Poverty Kills

Like a truck slamming into a Buick, the September 22nd Newsday story struck hard and left me stunned. After a night of downing gin last Friday, 18 year-old Savarin DeJesus returned to her room in an East Harlem homeless mothers' shelter, retrieved her four month old daughter from another shelter resident who had been watching her, and vomited into a bucket of cleaning liquid beside her bed before passing out. When she awoke the next afternoon, baby Niah had slipped off the bed and was face down in a six inch bucket of vomit and cleaning solution next to her mother's bed. The baby was pronounced dead at the hospital, from asphyxiation and/or drowning.

In Manhattan Criminal Court, the 18-year-old mother declared, tearful and trembling, to the judge: "I loved my baby. I want you to know that."

The young mother has been charged with negligent homicide and child endangerment. It's not known whether cribs were available at the East Harlem group home Ms. DeJesus called home. Given the gruesome circumstances of the baby's death, the young mother will no doubt be the object of much hate and criticism , and this story will receive much media coverage, until the next horror story bumps it from first place. Accusations will be hurled, like chairs in a bar brawl--at the "neglectful" mother, at the shelter, at whoever supplied the gin to the 18 year-old underage drinker. There will be questions too, about Niah's father. Who was he? Was he also a teenager? Was he employed? Was he homeless? What about the baby girl's grandparents? Could they have given a stable home to Ms. DeJesus and her daughter? If so, why didn't they?
In court, Ms. DeJesus' lawyer, Kenneth Gilbert suggested she might have moved to the shelter to be near her baby's father.

Eventually, this will fade from memory, like all the other disaster stories about how poverty kills people. Like the one about the kids in Chicago who died in a fire this month because the electricity was cut off and candles were lighting their apartment, which had no smoke detectors. Other than a natural disaster, there's only one reason for the electricity to be cut off, and that reason is lack of money to pay the bill. And there's ultimately only one reason that brings a person to live in a homeless shelter, and that reason is lack of money to rent an apartment or a room. Poverty is an unnatural disaster. Not an act of God; poverty is an act of man against his own kind. Poverty kills, just as surely as fire racing through an occupied home.

And after all the witnesses are heard, and all the pleas and motions are made, baby Niah will still be gone forever, and Savarin DeJesus will get an additional sentence added to the lifelong sentence of knowing that her bad decision, her lapse of good judgment was a contributing cause of the death of the baby she loved.

Are there any of us who, at age eighteen made only "good" decisions? Yeah... that's what I thought.

Because poverty imprisons just as surely as it kills, maybe now finally, Savarin DeJesus will get a more permanent housing situation--at Rikers --where the lights will never be turned off for failure to pay the bill.

Camp Refugee of America

Catherine was living in New Orleans when Katrina hit, and she lost everything, which wasn't much to begin with. A history of low wage jobs, family far away in London. It's a familiar script here, but each player brings her own unique qualities.

My friend from London has been in this country for thirty years, currently residing in a New York City homeless women's shelter known as Olivieri Drop-in Center. Or "Homeless Lane," as Cynthia calls it. Catherine doesn't have a strong social support network--not locally anyway-- and this is another common factor that brings women here, that creates refugees in America; but by no means is it the only one. Assumptions, as someone once said, make an ass of u and me.

Mental illness is another assumption assigned to the homeless, and she is not mentally ill. She is intelligent, articulate, compassionate, and funny-- and like too many of the women living as refugees in America, her life has been shattered by childhood abuse. To save herself-- to survive--she fled. Fleeing abuse is one of the most mentally healthy things you can do.

Neither does she fit the other convenient assumption made about homeless people: "drug user." Though she admits she drank in her younger days, those days are far behind her. An invitation from another friend to share some vodka holds nothing of interest for Catherine. She wants to keep her head straight, focused. She understands the enormity of the task before her, if she is going to reclaim her life.

By day three or four in this place, even the most organized, the most focused, begin to unravel. Nerves stretch thin-- from the daily uncertainty, the physical discomfort, the apparent lack of control over one's own destiny.

And there's the stigma. The homeless are everywhere in NYC, as they are in virtually every US city, dragging luggage on wheels, toting plastic bags and duffels and backpacks. Some are ragged, some are so stylish and well groomed, you'd never know they have no permanent dwelling. They are everywhere, but not everywhere are they welcomed.

A woman relates a story about a homeless man at a newstand, waiting to buy a newspaper, and told to wait outside. She was angry. Why should he wait outside when he was spending his money in that place? Why, indeed.

Here in this refugee camp of America, in a city sometimes referred to as "The capital of the world," the social workers are hard at work, five days a week, trying to fix broken lives. For each woman, a different mission. For Catherine, the mission is a ticket home to London. There, she believes she can get the help she needs to get on her feet again. And reconnect with her family.

To look at Catherine, you might think she is an office worker or a teacher on her way to a 9 to 5 job somewhere in Manhattan. And ideally, maybe that's what her life would be. Idealism is in short supply for many in this place. Anger simmering just below the surface, erupts sporadically. Step carefully: there are land mines buried here.

In this city, the capital of the world, you can find anything. You can buy fresh fruits and vegetables, hotdogs and fresh pretzels on the street for a pittance. Here there are great universities, museums and cathedrals. The performing arts flourish here. Talent gravitates here, from the musicians in the subway tunnels to the actors on Broadway. Everywhere there are 99 cent stores bursting with everything you'll ever need, and maybe a few things you want. The one basic need that's lacking is housing. Affordable, adequate shelter for all. It is the common denominator that underscores the dilemna of all who become domestic refugees.

You need an address to apply for a job, to apply for benefits. You need a home, with a closet to hang your clothes, or at the very least a locker. You need a place to take a shower. You need a phone to arrange interviews, appointments. Without this most basic foundation, moving forward, climbing up, is hard. Not impossible, but very, very hard.

In America, some people have three homes. In America, some people live in houses with more rooms than they'll ever use. And some people live in housing where many share one room, and many share one bathroom. Many of these are working people, paying taxes. Is it a housing shortage we have here, or a distribution failure?

Is it hopelessly idealistic to believe that every person living in America could have adequate, safe shelter with rent based on income? Is it really "socialistic" to believe that every person living here could have access to basic quality health care based on medical need, not personal wealth? Or is it simply democratic? What is democracy, anyway?

If you read this, Catherine, I want to tell you: hold on. You are stronger than you think. All of you are. Because the truth is, when people bad mouth the homeless, what they're expressing is their own uncertainty, their own fear that they couldn't survive the hardship you are living through today. I'm not sure how long I could survive, and because of that I'm in awe of you all.