speaker 8 (27:57):
Yeah, it just it seems like, you know, it's just
getting where people will do what you know, it's they
just will continue to do until people step in and say,
you know, no, enough is enough. You know, and you
know it's getting to the point to where we may
have to advocate, you know, may consider different levels of protests, right.

Speaker 6 (28:23):
You know, I.

Speaker 8 (28:25):
Choose a homelessness because it is something that intersects and
branches out to all so many other things. So when
you address problems, you address the root of problems. And
when I look at homelessness, I see it as the
root of so mental health. I mean, I've saw people

(28:49):
who were homeless friends of mine, Hey, how you doing, hey,
And as they continue to be homeless and struggled. Then
I would say, talking to themselves, and then I would
see them yelling, and then I would see them yelling
at cars passing by. And so this is a process

(29:12):
you know, that takes place, you know, as a result
of the struggle with homelessness, of actually saw people's mental
health decline as a result of hoons.

Speaker 4 (29:22):
And I have to put the point here two points
before it goes out. Is one of the points that
I remember the challenges of me being in house and
I am so fortunate that I was able to get
out of the despayspare and the depression that it was
because I had befriended people and they, in some way

(29:44):
or another made sure that it was I was able
to keep my mind still, the acuity that my mental
acuity there, my spirit was at least I wasn't like
I'm not saying I was skipping it happening jumping down
the street, being on the street.

Speaker 1 (29:58):
But it was able.

Speaker 4 (30:00):
It was I was able to bear it more because
I don't think I would have been able to bear
it sometimes just trying to.

Speaker 6 (30:07):
Do things to.

Speaker 4 (30:09):
Get out of that sinking quagmire that what house business brings,
you know, I started tutoring, and I was do things
to you know, try to do this, And it comes
down to this.

Speaker 6 (30:20):
It's like us a society.

Speaker 4 (30:22):
And I'm going to end this with this quote because
when I listened at the end of doctor King's life
when he spoke about the intersections over there in Vietnam
and how he was vilified, and he encapsulated something that
Steven Wonder says, and.

Speaker 6 (30:35):
It's very true. And I'm going to say this too.

Speaker 4 (30:37):
Use your heart to love somebody, and if your heart
is big enough, use your heart to love everybody. And
we need to show that kind of empathetic love, the
agape love, in order for us to look at how
we can be able to solve us because we are
in the same storm. We may not be in the
same boat, we may not be having some of it

(31:00):
on the rife wrap. Some of us are barely hanging
on to the boat, and some of us are just
out in the middle of the ocean, drowning, desperately trying
to hit someone to throw a lifeline. Thank you to
Curtis for his time. And when we come back more
from d C. Welcome back to Weedian House where I'm

(31:25):
in the field at the National Alliance the in Houselessness
in Washington, d C. Our next guest is Rachel Parker,
an Indigenous unhoused lived experienced expert who shares a story
of redemption and air proactive stance and helping other unhoused people.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
Rachel's story is very inspiring. Let's listen in.

Speaker 15 (31:50):
Chantay wash daywe My Indian name is good Heart woman,
but my government name is Rachel Parker. I am an
enrolled member of the Umaha Tribe located Omaha, Nebraska, with
descendancy of the Winnebago tribe and also of Cajun descent
in New Orleans.

Speaker 16 (32:06):
Thank you for having me THEO.

Speaker 4 (32:08):
Thank you for showing me on taking the time of
your busy schedule. So I wanted to ask about because
you mentioned several points in a class or workshop that
we were in, and I wanted you to elucidate a
little bit more for our audience to hear about your
perspectives on like doubling up on house. That's a new
term for many of our listeners, but it's important.

Speaker 6 (32:29):
So what is your insight on it?

Speaker 4 (32:30):
Because you mentioned a couple of things about the reservations
and things.

Speaker 15 (32:33):
So in terms of doubling up by hud definition. That
does not benefit individuals who are CouchSurfing because at the
end of the day, they are still facing housing instability.
You know, we not only need to recognize and elevate
that they are going through crisis, but how it affects
those individuals that they are help surfing with. Housing is

(32:54):
a human right. Everybody deserves to have a home. Anybody
who is an experience housing instability can attest to how
traumatic that experience is. Within my own experience, I have
lived experience of homelessness within the last five years.

Speaker 4 (33:10):
Can you talk a little bit of how did you
how was the descent of getting it to be homeless?

Speaker 1 (33:15):
How did it happen?

Speaker 15 (33:16):
Okay, so I will say in my lived experience includes
domestic violence and which resulted in my addiction of alcohol
and math. And so I fled DV in hopes of
you know, starting over, but dealing with the trauma and
the mental anguish that I endured from that experience. I
was not able to pick myself back up. I did

(33:38):
not have the supports at the time, and so I
did turn to self medication through that within three years,
I lost my home, my job, my car, my family.
But The underlying reason for my homelessness was not alcoholism.
It was the trauma that I endured and the lack
of support. And so, you know, the turning point in

(33:59):
my life was being incarcerated. I became incarcerated and at
that time I lost custody of my daughters and they
were in the child welfare system. And so waking up
in jail completely helpless, completely vulnerable. I had been assaulted
by a family member. That's what it led me to
go to jail, you know, feeling like there was no hope.

(34:20):
You know, in recovery rooms, they say when you're sick
of your own stuff, then that's when you change.

Speaker 16 (34:26):
And waking up and not having my.

Speaker 15 (34:27):
Children and feeling completely defeated, I knew I had to
change what I was doing. So when I was released
from jail, I was forced to adhere to a strict
regimen of drug and alcohol testing. But because I was clean,
I was able to get into a shelter, and that
shelter in Omaha is called the Stephens Center. I want

(34:47):
to elevate that that is my home.

Speaker 16 (34:49):
Still to this day.

Speaker 15 (34:51):
They gave me the support that I needed. They walked
me through my fires, so to speak and so from
that point I was in shelter for thirty days. I
went to outpatient treatment. I then got into sober living.
From sober living, I was fortunate enough to get into
a PSH apartment at the Stevens Center and I got
my daughters back within six months of them being removed.

(35:13):
So that was the greatest Christmas present in the world.
That year twenty nineteen was when you know, I started
my journey in recovery. And from there I lived at
PSH for two years and then I moved into my
own apartment and since then this year alone, this is
the year for us. We moved into a four bedroom
home in a great part of town. I have gainful employment,

(35:35):
I have the most wonderful support and with that, you
know that I found my passion with this work.

Speaker 16 (35:41):
So it's not like work. It's just me doing what
I love.

Speaker 15 (35:45):
And so you know, to elevate and to walk alongside
people who are walking through their own fires, that is
what we do, and that is why we do the work.

Speaker 6 (35:54):
That is so inspiring and so riveting.

Speaker 4 (35:57):
To hear your story and which is also why when
I felt your passion when you was talking yesterday at
the class I was say, oh, okay, this is a
very dynamic person to be interviewed. So let me ask
you if, for example, what's going on with the grants past.
Imagine that someone that is another ratual outfare going through

(36:18):
because I know we need to talk about it, because
that's making it just a little bit more harder. How
do you think and what could we do to help
the Rachel's about going to come behind you in this journey.

Speaker 15 (36:32):
I feel like it really does come down to support
and being, you know, showing grace to individuals who are
navigating through their own housing instability from what I've seen
in our city, being able to have human centered conversations
with individuals to get all of you know, to get
information that's pertinent, to assist them through their supports, but

(36:53):
really being intentional on not re traumatizing individuals by having
them tell their story over and over my process. I
am not a frontline worker, but I provide direct supports
to frontline workers, and I will never turn a client away,
even though I come from case management prior, in my
prior position in child welfare, I will never turn anybody away.

(37:14):
And so what I do for me and what works
for me and the client is I will speak with them,
talk with them for thirty forty five minutes, you know,
get the information that is necessary, and I do a
warm handoff to the frontline staff that I am directing
them to. And then that you know, helps that process
because we got to remember, trauma is always an underlying factor,

(37:37):
and when we go through homelessness, that is adding trauma
on top of trauma. It really comes down to being empathetic.

Speaker 16 (37:45):
Right.

Speaker 15 (37:45):
The empathy is the connection that you have with an individual.
So because of my lived experience, you know, in all
of these different areas, you know, I'm able to connect
effectively by just being myself and just treating people like
human beings. It's so simple. I say, it's humans that
make it hard, right.

Speaker 1 (38:07):
Very true.

Speaker 4 (38:08):
Now, you know, let Supreme Court as and this has
been the buzz what I've been hearing.

Speaker 6 (38:12):
I've had if recently.

Speaker 4 (38:13):
Just today, I had a conversation with someone about the
Supreme Court's decision about Grant's past and to educate our
audience who may not be aware. Previously, prior to Grant's
past ruling, there was a appellate decision or Superior Court
decision on It was called Martin versus Boising, and the

(38:36):
gist of that argument was it was cruel and unusual
punishment to criminalize an unhoused person for existing and trying
to survive when there are not available resources, and that
I want to remember, I want you to remember that.
Whereas when the Supreme Court listened to the Grant's past ruling,
they ruled that it is not cruel and unusual punishment

(38:58):
to demoni or site unhoused people even if you don't
have resources for them. So in essence is that more example,
like in Little Tokyo a few days ago, there was
a community of unhoused people in Little Tokyo surviving under
the heat wave. And because a community I guess I
used this derogatorily. A community business owner saw these unhoused

(39:23):
and the contents in order to survive the heat wave,
while he goes into air conditioned building called the police,
who promptly returned and told the unhoused that they must
leave and never come back because they are violating the
ADA standards and basically using as a catapult or the
pivot point of the Grant's past decision into intensifying the

(39:46):
ways of criminalizing or focusing on erasing the existence of
unhoused people, insofar as in San Francisco, California, Maryland and
Breed has been bragging or vowing more intensity and sweeping
and house people, whether even they have the resources or not.
So on the wings of that conversation, what is your

(40:08):
insight on that?

Speaker 15 (40:10):
So it's interesting to me because the people that are
trying to criminalize and demonize homelessness have probably never experienced it.

Speaker 16 (40:19):
So let me throw that back.

Speaker 15 (40:21):
If the shoe was on the other foot, and if
they had to endure the you know, the heat, the
excessive heat, the lack of resources.

Speaker 16 (40:29):
Which if this is.

Speaker 15 (40:31):
The problem, then if you're not part of the solution,
then you're part of the problem. You are not giving
the community the ability to scratch out out of this.
You want to criminalize it, but yet you know we
are here. Look at what we are doing to people.
You know, it is not humane to be out in
excessive heat. I always use this term. Anybody in this country,

(40:54):
middle class and lower are one paycheck away from homelessness.
Should they be punished because of a medical condition, because
of their mental health, because oh maybe they.

Speaker 16 (41:05):
Lost their job? Right?

Speaker 15 (41:07):
Those are life things. Life life be lifing for people.
Let's just say that life happens, and you are going
to punish them when they are already going through It
does not make sense to me.

Speaker 16 (41:19):
In our own community.

Speaker 15 (41:20):
And in Nebraska, there is a bill i'll be thirteen
fifty seven which they did want to criminalize homelessness in
public areas. You know, we were very, very intentional and
we went hard on you know, having a position on that,
and you know successfully, you know, they did not pass
the bill. We went all the way to Lincoln, we
sent lived experience folks there to testify, you know. But

(41:42):
yet we are here, Supreme Court. We are here, so
we're back to square one. But know this, we will
never stop fighting. We are just going to come harder.
So come on and bring it because we're ready for it.
You know, we are an army, an army of warriors.
We do this work because we know we will make
a change. We may not end homelessness tomorrow, we may

(42:04):
not end homelessness next year, but through the work that
we do, it takes one spark to light that flame
of that individual that can be the one to make
that change, to be the voice.

Speaker 16 (42:17):
And so we're going to keep coming. It's not going to.

Speaker 6 (42:19):
Stop, never give up, give in or give out.

Speaker 4 (42:22):
Because this is the fight of the soul of our country,
of our land, of our society. We must fight for
this because apparently the dark forces that are in respectability politics,
law and order, or blaming the people for living life
or having life experiences that leads them into houselessness.

Speaker 6 (42:45):
Is trying to hold sway.

Speaker 17 (42:47):
You know, I'm talking about Trump Project twenty twenty five
and his viewpoints on houselessness when he first was running
for office, talking about putting him out in the airport
in Los Angeles, somewhere far away from the humdruma of society.

Speaker 4 (43:04):
These are the people that are coming for everyone, no
matter what station of life. And if we do not
understand this and understanding the connective tissue that it is
with houselessness and the structural will breakdown of our society,
then we are going to be looking at a landscape
of much desolation. But I'm encouraged because we have advocates

(43:27):
like Rachel and I also encouraged that to know that
we are still not willing to lay down even though
Supreme Court read this decision. One other thing too, I
wanted to ask about is that in Omaha. How is
the houses the situation with because I'm making this point
this has been my soap box thing. It is hot outside.
I don't know if you know that. Yes, it's hot outside.

(43:51):
What is this situation there in Omaha? Do they have
cooling stations?

Speaker 16 (43:55):
Yes, we do have cooling stations.

Speaker 15 (43:56):
So our organization reimagine we are out of omahas we
are partners with our local COEOC which is called Threshold,
and Threshold I will say I do like the idea
of this. They are intentional of offering cooling stations throughout
the city. At our own location downtown, we are in
the heart of downtown where a lot of our unhoused

(44:17):
population is. We partnered with an agency called Together Inc.
They're amazing and what their pilot program is, which just
started this year, is called a Housing Stability Clinic, and
so it is a one stop shop. We have different
organizations within the city that come on specific days and
we see the lines around the corner. So even to

(44:37):
do little things being human centered, right, coming back to
the basics, we offer water. We are in the process
of providing awnings while they are standing because it's very uncomfortable, right,
and so just being intentional. Their street outreach has been amazing.
They go out, they go to the encampments, they make
contact with a lot of the unhoused population. I have

(44:58):
people out on the street who are not working with
an organization but just love to do the work and
they ensure that they know where the resources are and
who they can reach out to. So it really is
about collaboration, you know, with the from the boots on
the ground folks, you know, to the people that are
doing you know, the frontline staff that are working directly,
you know when people come in for services, and you know,

(45:21):
really getting leadership to get on board with that because
you know, in this realm, we are a spoke on
a will right, and so it takes all of these
different elements and facets right for this to work. And
so what our mission reimagine is to ensure that we
are able to be a part of that cross sectionalization
from the medical to the schools and specifically for our youth.

(45:42):
Our youth, the ages between ages nineteen and twenty four
in our community, especially coming out of foster care, experience
homelessness at much higher rates than any other group. And
so you know, the barrier is for young people, it's
hard to find housing for them. We are in a
housing crisis in our whole country, right, and we can
come back, you know, but you know that I'm going

(46:05):
to throw that back to our government. You know, give
us the funds, support the communities, build the houses, right,
you know, make low income. What we are seeing in
our community is older individuals and people that are facing
medically complex situations. And nine times out of ten those individuals,
that is the reason for their homelessness, right. And so

(46:27):
little things cooling centers, waters, you know what I mean,
the ability to come in and ask for help when needed.
So those are just some of the things that we
are working on in our city, and we are intentional
of being a part of that cultural shift.

Speaker 4 (46:41):
And I also wanted to point out too the people
that are housing secure and doubling up. Any idea is
how do we reach out to make sure that they
feel safe from the stigma because it is a vic stigma.
Or sometimes people defend themselves against not jeopardizing the person
that's offering them lodging because I name, it's a very
good point about that. They don't want to put the

(47:02):
person on blast that is being kind, harder or let
them stay, but they can lose their housing for doing so.

Speaker 15 (47:08):
So something that are I am the Training and Lived
Experience director for our company, and something that we have
been intentional about is offering housing problems solving training to
our frontline staff because nine times out of ten, when
you're in a CouchSurfing situation or doubled up, you know,
they may not be able to use family or friends
as a resource.

Speaker 16 (47:29):
But it's just the lack of communication.

Speaker 15 (47:31):
So you know, if you have someone almost like mediating
in a way, you know, as a frontline worker, saying hey, listen,
this is the situation. Clear communication, lay out the expectations,
you know, be open and honest, you know, and set boundaries,
you know, and sometimes that's not always easy with family,
you know, But at the end of the day, it
really comes down to getting individuals stabilized, not in terms

(47:55):
of what you think is best for them, but part
of being human centered and having those conversations conversations is
giving the client the autonomy to make their own decisions
and supporting them and coming from a place of non
judgment and coming from a place of acceptance. And so
you know, that's an element in our and that's something
that that's our angle, that is the position we're trying

(48:16):
to take. And I will say that our COEOC has
been very supportive of that process.

Speaker 1 (48:21):
I think I covered all of the questions.

Speaker 6 (48:24):
It is anything you like to talk.

Speaker 15 (48:26):
I just want to say thank you for the opportunity.
I will say that these conferences are so crucial because
you get to meet other individuals and hear about other
communities and what is working and so, you know, we
can talk about how to solve homelessness all day, but
we want to be the ones to make that change.
And so you know, like like you said, walking alongside

(48:48):
people and supporting them and doing the work and holding
that passion and you know, coming from a place of love, empathy, understanding,
that's what it's all about.

Speaker 4 (49:02):
Thanks so much to Rachel for their time and their story.
And when we come back my final interview from d
C stay with us. Welcome back to Weedian House for
the grand conclusion to our series on DC and the
National Alliance the in Houselessness Conference this past July. Our

(49:26):
final interview was with Tawana Simpson, one of the Unhoused
Lived Experienced advocates from Detroit, Michigan.

Speaker 1 (49:33):
Let's hear her story.

Speaker 12 (49:38):
My story begins. I have very humble beginnings in Detroit.
I grew up, you know, in a large family that
understood helping each other makes a difference. So I start there.
And as as my educational career grew, from elementary to
junior high to high school, I always found myself in

(49:59):
the stupid council president of this, you know, just a
leader of my people because being the fifth child of
sixth I understood probably a little more than some of
my peers did, because most of them didn't come from
large families in my neighborhood that I was from. But
after that, after high school, went to college, came back home,

(50:20):
and I became an advocate in my community, Prestin Delegate
citizen Citizen District Council, which is a group in each
community that helped develop their community. But I became unhoused
after I was elected a school board member.

Speaker 6 (50:36):
Oh and how did that come to be?

Speaker 12 (50:39):
I believe from my advocacy, I truly believe that. But
of course, you know, I was a person who was
receiving Section eight. My daughter had become of age, she
was in college, and the political agenda associated with me
being on the school board doing emergency man which is

(51:01):
a law in Michigan Pa. Four thirty six that gave
the governor a full governance over whatever happened with the
City of Detroit. The city, the school district, and a
few other municipalities surrounding Detroit was also involved. And so
that was very detrimental to our community because then your

(51:22):
elected officials lost their voice and their way to advocate
for you. So in the process of me fighting that,
I got caught up. I guess researched and found out
that I was actually receiving subsidies from the state, and
so they came and talked with the manager and somehow
decided that I was scheming the system won by having

(51:47):
enough tenacity and understanding that much is given, much is
deserved and earned, and you got to help other people.
So I became an advocate for our community, and they
used that against me as if I was scheming or something.
So therefore, my daughter is an adult in college. The
subdivision I was living in did not have a one

(52:08):
bedroom available for me to transfer to now that my
daughter wasn't in a home, but they used that against
me and I become I became unsheltered because of that,
and at that point I had to advocate unsheltered.

Speaker 4 (52:21):
How was that experience conversely than being an advocate house?
Is it been different or is it more involved?

Speaker 7 (52:29):
It was?

Speaker 12 (52:30):
It was both, It was both, and it was both
both of them. Was on a hundred. Okay, I was
on a hundred because then I had no water, I
had clothes, my pride. I didn't want to burden my
mother at that time she was eighty years old. Who

(52:50):
wants to come home and to your eighty old parent?
Even though I was there every day helping her, but
I didn't want her to feel or yeah with me,
And then I was fighting my own personal feelings. Now
I would be this grown having to go home, you know, So.

Speaker 7 (53:09):
I don't know. It eventually worked out.

Speaker 12 (53:12):
The universe really helped me out, because believe it or not,
and most people don't, but it's the honest to god truth.
One of the seniors that was in my mother's senior building,
because she was living in a senior brog, I couldn't
even go if I wanted to, and so they were
very supportive of what I was doing and then doing COVID.
They knew them my heart because I took care of

(53:33):
the whole building. I went grocery shopping, I used my
phone or their phones to pay their bills, talk to they,
you know, coordinated with their family members and all that
we had to do to keep everybody safe. And it
was about eighty eight people in that building, and of
the eighty eight, I believe I helped maybe about sixty five.

(53:53):
So long story short, she allowed me to stay in
her abandoned house that she had walked away from going
to senior building because you can no longer maintain it.
So that was my saving grace. That was my saving grace.
So that's how I was able to handle that.

Speaker 16 (54:12):
Now.

Speaker 4 (54:12):
Also I wanted to take a kind of a picturesque
of the backdrop.

Speaker 3 (54:17):
That was going on.

Speaker 4 (54:18):
You mentioned Michigan, and I'm going to be in Michigan
in August. But one of the things that was going
on that we touched on is that there was a
housing graces not just in Michigan but also all around
the country. But you mentioned about there was issues going
on with the water. But we've heard about Flint, so
I if you can touch.

Speaker 12 (54:39):
On oh, we have the same problem in Detroit because
the Natuality Flint was getting their water from Detroit. They
switched from Detroit to another municipality near them, but the
damage was done from the water from Detroit. A lot
of people don't want to say that, but that was
I believe personally, that was just the overlay for the underlay,

(55:02):
you know, so that it wasn't directly pointed back to Detroit.
But because there's a notion that we have good water,
but really our water is horrible, because we were, if
my if my memory served me correctly, if not the first,
but one of the first five states that first started
putting floor ride in the water. So we now know
that floor ride is not good for us. And most

(55:24):
of the chemicals that that they put in the water,
the floor the floor ride, the chlorine, and and several
other different chemicals that were put in our water. So
you know, which really was the reason that the rusted
out the auto plant that was in Flint that cost
the you know, that brought the attention.

Speaker 4 (55:45):
Brings a different question because I noticed when the courts
when the housing crisis was going on, but I also noticed,
and it was now that things are going so negatively
due to the Supreme Court grants past ruling.

Speaker 6 (55:59):
I just couldn't help.

Speaker 4 (56:00):
But understand that here you have people that are living
in buildings and they're sheltered to some degree, and they
have bad water, and then they happen to use alternative
ways of getting water.

Speaker 6 (56:10):
What's going on with the unhoused community. How are they
are able to because they can't just do.

Speaker 12 (56:15):
Not only the unhoused, the incarcerated, Okay, the unhoused incarcerated,
and then those who just are not articulate enough to
understand what's going to him. I just lost a very
good friend of mine that was living in public housing
and they were still in Detroit.

Speaker 7 (56:34):
And this is.

Speaker 12 (56:35):
Within the month the water was brown. They couldn't get
him to stop drinking it, and he died from it.
Oh man, And that's happened within a month ago in Detroit, you.

Speaker 4 (56:46):
Know, because he was drinking it because he maybe not
have the alternative or the financial wherewithal to get bottled water.
I fee what he wanted to say too, because you know,
it's not like I don't think people like, let's go
drink brown water.

Speaker 6 (56:57):
No, that's just that not happened these people.

Speaker 7 (56:59):
We have to in a heat wave, and you know.

Speaker 12 (57:03):
And you have to bathe because anything you put on
your skin goes straight into your blood stream. At least
your digestive system can help you out a bit until
they get fully burned.

Speaker 7 (57:12):
But yeah, so the.

Speaker 12 (57:13):
Water crisis is still happening and we're still having problems.
Detroit is a very, very old city and infrastructure has
not been updated since its inception. As a matter of fact,
I know that Michigan was one of the last states
that required the industry to filter and do all the

(57:35):
things they need to keep the air pollution correctly. Not
only the auto industries, the hospitals. We have a hospital
they're hearing Ford, who makes more money off buying whatever.

Speaker 7 (57:46):
The hospitals take out of people that's toxic, that's wrong,
or limbs and these things and get rid of them.

Speaker 12 (57:53):
I lived across the street from that place for twenty
six years and had to smell that smell. So I
was one of the organizers who helped you a filtration system.
We live in here, we have to smell this. So's
it's a lot of toxic things that's going on. Michigan
even accepts the toxic waste from Canada.

Speaker 16 (58:10):
Oh is that right?

Speaker 7 (58:11):
Yes, I know that.

Speaker 12 (58:13):
That's why I'm you know so, because I'm an advocate,
and like I said, I was elected under emergency management,
which we had to deal with not only our schools,
our city, the city bankruptcy, the school takeover as well
as the water and all that falls under what was
legislated under PA four thirty six. Okay, and then there

(58:34):
was a PA ten and it was a PA four,
but it eventually all those led to that PA four
thirty six.

Speaker 6 (58:40):
Now I'm gonna ask two different questions, but I'm gonna
sit the first one. Last time I was here in Washington.

Speaker 4 (58:46):
Really to take in the sites when I was in college,
but I've been here for a couple of the conferences
and I don't know if you notice, like we're in
that nice air conditioning, a little chestnut here, Yes, so
when you step out, it's like who that that that
he has no joke? And I am by no means
of an Olympic track star, but one trying to traverse

(59:07):
here with all of that humility and that heat. I'm
telling you, it's like it's really something. And I guarantee
in other places of life that and I was wanting
to know what is being done there is there Do
Detroit have cooling sitations for the ung housed community there.

Speaker 7 (59:23):
Okay, so I'm gonna turn. I had to the left now.
So first half of a story.

Speaker 12 (59:28):
I told you I became a house and I was
so embarrassed by it that I had to deal with
it until someone just finally seen me sleeping in my
car and offered me to live in an abandoned house
that they walked away from. So once I got my
housing straight, I prayed and I told myself I would
do something. I would do something to help the community.

(59:50):
So I went and got a job as a monitor
in a shelter. My first job was an activity director
in a nursing home. Then I worked in a shelter.
So to answer your question, yes and no. Okay, so yes,
they they say you can go to the libraries, you
can go to different places, but they're only open so long.

Speaker 4 (01:00:09):
Ah right, and like for me, like when they say
that same thing in Los Angeles, And I asked, because
I was out here in these many of these heat ways,
I had to create an impromptu one. But I will
tell you that later. But the thing it is, they're
not open on Sundays. I I don't know if other
places may have it. They're not open on Sundays.

Speaker 12 (01:00:27):
Sunday Mondays, and and another day through the week in Detroit,
because the libraries is funded by the public schools, and
the public schools on the you know, it's going through
their their mits hats. And then in shelters they require
you to leave. Yeah, yeah, and in the heating in
the winter. In these things, so yes and no yes

(01:00:49):
on paper there is, but in actuality the places really
don't make sense. And the main one they tell you
to go is to the library. And like most libraries
are not open seven days a week.

Speaker 4 (01:01:02):
And in Los Angeles, I also want to point this
out too, it's like when I was out in one
of the heat waves. You can't have a back like
a certain degree, and if.

Speaker 7 (01:01:12):
You go over that, you can't you can't come in right.

Speaker 4 (01:01:15):
And then they won't let you keep your stuff near
outside in your library because they'll have it taken away or.

Speaker 7 (01:01:20):
Throw the run away.

Speaker 4 (01:01:21):
And so in essence, it's really like a catch twenty two.

Speaker 6 (01:01:26):
You're damned if you do.

Speaker 7 (01:01:27):
Due you damned if you don't. And then we have
the rec centers.

Speaker 4 (01:01:30):
And and some representers don't want to hunt house people anyway.

Speaker 12 (01:01:34):
Yeah, they don't because of the children and because of
the you know whatever whatever, you know, those type of things.
But also in Detroit, most of our rec centers were
closed and was used doing the COVID for whatever reasons.

Speaker 7 (01:01:50):
But they haven't reopened.

Speaker 12 (01:01:51):
And so I know we're going like in our third
year post COVID, and we still haven't open enough rec
centers to provide the type of sheltered and showering and
things that the unhoused needs.

Speaker 4 (01:02:03):
The parks that I was at, and I remember clearly
because they refused to have places for unhouse people, and
then when they did open up a place where it
was so merrit very based that you know, if you
were in the program, you could come in. But if
it's like an I, a person that you know, don't
want to go into that whatever is going on over there,
they could, they couldn't come in. So they had it

(01:02:25):
separated where the kids wouldn't be there, because they always
have this belief that.

Speaker 6 (01:02:29):
On house people are gonna pounce on the children. After time,
they just try.

Speaker 7 (01:02:33):
To survive, just trying to survive.

Speaker 4 (01:02:35):
So it is this this, this this dichotomic. They don't
have the staying empathy of humanity. They just have it
on paper they.

Speaker 12 (01:02:42):
Have it on paper, but not in real life. And
and that's what I learned being a monitor in a shelter.

Speaker 7 (01:02:48):
I'm gonna leave the shelter.

Speaker 12 (01:02:49):
Name unnamed because I think it's a good organization, but
sometimes you know, people are not yet. Everything can always
be better. But the problem I have is the very
problem that you're trying to solve, and that you were
because not everyone in shelters have mental illness. Not everyone
in shelters are people who don't have jobs, don't have cars.

(01:03:14):
They have cars, and a lot of it is because
they just simply can't afford housing. And the other part
there's two other demographics that I noticed working in the shelter.

Speaker 7 (01:03:29):
Was one was people who were adopted.

Speaker 12 (01:03:33):
Yah really, yeah, okay, I will So if you get
adopted by a family or whatever, then you're basically no
longer able to get all the services that everyone gets.
I don't know if that's everywhere in the world, but
in Michigan so. And it has to do with your

(01:03:53):
age also, but even once you get past eighteen nineteen,
I'm really talking about that kind of group between sixteen
in twenty six, we're not.

Speaker 6 (01:04:01):
Talking about foster care. No.

Speaker 12 (01:04:03):
I've got talking about adoption and foster care is two
different things. Because foster care they have all kinds of
safety nets. But once you get adopted, if something happened
to the person that adopts you, let's just they have
some kind of fatal something and they no longer hear
or they no longer can help, You're back in the
same prediction you is because the family don't have.

Speaker 7 (01:04:24):
To take care of you. My time in the shelter
as a monitor, I.

Speaker 12 (01:04:28):
Met several people with that history and background, and there's
nothing you can do. There's nothing you can do in
terms of you have to wait out. I think it's
a certain time. And please don't quote me on this,
but I believe that's what one of them. It was
just so many problems was coming at me. I couldn't
research it all to help everyone, but I made it

(01:04:48):
my personal mission to help.

Speaker 7 (01:04:51):
Those that was not mentally ill, that was just there.

Speaker 12 (01:04:56):
And then some people who were like I met a
family that both of the sisters had some cognitive issues.

Speaker 7 (01:05:04):
Mother died.

Speaker 12 (01:05:05):
They could live day to day in the house and
all that, but they didn't have a capacity to help themselves.

Speaker 7 (01:05:11):
When the pipes burst in the basement, so both of.

Speaker 12 (01:05:16):
Them wan special needs and came into the shelter and
became a victim of the employees there because no one
wanted to take the time to deal with their disability.
They just they The one sister kept saying, we own
a house, we have a house.

Speaker 7 (01:05:34):
We're just displaced.

Speaker 12 (01:05:36):
And then they came in and actually tried to get
them to sign their house over to someone personally that
worked there.

Speaker 6 (01:05:43):
Oh my goodness, that's just horrible.

Speaker 12 (01:05:45):
In exchange for the certificate for the housing certificate. So
I kind of took them under my wing and showed
them kind of what to do, how to how to navigate,
and I'm glad that they didn't sign their house over.
They end up getting a certificate and so now they
can accept because because they didn't sign their house over,

(01:06:08):
they put a dart Protective services on them. Now they
have no income because if the guardian has their income,
and the guardian can say where they can go, if
they can keep it, whatnot. So hopefully it's an appeal
process going on because the adult Protective Services case was
that that the younger sister was not able to take

(01:06:28):
care of the older sister Pumper.

Speaker 7 (01:06:30):
Both of them have different forms of the same.

Speaker 6 (01:06:35):
It's not the same.

Speaker 12 (01:06:36):
So one is more visible than the other, physically visible
than the other. Okay, But that that's saved there because
now they can go to the court and say I
have this, and this is why we end up here
with a house because I didn't know how to do
this because of this.

Speaker 7 (01:06:53):
So they're they're they're actually in the process of going
to court.

Speaker 6 (01:06:57):
Now.

Speaker 12 (01:06:57):
I think they have to keep the guardian for six months,
and we're just gonna pray that the guardian, don't, you know,
make them separate the two, yeah, or do something various,
but you know, you got that going on. They're in
the shelter, and then you have that age group of
women and men that's forty five to fifty five or four.

(01:07:19):
I'm just gonna even go down and say thirty five,
thirty five, thirty okay, that don't qualify for a lot
of things because they're the empty net, empty ness mold.

Speaker 6 (01:07:31):
Okay.

Speaker 12 (01:07:32):
So they may have had Section eight taking care of
their children, just like I'm my situation, and then when
a child gets older, then you actually lose it and
then you back in the same situation it was when
you got it.

Speaker 7 (01:07:43):
For most people, and.

Speaker 12 (01:07:46):
For those people who had been working in these jobs,
and they're not demeaning jobs that just don't pay a lot,
because when you had Section eight or something in Michigan,
you only can work so much and you only can
make so.

Speaker 7 (01:07:58):
Much, so you end up being.

Speaker 12 (01:08:01):
Like the cross walk of the lunch lady or working
in laundry mac places where they're only paying ten fifteen,
you know, under under fifteen dollars an hour. I don't
want to call out any more these jobs because I
don't want to to send the meeting. But if you
made under fifteen, any job making under fifteen dollars an hour,

(01:08:23):
so then that their children get older, they been ten
twenty years working somewhere for ten dollars an hour, and
so now they end up in a shelter, so they
can't afford to live anywhere for ten dollars an hour.

Speaker 7 (01:08:39):
So I found that demograph.

Speaker 12 (01:08:41):
That's a big demographic, and they don't have disabilities or
anything any mental illnesses. It's just that they don't make
enough money to live.

Speaker 4 (01:08:51):
And that's another myth that it's break broken to is
that many people that are house are employed, are working,
but they don't have enough financial swhereithal to be able
to sustain themselves in an exploding run crisis. Hell, people
that are fully functional or halfway making more than ten
dollars hour can barely afford the rests, you know.

Speaker 6 (01:09:12):
But also I know there's a big thing that's going
on that we are just now talking about. It's particularly
in Los Angeles.

Speaker 8 (01:09:19):
I don't know.

Speaker 6 (01:09:20):
The oldest house person that I had been interviewing is
eighty years old.

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
And you can't just tell them to go get a job.

Speaker 12 (01:09:26):
And that was the other demographic. I mean to cut
you off. Remember I say it was three. That was
the other one was our senior citizen that oh god,
oh god, I met.

Speaker 7 (01:09:36):
I met. I met three ladies.

Speaker 12 (01:09:39):
I had to, you know, and it was against the
rules of working in the shelter, but I did it.
I found their families and in shelters with them. We
need training. I had the background of coming from a
nursing home as an activity director, so I was able
to identify UTI and what happens with the lethargic behavior.

Speaker 7 (01:10:00):
And I was able to identify it.

Speaker 12 (01:10:01):
And I kept trying to tell my director that we
had people in here got UTI's they need to you know,
go get some help because miss so and so can't
remember where her room is, she can't remember when it's
time for dinner. And a lot of them are just
became prideful people who didn't want to be a burden

(01:10:22):
to their children. Or you have the other half, which
is a larger percentage of the children and got up
and left and living their lives.

Speaker 7 (01:10:31):
And they don't even know.

Speaker 4 (01:10:33):
There's a lot of more elderly people that are on
housed and I'm sheltered, and it's we can't ignore it anymore.

Speaker 6 (01:10:40):
You can't just tell them to get a job, right, you.

Speaker 7 (01:10:42):
Can't, you know.

Speaker 12 (01:10:42):
And sometimes sometimes fifty or sixty depending on their ailment,
because we get a lot because we have bad water
in Detroit, so we have a lot of cognitive issues
that people have, you know, obtained just.

Speaker 7 (01:10:56):
From the water, yes, let alone.

Speaker 12 (01:10:58):
The physical abuse their body has been through because Michigan's
a very cold place to be homeless in Michigan. You're
six months, you're in you know, cold weather. Actually I
was dare to say more than six months. Yeah, that's
wait more than six months.

Speaker 6 (01:11:12):
That's disturbing.

Speaker 4 (01:11:13):
One of the things that I'm wan quickly to talk
on is I don't know if you knew about the
Supreme Court decision about the grants past thing.

Speaker 12 (01:11:21):
I think that it's a disgrace before the universe to
inconcerate someone because they can't help themselves in a capitalistic society.

Speaker 7 (01:11:32):
I got a button.

Speaker 12 (01:11:32):
From someone yesterday house keys instead of handcuffs, and it's
on my other shirt. I wish I had it on
to day, but that's I just don't just I just
I totally disagree with that.

Speaker 7 (01:11:44):
I think that is a horrible way to deal with it.
You know, in Detroit, I can't say across the whole state.

Speaker 12 (01:11:50):
But one of the reasons I was eager to come
to this convention and talk to my congressional leadership is
because I think that the shelters and getting this money
to help people should not be given all the money
until they help the person.

Speaker 7 (01:12:03):
It should be divbied.

Speaker 12 (01:12:05):
Out because what I found out is that our state
law says in the shelter, the case manager or the
social worker only have to see the client once a month.

Speaker 7 (01:12:15):
So if you're only seeing someone want a month, how
are you really helping them?

Speaker 4 (01:12:19):
Well, this has been in a very engaging conversation, and
we to drop it off here and we must not
give up, give out.

Speaker 1 (01:12:26):
Or give in.

Speaker 4 (01:12:28):
Thank you so much Tauana for her time, and thank
you again for listening to our series on the conference
and my journey to Washington, DC. Next week, I'm back
on the road. Median House went all the way to
Detroit and Flint, Michigan, where I learned more about the
Heidelbert Project and its connections to houselessness. And as always,

(01:12:52):
please like and subscribe, and if you'd like to share
your story on median House, please reach out to me
at Medianhouse dot com, at weedian House on Instagram, or
email me at Wiedianhouse at gmail dot com. Thank you
again for listening, and may we again meet in the
light of understanding. Wheedian Howes is a production of iHeartRadio.

(01:13:14):
It is written, hosted, and created by me Theo Henderson,
our producers Jbie Loftus, Kailey Fager, Katieficial, and Lyra Smith.
Our editor is Adam Wand, and our local art is
also by Katieficial.

Speaker 1 (01:13:32):
Thanks for listening.