What with all of the rigmarole, brouhaha, and hubbub in the last few months, my monthly feature offering good news somehow completely slipped my mind. An appalling oversight on my part, to be sure.
Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see a shadow.
In this spirit, I offer this good news post for the month of September to counter-balance the perfectly hissable sleaze who resides in the White House.
Food for Homeless a Form of Free Speech
A judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, Adalberto Jordan ruled last week that sharing food with the homeless could be considered a form of constitutionally-protected free speech. Jordan's ruling flies in the face of numerous local ordinances criminalizing food-based outreach throughout the country.
You've probably never heard of Allan Law. There's no reason you should have. This former teacher's not a man in search of fame. However, I think he does deserve a bit of recognition for the selfless work he has done for the last 12 years.
Every night, while most of us are sleeping.
And when you ask Law, why he does all this good work, he just says,"Because somebody has to care."
Throughout my childhood, I grew up hearing from my mother this phrase: "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
This was drummed into my head at the earliest age, not as some kind of arrogant boast of divine favoritism. It was instead a reminder never to take things for granted. No man, no woman or child should ever feel exempt from misfortune.
The vagary of life, sudden changes in circumstance, is the one things we all share. A business shuts down, an accident or illness, a poor choice, a hundred things beyond our control. (Add to that the temptations of drugs and alcohol and the instant relief of from boredom, stress or emotional pain.)
All of these things, whether we choose to acknowledge it or not, are a part of our common humanity. Today, it might be that person who is begging on the street, living in their car or suffering from an addiction, but never ever think it could not be you or I in that situation tomorrow.
That was the greatest lesson my parents learned from the Great Depression.
One woman's last bequest will help provide shelter to Australia's homeless youth.
Last Friday, in a small ceremony, the final request of Lily Fardell, known locally as the "Fair Lady of the Hill" was formally carried out.
I'm sure you've never heard of her. After all, she wasn't a celebrity and lived a pretty average life.
Mrs. Fardell, a resident of the city of Newcastle, (the second most populated area in the Australian state of New South Wales), died earlier this year at the age of 96.
Her four-bedroom, three bathroom home, the historic Pacific House, was located in the prestigious suburb called "The Hill."
And what a splendid home it is.
The home itself was built in 1871 and was sold to a couple living in nearby High Street. It originally housed Thomas Smith, a pioneering Newcastle builder who served on Newcastle council and was elected mayor in 1896.
With her husband, Noel, Lily moved to the Pacific House in 1958. Both of them were teachers. They were the actually the second owners of the wide-verandah home which looks out upon King Edward Park.
Pacific House became renowned for generosity and acts of charity and by all accounts, her home was filled with decades of pleasant memories.
When the Christmas carols were on across the road, she would host 40 friends who would sing along, drink tea and enjoy the odd tipple of good wine.
In so many ways, it was all that a home should be. A place of shelter where good things are shared with family, friends and even strangers.
The problem of hospital's dumping homeless patients back on the street is a shame for the nation.
The practice of homeless dumping has been for some time now a shame of the national healthcare system. Nobody is very much surprised that it happens. In a system where money outranks almost other considerations, priorities can pretty regularly become warped by the profit margin. The penniless and homeless simply aren't worth the expense of adequate healthcare when the chief aim is to make a return on investment.
That's the harsh reality of privatized healthcare.
In numerous incidents, hospital employees and/or emergency services have been caught releasing back to the streets otherwise homeless patients who may be in need of expensive medical care. These patients should have been placed in shelters or in some kind of adequate facility. The street is the last place for them, for their sake's and for the sake of general public health.
Otherwise ignored by mainstream media, the
Washington Post picked up an interesting news article the other day
regarding homelessness and a DOJ challenge the local
ordinances against vagancy.
To Be Without a Home, Like a Complete Unknown
Boise, like many US cities,
passed an ordinance which banned sleeping or camping in public places. That
city is by no means unique.
The usual knee-jerk reaction to a visible and
embarrassing problem has been to find a way to make it a criminal offense. The
idea is basically if we can't prevent it, we can make it illegal and then we can make it invisible.
24%
of cities impose city-wide bans on begging in public.
76%
of cities prohibit begging in particular public places.
33%
of cities make it illegal to loiter in public throughout an entire city.
65%
of cities prohibit the activity in particular public places.
53%
of cities prohibit sitting or lying down in particular public places.
43%
of cities prohibit sleeping in vehicles.
9% of cities prohibit sharing of food
A recent study by UC Berkeley School of Law noted that more
Californian cities have enacted more anti-vagrancy laws than in any other part
of the country. with Los Angeles and San Francisco topping the list.
The laws restrict anything from panhandling to sharing food with a homeless person to sitting in public spaces.
Homeless Anthony Castelow defied the odds and turned his life around. Once he had changed his life, he committed himself to helping others get the help they needed.
Last Sunday a man you've probably never heard of died of a heart attack in his own home in Redford Michigan. I stresss the words "in his own home." As Detroit Free Press' Mitch Albom explains, a place called home, a place in which to live and to die was not something 55-year-old Anthony Castelow took for granted.
On his final day, writes Albom, Castelow preached at the church, the subject of that last sermon was about "new beginnings."
Do city ordinances which forbid the feeding of the homeless violate the religious liberty of Christians? Why has there been so much more outcry about gay wedding cakes and yet barely a whisper when it comes to outlawing a core commandment of the Christian faith?
There's no denying that, from the time of the struggling Puritan settlers until this day, Judaic-Christian values have had a profound influence on American culture. Certainly more than any other religious teaching. This is true not merely in the so-called Bible Belt but in other regions and other aspects of American social life.
Of course, no fair minded person would say that America has no room for diversity of religious thought or that Christianity should be forced upon any citizen. Simply because a religion has an influence doesn't mean it has any more right to become the only faith or the national governmentally-endorsed religion. Yet, it is true that much of American morality has roots in this particular faith.
Despite what Justice Scalia has recently said, the government is constitutionally mandated to remain wholly neutral, neither supporting nor rejecting any religion. At the same time, according to past Supreme Court rulings, the government must also steer clear of interference with degrees of religious faith: from the devout to the unbeliever, all must be respected.
Even with the equally-strong belief in secularism (when it comes to religion and government), on a person level, the humanitarian principles found in Judaic-Christian teachings are generally considered the bedrock of American philosophy.
Among those Christian unchallengables is the call to charity, a command to help those in need, to feed the hungry and to clothe the naked. This idea, of course, is not unique to Christianity but it is generally where Americans draw their inspiration for doing good works.
After loving the Lord with the second uppermost command is that we "love our neighbors as we love ourselves." And the two points cannot be separate in the Christian theology as the Book of John observes:
If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion--how can God's love be in that person?
The Book of James one can find:
If one of you says to them, "Go in peace; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?
In the Old Testament too one can find similar thoughts. Proverbs 14:31 for example:
Whoever oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God.
And in the same book:
Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor will also cry out and not be answered.
With regular outraged anguish about "religious liberty" the Far Right Christians seem strangely silence and disinterested when it comes to criminalizing one of Christianity's most noble articles of faith.
* * *
Only last month we featured a post about laws against feeding the homeless. Here's what it looked like in action when a 90-year-old man was arrested in Fort Lauderdale, Florida last weekend.
American exceptionalism is a useful tool when it comes to claiming the higher moral ground. However it comes with serveral pre-conditions and mandates. One of those is a higher sense of moral development. We must be -at least in some way- a bit better.
However, when it comes to our treatment of the homeless, the elderly, the sick and the need, where is our moral superiority?
The great can protect themselves, but the poor and humble require the arm and shield of the law.
Back then, it was like stating the obvious.
Over a hundred and fifty years later, in November 1977, former Senator and vice-president. Hubert Humphrey said:
"..The moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life- the sick, the needy and the handicapped."
If, as one philosopher said, compassion is the basis of morality, then what does it say about the present state of morality in government today.
Has our government passed that moral test?
Is that even a criteria for public policy anymore?
When did it stop being important?
When Charity is a Crime
Thirty-three US cities have enacted policies banning the feeding of homeless. Daytona Beach, Florida, Raleigh North Carolina, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and Birmingham Alabama have all recently fined, removed or threatened individuals and private organizations found breaking the laws.
As one source notes:
According to a report co-released by the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty, during the past seven years Gainesville, Fla., began “enforcing a rule limiting the number of meals that soup kitchens may serve to 130 people in one day;” Phoenix, Ariz., “used zoning laws to stop a local church from serving breakfast to community members, including many homeless people, outside a local church;” and Myrtle Beach, S.C., “adopted an ordinance that restricts food sharing with homeless people in public parks.”
In a Daytona Beach incident, a couple who ran a Christian outreach group for over a year were fined for giving free food to the homeless.
In all, police officers ticketed six people, including four volunteers who helped the Jimenezes on Wednesday – one of them, a man in a wheelchair who recently escaped homelessness and participated “to pay it forward,” Debbie Jimenez said. The fines levied by authorities total $2,238.
Police officers also warned that all members involved were permanently banned from the park. If they ignored the warning they would be arrested for trespassing — on public property, no less. As one reporter said, "The right to peaceably assemble has been declared null-and-void for charity workers."
The excuse the officials gave was that not all of the homeless people are mannerly or clean while in the park. Living on the street tends to take the GQ and Gucci out of its victims. They also point out that some homeless people have mental health issues and substance abuse problems and criminal records.
It's an ironic statement, as we shall see.
Charity has always been considered one of the fundamental virtues of the Christian faith. Famously, the New Testament in the Gospel of Matthew relates the parable of the good King who admonished his ministers for their pettiness and selfish.
‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
The punishment for helping only the well-off and powerful to the determent of the needy? The King cursed them, "into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels."
Pretty harsh.
Both St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas wrote that charity united us to God and that the habit of charity extends not only to the love of God but also to "the love of our neighbor."
Many Christians would say that love for your neighbor- whether rich or poor- is the key principle of the religion and any law that forbids individuals from assisting the needy is, in fact, anti-Christian.
However, it appears that the same people who claim that America is a Christian nation are quite comfortable with outlawing feeding the hungry and helping the needy. They must be too busy fighting for their religious liberty not to bake cakes for same-sex couples.
Criminalizing the Homeless
If that were the only laws that made things difficult for the homeless, it would be shameful enough. But sadly, that's only the tip of the iceberg.
In Houston, it has become illegal to search in dumpsters for food, as so many homeless people are forced to do. One 44-year old homeless man was ticketed by a Houston police officer for." disturbing the contents of a garbage can in (the) downtown business district."
In the Houston area, the most recent statistics indicate that more than 6,300 people are without a home on any given night. Nearly half of the unsheltered homeless population have a mental illness and/or substance abuse disorder. (There is good news too. Since 2011, there has been a 37% decrease in homelessness in Houston and in the past year, an impressive 16% decrease, according to the Coalition for the Homeless of Houston/Harris County.)
In San Francisco, arrests for illegal lodging, or sleeping outside are increasingly common citywide. According to one source,
The number of such citations of homeless people jumped sharply in the last two years: Illegal lodging charges increased from 85 to 219; maintaining a public nuisance, from 134 to 240; and obstructing a sidewalk, from 317 to 677.
Said Elisa Della-Piana, director of the Neighborhood Justice Clinic in Berkeley explained to T.J Johnston, writer for Street Spirit:
“A tired homeless man faced up to three years in prison for dozing off on a milk crate. Prison. For sleeping while sitting up — an act that anyone who has ever been on a plane ride can attest is torture in and of itself.”
Increasing the penalties against the homeless only punishes the ones who need help, especially after deep cuts in affordable housing and "other poverty-abatement programs starting in the 1980s."
Origins of Our Contempt
According to the nonpartisan think tank, The Urban Institute, between the years 1981 and 1989, the homelessness rate tripled.
One reason for this was the lack of affordable housing. Available housing for the low-income household became harder and harder to find. There was a reason for that.
In the effort to limit government responsibility- a prime directive for conservatives- the budget for Housing and Urban Development (HUD) was cut by a staggering $65 billion, going from a budget of $83 billion in 1978 to only $18 billion in 1983.
In effect, as one source put it, the federal government under Reagan "relinquished its responsibility for developing affordable housing for low-income families."
For an explanation of the full effects of the policies, you can go to this informative site.
Consider that during the same years, Congress was debating the Reagan budget of the B-2 stealth bomber. At $2.4 billion each, Congress cut its initial purchase of was 132 bomber to just 21.
If nothing else, this gives some indication of the moral priorities.
Another of Reagan's policies which contributed to the rise of homelessness concerned the governmental responsibility of the mentally ill (including substance abuse.)
Combined with a sharp rise in homelessness during the 1980s, Ronald Reagan pursued a policy toward the treatment of mental illness that satisfied special interest groups and the demands of the business community, but failed to address the issue: the treatment of mental illness.
Betraying our Duties
Upon closer inspection, we can see that the movement that put more and more mentally ill patients on the street did not begin with President Reagan.
It was actually a part of the 60s and 70s reforms that gave more rights to patients with treatable mental illness. Drugs were seen as the panacea for mental illness and policy-makers with doctors decided that the best course was to put the less severely patient back into the community. It was a major mistake.
The range of patients who could be released into the community - so long as they were not a threat to others- broadened considerably.
The effect was predictable: Once released, they would fail to take meds or get counseling and went right back to being seriously ill. As reported back in 1984, the policy was not working and something needed to be done:
Dr. Frank R. Lipton and Dr. Albert Sabatini of Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital in Manhattan, who have done research on the problems of the homeless, say one of the major flaws in the concept of deinstitutionalization was the notion that serious, chronic mental disorders could be minimized, if not totally prevented, through care provided within the local community.
The neo-conservative mandate under Reagan to slash government programs all but ensured that Federal funds for community mental health programs would begin to dry up, shifting the burden to the states. The states, in turn, followed the federal government's lead and legislators too cut their budgets on mental health programs.
It was more than any single Reagan policy. It was a general attitude that homelessness, unemployment, substance abuse, and even diseases like AIDS, were all personal problems and that governments had no mandate to seek resolutions. In short, social problems could and should be resolved without any cost to government.
It may surprise a lot of the young whippersnappers that at one time when it came to helping the homeless, it was a matter of national pride. Edward Kennedy in his 1980 concession speech at the Democratic convention said:
Our commitment has been, since the days of Andrew Jackson, to all those he called "the humble members of society.." On this foundation we have defined our values, refined our policies and refreshed our faith.
And that was the historical pivoting point.
By electing Ronald Reagan in 1980, Americans decided by popular vote to turn their backs on the poor, the drug addicts and the mentally ill. The road to prosperity had to have its scapegoats, after all. The humblest members of society didn't deserve our attention. There had to be winners and losers.
What was the joy of success if prosperity was to be universally shared to all members of society?
When Compassion Became a Joke
Nobody can claim ignorance about Reagan's record. His sense of empathy had been made clear for years, well before he was elected president. In 1966, before a TV audience he said:
"We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry every night. Well, that was probably true. They were all on a diet."
Hunger in America, for many, was just a joke.
When heiress Patty Hearst was kidnapped and the SLA- the group that abducted her- initially demanded that free food for the poor and elderly be distributed in the poor neighborhoods of San Francisco. It was, they said, a condition of beginning negotiations for the release of Miss Hearst. In three days of distribution, over 75,000 resident received food through charity organizations.
What was Governor Reagan's response?
Reagan told reporters that people who accepted the food were "aiding and abetting" felonies. (I am sure he meant felons, not felonies.) He said he "deplored the fact that these people are accepting the food."
Fuming at the hostage-takers' demand, Reagan reportedly told Republicans at a luncheon (a luncheon!)
"It's just too bad we can't have an epidemic of botulism."
(He later claimed the botulism remark was just a joke.)
Joke or not, sometimes an off-hand remark can reveal so much about the character and the moral standards of the teller. President Reagan and the party that has always held him in high regard- indeed idolized him- set the path that would today lead to laws making the poor and the sick and the homeless criminals.
For a nation that takes so much pride in its Judeo-Christian roots, -with a moral code that demands we treat others the way would expect to be treated, that teaches us to care for the needy and the helpless as a glory to God- you'd think we could treat the homeless just a little bit better than this.
One farm in Monterey County California offers an example of a innovative idea to help US veterans transition back into civilian life. By providing vocational agriculture training, such farms can provide fresh food for the local community. More importantly, it offers them a safe place among like-minded to begin a long healing process.
As the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq wound down, President
Obama faced a challenge that his
predecessor never had to worry about: How to find work of millions of
veterans returning home in an already-depressed economy. So that was no small
feat and some steady progress has been made.
According to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures
released in March of this year, the unemployment rate for veterans who served
on active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces (at any time since September 2001) edged
down to 9.0 percent in 2013.
And where there is unemployment, there is homelessness. At one point, around 2006, one in four homeless Americans was a veteran. Those numbers have been in steady decline due to an improved economy and increased funding to those on the streets. Although the situation might have improved, Housing and Urban Development SecretaryShaun Donovan said last year that the Obama Administration goals remain the same: to eliminate the problem by the end of 2015.
That won't be won't be easy.
While there is still so much more that needs to be done for
those who risked life and limb, that
duty is much harder when partisanship seems to cripple progress in Washington.
The shameful fact is that now that the veterans are no
longer so vital to the defense of the nation, many legislators in the capitol have turned their
backs.
A Veterans bill, a
sweeping $21 billion bill that would have expanded medical, educational and
other benefits for veterans, was
derailed in the Senate in February this year by the Republicans. They dismissed the
legislation as election year campaign and an example of unnecessary and
excessive spending.
That's why, despite the discouraging lack of significant
progress, it was it was inspiring to read about one small project on the other
side of the nation.
Farming the Pastures of Heaven
A pair of Marine Corps veterans in California, John Wagner and Bryan Showalter, are business
partners in a venture which may offer one answer to the problem.
Their 20-acre Semper
Fresh Farm, located in Corral de Tierra in Monterey County, California,
is part commercial farm and part vocational training for veterans.
The project which opened last week, is still
operating on a rather small scale. The initial market for their organic
heirloom tomatoes will be at the farm, as well as local restaurants and other
farmers' markets in the area. Once the farm is open to the public later this
year, visitors will be able to this year
for the public to come and harvest the 100% organically-grown tomatoes. Picking
off the vine is about as close to fresh as you can possibly be.
The farm is located in Steinbeck country, and provides the setting for stories in his book The Pastures of Heaven.
Lee Jeffries started out as a sports photographer but after a chance encounter with a young homeless person on the streets of London, his career took a completely different turn. Since that meeting Jeffries has dedicated his time taking photographic portraits of the homeless in Britain and in the United States. As our source explains:
Shooting exclusively in black and white, Lee Jeffries’ 135+ pictures can be viewed in his Flickr Photostream. The majority are closeup portraits with incredible detail. Each photograph exudes so much raw character and depth, you find yourself studying each shot with great intensity.
Here are a few examples from a much larger collection which can be found on Flickr.
Arizona has been in the news for all the wrong reasons lately. From legislative attempts to tear down national educational standards or bills targeting gays under the shield of protecting religious freedom, Arizona seems like a real mess. However, it's important to recall that there is another side to report.
Due to a few Tea Party radicals, Arizona has received a
lot of bad press lately. However, as Kennedy once said that "no government or social system is so evil
that its people must be considered as lacking in virtue." This wise reminder
holds true for the people of the "Grand Canyon State".
Here's one small example of the pang of conscience leading to action.
Parker Olson
for Arizona Public Radio, reports how a group of students at Northern
Arizona University came up with one way to reduce waste while feeding the
homeless. According to sources, university meal plans offer flexibility to
students when it comes to when and how much they eat. This flexibility however
comes at a cost. Every week, thousands of meal vouchers at colleges across the
country go unused. This means a lot of prepared food is wasted.
NAU's voucher plan allows students to buy a certain number of meals each week. If they don't use them all by Saturday night, the vouchers expire.
One freshman student, Caitlin Fagan decided to put the
wasted food to good use. With the help of like-minded friends, his group
collects the food on campus and redistributes to people in need around
Flagstaff. Some volunteers head out along Route 66 looking for the homeless and
the hungry.
The article explains one
case:
That's where they meet Clark Reber, who's down on his luck and staying at a local shelter. "It's awesome," Reber tells the students. "You guys are doing great work here. You're uplifting to people that are down and out and bringing food which everyone needs."
Admittedly it's a small project but it could easily be
expanded and combined with similar waste-reduction efforts.
In the month since the student-run program started, organizers estimate they've fed about 100 people. If there's any food left after their Saturday night runs, they donate it to a local rescue mission. The group hopes to keep growing and become another reliable source for feeding Flagstaff's hungry and homeless.
Certainly the down and out need all the help they can get.
It all boils down to priorities and responsibilities to help without judgement.
This poster makes a good point. Something is clearly wrong when you treat your enemy prisoners worse than your own citizens. When enemies are entitled to better conditions than your average homeless person, it's worth a closer look.
To add insult to injury, while prisoners of war (pardon, enemy combatants) had, at the very least, free medical care, a roof over their heads and warm meals, past studies have indicated that up to a third of all of adult homeless men were US veterans and as such are, without the protections guaranteed by the Geneva Convention.
(One bright spot: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) reported that the number of homeless ex-service men and women has declined by 7% in 2012- far better than the national rate. )
This informational poster, however, did its job. It got me thinking about the issue of homelessness and entitlements.
To Be Without a Home, Like a Complete Unknown
First of all, even before the worst effects of the recession rippled through the country, homelessness was a shame for the nation with aspirations of greatness. Back in 2009, it was estimated the number of homeless Americans at between 2.3 and 3.5 million.
Surprisingly (given the present state of the economy) the rate of homelessness actually decreased from 2009 to 2012. (A one-percent drop isn't much for a superpower to brag about, of course.) There is a good reason for this modest decrease in the number of people living on the street or in community shelters. Blame Obama's Big Government boogeyman.
I'll explain in a moment.
But, even with that tiny glimmer of hope, that statistical decrease is misleading. The number of individuals in homeless families might have decreased by 1 percent nationally, but the numbers actually increased by 20 percent or more in 11 states. Altogether the rates increased in 24 states and the District of Columbia.
On Wednesday of this week, Seattle was the scene of another inexplicable random act of violence. A mentally-disturbed man armed
with two .45-caliber handguns, walked into a corner coffee house and started shooting the patrons, leaving five people dead.
After stealing the hat from one of the victims, the attacker marched away and killed another person, and stole her car. Later turning the gun on himself, the man, Ian Stawicki, ended the murderous drama in the usual way.
(This particular incident was somewhat marginalized by the horrific cannibalistic attack on a homeless man in Florida.)
It seems like these incidents have become so common these days, the coverage hardly makes any lasting impression on the public conscience. It's amazing how quickly society moves on.
Anyway, I found a story related to this shooting that caught my attention. I thought I would share it.
I agree that the article is a moving story, but I am not sure the reason why. Could it be because so many people think that homeless people have no feelings?
Isn't it ironic that people could think that the homeless would lack a sense of empathy and compassion for a stranger in need?
