County Suddenly Breaks off Dialogue With Homeless Advocates
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County Suddenly Breaks off Dialogue With Homeless Advocates Without a Plan to House All the Homeless
Without Dialogue Campaign of Direct Action Will Continue
Rochester, NY - On Tuesday, September 9, 2014 at 1:00pm representatives of the House of Mercy and St. Joseph's House of Hospitality were scheduled to meet with 7 officials from the County including Commissioner of Human Services, Kelly Reed to work toward building a partnership to resolve the current homeless crisis. St. Joseph's House of Hospitality has been providing homeless services in Rochester for 75 years and the House of Mercy for 29 years for a combined total of 104 years of service to the homeless.
Instead keeping the scheduled meeting to find common ground on the issues at hand, the meeting was abruptly called off. The County claimed that it was unnecessary to meet and there were no plans to reschedule. Commissioner Reed claimed she would send Sister Grace Miller from the House of Mercy two links to outside funding sources missing the whole point of the meeting (To date, those links were never sent). Our reason for meeting was to work together to solve the current homeless crisis. As the Coalition of Concerned Residents of Monroe County (of which House of Mercy and St. Joe's are a part) stated in an open letter to County Executive Maggie Brooks we are looking for openness, efficiency, and justice from the County Government in dealing with the crisis. We want...
- Openness in the releasing the County's plan to house all the homeless. If the County has a solid plan, they should have nothing to hide.
- Efficiency in spending the County's current emergency housing budget. We fear that the $1 million a year spent on emergency housing at the substandard Hotel Cadillac may be some of the more inefficient uses of taxpayer money and even a portion of that money could be used to fund a new shelter that meets more of the needs of more of the people.
- Justice and compassion in finding a way to house all the street homeless until we find a more permanent solution. If continuing to use the Civic Center Garage as the de facto shelter is the only alternative to current County policy that will continue to save lives this winter, then we support keeping it open. Either way we need to act swiftly to house all the homeless.
In addition, House of Mercy and St. Joe's were going to present the proposal for the County, the City, and residents to work together in enacting a Homeless Bill of Rights which would prevent these situations from happening again. We don't think this problem can be solved by dividing government from stakeholders. We still think dialogue with the County can be constructive. However, since dialogue has been called off, we will be forced to resume our campaign of nonviolent direct action until the homeless crisis is resolved.
Although we had planned actions earlier but out of respect for the tragic death of the police officer, Daryl Pierson, we held off. We are now ready for our campaign to continue.
For more information, Contact
Sister Grace Miller, 585-259-9580 or 585-455-0961
Although we had planned actions earlier but out of respect for the tragic death of the police officer, Daryl Pierson, we held off. We are now ready for our campaign to continue.
For more information, Contact
Sister Grace Miller, 585-259-9580 or 585-455-0961
