NEW YORK—On a daily commute, one might see a sleeping homeless person, perhaps on a park bench, or on a subway train.
Chances are that the person will soon be woken from slumber, and this may occur throughout the day, with an hour of sleep here, and an hour of sleep there. This morbid reality facing many homeless New Yorkers is not a pleasant one.
On Monday afternoon, current and former homeless, members of Picture the Homeless (PTH), a grass-roots organization founded and led by homeless people to advocate for social justice around issues like housing and police violence, gathered in front of Penn Station to accuse the NYPD of depriving homeless of sleep by waking them up when they are caught sleeping in public.
“Housing is a human right, that’s humanity,” said Michael-Vincent Crea, a current homeless pastor. “To deprive sleep is a crime against humanity. Every person needs to eat, to sleep, to rest. And when you have a home, you can sleep, you can eat, [and] you can rest.”
Crea said he has been in a struggle to get back into his home after he was kicked out. The last court hearing ended with a judge ruling in his favor, though the final outcome is uncertain. He suffers from dependent edema, or an accumulation of fluid in his legs, which is noticeable.
“This is a good example of what can happen when one gets sleep, as opposed to when one doesn’t get sleep,” he said, showing pictures of the swelling drastically reducing during his recent one week stay at his lawyer’s house.
The NYPD did not return a request for comment.
An all-time record 113,553 homeless people, including 42,888 children, slept in municipal shelters in fiscal year 2010, an all-time high, according to the “State of the Homeless 2011” report by the Coalition for the Homeless (CH).
The NYC Department of Homeless Services daily report from last Friday says that the total shelter census was 36,681 people, including 15,171 children.
Chances are that the person will soon be woken from slumber, and this may occur throughout the day, with an hour of sleep here, and an hour of sleep there. This morbid reality facing many homeless New Yorkers is not a pleasant one.
On Monday afternoon, current and former homeless, members of Picture the Homeless (PTH), a grass-roots organization founded and led by homeless people to advocate for social justice around issues like housing and police violence, gathered in front of Penn Station to accuse the NYPD of depriving homeless of sleep by waking them up when they are caught sleeping in public.
“Housing is a human right, that’s humanity,” said Michael-Vincent Crea, a current homeless pastor. “To deprive sleep is a crime against humanity. Every person needs to eat, to sleep, to rest. And when you have a home, you can sleep, you can eat, [and] you can rest.”
Crea said he has been in a struggle to get back into his home after he was kicked out. The last court hearing ended with a judge ruling in his favor, though the final outcome is uncertain. He suffers from dependent edema, or an accumulation of fluid in his legs, which is noticeable.
“This is a good example of what can happen when one gets sleep, as opposed to when one doesn’t get sleep,” he said, showing pictures of the swelling drastically reducing during his recent one week stay at his lawyer’s house.
The NYPD did not return a request for comment.
An all-time record 113,553 homeless people, including 42,888 children, slept in municipal shelters in fiscal year 2010, an all-time high, according to the “State of the Homeless 2011” report by the Coalition for the Homeless (CH).
The NYC Department of Homeless Services daily report from last Friday says that the total shelter census was 36,681 people, including 15,171 children.
Some PTH members spoke of the danger of shelters— violence, gangs, and drug abuse—on top of the poor living conditions and dispossession. They said it was safer to sleep in the waiting areas of public places than in the shelters.
A recent government initiative, the Income Contribution Requirement, would have had those who make income pay part of it to stay in a shelter. The program was dropped after public criticism.
The shelter system was implemented after a lawyer, Robert Hayes, co-founder of CH, discovered a man named Robert Callahan sleeping on the street during his commute to his law firm. He filed a class action lawsuit against the city and state to argue that shelter was a constitutional right in New York.
The subsequent consent decree, in 1981, mandated a right to shelter for all homeless men in the city (later extended to women and families), and outlined the basic minimum of health and safety standards the city and state must maintain.
Presently, PTH’s focus is on providing stable housing with adequate privacy for current homeless.
“We just finished a survey of the five boroughs,” said Indio, a former homeless man and member of PTH’s civil rights and housing committee. “Of all the abandoned buildings [and] vacant lots that can be converted, we’re taking all of this information and giving it to Hunter College, who are going to give us a rundown of who owns these vacant buildings and lots.”
They plan on then presenting it to Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Speaker Christine Quinn.
Ideally, the abandoned buildings and vacant lots would be made available for public use, a venture that could be less costly than what is currently spent on shelters.
The New York Housing Authority is working with the city’s Department of Housing, Preservation, and Development and Housing Development Corporation on expanding affordable public housing, including the Elliott-Chelsea, with 28 units reserved for low-income housing (no more than $38,400 for a family of four), and Council Towers VI, a residence building with 19 units set aside for low-income seniors.
But Section 8 vouchers, which help poor families pay rent, are no longer being given out except for emergency cases.
The National Low Income Housing Coalition’s “Out of Reach” report 2007–2008, stated that, in order to afford a Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom apartment of $1,318 a month without paying more than 30 percent of income on housing, one’s wages must be $25.35 an hour.
A recent government initiative, the Income Contribution Requirement, would have had those who make income pay part of it to stay in a shelter. The program was dropped after public criticism.
The shelter system was implemented after a lawyer, Robert Hayes, co-founder of CH, discovered a man named Robert Callahan sleeping on the street during his commute to his law firm. He filed a class action lawsuit against the city and state to argue that shelter was a constitutional right in New York.
The subsequent consent decree, in 1981, mandated a right to shelter for all homeless men in the city (later extended to women and families), and outlined the basic minimum of health and safety standards the city and state must maintain.
Presently, PTH’s focus is on providing stable housing with adequate privacy for current homeless.
“We just finished a survey of the five boroughs,” said Indio, a former homeless man and member of PTH’s civil rights and housing committee. “Of all the abandoned buildings [and] vacant lots that can be converted, we’re taking all of this information and giving it to Hunter College, who are going to give us a rundown of who owns these vacant buildings and lots.”
They plan on then presenting it to Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Speaker Christine Quinn.
Ideally, the abandoned buildings and vacant lots would be made available for public use, a venture that could be less costly than what is currently spent on shelters.
The New York Housing Authority is working with the city’s Department of Housing, Preservation, and Development and Housing Development Corporation on expanding affordable public housing, including the Elliott-Chelsea, with 28 units reserved for low-income housing (no more than $38,400 for a family of four), and Council Towers VI, a residence building with 19 units set aside for low-income seniors.
But Section 8 vouchers, which help poor families pay rent, are no longer being given out except for emergency cases.
The National Low Income Housing Coalition’s “Out of Reach” report 2007–2008, stated that, in order to afford a Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom apartment of $1,318 a month without paying more than 30 percent of income on housing, one’s wages must be $25.35 an hour.
