The Human Rights Blog

Yes Augusto Pinochet sure picked an appropriate day to die on. I am somewhat belatedly celebrating International Human Rights Day by publicly protesting the failure and even refusal of the Quebec Human Rights Commission to responsibly handle cases involving discrimination and harassment on religious grounds.

Eugene, Oregon and inhuman rights

It has been about 4 weeks since the Eugene police shot and killed a person with a mental problem. At that same time the Lane County was having an "“informal limited" hearing concerning a “not for profit” in Cottage Grove, Oregon engaging in fraudulent housing practices funded by Federal dollars. So what, you might say. What does it matter if the HOME TBA program does not follow federal regulations. So what, if they retaliate by kicking a disabled person off of a federally funded housing program. So what if the Lane County Human Services Department not only condones the practice, but forces a “limited” hearing so that the known abuses will not be heard. We were shot at by our landlord. The first time a deputy went up to talk with him, you could hear them laughing. Over a 2-week period he shot at our house 13 times with a shotgun. You could hear the pellets hitting the building and rolling off the porch. We were able to capture the sound of the shot and the pellets hitting the house while on the phone with 911. The three Lane County Deputies watched the tape, I gave them a copy. The next day they went and told the landlord, “don’t do that any more.” The Lane County Human Services Department were aware that the “not for profit” had violated HUD regulations, that the person in charge of HOME TBA in their department had sent our landlords lawyer bogus rental papers in an attempt to get us illegally evicted. They knew that there was an on going process to harass and intimidate us. Yet they decided that it was OK by their standards. So why should you care? At the same time, Lane County Oregon was approving a 10-year plan to end homelessness. The HOME TBA is part of that plan. It is being cloned in over 200 Counties across the United States. When I asked the State of Oregon’s Housing and Community Service’s how I would get a hearing through them, they wrote the grant for the federal funds for the HOME TBA Program. They said, “ we have no control over how the “not for profit” administers the program, there is no hearing or grievance process.” That is why you should be concerned. No matter which state you live in, they are setting up a process in 200 counties across the USA for 10-years with no oversight or process to complain. A few BILLION DOLLARS of money with no accountability.