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Stands for radio old. You are listening to frost radio, bringing the crystallization of new ideas to the airwaves. The views expressed in this show are not necessarily those of w, are you w or Case Western Reserve University? Leo, you are listening to frost radio. It is Tuesday, November 20th, and we are in studio with myself, Dan Kerr, Chris co-conspirator and Bob. Who is going to be with us for the hour. Talking about issues of sleeping out in the streets and being intense in the streets of Cleveland Bob's been outside. Essentially, essentially since 1979. You've been staying out by the brown stadiums that right Bob. Yeah, pretty much. It's been a while. 1979's pretty close 79 or 80. Yeah. Wow. And you've, you've been there essentially then what 20-some years and right? And how's that been? I mean obviously lots of things happen in that time. But how did you end up, you know coming down there originally. Well, I came to Cleveland find work and ended up there wasn't on to really speak of back then as far as you had to have transportation and I was on foot. So we really couldn't um You couldn't get to where the jobs were, they were more on the outskirts of the city. So I went to a temporary labor agency downtown and that's where I was stuck for the next 20 years besides five where I went to Texas. Wow. Wow, and when you move down there originally there were other campers. There are I guess campers isn't exactly the word. There are other longtime residents that were living in maintaining that camp before you got there, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, there was there was What if you guys down there, actually, most of them have passed away by now, but there was there was five or six guys down there. So you're essentially keeping up a camp. That's that's been there for for, you know, maybe 50, 60 years or yeah, something like that. I mean, it's not quite that old. I mean, I don't know how long the bridge has been there, right? Oh, and I'm no longer under the bridge. Like I like I said, I do have a tent now so I am in a tent. Yeah, okay. I was underneath the bridge which is just two seconds away from where I have my tent set up now, right? Right. Well, I don't know how long, sure they were up underneath the bridge before I got there because I don't know how long the bridge was there. Sure. Now how many people, how many people who were the people who you you first moved in with? Oh my goodness. Yeah. The only one I can actually remember right off the top of my head was well, I can remember a couple of there was Paul Smitty Jim Dan kerzner. At 22. Another guy named Chuck to Chuck's actually one time we had on the radio. Oh, yeah. Yeah, on a month or two back and that was pretty much it made been there. Who'd been there, the longest all schmidty. Absolutely. And what was his story? Well, he was a full-blooded Indian and he was just couldn't live in a confined space. He was like, oh, when I met him, he was like, 60, some years old and he'd been out there. Most of his life. He was born on a reservation. And so he just had no idea about the inside of a house. Matter of fact, me and a friend tried to get him to go into a house. We went and rented him, a an apartment off of friend of ours, for a month. We went together and combined, our money's, and paid the first month's rent, and the deposit. And we took him up there. We had to fill the frigerator up and everything, and he spent about six hours there. And we found him back, when we were came back home from work. He was back down in the bush. So right? He just couldn't handle being inside. So he'd been there pretty much since the 30s or 40s or 50s or something like that. I know it was long time ago. Yeah. Yeah, and he did, he die in the street then know he lost a leg to gangrene. Okay, and then he lost his friend. Took him in, and then he lost his other leg, and then he passed away, and in the home. Mmm, and he lost his leg to gangrene because of frostbite or I'm not sure. I couldn't really tell you. I'm not, I don't know, right. Right. Well, we actually have we'll probably get into some of this, but we do have an agenda here today and the agenda is largely based on some of the proposals are, actually, some of the activities are going on in other cities right now in particular Seattle regarding establishing tent cities to meet up, meet the housing crisis and the shelter crises that are currently Going on in cities, including Cleveland. And we have actually a special guest on the show. In addition to Bob, and he's not in the studio, but he's on the phone and he's on the line right now. He's going to give us some background into some of these things that are going on in some of the issues and proposals regarding a tent city. And then we're going to get back into people. The discussion about Bob Zone, experiences, living in a tent and his personal. Thoughts on the matter. So we're going to go to Brian Davis, the director of the Northeast, Ohio Coalition for the homeless. Brian! Hey, you're on the on the air. You're live on the air. All right, let me see. Okay, let's try that again. Are you there? Yes. Okay. Do you want to give us a little brief background on what the proposal for tent city is and where this ideas come from. Well with the housing housing is so expensive. Now, we Wait, we're having a little bit of a technical difficulty. Hey, Brian, if you could give us a call back, I just made a little small mistake here, trying to get the microphone. Close to the speaker. Oh, here we go, Brian. Okay. Sorry about that. You want to try again? Yes. We're because of the high cost of of house. Then in Cleveland and around the country, we estimate that the cost is about $11.25 an hour that you have to make, to be able to afford a place to live in Cleveland, many people turn to the shelters, but probably the majority of people don't feel shelter is appropriate. So they seek other means of survival and that includes going into abandoned buildings. Staying in tents and various. Other activities staying on couches, and things like that. So, in some cities, the three big ones are Seattle, Portland, and Santa Monica. They've religious organizations have come together to set up tent cities where they give their parking lot over to homeless people congregate tents there, provide services meals, whatever. Its it makes it easier to reach people. They're not isolated. They're not. Lost, they don't die in the bushes and things like that, and hopefully most of the time. These are Sober Living 10 cities and they're able to move on maybe into shelter. But most likely they try to move on to something more permanent. So, you know, this is in Cleveland, we realized that all the shelters are full. Every shelter that we build. There's at least two people ready? And And wanting to go into those. So it, you know, we don't have the resources anymore to build any more shelters. So we've been looking at this in the Grapevine to ask Community leaders homeless people others about whether it's time for Cleveland to look at a tense, any sure. Now and what are some of the different sides of this equation in terms of what people feel, whether what are the As in cons, you've heard so far. Well, one of the things that happens is that the city will usually attack the Tent City and try to get it. Try to make it illegal for the, for the people in Portland. They refuse to provide a license for the tents and they battled it out in court for three years before they finally prevailed, the Tent City prevailed and they were given a license in Seattle. The, the mayor has regularly tried to find the church organizations that provide the tent cities. So it's One of the problems with this is that the municipality will usually, you react organizations that have to spend a great deal of resources to protect the interest of the Tent City. Hmm. One of the other problems is that it's a real it's a temporary fix. So organizations are working on temporary fixes instead of more permanent fixes to the homeless problem and that can perpetuate itself as douche. Shelters perpetuate themselves, where you spend a lot of resources on this emergency situation instead of spending your resources on, you know, permanent housing and preventing people from going in from becoming homeless. So that those are some of the the problems some of the good points are that people aren't isolated. They're not alone. They're not subject to crime and the other problems that exist from people who are On the streets and there is a sense of community that is developed. And sometimes just a sense of community can bring a person back into wanting to participate in wanting to get stable and wanting to move on. So those are some of the good points that have been brought up right antastic. So now you're going to be dealing with this issue in depth in the up forthcoming Grapevine. Is that right? Right, that's correct. And that's going to be coming out when next week? Okay, so people can read up more on this issue next week. So by grapevine, from your local, vendor a couple other things. I wanted to go into, you are planning a Thanksgiving evening, to do a monitoring. It's some sort of monitoring of the treatment of people living on the streets or the day after Thanksgiving. Is that right? That's the day after Thanksgiving. And then the Saturday during the Thanksgiving or the holiday parade and after the holiday parade, we're going to send volunteers out teams of volunteers to monitor police interaction, with homeless people in the past. The last time was 1999. The police have been sent out by the city of Cleveland to arrest her ass threatened, with arrest homeless people. For their daily activity of looking for shelter or waiting for a food truck, those kind of innocent activities. That homeless people have been forced to to undertake in the city of Cleveland. We want to make sure that doesn't happen again this year. So we're sending human rights observers out to watch and make sure that there is you know, in Mary White last Few months of his administration doesn't return to the days of old when homeless people and homelessness was criminalized. Right? And now is there a number if someone one of our homeless listeners out there is harassed or Witnesses. Someone being harassed. Is there a number they should call? Yeah. On third on Friday and Saturday. We're going to going to be giving out slips of paper, to homeless people to call, if they are. Experience harassment. And we're going to be monitoring those phones all day on both days and they can call our main number which is 2, 4 1, 1, 1 0 4. And we'll be monitoring that and we'll try to get to them as soon as possible on both those days to try and resolve some of these issues before they escalate into something more serious. Where we have to go to court. Hey, Brian. Yes, as you know, I am out there. Have you has me? Our White's office or anybody gave any kind of notification that they might be doing this in the past. The mayor has always issued a press release, which was issued last week, saying, please come downtown and Shop. It's important for the economy and will try to make sure it's as safe as possible downtown, but they've never directly stated that we're going to start arresting homeless people. There is give this veiled reference to Um, encouraging Shoppers to come downtown. So that same press release was issued again this year with the added incentive that they're going to reduce the parking downtown to encourage shoppers, but he's never in the past issued, this blanket warning that he's going to arrest all homeless people in it. So that people should come downtown, right? And he didn't do that again this year. So we never know if it's going to happen until it really does. Happen. Do you need volunteers to assist? Yeah, we're still looking for volunteers. They anyone who wants to volunteer can call that same number 368. I mean, I'm sorry, 2411 104 and we'll put them on one of the teams. They'll be three teams downtown spread out too, and they'll all be just there to observe. What goes on on the street. They're not, they're not going to be true. To intervene or anything like that. All they're doing is to be witnesses to make sure there's no harassment. All right, any last questions you have on covered. Pretty much. All right. Any last comments, Brian, I think one of the things that you might not be aware of, but that's on the agenda. The county is cutting back funding by 10% over the next year because of funding cuts at the state level. And one of the things that will be cut out is the burial of homeless people when they die. That's been In the past, that's been an expense that was picked up by the state. They drop that either earlier this year or last year and now the county can't afford to do that either. So home in all likelihood homeless people that die on the streets and their bodies aren't claimed, that will be cremated and they'll be no, no record of, I mean, nobody No Grave or anything like that. Brian in the Seattle, the area there, where they have the Tent City put up to now, is that a fenced in? Area. Is it does it have like porta-potties or places like that or showers or anything? Have you heard anything like that from them? It's not. It moves around. Seattle is still fighting with its City over the tent city. So it has to move around more frequently than the one in Portland, as but they do have Porta-Johns. They are allowed to use the church during the day. For usually, they're allowed to use the church facilities during the day for Bathrooms and showers and things like that, but sometimes it is fenced in because the lat the parking lots are fenced in but other times it's not it really depends on which church there at Which churches assisting them at that particular time and some have run as much as six months. They've stayed at the same facility for six months and they've had more success on at some Churches than others, but most of the time, the neighbors will rise up and try to kick. Mount as soon as they they set up their tents right now. Back on the issue of homeless burials. Do you have a sense of how many homeless people have died within the past year? There's usually people who are declared homeless are, there's usually only a few because most of the time, people claim their bodies, family members. I mean, almost everyone has somewhere where they receive mail, or they have family local. So, most of the time they're they're not declared homeless, right? So it's hard to estimate. How many people are homeless that died, but the It for the burials was about a hundred and twenty thousand dollars a year. And I think the burial cost per person was only about four thousand dollars. So this would be homeless and you know, Indigent people who have no other means of no other. I mean, their family can't afford to bury them. So they're looking at about 25 people or so, right, maximally, right? All right. Well, thanks for participating. And if anything comes up, we may be calling you again, but I think that'll give us something to talk about for the next hour. Hey. Thanks a lot. Brian. Take care. Bye bye. All right. Let me see if I can. Okay, we've just been talking to Brian Davis, director of the Northeast, Ohio. Coalition for the homeless. We're here in studio with Bob who's a longtime resident of the bridge next to the Brown Stadium. We're going to talk about his his experiences in this particular location. Why? He's chosen to live. And also get some of his thoughts on this proposal for Tent City in the next 40 minutes. 35 minutes. Where should we begin? Well, I thought after Brian mentioned the names there or the amount of people that were homeless. I thought it'd be a good time to play that Bob Dylan song we were talking about. Yeah. Yeah, I think if you listen to it, it'll give you an idea of exactly what some people don't see. See out on the streets. That we see all the time every day. Yeah. Now, and I do know, one of the long time. One of the long time people who've come to food, not bombs. Older older, man, with a heavyset, man with a big long Gray beard, who has been a regular at food not bombs, and I unfortunately, don't know his name. I have talked to him a few times, but never have gotten his name passed away on. Streets within the past week. So we might want to dedicate this to his memory. You know who I'm talking about. Yeah. I can't think of his name. There's been a. Is he the one that had the heart attack? I think so. Yeah. All right. This is a track by Bob Dylan. It's called only a hobo. It's off of the CD. Bob Dylan, the bootleg series vol 1.

00:21:54.400 - 00:55:34.200

As I was walking on the corner, one day, a spot in olho go in the doorway a lady. His face was all grounded in the cold, sidewalk floor, and I guess, even there for the whole night Amal, only. Hope all. But one more is gone leaving. Nobody teasing his side song, even though nobody to carry him home. He was only a hobo, but one more is gone. A blanket of newspaper covered his head. As his step was his pillow. The street was his baby one. Look at his face, show The Hard Road. He come and A Fistful of coin, show the money. He bums. He was only hobo, but one more is gone leaving. Nobody teasing. His fav song leaving the nobody to carry him home. He was only a hobo, but one more is gone. One another take much ever. Mainly sees whole life, go down to look up in the world from a hole in the ground, to wait for your future like a horse. That's gone. Lame. Till I die in the gutter. With no name, he was only a horrible, but one more is gone. Leaving little, buddy. Teasing. Is that the song leaving? Nobody. Did you carry him home? He was only a hobo but one more is gone. You've been listening to W. Ru W Frost radio. That was Bob, Dylan. Only a hobo. What do you any feedback on that song by? No, not really just a lot of guys out there passed away. So and a lot of in different different things, you know, some of them crazy, some of them just, you know, I know a couple of froze to death one drowned in a puddle with about a half inch of water in it. So it just, you know, Makes you think my life is so short. Yeah. Yeah, and we'd actually, right before. Right? Before we talk to Brian, been talking about Smitty, one of the the longtime residents of your Bridge who passed away after getting gangrene in his leg. So, you know for all those people who recently passed away as well as in the past, you know, we should be thinking of them this holiday. Season. And also thinking about them, when the county is cutting back its services and we're really as the governor says, really cutting into the bone right now. So, so, but we have one of the issues, given the present housing crises that has been raised has been issue of potentially starting up a tent city. What are your thoughts as a long? Track time resident of a tent and someone who's been able to maintain your tent for the past, 20 years. What are your thoughts on that? Well, Dan, it depends on where you're located at. I'm more or less out of the view of the general public so they don't mess with me too much. I mean, I'm I'm in was deep in the bushes but wintertime it cuts them down, but I still cover it with a white white type tarp and then the snow covers it up so they can't even tell I'm there. If anybody did, I'm sure they'd give me a little bit of harassment. Not too much because I keep the area clean and that which is essential, you know, if you're going to live outside as far as the Tent City, a lot of the problem, I think we're going to find with starting one. Here is like the heating. We're going to find problems with the Fire, Marshals and stuff. If guys are guys and women are trying to bring heat into their tents. Like I have I actually went out and bought me one of them. Louis. Did he fire? Extinguisher just in case of an emergency, keep it by my bed. So I can have easy access to it. Another thing is like I said the porta-potties, you know, if they have access to that to the porta-potties into the showers, that ain't too bad. I have one that's five seconds from you almost. You know, it's like about a minute walk. I can be at a porta potty that's always kept clean and I keep it clean also showers. I take it Malachi's five days a week. Sure. So as long as they've got the essentials to keep themselves and their areas clean, with dumpsters to be able to dump their trash and to be able to use porta potties that are cleaned on a regular basis and take showers that are cleaned on a regular basis. I see, no real problem with it, the fenced-in area I asked him about, because I think, in the city of Cleveland, there's a lot of bad element out there also, and I think that if they were to do one like that, it Need to do something to wear in the effect that people would actually be given a card of some sort, and be able to show a guard or somebody at the gate to come in so that you don't get the criminal element coming in there and selling drugs and stuff like that. Sure. Now you've had actually some people are young, kids are harassing you in the past. Is that right? Oh, yeah, they threw a brick down through the tent and it was pretty good size. If it hit me to kill me. Me and it took it. I had to figure out a way to prevent that, they've done it twice more. But the third time they've done it. My my system worked. I've got enough stuff on the top of the tent blankets and tarps and pillows and stuff to where it stops it. Now it more or less just lays up there. I mean, it was a good 30 lb brick, they threw from 50 foot up in the air and the first time and it went straight through the Tenth Line of right beside my bed within seven inches of my head. If it Mary killed me and these kids had no business being out. There was 3:30 in the morning and they were between the ages of 12 and 17. You know, what, what are the police doing to keep these children, you know, from being down in the downtown area. No less right beside the Justice Center at 3:00 in the morning. Yeah, you know, but yeah, I've managed to surpass what they what they did. I mean I made it to where I'm a little bit more safer and inside when I'm Sleeping sure. Now, what do you think on the dangers would be that potential dangers to set up a tent city and having it end up like the shelter and some of the same problems people face in the shelter. Well, in the shelter, I'm I'm, I don't stay in the shelter for the simple fact because there's more dope and more drugs going around in most other shelters than there is. On the streets, the dope dealers know that. Once they are known, they can go hide in the shelter and the shelter may get checked once a month, maybe, you know, to see if you're there in there. Well, and even more. So, I mean, the reality is, if you've got a market like that, where you've got 400 People Under One Roof, right? I mean, where else? I mean, it's the same reason. The temp agencies, go to the shelter to get Workers. Right? Right. It's a profit for them. Oh, yeah. It's definitely. Profit, I mean, no, it's not only just the drug dealers. It's also, you know, I it's it's the way that that place is run. Sure. I'm not going to mention any certain spots because I don't think I can do that without getting sued, but they wouldn't get much. But the way they're run by the people they're run by. Hmm. I'm sure the higher-ups meant it to be well, but as it filtered down to the people that are actually running the shelters. They don't care about anything but going in there and doing their eight hours. There's a lot of fighting and cussing, just Rampage. I mean, the showers most of them are broke down the toilets. Most of them are broke down. I mean, there are some sure there's some good shelters out there. The one I'm actually referring to is, is a dump that was made to hold 300 people and they sleep 400. 450. Yeah, and your I mean we can we can name names, you referring to the main emergency shelter. Yeah, 2100. Yeah, the Salvation Army. I mean I know they meant the Salvation Army itself meant well when they built the building, well, I don't even think to tell you the truth. Well, I think they had a role in rehabbing the building but all the funding for it came from the city and the county. I mean, they're essentially just operating the shelter using city and county funding is If I'm not mistaken, I'm not sure about that. All I know is the toilet, half of them don't work to showers. Half of them didn't work. The guys were, they were the Salvation Army was supposedly feeding them and they would bring in enough to where they would run out sometimes, before they ever got to the end of the line. There were so many people in there. They had people sleeping on the floors on Matt's. Yeah. That was that we're never cleaned. They were just thrown in there. And nowadays, there's even more people and so some people don't even get Matt's, right. I've heard right more recently. Just sleeping on the bare concrete, and not only that you've got, they just had a thing. Now, everybody had to go get checked up because they found out a bunch of them. Ended up with scabies, be or some kind of disease, that thing comes tuberculosis actually. Well, no, they went through and did that check to, but they also have one. Yeah. They also had to go get their hair, go go to a doctor, and be checked for like scabies. Or something like that. It's something to do with head lice. Uh-huh. And it's because they don't make the people that come in there. Take a shower. So, these guys can go out here and run around, not take a shower for a year and still lay on the same beds, the same blankets, the same pillows the same sheets, and I don't think you can wash that stuff away in a wash. I mean, So, so for a variety of reasons, you've chosen to stay outside and you're one of the people who's actually set yourself up for Four Seasons outside. I think quite a few people stay on the summer but a smaller number of people are actually outside during the winter. Would you say? Oh, yeah. There's only I don't know about everywhere else in the city of Cleveland. I know in my earlier this year, they'll be three people. In my spot in my general area and on the other side. One, two, three. There's eight that I know of, on the other side of the bridge over on the West Bank. Mmm, but other than that, most everybody goes into a shelter when it starts to snow. Yeah, and there's also great, and the great state. The great greats a lot. Ya know. There's some longtime residents of our least, one of our public squares. I right. Oh, yeah. Yeah. There's a an older lady there that I don't even know her name. Tell you toss God's truth. I've known her for years. Mmm, she's been been living there for as long as I can remember. She's pretty motivated the police nearby. Pretty much. They'll come through another, they may sweep everybody else up but they'll leave. Oh, thank goodness, you know, she's not all there, but she's a very nice lady. I mean she doesn't bother anybody. She sits there and just does her own thing. Yeah. Yeah, and she stays out all four seasons to I'm pretty sure I'm not positive. Now, you know, she's gotten older. Sir, but last year, she was out. Yeah. Yeah, and she's been a long time person coming to food, not bombs, as well, might make sense to bring her on are some day if she's interested in. Are you big? Make sure she's got her medicine. All right, we can, we'll work something out. We've been talking to Bob and this is Daniel listen to frost radio. We're going to be here until 12 noon. We're talking about the concerns of Living on the street possibility for setting up a tent city, and if you want to give us a call at 368 2208, join in on the conversation, please do. So. We'll be here for another 20 minutes. Again, the number 368 2208. So you were so essentially you think that a tent city may work if it's set up in a right way. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean I would prefer to see them take and do something with like the housing that's down behind the projects on 25th up there, by Malik. Same Alki Church. There's like 10 15, buildings up there. There could be renovated out, you know, and do something with them. Hmm, and make it regular. A regular place to set up a tent city, but if that can't be done, attend City would be the next best thing instead of having some of these people out on the streets or in these overcrowded. Seltzer shelters. Yeah, so actually that's a, you know, I'm not sure if that's exactly true. That that can't be done. In fact, unfortunately, you know, we might get by and back a call but Brian was involved in taking over a house out on St. Clair and 107th Street last Wednesday night. And while they didn't keep that house. There's nothing to say that an organized. Movement to take over abandoned buildings, couldn't occur in the city of Cleveland and those buildings CMHA or other buildings couldn't be occupied and lived in that might, you know, that might be a more effective might be a more effective strategy. Right? Well, it's all about the money. The city doesn't want to spend the money to State doesn't have want to spend the money. The good people like Brian Davis and New York, Northeastern Coalition for the homeless and ABS. The ultimate Justice, you're referring to. Yeah, and some of the others that we've had meetings with in the past. They really don't have enough funding to go out and to fix these buildings up on their own. Yeah, so well and I think there are there multiple different approaches to take obviously having the resources from the get-go to take over a building and fix it up would be ideal, but you know, in other Squatters movements such as in New York City. Essentially what people have done is, is take over the buildings and then use the actual skills of the people who've moved in and secure the supplies, you know, sometimes, you know, maybe sometimes the the supplies were were gotten from killed trucks, insights ill-gotten gains, but other times, you know, people pitched in, I'll paid $25 a month dues and bought the roofing supplies or the sheetrock are or the electrical wiring but, you know, their ways in which those issues could be dealt with if that was an approach that people really wanted to take wouldn't necessarily be I don't, you know, I think ideally what would happen your ride is we could have City sanction, so That way, you know, there weren't continual threats of eviction. I have it be more of a homesteading type of arrangement rather than a squat. But, you know, maybe you're right. Maybe, you know, maybe even then, maybe even a squatters movement would be more effective than Tent City. Well, you know, Dan, there's a lot of guys out here and a lot of people come seem to think that just because you guys on the street, he has no talents. And a lot of these guys out here can do pretty much anything. um, they're very versatile. I mean most of them can do drywall, do wilfy, new flooring, do some carpentry work. If they would tell you if the city of Cleveland is so worried about cleaning up its its area and making it look finer than they need to put out some of this money that they're hoarding on and get some of these guys are living on the streets and say look, here's the material. Here is a house that's condemned, go in there and fix it. Yeah, you know and that that So, they have money and, you know, a lot of one of the sources of money that doesn't really get discussed, is the money they put in a demolition. I mean, that's a major sum of money. Like if you look at the building up on 55th and Chester, they've had a work crew over there. Demolishing that building for over a year now. A year and several months, all the money they put into that demolition, right? If they even took that money and had just given it to homeless people to rehab. I mean that building what if would have taken a lot, but even to rehab other buildings, right? They would, that might even be a better, you know, a one source of funding. We've got a caller on the line and we're going to go to the the caller. Caller, you're on the air, hello to your program. And if everybody can care about the firemen in the disaster. How about the homeless people? You know, why can't we throw a buck someplace and have somebody give it to these guys to help him out and get him off the street. I hear you, especially for the winter time. If we're going to be thankful on Thanksgiving. We should do something to help these people. I think that's, that's a great idea. And, you know, I think we have to as a community. Maybe listen to what the homeless are saying, is to wear the most Active use of those resources would be deadly if you'd like to get involved. When I get off here. I'm going to give you your reception person my number, and if there's something that I can do, I'll be sure more than glad to head to head up, their driver had something to help these guys out. That would be fantastic. Hey, we really appreciate your call. Thank you. All right. That's um, that's always hopeful to hear someone call and hello. Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you weren't on the air anymore. Yeah. Yeah. The number here is 368 2208. You want to leave his number? Oh, do you want to leave your number? Okay. Why don't you talk to a person off the air unless you want to leave your name and number. Are you there? All right. I'm All right, the whoever the caller was give us a call back and leave your name and number with our co-conspirator Crystal, but we really appreciate that call. I think if we can, maybe set up a process like that. I think Brian is engaging in now. And, and Bobs, and I are talking about in terms of setting up a strategy of, where is the most effective place to Our resources, you know, and the discussion right now is do we set up a tent city. Do we try and push for homesteading Arrangements? Do we? You know, and that those aren't necessarily do we pursue a squatting strategy? I think, you know, this is a conversation that I think could be could be very effective if it was, you know, broadened to include. Wide range of people who are currently homeless, right? Well, Dan, you got to look at it. I mean the tent city is a great idea if everything else fails, but on the east and west sides of the city of Cleveland, There are so many houses that are just abandoned and that was one of the reasons Brian did this because of that house, they went to was abandoned from what I understand. Nobody owns it, it's just sitting there. I mean, there's nothing wrong with the house at all and sooner or later. It'll just be, it'll go to the city and the city will auction it off or something. I'm not sure how that all works, but there's so many houses that are on either side of this city, that could be fixed up and used to help somebody out, get on their feet. Yeah. Yeah, and I think if there are people out there who are no of houses that should be perhaps occupied or, or could be occupied, whether they own that house, or they know that the owner has disappeared, which is often the case for many of these abandoned properties. You know, why don't you give the Northeast Child Coalition for the homeless a call at 2411 104 and it You know, maybe make sense for a group, like, Northeast, Ohio, Coalition for the homeless to set up a building, its own building, trust fund. That could be used to, you know, Assist efforts of homeless people to take over to take over these properties. And it may be useful for people like the last caller to, you know, help coordinate a fundraising drive, to build that trust fund. That would, you know, that, that could be very potentially powerful tool. Right, right. Like I said, they're you know, the guys that are out here, aren't scared to work. It's that the problem is not being scared of work or not going to work. I was I went to Lakeland laborers more than just say hello to somebody who is one of the dispatchers and he had like 25 tickets on his desk. There were 75 people in the building itself, waiting for work. So it's not like all 75 them. People are going to go to work and most of them have probably been there since 5:00 this morning waiting to get one of them 25 tickets. Mmm. So it's how can we as a society or a city or a community rather? Make sure that these These guys who want to work and maybe can't go out to work at Lakeland. Labor could, perhaps improve their own living conditions, be given that opportunity by fixing up abandoned houses creating situations where where they could have a viable living living space, you know, and I think it would be ideal. I mean ideally they would also have support services to so that. It may be different houses would have different groups are finity groups of people. So you might have one with a A, for example photo right where they could have meetings, you know, on a regular basis in the living room, or you might have other, you know, folks who need more medical assistance or mental health Assistance. Or, you know, there could be a variety of Of different houses. There's plenty of houses out there and different houses could meet the needs of different groups of people. Well, see the thing is, there's so many houses out there that once you got a group of the homeless together, they would actually have a job. They would be a never-ending job because there's always going to be houses that are going to get caught on fire and abandoned. There's always going to be houses that are abandoned. There's always going to be houses that are condemned. Mmm. And as long as that group of homeless, people is willing to go out there and work for it. Why shouldn't they be? All to earn a little bit of a living cleaning up and fixing up these houses for other people to come in other families. Even yeah, that's one of the reasons we picked out the next song that we did for the end of the show is because there is people out there that have have a job right now and who are making good money right now. And all it takes is a turn of a switch and they could become homeless. Yeah. And you know, for the people who live on those blocks with those abandoned houses. I mean, I think they need to start thinking, is it really better to have this house sitting there with all the grass growing, the weeds growing tall the bushes? Growing roof kind of falling apart, or would it be better to actually have it taken care of and occupied and you know, not to say people are angels but Let's be honest, those of us who live in houses aren't always Angels, either? Right? Well, most homeless guys are just average. Average people. I mean same with the women, most women that are homeless are just average people Shaun couldn't. If I walk I go into the into the BW3 is quite often to play my little and Tian game and have a couple beers. And I associate with people that are dressed in three-piece suits and all kinds of thing. And until I had actually told them they had no idea. I was homeless because How can you tell a homeless person just by looking at him? It's impossible. I mean, if anyone spends a half an hour in the shelter, they'll see people dressed in all kinds of, you know, all kinds of attire. Most, you know, most of the people I, you would just never know, right? I mean now there are some out there that are still the old time, hobos it. Hmm, you know, they're they're going to never change. I mean, there's a total of them out there. Sure. But most of these guys that are out there really Work. And they really want to be able to make their lives better. They just don't have that little stepping stone to get them going. Yeah, and I think that's what, you know, what, what we're kind of trying to get at is how do we restructure the opportunities available to people provide them with more and better choices? And we kind of got it at this a little bit. But I would venture to say even those who are hardcore addicts, you know, the people who are seen as most Unredeemable, let's be honest. Like are they better served in the shelter? Or would they be better served in, you know, another living situation, you know, the chaos of a shelter is not conducive to. I think dealing with social problems. People face, especially when as you were talking about earlier, you know, drugs are probably more freely available there, you know, with exception of Prisons that one place where drugs are more freely available. Right? Right. And You know, okay. We've got a caller. Caller, you're on the air. How are you doing? Why don't they just start their own businesses, you know, the plumbers can do and what you get is you get shysters going around, ripping off old, ladies all day long. You got dilapidated buildings up and down Lorraine and 25th. It Clark Avenue and just nothing's happening. You know, if you just made your own business you'd be charging half the price. Probably because you don't have any overhead or whatever, you know the head or let the plumbers higher. Add a point where you know, the people that can do the plumbing should be hired and in should be employed as plumbers rather than have to have to lay around in. Under bridges and things like that. Yeah. Well and I think, you know, the possibilities for setting up a Cooperative businesses, among the homeless could or not, even just homeless people, just among those who are currently attending. These temp agencies. Perhaps could be one of the one of the programs that a community hiring Hall, would set up, you know, if the 25 people get sent out and there's 50 other people who want jobs. Maybe there could be And programs available to get them. Some startup Capital to set up their own businesses here. Yeah, we like I like the idea of what you're saying there but like and mainly it's having being able to get get the funding to get, to the proper tools, to do the job that needs to be done, and to be able to move the material and have have a way to get these jobs. That would be the problem. The only problem that, that the guys out here would have, as far as setting up something like that. All you need is a phone number. We got a phone. Number somebody wants a plumbing done. They cannot, they can say you need $40 worth of materials. They can buy $40 worth of materials. You only charge them half price of what a regular performer does is no reason they can't do it. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you one thing. I think it would be at least worth while to also have discussions with the building's trades to because we wouldn't necessarily want to all sudden, cut wages for plumbers by half. Because our plumbers need to make livings to so, but I think I think your overall idea could, you know, could be developed? I don't think it should be not discussed just because some of those problems because I think those problems could be dealt with if we set up a dialogue with the plumbers and the building's trades, figure out ways to get guys started up so that they can fix up some of these buildings, but, you know, overall I think Think that's a great idea. Well, you know, it's like I work for a plumber one time here in Cleveland. And I went to this job site where another plumber from the company was working. Are you still there? Yeah, we're here, you're on here. All right, this plumber had the walls tore out of the house. I mean, following the pipe and everything else. In the reason for this was there was a vibration in the pipe. Now, the guy had two walls tore out following the pipe. What reason? I have no idea. Because any vibration would be caused by a fixture which is most like, which was in the toilet. You know, when the picture gets old, it starts vibrating and shaking when when it about gets cold or whatever. And you know, it was just I mean they were just robbing this guy and this is one of the respective respected plumbers in the city. Yeah, this is, this is what's going on. Every day, all day long all over the city. If we can just get a little honesty going and you know, things just change. I mean, it's got to go that way. You got to go and go with honesty. All right. Well, hey, we appreciate your call Pete and we'll look forward to hearing more from you in the future. All right. I hope this a lot more. All right, I'm sure you will. Thanks a lot. All right. So while we're winding down another hour of frost radio, I need the last comments to the listeners out there. Bob. Well, just think about the words to this song, as we're leaving. We ain't gonna be able to get as much of it on there if we wanted to. But I think you'll get the general idea from listening to it, that anybody at any time, can become homeless. We're going to be listening to a song. Many of you all have heard of called, like a Rolling Stone by Bob, Dylan off of his CD Highway 61 Revisited.

00:55:52.500 - 01:00:52.800

Do the people call? Save me? Where do you find fall? You? Thought they were all, didn't you? You used to laugh about everybody that were hanging out now. You don't talk so loud. I'm so proud to be scrounging your neck. All right, Miss Lonely, but, you know, you only used again. She's still live out on the street and now you're gonna have to get used to it. You say never compromise with a mystery trip, but now you realize he's not selling any Alibi, as you stand to the vacuum of his eyes. Do you want to make a deal? To see the frowns on the jugglers and the clowns. When they all dead tricks for you. Never understood. That ain't no good. You shouldn't let other people. Get your kicks where you used to ride on a bus with your Blow man who carried on his shoulder. A Siamese cat. Ain't it hard when you discover that he really wasn't after he took from you. Exchanging all precious gifts, but you better take a diamond ring. You better price on it, babe. And the language that he used to paint with you. We got nothing, you got nothing to lose, you're invisible now. You got no secrets.