Research for Tracy Kidder book on Rough Sleepers

Our book club is reading Tracy Kidder's book, Rough Sleepers (2023). I was researching some of his information on homelessness, and saw the subtle but common myth some of our current burden was the Reagan policies "with its deep cuts in programs for the poor and policies that led to declines in the supply of inexpensive housing." ( p. 55) I'll skip over the housing supply (single room occupancy) because that is a local/city problem. I did find the article in "Behavorial health news," by Michael B. Friedman, which I then checked further, since it also brought up Reagan. Yes, there was a 1983 SSDI law passed to stop fraud and he signed it. Then it was revised twice in 1984 and actually eased the requirements so the disability awards shot up, not down. Since I was a Democrat then and only believed the worst about Reagan (same media treatment that Trump gets, and Bush before him) I had always believed Reagan was the reason people were put on the streets.

But as the author himself wrote, the deinstitutionalization which is closely tied to the SSDI recipients finding housing began in the 60s and 70s, long before Reagan was in the White House. And truly, one can't deny that most of the programs that make it to Congress and the White House begin in academe (where I worked). Congressmen are so busy raising money to campaign they have no time to dream up billions in social and economic programs, or even read the bills they vote on.

But I want to pass along two experiences with government programs for the disabled, one from the late 1960s and one from 2020. In the late 60s at church coffee hour I met a former pastor of the Church of the Brethren (Anabaptist tradition) who was a social worker in one of the rural Ohio residential institutions for the blind and deaf mentally challenged. It was in the process of "deinstitutionalizing" his clients because he said, "they deserved their civil rights like any other citizen." Joe was thrilled with the idea. At that time, I was a giddy humanist in my early 30s, so he convinced me they would do fine on the "outside" because there would be community programs and smaller homes (not yet established) that would help them. So, many of them lost the only home they knew and life long friends.

In October 2019, our son was diagnosed with glioblastoma. He was 51, employed and a homeowner with a mortgage, but no wife or adult children, only his 80 something parents. However, he could not work, especially not after the surgery and chemo which is the same "slash and burn" method of 30-40 years ago. The SSDI application was brutal. I can't imagine how anyone, let alone someone who has been on the streets, completes it. Our daughter who works in the medical field and her cousin who was a lawyer for Social Security in DC worked together on it. Probably took eight hours with both working on it. The sick, unemployed person usually waits 6 months--to prevent fraud (which vastly increased during Obama years as people lost their insurance). He died about 6 months and 1 week after the application went to Washington. He paid his bills with his IRAs and retirement account, he had family to help, and it was all used up in 6 months plus he was charged a penalty for closing out his retirement funds and he had to pay income tax on it (or rather his estate did since he was deceased).

Between the green local laws to save the environment which adds thousands to every home purchase/rental and the new codes for safety and transportation, all types of housing have become prohibitive. Plus this is not the 1930s culture where people let even cousins or childhood friends sleep or rent a room at their home. Let's not point fingers at the 40 year old Reagan administration; there has been plenty of mischief since then. 

Are you old enough to remember or have studied the housing shortage after WWII? Low income, inadequate housing was taken off the market through special codes. A lot of livable housing was condemned. There was no actual shortage. Reagan was a movie star then, not a politician. There were the same number of housing units in 1945 as in 1940--it was the liberal policies that destroyed them by law.

California has become a cesspool of homelessness by fixing the tax system with Prop 13 so no one would dare move and it weakened the tax revenue for supportive services. The grifting of non-profit agencies and probably thousands of California state employees to "fix" a problem has contributed to the now mushrooming homeless population who suffer from legal and illegal drugs, alcoholism, mental illness, illegal immigration, an aging population, lack of general life skills, and mentally challenged (probably some blind, deaf).

It wasn't Reagan and it isn't Trump. But it is government at all levels working with academe. It's liberal, pie in the sky programs that don't work which began in academe by people who need to publish and who don't live in reality or a low income neighborhoods.

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Growth of homelessness--who caused it? Reagan policies, loss of SRO housing, closing of institutional care facilities, 1968-1973 (about 1/3 of the increase), https://www-origin.ssa.gov/benefits/disability/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2013/04/08/how-americans-game-the-200-billion-a-year-disability-industrial-complex/

Why Are the Disability Rolls Skyrocketing? The Contribution of Population Characteristics, Economic Conditions, and Program Generosity, pp. 337-379, chapter 11 in "Health at Older Ages: The Causes and Consequences of Declining Disability among the Elderly" (2009) https://www.nber.org/system/files/chapters/c11119/c11119.pdf  

Deinstitutionalization Did Not Cause Homelessness: Loss of Low-income Housing and Disability Benefits Did By: Michael B. Friedman, LMSW Mental Health Policy Advocate
April 1st, 2020 https://behavioralhealthnews.org/deinstitutionalization-did-not-cause-homelessness-loss-of-low-income-housing-and-disability-benefits-did/

"At the height of deinstitutionalization in New York (1968-1973), people who were discharged (with wildly inadequate discharge plans) were not homeless. Most went to live with family. Some went to adult homes. Many went to nursing homes because they had dementia. And quite a few went to single-room occupancy hotels (SROs) and other places where poor people lived. To be sure, this resulted in huge family burden, inadequate care in adult homes, transinstitutionalization to often unprepared nursing homes, and squalid sometimes dangerous living conditions in SROs and poor neighborhoods. But they were not literally homeless. In fact, the scandal that led to the creation of the community residence program for people with mental illness in NYS was not homelessness. It was the squalid and dangerous conditions in SROs."

The No-Fear Act

Today when I was looking up some COVID19 statistics at the CDC site, I noticed something at the bottom of the page called the "No-FEAR" Act. Have you heard of that? Trust me, President Trump hasn't removed all the ridiculous red tape and piles of useless paperwork in DC. "The Notification and Federal Employee Antidiscrimination and Retaliation Act of 2002 is a United States federal law that seeks to discourage federal managers and supervisors from engaging in unlawful discrimination and retaliation. It is popularly called the No-FEAR Act, and is also known as Public Law 107–174."

I'm not sure where the final total of these discrimination and retaliation reports goes, but every government department and agency seems to be required to fill them out. . . quarterly. Then annually, then compare them to the last 4 years (at least that's all I found so I was looking at annual totals from Obama years also). I didn't investigate in depth--only about 10 minutes. What I found out from the agencies I looked at is that it takes about 200 days to investigate a complaint (race, color, religion, reprisal, sex, PDA, national origin, equity pay, age, genetics (?), awards ). The biggest complaints seemed to be performance evaluations and non-sexual harassment. There were miniscule number of filings considering the size of some of the agencies, and in most cases there were zero findings of discrimination and retaliation. Maybe if you complain about your boss, the investigation and findings would be to get demoted to this awful job.

https://www.opm.gov/equal-employment-opportunity/no-fear-act/

https://www.cdc.gov/eeo/nofearact/index.htm

https://www.fema.gov/about/offices/equal-rights/no-fear-act

https://home.treasury.gov/footer/no-fear-act

The most detailed report was the Bureau of Consumer Financial  Protection which is awash in helpful and eye opening acronyms  https://home.treasury.gov/footer/no-fear-act

If you’re very able, you can get a disability sticker

My friend Joan added this to her Facebook wall today.  It reminded me of the time years ago I took my librarian colleague Eleanor to get her disability sticker after getting out of rehab when she broke her leg.  It was quite a challenge, and everywhere we parked was almost inaccessible from crumbling concrete, stairs or poor marking. How would a disabled person ever do this without help from an extremely abled companion (usually a daughter).

“I proved NISA  (Nothing Is Simple Anymore) again over the last three weeks. After printing the form myself, delivering it to the doctor’s office for approval, having 4 telephone conversations with doctor’s office and three trips to doctor’s office, visit with the notary at the doctor’s office, and finally a hike to the courthouse (long waits at every stop), three weeks from start to finish, I finally have a disabilities parking permit for Mother. That’s one little job to mark off the list.”

Auditory processing disorder

I have APD, but since no one knew about learning disorders when I was a child, I'm glad now I didn't have any of the technology or instruction recommended in this article. I may have just thought of myself as a victim. I was always an A student and retired as associate professor, but even the compensations don't work as well at 79. I only mention it because if you think your child or grandchild isn't listening, it just might be APD. Slow down your speech, make eye contact, and turn off the distractions and see if that helps.

https://www.understood.org/en/learning-attention-issues/child-learning-disabilities/dyslexia/the-difference-between-dyslexia-and-auditory-processing-disorder

https://collectingmythoughts.blogspot.com/2006/11/thursday-thirteen-13-things-about-my.html

Oregon's assisted suicide law by Joni Eareckson Tada

Joni Eareckson Tada, Agoura Hills, Calif., Jan. 16, 2018
http://www.joniandfriends.org/blog/oregon-assisted-suicide-law/

"Ever since the 1990s when Oregon passed its Death with Dignity Act, I've been working to de-grease its slippery slope. Under the law, physicians may give lethal drugs to patients with terminal illnesses who want to end their lives. The law's proponents have insisted it could only be offered to those who had 6 months or less to live, and was a safety valve when nothing else could be done to alleviate suffering. But not so anymore.

"The Oregon Health Authority (which studies and keeps records on the Death with Dignity Act) now says, 'the law is best seen as a permissive law... it does not compel patients to have exhausted all treatment options, or to continue current treatment.... If the patient decides they don't want treatment, that is their choice.' In an eerie tone, the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) said the law is 'silent on whether the patient must exhaust all treatment options.'

"This spells bad news for people with chronic conditions such as muscular dystrophy, multiple sclerosis, ALS, or even diabetes. Many people with chronic conditions rely on medication or other supports to enable them to live for decades. But what if people with disabilities begin to despair of their condition? What if insurance runs out? Citing an example, the OHA said that if you are a diabetic in Oregon and decide to forgo insulin injections, you could qualify for a lethal prescription under the state's physician-assisted suicide law.

"It is true that no one with diabetes has yet taken advantage of this new interpretation of the law, but the door is now open, inviting any Oregonian despairing of his disabling condition to test the law's new interpretation and request assisted suicide. Such cases are already successful in Canada and in Western Europe, showing how slick the slope is in Western industrialized nations.

"This is one reason why I recently revised my book When Is It Right to Die? I wanted to give Christ-followers a keen understanding of the arguments surrounding physician-assisted suicide, as well as give them language for articulating a biblical worldview on life, no matter how disabled or elderly one's life might be. People are not 'better off dead than disabled,' and life is worth living until God decides it is time.

"Christians can provide life-encouraging alternatives to assisted suicide by providing hands-on support to persons with disabilities who are despairing of their lives. Christians can ascribe positive meaning to a person's affliction, prevent social isolation, help them deal with depression, provide spiritual community, and, in short, be a friend. This is compassionate care; not the administration of lethal drugs.

"In 1997 the US Supreme Court ruled that there was no inherent 'right to die' in the U.S. Constitution. But that did not stop states from creating legislation based on people's perception of a 'right' to die. Oregon was the first state to legalize physician-assisted suicide for mentally competent people with terminal illnesses. California, Colorado, Vermont and Washington also have enacted similar laws based on the Oregon model (Montana's Supreme Court ruled that nothing in state law prevents physicians from helping terminally ill patients end their lives).

"People who feel overwhelmed by their chronic medical conditions do not need assisted-suicide; they need treatment for depression, good pain management, social community, support, help, hope, and a purpose for living. Christians have the message that gives life meaning, and helps people grasp that life is worth living. I pray Christians will do all they can to expose the dangers behind this new and chilling interpretation of a terminal illness."