Setting Standards For Shelter Care

Tomas Picarello would like to get out of the homeless shelter system because the shelter where he stayed had no hot water for washing or toilet paper.

Charles Pitts has already done the same after witnessing abuse by shelter staff too many times.

James Leonard couldn’t make a job interview because the shelter wouldn’t accommodate a simple
and reasonable request for clean clothes and bus tokens.

And Jakkee Bryson blames the shelters for her physical disabilities, including asthma and mobility problems.

“Unfortunately, you could go to any shelter in any party of the country where homeless people stay and the conditions are the same everywhere,” said Robert Love, an Episcopal Community Services resident who also stayed in Las Vegas and Denver shelters.

Robert, as well as an alliance of homeless residents, service providers and the city’s Shelter Monitoring Committee, lobbied the Board of Supervisors to establish basic standards of care in San Francisco’s shelters. The proposal, authored by Supervisor Tom Ammiano, passed on a 9-2 vote on March 18 and awaits a signature from Mayor Gavin Newsom. The legislation mandates minimum standards in cleanliness, safety and professionalism in publicly funded shelters, and it follows similar measures in Seattle, Wash. and Norfolk County, Va.

Last year, 215 people who stayed in shelters were interviewed by the Coalition on Homelessness for their report “Shelter Shock.” Of those respondents, 55 percent of the respondents experienced verbal, physical and/or sexual abuse in the shelters, 32 percent said they felt unsafe in the facilities and 27 percent didn’t have access to toilet paper, feminine hygiene products, soap or bathroom supplies.

Only six of the city’s 19 shelters met basic hygiene requirements, the SMC found.

The ordinance would redress such conditions and also require dignity and respect from shelter employees, meeting nutritional needs of residents, electricity for cell phones and wheelchairs, first aid kits, clean bedding, fresh drinking water and an assured eight hours of sleep. It would also ensure that shelters with city contracts comply with these standards and take corrective action when violations are reported. In an eleventh-hour move that drew objections from some advocates, a provision granting compliance duties to the Shelter Monitoring Committee was amended to assign enforcement to the Department of Public Health.

"I'M NOT DOING THIS FOR MYSELF"

After 18 years as a legal professional, Tomas Picarello became unemployed and had to stay at the Ella Hill Hutch Center on McAllister Street. Tomas suffered the indignities of waiting for a place to sleep, which was usually a gym mat on the floor. At times, the shelter had no hot water and no toilet paper. He was appalled by these shortages and it spurred his motivation for reform.

"I’m not doing this for myself,” he said. “I’m doing this for the 1,600 people presently in the shelters." But his main concern is how grievances in the system will be handled by the public health department.

“DPH has not in the past – nor will in the future – have the balls to enforce this historic legislation,” Tomas said.

A CULTURE OF TRAUMATIZATION

Charles Pitts, a spoken-word artist originally from Illinois, said he was enraged by the changes in the bill, and should revert to its original form – given his shelter experiences, it’s an understandable sentiment.

“(Shelter employees) relive their abuse as a perpetrator,” Charles said. He recalls an incident at Central City Hospitality House on Leavenworth Street where an employee screamed at a client for having a schizophrenic episode and woke everybody.

Charles also remembers another client being willfully locked out without access to his medication. An ambulance had to be called. When Charles tried to intervene on behalf of the client, he was told get an affidavit and a lawyer.

Charles said that there’s a “culture of traumatization” at the shelters: most staff he encountered have been in prison, mirroring their arbitrary nature of their enforcing rules. Illicit drug activity, exchanging sex for beds and overall psychological abuse are common, he said.

Charles lives outside as an alternative to staying in such an atmosphere.

INJURED BY THE SYSTEM

“I have a sad anniversary coming up,” said Jakkee Bryson to the board. “May 16 will mark 10 years of my being in the sheltering system.” Jakkee stood on the podium for public comment at a March 5 meeting with a walker, a cane and insoles in her shoes. Asthma also slows Jakkee down.

“I’m very sorry to say that a number of conditions (in the shelters) have crippled me,” Jakkee continued. Lack of accommodation is her barrier to city services, she said, and that most public places -- especially shelters -- violate the Americans with Disabilities Act.

“Unless you want to have more people in walkers, more people with asthma, or more people dead, you’re going to have to pass these standards,” she told the board.

SHELTER OR PRISON?

Robert Love was an automotive machinist in Las Vegas when he became homeless in June 2004. At 53, Robert suffers from asthma, arthritis and high blood pressure, among other ailments. Homelessness has aggravated his condition, he said.

As do other shelter residents, Robert endures filthy bathrooms, unpalatable food and reactionary employees who make their own rules regardless of any policy.

“Their rules are structured so that we’re treated more like prisoners instead of humans,” Robert said.

Although he’s satisfied with the ordinance, Robert said ruefully, “It takes a mandate of law to do what they should be doing voluntarily.”

WHOSE POLICY?

James Leonard, a San Francisco resident since 1979, now lives in an SRO hotel and has worked with SMC on the legislation. But before that, his year-long homelessness took him to Ella Hill Hutch, Hospitality House, Next Door Shelter on Polk Street and Multi-Service Center on Bryant Street. It also took him back to the streets when he could no longer tolerate the shelters.

“I got it by then that by design, or by lack of standards, the shelter system that we have … is holding (homeless people) back and keeping them captive,” James said.

While staying at Next Door, James got a job interview for a security guard company. The case manager asked how she could help James. He told her he needed access to clean clothes, laundry facilities, electricity to charge his phone and bus tokens for commuting.

James already knew the shelter was contractually obligated to provide such services, but the case manager told him it was against shelter policy. However, he was given a clothing voucher at a St. Vincent de Paul store, but that store closed one month earlier.

James also saw personnel that he thought were unqualified berate and order around disabled homeless people.

James is optimistic that the added language in the bill allows for SMC oversight in six months, and he looks forward to improvements in the law, such as including hiring standards and drug testing for shelter staff.

“San Francisco is about change for the better and about humanity.”

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