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Mayor Don Lane opens conversation about Homeless Services Center and River St. Shelter
Yesterday morning, on June 18, 2012, Mayor Don Lane left me a voicemail inviting me to converse with him on issues I have about the Homeless Services Center (HSC) and the River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES). Because I deeply believe in open, transparent government which is held accountable for its actions or lack of action, I am opening this up as a public conversation with my email response to Mayor Lane's invitation for a (personal) conversation. I hope that Mayor Lane will not take offense, but rather will rise to the occasion by conversing with not just me, but all Santa Cruz citizens who have concerns about the HSC and the RSES, and about homelessness in general.
Attached are photographs of wheelchair bound homeless individual Steve Lazow who I successfully advocated for to be reinstated at the Paul Lee Loft shelter at the HSC. Also attached are certificates authorizing me to represent/advocate for Mr. Lazow, and two other disabled homeless people who are staying at the Paul Lee Loft shelter at the HSC. Both of them, Ron Skinner and Megan Andrea Morgan, use walkers. I have also attached disability accommodation requests they made to the HSC and the RSES under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Section 504 (of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973) and the federal Fair Housing Act (FHA).
I hope the unfolding story of these three disabled homeless individuals fighting for their civil rights opens up a fertile public conversation about disabled individuals who make up the majority of the chronically homeless in Santa Cruz County.
I honestly hope that Mayor Lane will engage the public, not just me, in a conversation about these issues.
Attached are photographs of wheelchair bound homeless individual Steve Lazow who I successfully advocated for to be reinstated at the Paul Lee Loft shelter at the HSC. Also attached are certificates authorizing me to represent/advocate for Mr. Lazow, and two other disabled homeless people who are staying at the Paul Lee Loft shelter at the HSC. Both of them, Ron Skinner and Megan Andrea Morgan, use walkers. I have also attached disability accommodation requests they made to the HSC and the RSES under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Section 504 (of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973) and the federal Fair Housing Act (FHA).
I hope the unfolding story of these three disabled homeless individuals fighting for their civil rights opens up a fertile public conversation about disabled individuals who make up the majority of the chronically homeless in Santa Cruz County.
I honestly hope that Mayor Lane will engage the public, not just me, in a conversation about these issues.
June 19, 2012
Mayor Don Lane
809 Center Street, Room 10
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Tel: 831.420.5020
via email to: dlane [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: citycouncil [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: JBarisone [at] abc-law.com
cc: mbernal [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: cberg [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: John.McCarty [at] hud.gov
cc: Lester.Davis [at] hud.gov
cc: Richard.Salom [at] hud.gov
cc: Clifford.Taffet [at] hud.gov
cc: Helen.R.Kanovsky [at] hud.gov
cc: Ophelia.B.Basgal [at] hud.gov
cc: Maria.F.Cremer [at] hud.gov
cc: kimberly.y.nash [at] hud.gov
cc: Nancy.deSerpa [at] mail.house.gov
cc: Adam.Spickler [at] asm.ca.gov
cc: jgrow [at] nhlp.org
cc: Neil Donovan c/o info [at] nationalhomeless.org
cc: Katie Sullivan c/o nfha [at] nationalfairhousing.org
cc: mcollier [at] sfchronicle.com
cc: achance [at] sacbee.com
cc: dbutler [at] mercurynews.com
cc: white [at] kpix.cbs.com
cc: 4listens [at] kron4.com
cc: assignmentdesk [at] kqed.org
cc: contact [at] pacifica.org
cc: garcher [at] gtweekly.com
cc: terry [at] calaware.org
cc: pscheer [at] firstamendmentcoalition.org
re: My most urgent issues with the Santa Cruz Homeless Services Center (HSC) and River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES)
Dear Mayor Lane:
I want to thank you for offering to converse with me about my most urgent issues with the Santa Cruz Homeless Services Center (HSC) and the River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES), as per your message left on my voicemail yesterday morning, June 18, 2012. As you know, I deeply believe in governmental transparency, openness and accountability. Thus I prefer to carry out our conversation in the open, where nothing is hidden and nothing can be misunderstood.
I am currently (officially) advocating for the following individuals, with more individuals to follow.
• Steve Lazow — he is confined to a wheelchair and is in a great deal of pain. This makes it difficult for him to advocate for himself and to communicate with and understand medical/social service providers. Mr. Lazow was evicted a week ago last Sunday from the Paul Lee Loft shelter for exercising his disability rights. His friend Mia Dellarosa was evicted from the Paul Lee Loft for assisting Mr. Lazow in exercising his disability rights. The Paul Lee Loft shelter staff violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Section 504 (of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973), and the federal Fair Housing Act, discriminating against both Mr. Lazow and Ms. Dellarosa by making them homeless for exercising Mr. Lazow's disability rights. Moreover, Paul Lee Loft shelter staff violated the requirements of their HUD block grant money by not providing Mr. Lazow and Ms. Dellarosa their due process rights in receiving written explanations when a federal benefit has been rescinded and then being allowed to appeal the revocation of their federal benefits. This systemic misbehavior places the Paul Lee Loft shelter's HUD funds at risk. About a week ago, Mr. Lazow suffered a seizure after being rehoused at the Paul Lee Loft shelter — it is fortunate that I emailed you to resolve his eviction so that he was in the shelter when his seizure occurred. I asked HSC Executive Director Monica Martinez to ensure his wheelchair and possessions were safeguarded while Mr. Lazow was hospitalized. Mr. Lazow returned to find that some of his belongings had been taken, most notably some pain medicines, his jacket and his shoes. While Mr. Lazow said he has a medical appointment this week so that he can obtain more pain medicines, he is suffering in great pain: from my observation he is not totally lucid at present. Mr. Lazow has not had shoes for several days. Imagine using a public toilet stall or entering private businesses with only socks on your feet: this is unsanitary; it is demeaning. I emailed Ms. Martinez requesting an investigation into this theft with no results to date. Mr. Lazow has been chronically homeless, to my understanding, for the last ten years. He has not had (semi) permanent housing to his understanding for many, many years.
• Ron Skinner — he uses a walker and has other medical conditions making it difficult for him to advocate for himself or to communicate with and understand medical/social service providers. Mr. Skinner is physically and emotionally fragile: he cannot survive being unhoused on the streets.
• Megan Andrea Morgan — she uses a walker too. Ms. Morgan has chronic fatigue and extreme pain from several medical conditions, making it difficult for her to advocate for herself because she is just too tired and pained to be functional. Ms. Morgan has been chronically homeless, to my understanding, for the last three years since she lost a Section 8 voucher. Ms. Morgan suffers from several very serious medical conditions — she cannot survive on the streets. Ms. Morgan's primary care physician wrote a disability accommodation request letter asking that she be granted extended shelter so that tests could be performed to determine the cause of her serious medical conditions. This request has not been fulfilled, stopping Ms. Morgan from having these tests performed. Ms. Morgan requires a horizontal cushioned place, like a couch or bed, to rest during the day because she requires more rest than the Paul Lee Loft shelter allows her during its open hours. Consequently I composed an immediate disability accommodation request on her behalf, which she signed, to alleviate her chronic exhaustion. Ms. Morgan's present condition threatens her ability to benefit from and potentially to participate in the services of the Paul Lee Loft shelter. This immediate disability accommodation request was faxed and emailed to Ms. Martinez early yesterday morning, June 18, 2012 around 5 AM. We have not yet received any response about this request, or in fact about any of the disability accommodation requests for Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan made over the last week.
As a refresher on the issues I brought to your attention which have not all been resolved, please read the following article I published on Santa Cruz Indybay after Mr. Lazow was evicted from the Paul Lee Loft shelter:
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/06/11/18715157.php
Please view photographs of Mr. Lazow today without shoes while suffering in great pain. It took him about fifteen minutes to make his way from the Paul Lee Loft shelter to the HSC entrance — where these photographs were taken — about 200 feet away. Mr. Lazow can only move very slowly in his wheelchair. It can easily be observed that Mr. Lazow is suffering in great pain because he is not completely lucid — Mr. Lazow informed me that he is suffering in pain.
Mr. Lazow's righthand side pants are pulled up so that he can use them as leverage to pick up his leg. It is clear that Mr. Lazow is severely physically disabled. He cannot survive on the streets. That he has survived this long while being chronically homeless, bouncing from one shelter bed to the next, is a miracle. His luck may run out.
My main issue at the moment with HSC Executive Director Monica Martinez is that she refuses to recognize me as an advocate and representative for her clients, claiming that HSC clients require court ordered requests to retain an advocate and representative. Her staff refuses to provide me a written copy of this policy so that I may share it with the federal government, an attorney and the news media. I believe her claimed policy is illegal, not only under disability laws like the ADA, Section 504 and the Fair Housing Act, but also under laws which allow people to retain others, like family members, as representatives and advocates for them. Clearly Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan require assistance in exercising their disability rights, to remain sheltered, to gain more permanent housing and to obtain adequate medical treatment. Ms. Martinez is impeding me from assisting them in exercising their disability rights under the aforementioned laws.
Until Ms. Martinez recognizes me as a representative and advocate for her clients, I can't even get past square one in ensuring they are sheltered and gain more permanent housing for them so that they do not bounce from one crisis to the next, with being unhoused on the streets hanging over their heads like a sword of Damocles.
This issue must be resolved immediately.
Beyond that the following issues must be immediately addressed:
• Mr. Lazow's immediate disability accommodation request to allow persons of his choice, male or female, to assist him in showering must be granted. Until then he is unable to shower.
• Ms. Morgan's immediate disability accommodation request for a horizontal rest space during the day on the HSC campus — while the HSC campus shelters are closed to residents — must be granted to provide her a bed or couch to rest upon. If this is not granted, she will suffer needlessly to the point of not being able to participate in the Paul Lee Loft shelter program.
• The HSC and the River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES) must provide me with records about Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan. All of them are willing to sign releases which would be acceptable to their physicians to release information to me. I cannot adequately advocate for them all until I understand their history of homelessness, what services they have used and are presently being provided. Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan signed releases for me to gain access to all of their records from the RSES, but RSES program manager Tracey Heggum still refuses to release their information to me. This must be resolved immediately before Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan are forced back onto the streets.
• Santa Cruz City Housing Programs Manager Carol Berg has not responded to my complaint about the illegal eviction of Mr. Lazow and Ms. Dellarosa, as well as the Paul Lee Loft shelter's denial of due process rights in taking away federal benefits funded in part by HUD block grants to the City of Santa Cruz. Paul Lee Loft shelter staff are not providing beneficiaries with written explanations when they are being evicted for alleged program violations, nor are they given opportunities to appeal their evictions. Ms. Berg is required by your own citizen participation plan to investigate complaints about HUD HOME and CDBG grant providers administered by the City of Santa Cruz. I ask for the required investigation concluding with a formal letter of findings and, if appropriate, correction of HUD program violations.
Once these issues are addressed satisfactorily, we can correspond about deeper systemic problems with the HSC and the RSES. I believe this email describes my most pressing issues with the Santa Cruz HSC, its executive director Monica Martinez, the RSES, and its program manager Tracey Heggum.
Please inspect the PDF attachments of the certificates authorizing my representation/advocacy and the immediate disability accommodation requests Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan have made to HSC Executive Director Monica Martinez and RSES Program Manager Tracey Heggum. No responses to these immediate accommodations have been forthcoming, setting the stage for further disability rights violations of the ADA, Section 504 and the Fair Housing Act. They may also be viewed using the following links to Google Docs.
Certificates authorizing representation/advocacy:
http://tinyurl.com/6pk6or2
http://tinyurl.com/8xzfrcu
http://tinyurl.com/7wmgt3y
Mr. Lazow's immediate disability accommodation requests:
http://tinyurl.com/7u9suv7
http://tinyurl.com/7cavfbo
http://tinyurl.com/d6hffpj
http://tinyurl.com/7q3tahz
Mr. Skinner's immediate disability accommodation requests:
http://tinyurl.com/7s7cpcj
http://tinyurl.com/7v3apjf
Ms. Morgan's immediate disability accommodation requests:
http://tinyurl.com/8ayj94r
http://tinyurl.com/79dg2m9
http://tinyurl.com/cgox5j2
I appreciate actions by you, the City Council and Santa Cruz city staff to forestall my clients' disability rights being violated further. Thank you for your sincere concern about disability rights and HUD program requirements at the HSC and the RSES. I look forward to your response.
Sincerely yours,
John E. Colby, Ph.D.
Mayor Don Lane
809 Center Street, Room 10
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Tel: 831.420.5020
via email to: dlane [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: citycouncil [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: JBarisone [at] abc-law.com
cc: mbernal [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: cberg [at] cityofsantacruz.com
cc: John.McCarty [at] hud.gov
cc: Lester.Davis [at] hud.gov
cc: Richard.Salom [at] hud.gov
cc: Clifford.Taffet [at] hud.gov
cc: Helen.R.Kanovsky [at] hud.gov
cc: Ophelia.B.Basgal [at] hud.gov
cc: Maria.F.Cremer [at] hud.gov
cc: kimberly.y.nash [at] hud.gov
cc: Nancy.deSerpa [at] mail.house.gov
cc: Adam.Spickler [at] asm.ca.gov
cc: jgrow [at] nhlp.org
cc: Neil Donovan c/o info [at] nationalhomeless.org
cc: Katie Sullivan c/o nfha [at] nationalfairhousing.org
cc: mcollier [at] sfchronicle.com
cc: achance [at] sacbee.com
cc: dbutler [at] mercurynews.com
cc: white [at] kpix.cbs.com
cc: 4listens [at] kron4.com
cc: assignmentdesk [at] kqed.org
cc: contact [at] pacifica.org
cc: garcher [at] gtweekly.com
cc: terry [at] calaware.org
cc: pscheer [at] firstamendmentcoalition.org
re: My most urgent issues with the Santa Cruz Homeless Services Center (HSC) and River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES)
Dear Mayor Lane:
I want to thank you for offering to converse with me about my most urgent issues with the Santa Cruz Homeless Services Center (HSC) and the River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES), as per your message left on my voicemail yesterday morning, June 18, 2012. As you know, I deeply believe in governmental transparency, openness and accountability. Thus I prefer to carry out our conversation in the open, where nothing is hidden and nothing can be misunderstood.
I am currently (officially) advocating for the following individuals, with more individuals to follow.
• Steve Lazow — he is confined to a wheelchair and is in a great deal of pain. This makes it difficult for him to advocate for himself and to communicate with and understand medical/social service providers. Mr. Lazow was evicted a week ago last Sunday from the Paul Lee Loft shelter for exercising his disability rights. His friend Mia Dellarosa was evicted from the Paul Lee Loft for assisting Mr. Lazow in exercising his disability rights. The Paul Lee Loft shelter staff violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Section 504 (of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973), and the federal Fair Housing Act, discriminating against both Mr. Lazow and Ms. Dellarosa by making them homeless for exercising Mr. Lazow's disability rights. Moreover, Paul Lee Loft shelter staff violated the requirements of their HUD block grant money by not providing Mr. Lazow and Ms. Dellarosa their due process rights in receiving written explanations when a federal benefit has been rescinded and then being allowed to appeal the revocation of their federal benefits. This systemic misbehavior places the Paul Lee Loft shelter's HUD funds at risk. About a week ago, Mr. Lazow suffered a seizure after being rehoused at the Paul Lee Loft shelter — it is fortunate that I emailed you to resolve his eviction so that he was in the shelter when his seizure occurred. I asked HSC Executive Director Monica Martinez to ensure his wheelchair and possessions were safeguarded while Mr. Lazow was hospitalized. Mr. Lazow returned to find that some of his belongings had been taken, most notably some pain medicines, his jacket and his shoes. While Mr. Lazow said he has a medical appointment this week so that he can obtain more pain medicines, he is suffering in great pain: from my observation he is not totally lucid at present. Mr. Lazow has not had shoes for several days. Imagine using a public toilet stall or entering private businesses with only socks on your feet: this is unsanitary; it is demeaning. I emailed Ms. Martinez requesting an investigation into this theft with no results to date. Mr. Lazow has been chronically homeless, to my understanding, for the last ten years. He has not had (semi) permanent housing to his understanding for many, many years.
• Ron Skinner — he uses a walker and has other medical conditions making it difficult for him to advocate for himself or to communicate with and understand medical/social service providers. Mr. Skinner is physically and emotionally fragile: he cannot survive being unhoused on the streets.
• Megan Andrea Morgan — she uses a walker too. Ms. Morgan has chronic fatigue and extreme pain from several medical conditions, making it difficult for her to advocate for herself because she is just too tired and pained to be functional. Ms. Morgan has been chronically homeless, to my understanding, for the last three years since she lost a Section 8 voucher. Ms. Morgan suffers from several very serious medical conditions — she cannot survive on the streets. Ms. Morgan's primary care physician wrote a disability accommodation request letter asking that she be granted extended shelter so that tests could be performed to determine the cause of her serious medical conditions. This request has not been fulfilled, stopping Ms. Morgan from having these tests performed. Ms. Morgan requires a horizontal cushioned place, like a couch or bed, to rest during the day because she requires more rest than the Paul Lee Loft shelter allows her during its open hours. Consequently I composed an immediate disability accommodation request on her behalf, which she signed, to alleviate her chronic exhaustion. Ms. Morgan's present condition threatens her ability to benefit from and potentially to participate in the services of the Paul Lee Loft shelter. This immediate disability accommodation request was faxed and emailed to Ms. Martinez early yesterday morning, June 18, 2012 around 5 AM. We have not yet received any response about this request, or in fact about any of the disability accommodation requests for Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan made over the last week.
As a refresher on the issues I brought to your attention which have not all been resolved, please read the following article I published on Santa Cruz Indybay after Mr. Lazow was evicted from the Paul Lee Loft shelter:
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/06/11/18715157.php
Please view photographs of Mr. Lazow today without shoes while suffering in great pain. It took him about fifteen minutes to make his way from the Paul Lee Loft shelter to the HSC entrance — where these photographs were taken — about 200 feet away. Mr. Lazow can only move very slowly in his wheelchair. It can easily be observed that Mr. Lazow is suffering in great pain because he is not completely lucid — Mr. Lazow informed me that he is suffering in pain.
Mr. Lazow's righthand side pants are pulled up so that he can use them as leverage to pick up his leg. It is clear that Mr. Lazow is severely physically disabled. He cannot survive on the streets. That he has survived this long while being chronically homeless, bouncing from one shelter bed to the next, is a miracle. His luck may run out.
My main issue at the moment with HSC Executive Director Monica Martinez is that she refuses to recognize me as an advocate and representative for her clients, claiming that HSC clients require court ordered requests to retain an advocate and representative. Her staff refuses to provide me a written copy of this policy so that I may share it with the federal government, an attorney and the news media. I believe her claimed policy is illegal, not only under disability laws like the ADA, Section 504 and the Fair Housing Act, but also under laws which allow people to retain others, like family members, as representatives and advocates for them. Clearly Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan require assistance in exercising their disability rights, to remain sheltered, to gain more permanent housing and to obtain adequate medical treatment. Ms. Martinez is impeding me from assisting them in exercising their disability rights under the aforementioned laws.
Until Ms. Martinez recognizes me as a representative and advocate for her clients, I can't even get past square one in ensuring they are sheltered and gain more permanent housing for them so that they do not bounce from one crisis to the next, with being unhoused on the streets hanging over their heads like a sword of Damocles.
This issue must be resolved immediately.
Beyond that the following issues must be immediately addressed:
• Mr. Lazow's immediate disability accommodation request to allow persons of his choice, male or female, to assist him in showering must be granted. Until then he is unable to shower.
• Ms. Morgan's immediate disability accommodation request for a horizontal rest space during the day on the HSC campus — while the HSC campus shelters are closed to residents — must be granted to provide her a bed or couch to rest upon. If this is not granted, she will suffer needlessly to the point of not being able to participate in the Paul Lee Loft shelter program.
• The HSC and the River Street Emergency Shelter (RSES) must provide me with records about Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan. All of them are willing to sign releases which would be acceptable to their physicians to release information to me. I cannot adequately advocate for them all until I understand their history of homelessness, what services they have used and are presently being provided. Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan signed releases for me to gain access to all of their records from the RSES, but RSES program manager Tracey Heggum still refuses to release their information to me. This must be resolved immediately before Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan are forced back onto the streets.
• Santa Cruz City Housing Programs Manager Carol Berg has not responded to my complaint about the illegal eviction of Mr. Lazow and Ms. Dellarosa, as well as the Paul Lee Loft shelter's denial of due process rights in taking away federal benefits funded in part by HUD block grants to the City of Santa Cruz. Paul Lee Loft shelter staff are not providing beneficiaries with written explanations when they are being evicted for alleged program violations, nor are they given opportunities to appeal their evictions. Ms. Berg is required by your own citizen participation plan to investigate complaints about HUD HOME and CDBG grant providers administered by the City of Santa Cruz. I ask for the required investigation concluding with a formal letter of findings and, if appropriate, correction of HUD program violations.
Once these issues are addressed satisfactorily, we can correspond about deeper systemic problems with the HSC and the RSES. I believe this email describes my most pressing issues with the Santa Cruz HSC, its executive director Monica Martinez, the RSES, and its program manager Tracey Heggum.
Please inspect the PDF attachments of the certificates authorizing my representation/advocacy and the immediate disability accommodation requests Mr. Lazow, Mr. Skinner and Ms. Morgan have made to HSC Executive Director Monica Martinez and RSES Program Manager Tracey Heggum. No responses to these immediate accommodations have been forthcoming, setting the stage for further disability rights violations of the ADA, Section 504 and the Fair Housing Act. They may also be viewed using the following links to Google Docs.
Certificates authorizing representation/advocacy:
http://tinyurl.com/6pk6or2
http://tinyurl.com/8xzfrcu
http://tinyurl.com/7wmgt3y
Mr. Lazow's immediate disability accommodation requests:
http://tinyurl.com/7u9suv7
http://tinyurl.com/7cavfbo
http://tinyurl.com/d6hffpj
http://tinyurl.com/7q3tahz
Mr. Skinner's immediate disability accommodation requests:
http://tinyurl.com/7s7cpcj
http://tinyurl.com/7v3apjf
Ms. Morgan's immediate disability accommodation requests:
http://tinyurl.com/8ayj94r
http://tinyurl.com/79dg2m9
http://tinyurl.com/cgox5j2
I appreciate actions by you, the City Council and Santa Cruz city staff to forestall my clients' disability rights being violated further. Thank you for your sincere concern about disability rights and HUD program requirements at the HSC and the RSES. I look forward to your response.
Sincerely yours,
John E. Colby, Ph.D.
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Visit and join Santa Cruz (Disabled) Homeless Persons Advocacy Facebook group
Mon, Jun 25, 2012 11:51AM
I believe you misread the HIPAA authorization entry you referenced
Tue, Jun 19, 2012 11:18PM
HIPAA happens, or why you can't always get what you want
Tue, Jun 19, 2012 10:44PM
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