Janet Jackson testifies on unsafe and unsanitary shelter conditions
Jackson, formerly homeless five years, describes mice in mattresses, flooding, invasive staff entries, long commutes, and unaddressed grievances. She says safety means dignity and clean, maintained space.
Janet Jackson.
Good afternoon.
Good afternoon.
My name is Janet Jackson with the Community Leadership Coalition, Leadership Collective at the Coalition for the Homeless.
I am formerly homeless, but I
I continue to fight the issues I faced while I was in the shelter for about five years, continue to that.
One of the hardest parts about being in the shelter was the constant feeling of insecurity.
I stayed in a few different shelters, and some of them were in isolated parts of the city.
When I first entered the shelter, I was placed in a congregated shelter after intake.
There were mice nesting in the mattresses along with other insects.
The dorm rooms I lived in would flood during heavy rains.
Others could not put their belongings in the closet at the bottom because it would be ruined by the flooding.
During COVID, I was placed in a hotel because of my health issues.
Being in my own space made a huge difference, but even though I had my own room, staff was destructive.
I would try to get some sleep after working a long shift at the hospital, but staff would come around, open the doors to every room without knocking.
It didn't matter if you were undressed.
Some of these staff were male.
They just opened the door.
It was very invasive and unnecessary.
When COVID emergency ended and they wanted to transfer me out of the hotel, I requested a shelter that was closer to my job and told them I needed a shelter that didn't require steps because I required a cane to walk and steps were hard for me.
They told me the only shelter they could put me in was in East New York, Brooklyn.
And this was a senior women's shelter, which was one and a half to two hours away from my job in the Bronx.
at Jacoby Medical Center, where I worked the evening and the night shift.
I would often get back to the shelter for my shift at 1 to 2 a.m.
In the morning after traveling on the train for an hour and a half.
And then when I get off the train, the L train, I felt unsafe because it was desolated.
And this is 1, 2 o'clock in the morning, and walking to the shelter, I felt unsafe.
We made complaints to the shelter.
It's hard to get the staff to do anything about it.
I was having trouble breathing, and the day shift supervisor was making his rounds, and when he came to my room, I told him,
that I was having difficulty because there must have been a mouse or something on the trap under the dresser.
He told me it had to wait until the next morning.
When the next shift supervisor came at 4, I told her what happened.
She seen I was having trouble breathing with my air conditioner on.
Checked up underneath the dresser and there was two mice trapped in the trap.
The mice exhumated my asthma.
A shelter should be a place where people can find stability, but instead it's hard to get anything done or your basic needs met.
Safety means being treated with dignity.
It means being able to sleep peacefully, having a clean and well-maintained place to stay, knowing that staff take shelter residents'concerns seriously,
trusting that you will not be punished for speaking up.
I'd like to thank the council for inviting me here today and for this hearing to shine a light on all the problems in the shelter that still exists that make people feel unsafe.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for your testimony.