"You Are Not Going To Make Me Do Anything" and When Are We Doing Too Much!

And isn’t that the problem essentially? Our well-intentioned helping organizations in this area have done so much for our outdoor citizens, while at the same time requiring them to do nothing for themselves or in return, that the attitude of some of our outdoor citizens is simply this: 'You are not going to make me do anything', even when asked to simply keep their word.

This article is the second in a series of articles, see last month's, “If You Won’t Work You Won’t Eat” article. These articles are not directed at individuals or organizations who fail to give or provide services to ‘outdoor citizens' (which does not excuse them from getting involved). Instead, these articles are directed at individuals, agencies and organizations that are willing to help the under served; however, they often do so in a destructive manner.

In other words by giving individuals everything without requiring any accountability or effort on their parts, is unwise and can only have negative residual results. The articles are also directed at some in the outdoor citizens demographic, many of whom have become professional malingerers, promise-breakers, excuse makers, beggars, thieves, takers and dependents.

Next:

• Designing Opportunities & Teaching Individuals How to Help In a Meaningful Way
• Involving Outdoor Citizens In Their Recovery
• The Profile of a Man Who Begged at the Church for Nearly a Half-Century (who  was subsequently healed when the right man came along and did not feed him, but helped him to rise and stand on his own 2 feet)!

In the opening salvo contained in the subject line, one of the original founders of HOP went absolutely ballistic during one of our board room Business Enterprise meetings about a month or so ago. And, it was Peace Day no less, a day that he had been promoting and passing out fliers for before and on that very day. His shocking behavior and the surprise outburst were in fact instructive for me given that he was a principle in helping to give shape to HOP, the outdoor citizen’s coalition. This is a project that he diligently worked on for over a 12-month period.

Given that my background, experience and training are in ministry and the social sciences, I needed to understand what took place, given his vociferous and unprovoked outburst.

At first I assumed that he was high on something, experiencing dementia or having a psychotic break.  Otherwise, the way that he was behaving, uncharacteristically I might add, made no sense at all.  The behavior was atypical, and unlike the behavior that he had exhibited before in my presence for over a one-and-a-half year period. Aside from HOP’s BEU, he was a founding member of HOP.

What I learned was, that among other things, he received help from an enabling peer who befriended him, a man who is retired by the way, has a place to live and sleep, is also a board member and a volunteer in the kitchen and dining hall at one of the local churches in the area that serves nearly 1,000 meals a week to mostly outdoor citizens – I will come back to that later.

As I engaged in post analysis following the incident, I considered the following:

• What it entailed for he and other chronic outdoor citizens to transition from a life spent daily in parks, libraries, food lines (where their meals were provided for them daily...),  in addition to sleeping bags, clothing, health products, cosmetics, medial supplies ….
• What it meant to have to adjust back to operating on a schedule, to be time-responsive and accountable given the laissez-faire lifestyle that he had enjoyed up to this point.
• The impact of leaving significant others behind, particularly where long term relationships had been developed (and their cohorts neither wanted them to leave the nest nor them behind). 
• What it entailed to return from partial isolation in order to work within a team milieu.
• Also, what happens when professional and semi-professional care professionals and service providers, get too close to the people that they are supposed to be serving.

How do people get this way (not only outdoor citizens) like this once faithful outdoor citizen who up until the BEU was officially opened, was HOP's researcher, an individual who attended every meeting, volunteered to help whenever he could to include shaping our outdoor citizens self-help business model, unit and policies ...?

In fact, he even went on site visits and helped to secure HOP's current location.  Afterward, he volunteered to sign on to HOP's Fictitious Business Statement.

During his outburst, one of the other outdoor citizens who often demonstrated acute anti-social behavior and personality disorder, who sat across the board room table directly in front of him when the unprovoked outburst occurred, began to laugh.  He found the whole matter to be amusing. We have since asked him to move on for a myriad of other reasons.

Why this outdoor citizen was so vehement in his tone, physically demonstrative in his behavior and unnecessarily angry when he snarled and leered while leaning towards me saying, “you are not going to make me do anything, and Charlie said that he is not going to any of those meetings (BEU) and I am not going either …” Well there it was, Charlie, coupled with what I will refer to as ‘transition psychology’, 'situational adjustment to life and separation anxiety". As an outdoor citizen, he had already made one situational adjustment to life when he found himself living outdoors.

Then, he found himself in the throes of another 'situational adjustment' when he volunteered and helped to found an all volunteer outdoor citizens self-help and empowerment organization.  His choice of phrase,” you are not going to make me ...” was telling!  The operative terms being, "you", "make", "me" and "do anything".

Now, as I mentioned before, I know Charlie, his accused influencer. Charlie happens to be a board member at the church where HOP was formed.  I only mention him to show what can happen when unhealthy dyads and triads are formed with furtive individuals who have their own motives in their positions of power, while feigning to be helpful service providers.

The latter can be destructive when the individuals who are in need or transition, are under a purported service provider's negative influence.  The problem is even more acute, particularly when the identified person or client(s) is attempting to move beyond an unhealthy relationship, environment or service provider into a positive one.  Is there a psychologist in the house? Ironically, Charlie, who is a retired nurse, apparently learned little about the Hippocratic Oath, that the physicians that he purportedly was associated with during his working years had to take.  The last I heard was that Charlie invited one of the outdoor citizens outside of the serving area in order beat him up!

Ergo, if our member’s accusation was true, Charlie was not ‘doing good' given the poor example and advice that he offered, but in fact 'he was doing harm’.  Service providers, trained or untrained, often experience 'burn out'.

Again, when dyads and triads are formed, particularly in conflicted and unbalanced relationships like this one apparently was, the identified 'person' or 'client can experience incredible conflict. And the relationship can be difficult to escape from, result in incredible fear, stress and separation anxiety and lead to transference of displaced anger. I have observed this firsthand when talking to other outdoor citizens in their park habitats and elsewhere.

Typically, one outdoor citizen will glance over at his outdoor peers, in order to seek approval to talk with me or to participate in the opportunity that I am presenting them with at the time, for example, a chance for each one to help him or herself.  Conversely, I never experience that kind of approval seeking maneuver, when I am giving away something for free like clothing, socks, shoes, female personal products …

The fact that bonds are established and in place, cannot be overlooked, whether the bonds are healthy or not, and whether an outdoor citizen’s significant other has his or her best interest in mind or not. Often bonds that have been forged between members of the outdoor citizens demographic and their service providers, professional or in this instance not, are in fact unhealthy.

In this particular scenario, Charlie, a service provider who informed several outdoor citizens before, reportedly, that “he did not like me"; our HOP member apparently felt that he had to choose between the two of us.  (And btw, 'who couldn't like me?')  Service providers should periodically be subjected to self-assessment/self actualization batteries in order to determine their motivations for being in the helping professions, or pretending to be. I was put through a series of these batteries at the beginning of my career.

These batteries help to determine one’s motivations, particularly, ‘if what they are doing or about to do is being done for the population that they serve, or for themselves.  BTW, I passed with flying colors.

When an outdoor citizen has been influenced or conditioned by an enabler, in this context to separate from an organization that is trying to help him to help himself, or to break his word, then clearly the enabler has placed his own needs ahead of the ‘identified person’, in this context the identified outdoor citizen.

And it proves that oftentimes, something can be lacking with an enabler who has not resolved his or her own personal issues and conflicts, as well as the enabler model that is so prevalent in this valley and elsewhere.

Another outdoor citizen who I met by chance, approximately 6-months ago, was waiting for a bus in front of the Cesar Chavez Library, near downtown, when I disembarked from the 68 Bus. The library was closed that Wednesday, so we began talking while both of us waited for the next bus or buses in this instance to arrive. During the conversation that ensued, he informed me that he had just returned from a 2-years hiatus in Chicago Illinois (Chi-Town to some of us). The reason that he returned to San Jose, after being away for 2 years, he said, was, “because I received a message saying that my “Section 8 housing”, as he referred to it, “had come through in Santa Clara County”.

He added that he originally returned to the mid-West years ago and lived with family, while waiting for his ‘Section 8 (mostly free housing)’ to be approved. Hmm I thought, and proceeded to get on the next bus. I was shocked to hear how blatant the fraud was in this area, based on this and similar conversations and circumstances that I learned about from other outdoor citizens in the area, since returning from the East Coast myself. And that brings me to my most recent encounter with a fellow service provider that did not go well.

Several weeks ago, a long-time professional social worker and now current organization manager in the San Jose area, both contacted and invited me to her office for a meeting. This agency manager purportedly heard about what we were doing at HOP, and felt that there could be synergy between our ‘self-help model and her organization’.  During our across the table discussion, she attempted to explain what I was likely doing wrong in terms of trying to provide self-help opportunities for outdoor citizens in the area.

The timing was interesting given that we had to, just a week before, and don’t be shocked at this, ask a replacement team from Project Homeless Connect AmeriCorpVista (who asked to come and often showed up unannounced at our meetings afterward); an organization that typically does good work, to back off. For unlike their predecessor who was of great support to HOP, this team from PHC had its own agenda and reasons for showing up and hanging out at HOP!

The former reminded me of a similar situation that occurred before when a young team of matriculators/academicians returned from East Palo Alto some years ago with their tails between their legs after being sent packing by the community leaders in EPA.

What happened was that these, only a few years out of high school academics, believed that they knew more about what was needed in East Palo Alto, than the dedicated workers who worked in the EPA catchment for years, knew.  And as a result, they were sent packing just as we had to do with our visitors who failed to grasp the self-help model.   And the aforementioned included more advanced Stanford students!

Back to the subject though, her position was that as long as outdoor citizens remain unhoused, that they would likely be uninterested in pursuing a self-help opportunity.  Plausible yes, however, as a practical matter, nyat, and I vehemently disagreed.  The meeting did not go well from that time forward.  In fact it went down hill from there ending with her asking to meet with me instead at noon on the following day at HOP's offices.  She failed to call me to tell me that she was not going to show up for the meeting on the following day, however! Oops, add one more fan to Solomon’s expanding fan club!

Why was she upset, and btw, I phoned her 2 hours after she was supposed to arrive (having already cut a morning meeting short myself in order to meet with her). When I phoned and asked why she didn’t show up, she informed me that she got tied up and did not have time to call.  Obviously, she didn't value me or HOP very much either, huh. The fact of the matter is that she was noticeably disappointed when I explained the differences in terms of our methodology and praxis at HOP, in deference to other helping organizations, including hers in the area. From my point of view, those differences are more strategic than they are tactical, even though all of us intend to help and are working for the same cause, I'm sure.

Clearly, I have been knowingly stepping on sacred cows, individual and entrenched institutional icon ground and belief systems, since helping to start this organization (and when I stayed in a shelter for 4 months myself). If the truth be known, I started my own personal crusade about 2.5 decades ago when I was exposed to what was going on in the service provider industry way back then. Our organization, HOP, well I do anyway, believes that outdoor citizens have to participate in their own recovery as opposed to morphing into or being transformed into dependents or co-dependents.

As a side note, do you suppose that the song that we often sing at church, “Room At The Cross for You”, might come true for me (sooner than later I suspect)? I hope not, because nails in my hands and feet, were and are not what I had in mind for my planned ending!

Factually, I am trying to remind well intended enablers every place that I go to get back on track. My hope is that all of us, either together or apart, can help eliminate a historical praxis and practice of creating dependency and despondency in those that we are suppose to help, along with misguided attachments. For on the other hand, I believe that we should shape our individual and organizational policies and practices in ways to forge meaningful partnerships with outdoor citizens and others in need of support. And, we should do so in a manner that is helpful and beneficial to the ones that we serve, and society.  The latter often picks up the tabs for all of us either direct or indirectly.

Having said that, I neither view homelessness as a sin nor something to be ashamed of and apparently native Americans and Jesus did not either.  Remember?  The foxes have holes ... and the Son of Man, no place to lay his head! Jesus lived among the outdoor citizens in his time. Even though I have been there and done that myself, at the same time I refused to surrender or permit anyone to take away my dignity or drive!

Back to the pogrom at City Hall. I explained to the agency director that one of the primary challenges that I have been experiencing at HOP and elsewhere, is that of introducing a new paradigm to chronic outdoor citizens who have been shaped in a system that promises that everything will be provided for them. And what are some of those provisions? They have either been given, are being given or promised food, clothing, shelter, medical help, vouchers to ride buses, sleeping bags, raincoats, socks, shelter, monies …, and sadly, they haven’t had to do anything, in most instances, to earn those gifts. Some have remained on the dole for years, while enjoying or waiting for their next perceived entitlements!  What happened to the Protestant Work Ethic?

The outdoor citizens in this area, like others around the nation (we discussed this national phenomenon at a Congressional Black Caucus meeting in Washington DC several years ago), are spoiled, and in fact they have been damaged given all of the largesse that they have received from well meaning but inconsequential enablers. Some outdoor citizens can tell you what their number is on the HUD, housing wait list, without batting an eye. “I am number 35,000 on the waiting list”, one woman told me. And I believe that she will be patiently waiting for her number (sounds like the California Lottery system) to come up, 4 or 8 years from now, while doing nothing to help herself in the meantime!

We have been working at getting her to come here on a consistent basis for some time now, in order to practice self-help, so that she can get herself going again, and secure an income producing opportunity rather than wait 4 to 8 years to acquire a government provided place to live and everything else for free in the meantime. And, she does possess a variety of skillsets, neither of which is being utilized at this time.  However, it would appear that she prefers to play the waiting game, or that she has been compromised.

My opponent countered again that once outdoor citizens are provided with housing (having done nothing to earn housing I might add), that then they would likely be interested in pursuing self-help job opportunities. I responded again, that I believe that actually the reverse would occur. I know some outdoor citizens who have received the golden grail of housing on top of everything else that they have received without earning it, and now you cannot get them outside, or to do anything else to help themselves or anyone else for that matter - from what I have seen.

One of our outdoor citizens, before being asked to leave, told me that “many of the outdoor citizens that I have attempted to recruit won’t come to HOP’s BEU, because of the way that I talk down to them.  An enabler ‘outdoor citizen’?  Now that is what we really do not need either – I repeat, we really don’t need that! This outdoor citizen who apparently has consumed too much of the ‘enabler kool-aid' himself, has apparently made it his business to enable other ‘outdoor citizens’, with the juice from the well that he has been imbibing from for years now.  The latter is not uncommon among outdoor citizens either!

Based upon what I observed, while he was coming here, off and on for over 3 months, he was nothing more than a manipulator, malingerer and a consistent con artist.  It would appear that he used this place to serve his own purposes, i.e., to have a place to come to and use the equipment and phones   In short, he was neither working on transition nor uplift for himself or anyone else. Oops, just stepped on another sacred cow didn’t I, as a result of expressing my observations and the conclusions that I drew from attempting to help an outdoor citizen con artist and other outdoor citizen malingerers (not all of them thank God)?

DO I LOVE our OUTDOOR CITIZENS? I will leave that for you to decide for yourself, but I warn you that many of them know that I do and have expressed the same to me! Oftentimes, the achievers that are looking to and trying to help themselves will stop me on the Lite-Rail or walking or in other venues to say, “thank you for providing me with a job referral”.  Some report, “I GOT THE JOB”, and others will ask, do you know of any other jobs openings ...?

These individuals, from the same targeted groups, never felt or implied in any that they were talked down to, thankfully.  And most of them are either trying or doing something in order to better their conditions.

On the other hand, many of our outdoor citizens need the proverbial ‘stiff kick in the butt’ in order to get going again, including the whiners that I referred to in this document! Many, particularly males, could likely benefit from spending time in a paramilitary or military camp, instead of being pampered by women in this area who simply want to nurture, feed, pamper, wipe their noses and provide everything for them - while they do nothing.  A little time ‘in the real world’, without being pampered, fed, cuddled …, I suspect would do many of them a lot of good.

I don’t believe that individuals, including outdoor citizens, will be incentivized to work and acquire their own accommodations …, if on top of every thing else, they get everything for free while doing nothing to achieve or earn what they get. Now, and having said that, I do not include the mentally or physically incapacitated in with this group.

However, and having said that, there are many mentally and physically handicapped individuals in the area who work, some for what they get and others at organizations like Project Hired on Parkmoor Street in San Jose. Why? Because they are motivated and their value systems are not compromised!  Many travel in wheelchairs ..., to get to their jobs!

On the other hand, many of our able-bodied outdoor citizens, like one who told me to ‘move on’ when I offered he and his peers an opportunity at self-help employment at St. James Park one Sunday morning, responded this way, “we are trying to smoke some weed here”, in other words 'move on'. The ones who were with him were silent, and seemingly embarrassed by his remarks.

Are the enablers helping the outdoor citizens to save monies in order to purchase chemical substances, while the providers work feverishly to provide everything, particularly, their necessities for them - something that the recipients of the City and County’s largesse, ought to be doing for themselves?

Yes, we need to create paramilitary camps, and load up all of the ones who refuse to do anything for themselves, 'including’ outdoor citizens’, and instead help to rehabilitate them at the camps as opposed to rewarding them for doing nothing. Who will pay for it? Answer, we can use the same monies that we provide in order to take care of them for doing nothing, in order to help to rehabilitate them!  Legislation, did you say?  What happened to 'we the people'?

Just over a year ago, a long-term chronic outdoor citizen invited me to his HUD provided apartment. The visit was short. I left when he lit up his pipe and said, “they will put me out of here if they knew that I was smoking this stuff in here”. Now I wonder how he came to acquire enough disposable resources to afford his weed and his pipe. Could it be that he did so a result of his having received free food, housing, clothing, furnishings, and gas for his car so that he could save his money, likely provided for free, and purchase chemical substances? I was very disappointed in him and the system of enablers ...

But back to the interview, my agency director opponent was completely dismissive at this point. However, the fact of the matter was and is that several of our outdoor citizens who were provided the opportunity to use our offices, phones, faxes, desks, printers, supplies … at no charge, in order to help themselves to get back on their collective feet (so that they could afford a room or apartment), turned tail and ran back to their safety nets.

Some preferred a system that would take care of and provide their needs for them, as opposed to putting forth a real effort to work hard in order to help themselves.  In other words, let someone else worry about and address their problems.

The fact of the matter is that some of our outdoor citizens deflected blame and refused to take responsibility for their futures when they were here at HOP. Others found fault with HOP, criticized and disparaged me, rather than admit that they refused to and were not doing anything here (as they had been conditioned to do by the phalanx of helping organizations in the area before coming here).  Well to be fair, a few of them used up our resources for purposes other than what they were supposed to be used for, paper, printing, pens, pencils, phones ...

And when asked to be accountable, many were like the once faithful member that I wrote about earlier  who said, “you are not going to make me do anything”.  Some didn't say it; they simply demonstrated what they were doing at other churches and organizations in the area, and voted with their feet when I insisted that they ‘do something’.  Others, I asked to comport or to 'hit the road toad!  And if you're wondering, NO, I am not afraid of them!

BTW, all of those who left, and the two who were asked to leave for doing nothing or failing to follow a few simple rules, have been replaced with individuals who appear to want to work to better themselves, already.  And keep in mind that our model is and has always been a self-help model that was FUBU, for us and by us from the ground up.  In other words, outdoor citizens were to create the vision and work to the plan in order to bring the vision into reality.  Ours was, and still is a 'working self-help  model'!

The idea behind the BEU was and is that the members of HOP were to and are to, with support, conceptualize, plan, strategize, construct, actualize, learn and then teach others and hire others once they got their enterprises going or found work elsewhere.

Houston, we have a problem in San Jose and Santa Clara County. The economy that too many of our outdoor citizens have become accustomed to and instead prefer, is the one that they currently enjoy. It is ‘a free handout economy’, one that even promises to eliminate homelessness ‘for them’ in 8 years', while outdoor citizens lie around and wait for everything to be provided for them.

BTW, the latter is the current projection that I heard about for when homelessness is to be eliminated in the area (and for that matter I hope that the deadline will be met for the ones who deserve a helping hand). The question remains, however, what are the outdoor citizens doing to earn housing? Who is going to pay for free housing for individuals who do nothing to help themselves?  And finally, how many of you believe that these individuals will change their lifestyles once they are housed?

In other words, you will still see many of them wandering the streets, some still begging and malingering, because the requisite changes that need to be made have not been made.

One long-term outdoor citizen that I discussed this paper with, suggested that organizations provide services like housing, after the outdoor citizens prove their worthiness, by working in self-help organizations like HOP. I was proud of her for saying that. And shouldn’t it work that way? In other words, we should reward the ones who put forth an effort to do something, as opposed to the ones who are simply biding their time.  I liked her thinking, and wouldn't that be fair given the hard work that an army of individuals are providing, in order to help them.  In other words, shouldn't they be working too, "until their change comes".

Part II

In Santa Clara County and San Jose, California, if not elsewhere, we have a serious" conundrum wrapped up in an enigma", as one writer once wrote, however, in a different context of course.

In my last article, I used scriptures to explain Jesus’ and the Apostle Paul’s positions on individuals who wouldn’t work to help themselves or their families, the thousands (numbers almost equal to the number of counted outdoor citizens in this area 7000 at last count) who instead followed Jesus in order to garner food miracles (health care, housing, political power …).  Did Jesus simply want these people, a crowd that begun to grow exponentially, to continue following the food and miracle wagon?  The answer is no!  He recognized apparently that having self-esteem, confidence and health restored meant far more!

Folks, not much has changed 2000 years later. Sadly, many of our church organizations of today have become the enabler organizations that do not require the long-time chronic individuals who utilize their services, on a long-term basis, to do anything in exchange for the gifts that they have received and are receiving from faith-based groups... which typically come from public donations.

Unlike Jesus and the Apostle Paul, who knew when enough was enough,  based on what I have observed, the churches in this area, some of them are the number one violators and prevaricators of Jesus’ and Pauline principles, i.e., if you want to eat …, you need to work.  The Apostle recognized that there were a few 'slow-bellies around', in his day.  I have discussed this matter with over 4 faith-based organizations in this area, ministers and pastors.

One congregation travels here from Milpitas, twice a month, the first and second Sundays of each month, to serve a hearty breakfast to our outdoor citizens demographic.  The leaders, who have since asked me to preach there,  were a bit taken back when I asked them, why weren’t they insisting that the 100 or so individuals that they fed and provided clothing for, to at least put up their chairs and clean the areas that they utilized when they ate there for free?

They finally came around in time, however, they were more than a bit taken back when I first questioned them.

Another pastor in the area inexplicably refuses to return my phone calls, or respond even after I stopped by and personally asked him to call after I spoke at his church offices several months ago. Oops!!

My point is that these people intend to do what they are doing, spoiling and crippling outdoor citizens and others. And the outdoor citizens are doing what they have planned to do all along, that is to be on the receiving end and do nothing in return or to earn what they receive, fortunately not all of them.  One of the primary complaints among the outdoor citizens that are willing to help and often do help out is that their counterparts never help with the chores and are not required to do anything.  That is a fair argument and I have shared that complaint with a pastor or two.

Are leaders in this area actually saying that some of these people cannot bus tables, work in the kitchens, mop floors, cut the grass around the church, paint, and volunteer in agencies or sweep the streets in exchange for what they get for free, charitable kindness?  Once I return to the pulpit, and if we have similar feeding programs - if I have my way, food won't be served until the 'outdoor citizens and others sit up the dining rooms, set the tables ..., or, don't come back!

Some Christian zealot who is reading this article is already thinking about another scripture that reads, “But the poor you always have with you”. And to that Christian, I will remind him or her that the overwhelming numbers of individuals in the circum- Mediterranean region where Jesus lived and did his work were poor. Jesus did not make an exception for them, after initially having provided them with food and miracles by the thousands, just as is being done currently in this region of the country.

Being poor or homeless is no excuse not to work or to help yourself. Jesus did not make excuses for individuals who were under political oppression, homeless, living in regions where unemployment was the norm … and we should not make excuses or reward slovenly behavior either. I and others worked more hours than normal, when we were unemployed and homeless, and we still do – it is good for the spirit I tell you!

For those service providers who don’t believe that the ‘outdoor citizens, for example, should be required to do anything, does that not speak to some kind of ‘wish fulfillment of your own’, I ask you? I believe that it does!

Am I a fiscal or social conservative right-wing Republican nut job? Sorry, I am not by any stretch, but some of them have it right on this issue, even the ones who use it as an excuse not to help out.   Still, I know when an organization that purports to help, be it a church or other organization has become an enabling organization or institution. And it is being done to the extent, by some institutions, that I would have to agree with our conservative Republicans nemeses', even the nutty ones, ‘that at times we do too much for individuals who aren’t doing anything to help themselves’.

When a service provider in a church, who like Charlie is reportedly discouraging one or more outdoor citizens from helping themselves to improve themselves or their lot in life (not just at HOP) so that they can play with him, well, do you see my point? Board Member Charlie would apparently prefer that the outdoor citizen who sleeps in a (unheated) truck remain in the truck and come and get whatever else he needs from the church (housing soon) or other institutions, and afterward spend time gossiping with him (the latter being idle Charlie’s need to be fulfilled apparently).

And what happens afterward, quasi service provider and co-dependent Charlie goes home to his warm and comfortable retirement bed and abode. And sadly, the outdoor citizen goes and nearly freezes to death in his unheated and inoperable lite pick-up truck.  Sadly, there are many Charlie quasi-type service providers in this world, and similar enabler type organizations in the city, county, state and country!

As I pointed out in my last posted article: I had to argue a similar position before a hall full of social workers and service providers in our nation’s capitol, Washington DC, just over 2 decades ago. There, service providers, apparently from all 50 states, were being unrealistic in my opinion, at the national level, in terms of helping to resolve social problems in our nation. I have reminded social workers in this area that I was the President of the League of Faculty and Student Social Workers at my Alma Mater ... Why? The reason is because I chose to help, but having said that, I will not be a part of anything that cripples individuals.

In other words, I did not choose the helping professions for my life’s work in order to be an enabler. Am I an expert? Again, in deference to many who claim to be helping or experts, I have lived outside too, and I know and have experienced a lot more than they have by living with the outdoor citizens that they serve, both on the outside, in shelters and riding with them at night (as an outdoor citizen to the break of dawn, on buses and the Lite-Rail).

Even within the shelters, many of the outdoor citizens refuse to do chores, look for work ...  I witnessed this first hand, and shared my concerns with shelter management, having been a pastor that once co-hosted a revolving shelter program in Palo Alto California.  I asked one shelter manager, how come he was permitting 'outdoor citizen X' to get away with egregious violation of the shelter's rules?  His answer was, "because he won't do what he was supposed to do, mop the floors"?

Folks, many of these individuals have been ruined and are getting away with murder.  And, sadly, in the helping professions, critical thinking (by some) is often anathema.  And that, being combined with the attitude of many of outdoor citizens who are con artists and malingerers, that is not a very good combination!  Many churches are being vandalized by the individuals that they have served, just as our offices have been vandalized over and over again.

Part III

Now to the question that was posed in my last article. When are we doing too much, is the subject of this article? The answer is this: when an able-bodied individual who is not mentally incapacitated is able to do for himself, and is being told literally (and in so many words and by certain individualists) that you don’t have to do anything, because we will do it all for you.  When that happens, someone is misinformed, and they are no longer helping.

What is my major concern here, having provided direct services and lived with our outdoor citizens in shelters and on the streets? Clearly, given the high rate of unemployment in the nation, state and region, coupled with the changes in the global economy that is having a deleterious effect on the American economy, resources, like jobs are drying up.

In fact, the middle-class is shrinking, and there is anecdotal evidence to suggest that the wealthy are not going to do much more than they are doing to help the poor (and perhaps they are doing so with good reason).  Republican Gubernatorial candidate, Meg Whitman, recently spent $140m of her own fortune, hoping to become governor of the state of California.

And not only did she loose, thank God, she refused to walk down the street and donate $150k to a revolving shelter program to help the outdoor citizens near one of her offices.  Now do you get my drift and can you see where I am going with this. Just think what $140M could have done, if it had been channeled into self-help organizations like this one and others?

Some know that some of our people aren’t doing anything to help themselves.  Otherwise, explain why we have an arm of helpers of the so-called helpless, across the nation, and the problem is getting worse not better?  Is the problem due solely to economics, unemployment, because wealth is concentrated in the hands of the few ...?  Or is it because many of the outdoor citizens are not doing their part, and the so-called helpers are misinformed as well as misguided.

So, where is that going to leave the poor when do-gooder middle-class individuals run out of resources, as many are doing now? The food banks are running out of resources or can hardly keep up with the crippling need and pace.

Am I a mean person? No, but think about it this way: When the outdoor citizens in this area should have and could have been taught to continue to work; to look for work; create job opportunities for themselves; work in community farms and produce food …, they have been taught to do nothing and that they will be taken care of for the rest of their lives if need be.

The consequences of such muddled conditioning, coupled with 'outdoor citizens' personal refusals to get up and help themselves, is that many of their skills have eroded, their self-esteem is low, and some have become marauders, users and full-time beggars. The question being, what will they do when the agencies go broke, and do-gooders and others in the helping professions and churches can’t take care of their own needs or their needs any longer?  Shall we call on Mitch McConnell, John Boehner or how about Meg to help solve the problem?

The fact of the matter is that they will likely begin or continue to live on in a predatory life-style, to include preying on fellow outdoor citizens, the public and some in the middle class who loaded them down with gifts before but cannot do so any longer. And who will be responsible for it if that were to occur? The enablers will be responsible along with the individuals who failed to help themselves, regardless of what the rich do or don’t do - or whether social and public policy ever changes in this country and it ought to be changed.

Again, neither Jesus … nor Paul, who were self-employed themselves, ever made excuses for the ones who would not help themselves, not even the ones with 'dual diagnosis', and neither should we!  Jesus and Paul worked to get even the sick ones healed, they didn't help to turn them into charity cases.

In case you are wondering: The gentleman who, I mentioned before that said “I am not going to make him do anything”, who volunteered for over one year at HOP ...attended practically every meeting that was held, occasionally twice a week, at the San Jose Public Library, the First Christian Church of San Jose and on the Mezzanine at City Hall ...

As long as he didn’t have to do anything but meet and make plans (he maintained that he wanted to focus on creating ‘green technology' opportunities for outdoor citizens, he was okay). I even provided him with a book, with detailed information about green technology jobs, even though I did not personally believe that green technology was the savior of the American economy, that some in the government pretended that it would be, including our current President`! Has anyone been keeping up with Solyndra, in the east bay, to make my point?

In conclusion, the featured outdoor citizen, a perfect prototype who like many others that volunteered to help build their own self-help opportunity center, to find and secure this site and sign on to the fictitious business statement so that we could conduct business in the county - simply walked out, just as his peers had done before in order to return to a sedentary lifestyle in parks, libraries, dining rooms and with a enabler peer, while waiting for others to gather food, cook and provide other services for him.

The fact of the matter, in summation, as it appears to me to be is that the transition to doing real work or to help others to acquire work skills, was and is a barrier that he and others of his counterparts choose and have chosen not to hurdle after all, along with the other challenges mentioned in part I. Are they welcome to come back here? Some are, one has returned already and some will have to prove that they can be trusted and are serious about working to help themselves to return to viability.

And for those of you who are still unclear and are left wondering, what onerous thing was this man asked to do who snarled at me; he was simply asked to fulfill his step by step commitment and to help mentor others who wanted to work in the green technology field that he once championed.

He didn’t know and I didn’t know what his having spent so much time away from real work had done to him on the inside, for I trusted his word and made my decisions about him initially, based upon his faithfulness and eagerness in the beginning. In fact, he is a good man in my opinion, but the long-time separation from work, living with others like him, and being mis-influenced reportedly by a quasi neutral service-provider, had set up a straw man inside of him (as has been done to others who live on the outside)...  The latter emerged, and often emerges when the IP is faced with a challenge.  It is easier then to resort to the blame game!

And this is something that we will have to make the necessary steps to address when dealing with future long-term chronic outdoor citizens in transition at HOP. In other words, we will have to focus more on the psycho-social aspects of long-term homelessness, and to challenge each other (because many of us are in contact with many of the same individuals, and not just provide free handouts and giveaways.

Am I angry? Factually, I am angry and disappointed at individuals who are able-bodied and mentally capable of helping themselves, along with the organizations, to include churches …, and individuals who have taught individuals that government, churches and well-intended do-gooders will take care of them and supply their needs for not doing anything for the rest of their lives. When am I joining the T-Party, bleeding hearts will ask? I’m not!  I have not overlooked the systematic manner in which wealth ends up in the hands of the few,’ the financial watershed, I call it!

However, I suspect that my anger is noble and justified in this regard, even if I do say so myself. Someone once said that “everything that a person will do will be done for him or herself”. Whether that is true or not, in this instance, I would suggest that most of what the do-gooder individuals and organizations in this valley are doing, despite a show of helping others, they are really doing for themselves.

And what is my motivation? Frankly, I don’t have to work, well at least for awhile, and I can return to a 6-figure income or the pulpit. However I thought that I could help others to get going by staying with them, working for them and helping to provide self-help opportunities, instead of simply heading to the suburbs myself.  However, too many service providers and poverty pimps use their plight, pain and the suffering of others to provide perpetual income producing opportunities... for themselves and their institutions, it would appear. Can I prove it?

I can recall when I was employed at one of these institutions a couple of decades ago, a Community Mental Health Center where I carried a caseload. A bond levy had to be passed, or the centers in the region would be shut down, we were told. One day one of the workers, when we were all sitting around in our team milieu, explained why we had to get out and work to get the levy passed in order to save our jobs. I asked, and what about the clients, should we do it for them or for us? The response that I received was silence.

To wit, this past week I participated in an activity wherein organizations and members of the helping community in the area came together in order to discuss ways to procure ‘bus passes’, for outdoor citizens and the poor in this community. I was stunned, but not shocked by a position that was offered by one of the few outdoor citizens in the audience that actually received applause from members of the helping community.

His suggestion was that the city should consider adding an extra day to one of its successful annualized events, and use those receipts in order to purchase and distribute free bus passes to outdoor citizens. And what was wrong with the suggestion? The fact is that the one who proffered the suggestion, was and is an able-bodied outdoor citizen, who was once self-employed but refuses to work (although skilled) and has neglected for 3-months to do anything to help himself when provided all of the bandwidth needed to create or procure an opportunity for himself.

His thinking is like that of many outdoor citizens in this regard, “what are other people going to do about my problem, while I refuse to do anything about it myself”? Perhaps it is fair, you decide, that if organizations are going to pimp the outdoor citizens to get money to pay their salaries and provide job security for them, why shouldn’t the outdoor citizens in turn pimp the helping organizations and get what they want and need?

Like many of the outdoor citizens that I have worked with, this man has been conditioned to believe that someone is supposed to solve his problem(s) and those of other outdoor citizens. And trust me, the helping community will do all that they can to solve his problems and pluck their brains out to solve their problems, while the outdoor citizens, some of them, eat, drink and get high in the parks! Folks, the latter is not the way that we believe that things ought to be done at HOP, 'the outdoor citizens’ coalition in Santa Clara County.

It is time for the helping organizations, the good-hearted citizens of Santa Clara County, the City of San Jose and elsewhere to reconsider their strategies. I believe that the current policies and practices will continue to have long-term deleterious effects and negative consequences for a growing permanent underclass that includes the outdoor citizens demographic in this area. Should we teach them to fish, or continue to provide them with fish ...?  We have to ask ourselves?

For the point was made in our original proffer and profile of a 'good man who was has traveled and lived abroad', worked hard for this organization for over a year and one who believed that by someone asking him to do what he promised, that somehow it was tantamount to ‘making him do something’.  Many of our outdoor citizens are in the same boat and sadly, they don't intend to do anything. I have lived with them, counseled them and prayed for many of them and I can tell you first hand that too many of them plan to get by from the largesse as a result of the largesse of you, me, the faith-based community and other institutions.

How did they get this way? I suspect that they had some help. And finally, ‘shouldn’t we make them do something after all?  And if we keep doing what we've been doing, and they are not doing 'anything', then aren't we doing too much and becoming unwitting enablers?

I welcome your comments: Please respond in the HOP Forum!

Addenda:  12/13/2010 I spent time at the San Jose Police Department this morning, reporting break-ins at HOP's offices, Friday 12/10, Saturday 12/11 and possibly 12/12.  The thieving trespasser/burglar entered HOP's offices each day, rifled and stole from my desk as well as from our file cabinets.  They removed a printer cartridge from the Lexmark, after having used up most of our ink in the printer overnight; attempted to steal my ca on Saturday (but my car alarm rang out and I got there before they could); unplugged the printer and router the third day (apparently to steal them both).

Again, would we prefer that people take from us or get to work helping themselves so that we can help others who are truly in need and trying to help themselves, I ask YOU?

And where are we located:  We are located in the upscale triangulated area between San Jose City Hall, the Police Department, and the County Building and just across the street from a Congressperson's office!  Fortunately, our trespassers and burglars left fingerprints on a glossy black Lexmark folder that has been turned over to SJPD.   Folks, we have got to work together to reverse the current trend that is so prevalent in the Valley!

Additionally, the Police Department, was pleased to learn that an organization existed in the area, i.e., current and former outdoor citizens helping themselves, policing themselves and offers while working to be all that we can be!

Incidentally, some years ago, I was walking down the street in the opposite direction of a well-dressed female and an 'outdoor citizen apparently'', during the lunch hour. The outdoor citizen male suddenly turned and kicked her in the rear end - I witnessed the entire incident.  Why did he do it?  She refused to give him money when he asked for it.   She ran in one direction as I confronted him as he took off in the other.  Just one more reason for the helping community to wake up.  And, I helped to make him do something that he didn't want to do!