Theme
of this month’s Senior & Disability Action (SDA) General Meeting was 2015 Election: The Fight for Affordable
Housing with panelists discussing Propositions A ($310 million bond for
affordable housing), D (Mission Rock Development to include 40% affordable
housing), F (regulate and enforce short-term rentals), I (Mission District
market rate development pause and neighborhood stabilization plan to prioritize
affordable housing) and K (securing public lands for new affordable
housing). SDA recommended YES! YES! YES!
YES! and YES!
Affordable housing remains a hot issue in San Francisco, where seniors and persons with disabilities continue to be targeted for eviction from their long-term tenancies. This has become common when older, long-term landlords--often content receiving monthly rental income stream from stable, hassle-free tenants--transfer property to new landlords who view housing as a commodity to make quick profits and ignore community.
News headlines like "City Sues San Francisco Landlord Accused of Bullying Elderly and Disabled Tenants” and “S.F. landlord evicting seniors who helped her ailing aunt” are disturbing.
One would expect better behavior from landlord Annlia Paganini-Hill, a UC Irvine investigator of The 90+ Study to determine factors associated with longevity--"Because little is known about people who achieve this milestone, the remarkable increase in the number of the oldest-old presents a public health challenge to promote the quality as well as the quantity of life." After Paganini-Hill inherited San Francisco property from her aunt, she evicted the tenants (including SDA housing organizer Theresa Flandrich), seniors who had cared for her ailing aunt when she was in her 90s. Paganini-Hill's eviction actions did not contribute to quality/quantity of life, with one 78-year-old tenant who died while fighting her Ellis Act eviction. Maintaining a sense of caring and community appears to be a public health challenge.
Affordable housing remains a hot issue in San Francisco, where seniors and persons with disabilities continue to be targeted for eviction from their long-term tenancies. This has become common when older, long-term landlords--often content receiving monthly rental income stream from stable, hassle-free tenants--transfer property to new landlords who view housing as a commodity to make quick profits and ignore community.
News headlines like "City Sues San Francisco Landlord Accused of Bullying Elderly and Disabled Tenants” and “S.F. landlord evicting seniors who helped her ailing aunt” are disturbing.
One would expect better behavior from landlord Annlia Paganini-Hill, a UC Irvine investigator of The 90+ Study to determine factors associated with longevity--"Because little is known about people who achieve this milestone, the remarkable increase in the number of the oldest-old presents a public health challenge to promote the quality as well as the quantity of life." After Paganini-Hill inherited San Francisco property from her aunt, she evicted the tenants (including SDA housing organizer Theresa Flandrich), seniors who had cared for her ailing aunt when she was in her 90s. Paganini-Hill's eviction actions did not contribute to quality/quantity of life, with one 78-year-old tenant who died while fighting her Ellis Act eviction. Maintaining a sense of caring and community appears to be a public health challenge.
At
the same SDA meeting, Joyce and David invited all to join celebration of Social Security Act’s 80th Anniversary at visibility events in San
Francisco
On
August 14, members of California Alliance for Retired Americans (CARA) held up Happy 80th Birthday
Social Security: Protect, Improve and
Pass It On banner and passed out information flyers to passersby on Market Street
Social welfare entitlement programs, like Social Security and Medicare, have shifted income and health care support from filial obligation
to societal responsibility. Yet, aside
from Medicaid for low-income persons, long-term care remains a family
responsibility.
Growing up in a
multi-generational household, generational interdependence and caring for all family
members was reciprocal. For example, my
grandparents cared for me and my siblings when we were very young (while we
provided priceless entertainment :-)) and my parents worked outside of the home
(earning money for our basic needs and wants); then as my grandparents
developed dementia issues later in life, my siblings and I looked after them (while
my grandparents provided amusement) and we took turns working for our parents
who ran several businesses. Caring was an
expression of filial piety and love, so we never viewed caring as a burden or
sacrifice.
Oddly, bullying is
rampant in “caring” professions like health care,
education and public service/government, according to a 2013 Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) study. At last month’s LaborFest, Workplace Bullying Labor Educational Conference: What It Is and How to Stop It! featured Derek
Kerr, MD, vindicated whistleblower who received a $750,000 settlement and plaque recognizing his 20+ years of distinguished service, including founding the
hospice care unit at Laguna Honda Hospital (subject of Geriatric Nursing study, “A model long-term care hospice unit: care, community, and compassion”). Dr. Kerr and Dr. Maria Rivero, who were both terminated in retaliation for exposing wrongdoing by Laguna Honda administrators, write a Watchdog column in the monthly Westside Observer, while the corrupt bullies remain at Laguna Honda. (Ten years ago, Dr. Rivero had questioned whether San Francisco's Director of Public Health was changing Laguna Honda's commitment to elderly patients after noticing a sharp increase in younger patients who were taking up beds needed by the elderly.)
Dr. Kerr talked about
growing recognition of workplace bullying as psychological violence. WBI defines bullying as repeated, malicious,
health harming mistreatment that interferes with work performance—different
than incivility and discourtesy. One-third
of workers experience bullying at some point in their career; 60% inflicted by
supervisors, 30% by peers, 10% by subordinates.
Since workplace bullying results in symptoms of PTSD and major
depression, Dr. Kerr said it is extremely debilitating, an occupational health
hazard.
Carrie Clark and Michelle Smith talked about their work with California Healthy Workplace Advocates to “Raise Public Awareness and Compel our State
to Correct and Prevent Abusive Work Environment Through Legislation” based
on Healthy Workplace Bill drafted by Suffolk Law Professor David Yamada.
Elderly bullying can be a form of emotional/psychological/mental abuse, which is a non-mandated report
in California
National
Long-Term Care Ombudsman Resource Center (NORC) hosted an excellent webinar last month on Identifying, Preventing, and Responding to Bullying in Long-Term Care Facilities presented by Robin Bonifas, PhD, MSW of Arizona State University’s School of Social Work
Dr.
Bonifas also distinguished bullying from behaviors related to dementia and
mental illness like verbal or physical aggression linked to decreased impulse
control or frustration with inability to express needs.
Dr.
Bonifas recommended a three-tiered intervention model to prevent and minimize
bullying behavior:
1) organization’s goal is to create caring
communities requiring a culture of respect (zero tolerance for bullying),
accountability for behaviors, willingness to stand up for what is right (bully
has to be confronted often and clearly, even called out publicly since no one
self-identifies as bully), civility
training (pay attention, listen, be inclusive, don’t gossip, show respect,
be agreeable, apologize, give constructive criticism, and take responsibility);
2)
intervention for bullies (consistently
set limits on bullying behavior; offer appropriate outlet to vent frustrations; identify alternative methods for bullies to feel in control, learn positive
communication skills like making “I" statements, develop empathy by modeling, help expand social network, and address feeling of loss); and
3)
intervention for victim/target (assertiveness
training to stand up for one’s rights, use direct communication strategies,
manage feelings of anger, and setting boundaries).
“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil,
but because of those who look on and do nothing.”
—Albert Einstein
At last month’s NAMI
convention in San Francisco
Dr. Taylor said the brain’s judgmental left hemisphere would rather be right than happy,
whereas its open-minded right side would rather be happy than right.
- We care about “Me” (not we)
- Focus on personal gain (not community)
- Care about profits (not people)
- Strive for authority (not equality)
- Seek differences (not similarities)
- Competitive (not compassionate)
- Judgmental (not forgiving)
According to Dr. Taylor,
our left brain dominant society is eroding our self value when we are rewarded
for what we do, rather than who we are. We are in pain, which results in a mental
health crisis: pain is masked in various forms of addiction to substances like drugs
and alcohol.
Dr. Taylor explained that information received
into our brain is organized by the limbic (emotional) system and then sent for
cognitive thinking, thus we are FEELING
creatures who THINK. Our limbic system cells never mature, which
is probably why people can react like a two-year-old when emotional “buttons”
are triggered. Yet it takes only 90 seconds for our body to rid itself of the rush of adrenalin caused by an
explosion of anger. If people stay angry
longer than 90 seconds, it's because they have chosen to have a thought in their brain that makes them angry—so every time they think that thought, they run the same circuitry in
their brain that keeps them angry.
Response-ability: Dr. Taylor said if we use our limbic system in
the proper way (and we own the power to
choose how we perceive and respond to experience), it will dissolve
barriers between us and the world, allowing us to see ourselves as a member of
the human family, showing compassion to one another in one big caring community!
Death claims 97-year-old Burlingame woman fighting eviction
ReplyDeleteBy Kevin Fagan
Updated 11:37 pm, Thursday, March 3, 2016
Marie Hatch, the 97-year-old Burlingame woman whose fight against being evicted from her home of 66 years drew international attention, died Thursday evening.
Ms. Hatch apparently died of natural causes after suffering from a severe cold for more than a week, family friends said. She had been hospitalized and Thursday evening returned home, where she succumbed.
“It’s so sad — we will miss Marie,” said Cheryl Graczewski, who lived next door and had been advocating for Ms. Hatch since she first received word in December from her landlord that she had to vacate the house.
“She was a real sweetheart. There was a lot of spirit in that woman.”
Joe Cotchett, the powerhouse lawyer who — after The Chronicle broke the story last month — took up Ms. Hatch’s fight with a lawsuit, said her case was “the tip of the iceberg as to how senior citizens are being treated in the Bay Area in terms of being put out on the sidewalk.”
His law partner, Nancy Nishimura, was at the Hatch home comforting her relatives and her longtime roommate, 85-year-old Georgia Rothrock. “There is no doubt that her being served with a notice that she had to be out on the sidewalk brought about her death,” she said.
“From December 2015 when she first learned that (landlord) David Kantz intended to sell the house and believed he had a right to evict her in 60 days, Marie Hatch mentally and physically deteriorated because she was so scared, upset and distraught,” Nishimura said.
In response to Ms. Hatch’s plight, hundreds of people from as far away as New Zealand and all over the United States mailed in money and offers to either have the woman live with them or to buy the house and let her stay in it.
Cotchett’s firm filed suit in San Mateo County Superior Court on Feb. 26 arguing that Ms. Hatch had been promised lifetime tenancy in the home by three generations of women who owned the house. The suit contends elder abuse and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Kantz and his lawyer did not return calls Thursday evening.
Cotchett said he will continue to wage a legal fight on behalf of the Hatch family, and on behalf of Rothrock so she can continue to live in the house.
Ms. Hatch, who was fighting cancer and had difficulty leaving her home because she was prone to agoraphobia, told The Chronicle that when she moved into the house in 1950 her landlord said she could live there for life. That landlord, Vivian Kroeze, died, and her daughter and granddaughter successively carried on the promise, Ms. Hatch and Cotchett contended in the lawsuit.
“This seems so unfair,” Ms. Hatch told The Chronicle. “Why should I have to leave my home because this young man wants to make all this money?”
It was only in 2006, when Kroeze’s granddaughter was killed by a boyfriend while she was getting a divorce, that the promise fell into doubt, Ms. Hatch contended. Kantz, the granddaughter’s widower, said his wife’s trust was expiring later this year and that he had to settle finances on the house for the sake of his two sons.
“I feel bad for the elderly lady, I feel bad for my sons, I feel bad for me,” Kantz told The Chronicle. The house, long paid off, was listed on the Zillow real estate site at $1.2 million.
Graczewski, who moved this past week from her home — Kantz, who owned that house, had also served her with a notice to vacate — said the big question now is what will happen with 85-year-old Rothrock. She set up an appointment with social workers Monday with the roommate in hopes of planning for her future.
Kevin Fagan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kfagan@sfchronicle.com
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Death-claims-97-year-old-Burlingame-woman-6869612.php
Gentrification evictions could amount to elder abuse
ReplyDeleteBy Brendan P. Bartholomew on March 10, 2016 1:00 am
Evictions in the Bay Area, where the cost of living has skyrocketed in recent years, appear to have taken a fatal turn.
The death of a 97-year-old woman in Burlingame on March 3 was widely reported by local and international news agencies, with quotes from friends and supporters of Marie Hatch claiming she was “done in” by the stress of being evicted from her home of 66 years.
But what many reports missed, according to a local housing activist, is that Hatch was only the latest Peninsula senior resident who died shortly after being hit with eviction notices or staggering rent increases.
Hatch lived with her friend Georgia Rothrock, 85, in a modest, brown-and-white cottage at the corner of California Drive and Oak Grove Avenue. Despite the home’s location on a noisy thoroughfare, next to a busy auto mechanic’s shop, real estate website Zillow pegs the dwelling’s value at $1.2 million.
Lawyer Nanci Nishimura, who represented Hatch on a pro bono basis, said she will continue to fight the eviction on Rothrock’s behalf. Nishimura’s firm, Cotchett, Pitre, & McCarthy, LLP, is suing landlord David Kantz.
Kantz said he could not comment on the case.
The lawsuit alleges the cottage’s original owner, the late Vivian Kroeze, promised Hatch she could live in the home until Hatch died. Hatch had served as Kroeze’s caregiver, and the agreement constituted an oral contract, which was honored by Kroeze’s daughter and granddaughter, Nishimura said.
Kantz was married to Kroeze’s granddaughter when she was murdered in 2006, and gained control of the property as a result of her death. Kantz has claimed his late wife’s trust requires him to sell the cottage, according to Nishimura, but he has failed to produce a copy of the trust.
When Hatch received a 60-day eviction notice 10 days before Christmas last year, she had a panic attack and heart palpitations and was rushed to an emergency room, Nishimura said. This led to a lengthy hospitalization, and Hatch died soon after she was released from the hospital.
“For a senior citizen in this housing market, eviction is a death knell,” Nishimura said.
This type of story is all too familiar to Cynthia Cornell, who said she knows of at least three other local seniors who died soon after losing their homes. Cornell said she started her activist group, Burlingame Advocates for Renter Protections, after the deaths of her former neighbors, Gene and Patty Collins.
The Collinses had lived in an apartment building for seniors, Cornell said, but the building was sold, and the new owner immediately raised the Collins’ rent by $1,000.
“They struggled to pay for rent, food and medicine, and Gene died from the stress six months after being displaced,” Cornell noted. “He was trying to figure out how to make extra money at 79.”
Patty Collins was diagnosed with cancer and died two years ago. Cornell believes she might have had more strength to fight the illness if she had not been devastated by the loss of her husband and home.
And about a year ago, Cornell said, another friend, who was 80, died within 60 days of being evicted from his San Mateo apartment.
Cornell declined to provide his full name due to privacy concerns.
And just days before Hatch’s death earlier this month, Burlingame resident Darryl Wagner’s alleged suicide ignited rumors he had taken his life after a rent increase.
John Kevranian, a Burlingame business owner, said he heard from one of his customers that Wagner was informed of the rent increase and said he “couldn’t take it,” before he reportedly died by suicide.
The San Francisco Examiner was unable to independently verify claims that Wagner had spoken of a rent hike prior to his death.
Wagner’s landlord and brother both did not respond to interview requests.
The lawsuit against Kantz includes allegations of elder abuse, and Cornell has long described gentrification evictions as a form of elder abuse…
http://www.sfexaminer.com/gentrification-evictions-amount-elder-abuse/
Elderly woman and daughter in San Francisco vow to fight eviction
ReplyDeleteBy Vic Lee
Wednesday, March 30, 2016 07:18PM
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) --
An elderly and disabled tenant in San Francisco's Noe Valley is being evicted from a flat she's lived in for more than three decades. She tells ABC7 News she's not going without a fight.
Beatriz Allen lives in the upper flat of the apartment building. Her attorney says it's morally wrong for the landlord to evict this disabled senior citizen. The landlord's attorney says while it's unfortunate she has to move, his client has every right to evict her. It's a refrain we're hearing more and more every day.
"We're fighting this," said her daughter, Betty Rose. "We've made the decision to fight this."
Beatriz has lived in the same neighborhood for almost her entire life and in the apartment for more than three decades.
The 80-year-old has suffered three strokes. Now she's being evicted by a new owner.
"I feel very sad because I have been here for 35 years," said Beatriz.
Allen's daughter lives with her.
"There's no need for you to do this, you have so much, just let my mother finish staying here," she said.
The new landlord is Tariq Hilaly, a technology investor who also owns his own firm. He and his wife live in a house next door. The couple's attorney Andrew Zacks explains why the two are being evicted.
"The mother of the wife that owns the property recently had a fall in her home," he said. "She's become ill and she needs a place to live near her family."
And that place is the flat where Beatriz lives.
Allen's attorney Raquel Fox believes the landlord knew Allen had been taken by ambulance to the hospital March 17, when she became ill.
"Four days later, he records a new ownership interest that is now permitting his wife to attempt a "relative move in" into the apartment that's occupied by the Allen's. "It's just not right. Morally wrong."
Zacks says they're committed to helping ease their move.
"My clients would love to help find a way to help her, to provide her assistance in some way," he said.
But the problem is -- where would she go?
Vic: "If you have to move, where would you go?"
Beatriz: "I don't know. I don't know. It would be very difficult."
http://abc7news.com/news/elderly-woman-and-daughter-in-sf-vow-to-fight-eviction/1269891/
99-year-old SF widow wins eviction reprieve, for now
ReplyDeleteBy Steve Rubenstein
Updated 6:19 pm, Tuesday, April 12, 2016
A 99-year-old widow who had the good luck to make it to 99 got a little more good luck on Tuesday in San Francisco when the legal system put her hard-to-believe eviction on hold.
“I feel happy,” said Iris Canada, holding onto the handles of her walker as she stood at the front door of the courthouse on McAllister Street.
Canada has lived in her flat at 670 Page St. since the 1940s. Eleven years ago, after the apartments in the six-unit building were sold off individually, Canada was promised she could keep living in her flat for the rest of her life, for $700 a month.
She kept living and living and, despite a mild stroke some months ago, kept living. And while she continues to do that, the owners of her flat cannot sell it.
“I love living in San Francisco,” Canada said. “San Francisco is my home, and my home is my home. I don’t want to go anyplace.”
On Tuesday, several lawyers in suits met inside a courtroom to argue before a Superior Court judge why Canada should or should not have to leave.
Lawyers for the unit’s owners — Peter Owens, Stephen Owens and Carolyn Radisch — contend Canada, a retired nurse, has not lived continuously in the flat. The owners filed a complaint with the court stating that Canada had “permitted waste to occur on the premises” and that she had “failed to permanently reside at the premises.”
Lawyers for Canada replied that was because she was in the hospital, with her stroke, and also caring for a niece, who had cancer, according to attorney Michael Spalding, who represented Canada on behalf of the Homeless Advocacy Project of San Francisco.
Lawyers for the owner said Canada had not kept the place up.
“Yes, I have,” Canada said later.
Action postponed
Judge Ronald Quidachay postponed the eviction and ordered lawyers for both sides back next week to see if the eviction should be lifted permanently.
Meanwhile, Canada found herself something of a sudden celebrity in the world of tenants’ rights law. Standing beside her at the courthouse door were a half dozen tenants advocates, protesters with picket signs and San Francisco Supervisor London Breed, who called on the building owners to “show some compassion.”
Supervisor’s objection
“This is something that shouldn’t be happening,” Breed said. “Something is wrong. We have too many seniors living on our streets. We are asking the owner to let her stay, let her be.”
Canada’s friend, counselor Gus Brown from the Housing Rights Committee, said that the widow had paid $79,000 over the years to the owners under the terms of her deal, and that it was not her fault she was still alive… .
Tommi Mecca, counseling director of the committee, urged the unit’s owners to drop their lawsuit.
“Why all of a sudden do they want her evicted? They can’t wait? The woman’s 99,” Mecca said. “I just can’t fathom how they justify this.”
Proving her point
After the court hearing, Canada went back to her flat and invited anyone who believed that she hadn’t kept the place up to come inside and have a look around.
She put her walker aside, climbed the 13 steps to her apartment without assistance and plopped down on a red sofa to “see what’s on TV,” which is how she passes the day when she is not called before the bar of justice. She said she likes watching news and movies because they’re both “full of good stories.”
…Canada said she is looking forward to returning to court to see what the lawyers have in store this time, assuming next week rolls around, never a sure thing.
“We’ll see what happens,” Canada said.
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/99-year-old-SF-widow-wins-eviction-reprieve-for-7244720.php
Nursing homes turn to eviction to drop difficult patients
ReplyDeleteBy Matt Sedensky | AP May 8 at 12:37 PM
NEW YORK — Nursing homes are increasingly evicting their most challenging residents, testing protections for some of society’s most vulnerable, advocates for the aged and disabled say.
Those targeted for eviction are frequently poor and suffering from dementia, with families unsure of what to do, according to residents’ allies. Removing them allows an often stretched-thin staff to avoid the demands of labor-intensive patients in favor of ones who are easier and more profitable…
An Associated Press analysis of federal data from the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program finds complaints about discharges and evictions are up about 57 percent since 2000. It was the top-reported grievance in 2014, with 11,331 such issues logged by ombudsmen, who work to resolve problems faced by residents of nursing homes, assisted living facilities and other adult-care settings.
The American Health Care Association, which represents nursing homes, defends the discharge process as lawful and necessary to remove residents who can’t be kept safe or who endanger the safety of others, and says processes are in place to ensure evictions aren’t done improperly. Dr. David Gifford, a senior vice president with the group, said a national policy discussion is necessary because there are a growing number of individuals with complex, difficult-to-manage cases who outpace the current model of what a nursing home offers.
“There are times these individuals can’t be managed or they require so much staff attention to manage them that the other residents are endangered,” he said.
The numbers of both nursing homes and residents in the U.S. have decreased in recent years; about 1.4 million people occupy about 15,600 homes now. The overall number of complaints across a spectrum of issues has fallen in the past decade, though complaints about evictions are down only slightly from their high-water mark in 2007, the federal figures show. Meanwhile, the share of complaints that evictions and discharges represent has steadily grown, holding the top spot since 2010.
Advocates say offending facilities routinely flout federal law, attempting to exploit and widen justifications for discharge. They say hospitalizations are a common time when facilities seek to purge residents, even though the Nursing Home Reform Act of 1987 guarantees Medicaid recipients’ beds must be held in their nursing homes during hospital stays of up to a week….
Federal law allows unrequested transfers of residents for a handful of reasons: the facility’s closure; failure to pay; risk posed to the health and safety of others; improvement in the resident’s condition to the point of no longer needing the home’s services; or because the facility can no longer meet the person’s needs.
Though that final category is often cited in evictions, advocates dispute how often it fits.
“The majority of the time, it’s because the resident is considered difficult,” said Tony Chicotel, an attorney for California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform.
Chicotel says involuntary discharges are almost entirely focused on Medicaid beneficiaries and that economics sometimes play a role in the ousters. Rather than a long-term Medicaid patient, many facilities would prefer to fill a bed with a private-pay resident or a short-term rehabilitation patient, whose care typically brings a far higher reimbursement rate under Medicare….
“It’s not just losing their home. It’s losing their whole community, it’s losing their familiar caregivers, it’s losing their roommate, it’s losing the people they sit with and have meals with,” said Alison Hirschel, an attorney who directs the Michigan Elder Justice Initiative and has fought evictions. “It’s completely devastating.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/nursing-homes-turn-to-eviction-to-drop-difficult-patients/2016/05/08/1df69b26-1537-11e6-971a-dadf9ab18869_story.html
WILL NORTH BEACH LOSE ANOTHER? 81 YEAR-OLD POET BATTLES ELLIS EVICTION FROM HOME OF 30 YEARS
ReplyDeleteby Stephen P. Booth, Esq. on July 7, 2016
The Assault Upon The Cultural Fabric Of San Francisco Continues By Greedy Ellis Act Evictor
North Beach poet Diego De Leo may face trial in August to battle for his right to remain in his home of 30 years. As previously reported in December 2014, Diego’s lawyer Steve Collier was able to beat back as “fatally defective” a prior Ellis assault by his landlord, Martin Coyne. Round two, again facilitated by the City’s most notorious Ellis eviction firm, Zacks, Freedman & Patterson, is fraught with legal defects which will be demonstrated in the August trial. Nevertheless, the stress of living under the threat of expulsion from his home of 30 years has been monumental for 81 year-old Diego De Leo, who feels, in a way, that he is battling for his life.
Diego De Leo Is Part Of The Disappearing Italian Tradition of North Beach
Diego, born in Bari, Italy, came to the US in 1956 as a 17 year-old. Diego first settled in New York, then San Mateo until he met his wife to be, Josephine, from Palermo, but settled in San Francisco. It was love at first sight. Diego soon moved to San Francisco and he and Josephine were married in the Saints Peter and Paul Church in 1975. Until Josephine’s passing in 2012, they shared the home at 566A Chestnut Street, the home from which landlord Martin Coyne now seeks to expel Diego.
Diego recalls that when he came to San Francisco, there was a hugely caring family-oriented and thriving Italian community in North Beach. The benches in Washington Square Park were filled with Italian families. These families shared with other families and the younger generations looked after the elders. For example, Diego’s original landlords, the Tarantinos, when they sold the complex to Martin Coyne, made sure that the sale documents stipulated that Diego would never pay more than a monthly rent of $800.00, the amount he pays to this day. Diego believes this is precisely one of the reasons for his eviction; the current landlord wants to obliterate the generosity of one family to another that legally ran with the title.
Diego, who had little formal education, came late to poetry. Now, never without his Ipad, verses flow daily. He relates that the pursuit of written and spoken word has served as the means to self-educate, making-up for the lack of formal education early in life. Diego enjoys sharing his work with other local masters of verse for comment, including Evan Karp, Jack Hirschman, Bob Booker and Tony Robles. Diego cherishes the times when he has been able to present his work at venues such as the Rex Hotel and the Emerald Tablet.
To be faced with Ellis eviction at this stage in his life is enormously stressful. Diego feels “it is like a death sentence. For one to be faced with eviction, at 81 years-old, in a city where the rent could be in excess of $4,000.00. It is such a travesty that elders are expelled from San Francisco, just so wealthy landlords can make a few dollars more.”
Stephen P. Booth is an attorney at the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, whose colleague Steve Collier represents Diego De Leo.
http://www.beyondchron.org/will-north-beach-lose-another-81-year-old-poet-battles-ellis-eviction-home-30-years/
A surprising bullying battleground: Senior centers
ReplyDeleteMatt Sedensky, Ap National Writer
Updated 9:07 am, Sunday, May 13, 2018
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The unwanted were turned away from cafeteria tables. Fistfights broke out at karaoke. Dances became breeding grounds for gossip and cruelty.
It became clear this place had a bullying problem on its hands. What many found surprising was that the perpetrators and victims alike were all senior citizens.
Nursing homes, senior centers and housing complexes for the elderly have introduced programs, training and policies aimed at curbing spates of bullying, an issue once thought the exclusive domain of the young.
"There's the clique system just like everywhere else," said Betsy Gran, who until recently was assistant director at San Francisco's 30th Street Senior Center. "It's like 'Mean Girls,' but everyone is 80."
After the cafeteria exiles and karaoke brouhahas, the 30th Street Center teamed up with a local nonprofit, the Institute on Aging, to develop an anti-bullying program. All staff members received 18 hours of training that included lessons on what constitutes bullying, causes of the problem and how to manage such conflicts. Seniors were then invited to similar classes, held in English and Spanish, teaching them to alert staff or intervene themselves if they witness bullying. Signs and even place mats around the center now declare it a "Bully Free Zone."
"I think in the past I would have just stayed out of it," said Mary Murphy, 86, a retired real estate agent who took the classes. "Now I might be inclined to help."
Robin Bonifas, a social work professor at Arizona State University and author of the book "Bullying Among Older Adults: How to Recognize and Address an Unseen Epidemic," said existing studies suggest about 1 in 5 seniors encounters bullying. She sees it as an outgrowth of frustrations characteristic in communal settings, as well a reflection of issues unique to getting older. Many elderly see their independence and sense of control disappear and, for some, becoming a bully can feel like regaining some of that lost power.
"It makes them feel very out of control," Bonifas said, "and the way they sort of get on top of things and make their name in this new world is intimidating, picking on people, gossiping."
There is far less recognition of bullying as a problem among seniors compared with young people. Even among those who have been called bullies, many are unaware how problematic their behavior is until it's labeled. Campaigns around the country have sought to spread the word, including a booklet circulated last year by the National Center for Assisted Living.
"In the life cycle, it doesn't go away," said Katherine Arnold, a member of the city Human Rights Commission in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, which created a public service announcement on its community-access station that included a portrayal of a man who was excluded from a card game and became the subject of gossip by other seniors. "There's really not a lot of escape."
Most senior bullying isn't physical but rather involves name-calling, rumors and exclusion, said Pamela Countouris, a longtime schoolteacher who now runs a Pittsburgh-based consultancy that offers training on bullying. Women constitute the bulk of the bullies Countouris encounters among seniors, a reflection of lifespan disparities and the gender makeup of those who live at or participate in programs at senior facilities…
https://www.sfgate.com/news/education/article/Nursing-homes-senior-centers-Mean-Girls-80-12909393.php