Welcome to the Peon Camp
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So, getting back to the single African American mother around the age of 21 I wrote about July 8: let's call her Sherry. Sherry gets money from DHS for housing. In late June, I got this correspondence from DHS (also called DSS) shown below:
The yellow arrow points to the correct amount of Sherry's rent specified in her lease. This is the amount I must charge to meet my monthly expenses, which include insurance, building maintenance and property taxes. A portion of my property taxes goes to Albany to help people like Sherry get housing.
The red arrow shows the amount DHS reduced her monthly rent payment to as of July 1st. If Sherry, who isn't working, can't make up the difference of $126.50 each month she will incur late fees and eventually be evicted. Most DHS tenants try to get a family member to subsidize their rent payment at that point, or they get a lawyer from Legal Aid to help them negotiate with DHS to get the maximum amount. Legal Aid is paid for by United Way.
Sherry told me DHS didn't have enough money to pay her rent after taking out money for her RG&E bill. RG&E is generally paid for by HEAP when the client receives welfare. When I called Sherry's caseworker, I was told that if Sherry's rent was too expensive, she would simply have to move out. Sherry had been living in the unit for 4 months, and though she didn't want to give up her apartment, she left voluntarily, breaking her lease. Under these circumstances, I was entitled to keep her security deposit, nonetheless I received phone calls from Sherry's case manager at Strong and even Legal Aid inquiring about her "refund."
What happened to Sherry? Even though she wanted her own apartment and she was only guaranteed housing for 5 months, DHS persuaded Sherry to move back into the shelter by making it impossible for her to pay her rent. The day she returned her key, she showed me the 2-page form she received from DHS:
The red arrows show that, despite what Sherry's caseworker told me, DHS can somehow afford more than twice the amount it would cost for Sherry to have her own private apartment, where she can live with her daughter like a human being. I was told by another former DHS victim that if I had given her back her security deposit, she would have gotten no cash allowance (3rd red arrow).
Instead, DHS prefers to kennel this young Black female and her child at Melita House, a new shelter recently opened in Irondequoit, like dogs. The situation is as racist as it sounds. She's even losing her food stamps (below).
You might think the situation I'm depicting above, which is true, horrifying, long-standing and happens all over the city of Rochester, is only misfortunate for the poor suckers who get stuck in the system because they're criminals and drug addicts. Maybe you think it isn't your problem because you're not a landlord or because you refuse to rent to DHS clients. Maybe deep-down you think all landlords are scum.
Nearly two years ago, I ran across the following letter left behind on a Staples copy machine lens:
This landlord, a man who owned 3 buildings, was looking at the end of his career and his ability to support his family, and most probably homelessness. It does not say whether he refused to rent to DHS clients, as an increasing number of Rochester landlords claim they do.
But I can promise you that, like most Rochester city residents who own their own homes, he was not a rich man and he struggled to pay his property taxes. After he could no longer pay, he was probably forced out of his home and sent to a shelter. And at some point, when everyone is homeless and no one owns property, there will be no more money for DHS to send people to shelters. We are all going to the peon camps.
This is large scale tax fraud that needs to be stopped. Are you in?
Additional Information: Part I: American Peon Camps in the 21st Century
