A Safety Net With Holes

(respres)

By Ashley

The Bronx Journal Staff Writer

When you enter a shelter, you expect help. You expect to get out of the difficult situation that you’ve been put in. You expect the truth, generosity, and most of all, at least a little bit of empathy. But you get none of the above.

I never expected to end up living in a homeless shelter, but once I ended up here, I never expected to be treated like first-class crap. Remember, how in my first entry, I wrote about how being approved to get into the shelter brought tears to my eyes while giving me “hope”? Well, that “hope” I told you all about fades and it fades quickly.

That “hope” turn into “hopeless.” So why do I feel this way now? Well, let’s start off with the fact that if you’re in a four-year college, you are not exempt from working. (I’m okay with that, but if your classes interfere with the nine to five job, you have to work each week, so they expect you to work rather than educate yourself. Yup!)

You read that correctly: work before education. Don’t these people know that an education becomes the major factor of your future? Don’t they know that an education is what helps us from being homeless? An education can either get you out of being homeless or guarantee that you will never end up without a home.

Education can help solve homelessness.

I guess not by the looks of it. I didn’t let this get me down though. In fact, it only made me work harder. So what was it that made me lose some sense of hope?

No more vouchers for the homeless.

What’s a voucher? A voucher helps you to pay less rent once you are out of the shelter. It gave you two years to get back on track and start over. But they were wiped away as part of the budget cuts. Here’s something ironic: welfare pays about $2,500 a month for you to live in a room within the shelter and more homeless shelters are being built because more and more people are becoming homeless. It makes no sense, does it?

The last straw…about two weeks ago our case worker told my parents and me that we had to take the first available apartment that was offered to us. And if you decide to not take this apartment, they can either give you a violation or even kick you out of the shelter.

New York City shelters are required to show us apartments several times a weeks and at that point, they had yet to show us any apartments. Granted, they took us to see two places, but upon arrival, there wasn’t anyone there to show us the apartment and both trips were a complete waste of time. Also, we must take the first apartment that is “suitable” for us.

The first apartment that we actually got to view was in Far Rockaway, Queens. Now, my question is, how is an apartment in Carajoland, Queens “suitable” for us when I attend work and school here in the Bronx? How is an apartment in Carajoland, Quens “suitable” for us if my father is diabetic, disable, asthmatic, etc., and his doctor is here in the Bronx? It isn’t, is it? Well, we didn’t take that apartment and although we didn’t get kicked out of the shelter, we did however get a violation. So how many “suitable” apartments have we viewed since then? Zero, zip, nada! Now tell me, how can I still have hope if I haven’t gotten any help?