By Mark David Blum, Esq.

I take a lot of kicks in the public arena because I do not go along with “the flow”. In my writings and observations here, I focus hard on the inconsistencies and ironies of life. Great effort is made to expose the hypocrisy of everyday conventions which, in their effect, I feel hold us back as a People and a nation. It matters not whether you agree; I consider my mission complete when I am read and when you take a moment to pause and reconsider your own value system. If in the end and as a result you find yourself more firmly entrenched in your paradigm, then at least for a moment and in your own mind, you were compelled to defend yourself and explore the rationality of your beliefs.

You are not alone. In the process of exploring these issues, I too find myself challenged and thrown into dogmatic disarray.

Here, let me show you …

Every year at Christmastime, the Legal Aid Society of Mid New York sponsors what it calls its ‘Home for the Holidays’ program. Lawyers (like me) are recruited from the community and asked to volunteer their time helping indigent tenants avoid eviction at Christmas. It is a well intentioned program run by some of the most honorable people I have ever met. Their message is simple: “It is Christmas. You do not evict someone at Christmas. Nobody should ever have to face Christmas homeless and evicted.” Nice; huh? This program truly reflects what fundamentalist Christians call “the Christmas spirit”. Ironically, the program is managed, supervised, and staffed mostly by Jews.

There are so many competing interests involved; every one of them as precious and important as the other. I fully sympathize with a property owner stuck with a tenant who is not paying rent and damaging the property. Losing income while still paying a mortgage is bad business. We are not a welfare state and nobody has a constitutional right to live in YOUR home. The right to property and the free use thereof is a treasured and “inalienable” right of every American (sorta). If we took away the right to evict a tenant or even limited that right for non payment of rent, then the available rental housing market would evaporate.

Still, we are talking about the most basic of human needs; shelter. A person like you or me who suddenly finds their income stream disrupted and slips further and further behind in their rent should not have to deal with being homeless on top of all their other pressures. There is no way to find a job or stabilize your life when your night’s bed is a doorway. We have all been through rough periods in our lives and we all know that such situations are temporary. The problem is that when your home is not yours and you cannot perform according to your contract. You have no right to continue to live there and must leave; even if the date is December 23rd, the temperatures outside are in the 20’s, and there are six foot snow banks on all the sidewalks.

Unfortunately, in a capitalist society where property rights are supreme and paramount, HUMAN rights take a back seat to the rights of property. If you step into Housing Court, you learn very quickly how no matter your intentions or how severe your situation, if you cannot pay the rent, you are out. It is summary. It is quick. Seventy two hours is all you get. Judges have little discretion and seem to very easily sign off on the ‘Warrant, Order, and Judgment’. Watching these judges work and enforce this law serves as a continuing reminder why I never want their job. I look forward to the day I get the chance to ask “how do you do it” and get an honest answer.

Generally, my days are spent in front of State and Federal courts. Also, I spend a lot of time down in Family Court and doing divorces. Until this past Wednesday, I was always convinced that Family Court represented the worst of man’s inhumanity to man. The petty cruelties that are inflicted by parents upon each other and upon their children always set a new standard each time I appear. Having spent now two holiday seasons and more than five days in Housing Court, I am convinced Housing Court could easily give Family Court a run for the title.

All in all, I feel I did good work and nobody was removed from their apartments until at least January 2, 2007. That was my goal and for the most part, I felt comfortable with the outcome.

For three years now, I have been volunteering for this program and still I wonder about a tenant I met two years ago. She was a very young 20-something, single mother of a newborn. Due to the birth of her baby, she had to quit work. Her boyfriend moved out. She had no family and no support system anywhere. For reasons not relevant, she did not qualify for public assistance or emergency help. Her landlord was being a colossal jackass and was insisting the woman be out “in three days”. So adamant was her landlord that she get out that the landlord told the judge they were willing to waive the money and rent arrears. All they wanted was the girl to be “out”. Another adjournment was requested and I took the landlords out into the hallway to try and make a deal. Nothing I said moved these people. I even offered to pay the girl’s rent from my own pocket just to let her stay until after the first. That offer too was rejected. To this day, her whereabouts and outcome haunt me.

I still cannot shake the feeling of revulsion over the entire process. It is a deep state of social and moral cognitive dissonance. Beyond the sheer horror of balancing the superior interests of the property owner with the inhumanity of making an American and a Human Being homeless … lay the realization that all my work was really just a Pyrrhic victory. While I may have delayed the inevitable; nevertheless on January 2, 2007, when I wake up to a New Year warm in my bed with my family around me, too many others will find themselves again homeless. I have no solution. That, more than anything is the source of frustration and heartache.

Is it me, or have we completely lost sight of who we are and what our time on this planet is all about? We are quick and summary and have no qualms with throwing a human being into the streets without a care of their future or condition. Somewhere along our path, our nation has forgotten our declaration that, "we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."

There is no honor in homelessness, no fortune to be made in ignoring the poor, and what kind of Christian life is it to take no notice of those most desperate.