Ms. Hughes has outraged and insulted the city of Hackensack in her letter advocating homeless services published on 8/19/05 in the Record Rag. She identifies herself as a member of the Christ Episcopal Church on State Street in Hackensack.
It’s long been said by the advocates for increasing social services in Hackensack that we had a homeless problem long before any shelter opened here. Before the first shelter opened in 1985, Hackensack, Englewood, Lodi, and Garfield each had literally a handful of homeless, and there was one in Paramus (living in the woods off Farview Ave), and another in Rutherford. So, in a very limited sense it is true that there were homeless here before any shelter opened. Then Christ Church, with the assistance of publicity from The Record, selected one of these towns, Hackensack, and began advocating a shelter. People from one end of Hackensack to the other laughed with ridicule that a dozen bed shelter was opening. “Hahaha, they’ll never fill it, how can they possibly expect there to be 12 homeless in Hackensack on a single night”, was the feeling all across Hackensack. Well, now there’s over 200 homeless drawn here by all the social services.
And it’s the constituents of Peter’s Place, run by Christ Episcopal, that are the most unwanted of all. These are the people who are so mentally ill or intoxicated that they are kicked out of the county shelters onto the street. I cannot even fathom how a woman from Dumont can expect another community to allow these people to roam the streets. It’s simply beyond comprehension that any rational person could come to this conclusion.
Nor can I fathom her comparison of Hackensack to Paterson. By the way, the best neighborhood in Hackensack makes anything in Dumont look like a slum by comparison. She says she’s happy not to live in Hackensack. Well, I’m happy she can’t vote in our elections or voice her concerns to our city council as a resident of Hackensack. I dread the thought that members of her church might buy condo units at the new Paragon building almost next door to the church.
I didn’t see Ms. Hughes, of Dumont, agonizing that Dumont has done nothing to serve the homeless. Not Paramus either, with all its wealth and shopping mall ratables. Nor does she advocate increasing social services at Bergen Regional Medical Center, where the mentally ill and substance abusers can have the high-quality care they deserve. Nope, instead she wants them roaming the streets of Hackensack, as if they have the civil rights to walk the streets. She thinks the answer is for them to terrorize the streets of downtown Hackensack, and pop in and out of homeless for band-aid services that amount to a fraction of what could take place at Bergen Regional.
We, the citizens of Hackensack, have been hoodwinked. What’s happening is a decades-long continuing trend to abandon county-funded social services at the County hospital and reinvent all the social services in the downtown of Hackensack. Remember Ronald Reagan’s 1000 points of light? That was the start of it, the sugar-coating of the transition from government care to private care of those in need. That way the taxpayers don’t pay for it, and instead donations from people like Ms. Hughes pay for it. I happen to think it’s the responsibility of government, not the private sector, to fund the solution.
Services for homeless that are temporarily homeless due to financial issues or spousal abuse can be provided in Hackensack with no burden to the city or the business community. But services for the mentally-ill, alcoholic, and drug-addict homeless of the Peter’s Place crowd belong at the County Hospital. They don’t belong on the streets of Hackensack, Dumont, Paramus, or any other town.
The County Hospital was founded specifically to rid the streets and local communities of indigent people. I’m told that interests in Hackensack, specifically the Woman’s Club, that were the driving force behind the creation of Bergen Pines, the predecessor of Bergen Regional. It was specifically to get homeless who had tuberculosis and other conditions off the streets, and to provide them REAL care. Thank you, Ronald Reagan, we’re living with your legacy now in the City of Hackensack.