December 28, 29, 30 Residents At Peachtree Pine
December 31, 2012
December 28, 2012
Men 692; Women 15; Children 5
December 29, 2012
Men 693; Women 13; Children 6
December 30, 2012
Men 680; Women 10; Children 3
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 31, 2012
December 31, 2012 Sixth Day of Christmas
December 31, 2012
On the sixth day of Christmas
Dave “Great news!” Wardell sent to me
Six vats of Kool Aide
Five golden necklaces
Four fingers shooting the bird
Three bogus letters signed Greg Pridgeon
Two Innovation Delivery Team members
And a family living in a pear tree.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 31, 2012
Closing Out The Year At Peachtree Pine
December 30, 2012
Homeless Men, Women and Children resided at the Peachtree Pine Community 365 days during 2012. The exact numbers for the first two days of Christmas, December 26 and 27 are as follows:
Wednesday night, 12/26/12: Men 676, Women12, Children 5
Thursday night, 12/27/12: Men 665, Women 13, Children 6
Note: I dedicate the posting of these numbers this day to Debi Starnes and Horace Sibley and Rector Hoare at The Varsity Grill Episcopal Church. Debi Starnes during her reign published to the day of her demise that there were never more than 300 people residing at The Pine.
Horace Sibley as the chair of the so-called United Way’s Commission on Homelessness stated again and again that Team Goliath would end homelessness in Atlanta. Episcopal Giant, Rector Hoare, CEO of The Varsity Grill Episcopal Church from his pulpit called for the closing of The Pine as it was a squalor unfit for humans beings to inhabit.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 30, 2012
December 30, 2012 The Fifth Day of Christmas
December 30, 2012
On the fifth day of Christmas
Manny Fialkow’s lawyer sent two me
Five golden necklaces
Four fingers shooting the bird
Three bogus letters signed Greg Pridgeon
Two Innovation Delivery Team Members
And a family living in a pear tree.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 30, 2012
December 29, 2012 Fourth Day of Christmas
December 29, 2012
On the fourth day of Christmas
Rector Hoare sent to me
Four fingers shooting the bird
Three bogus letters signed Greg Pridgeon
Two Innovation Delivery Team members
And a family living in a pear tree.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 29, 2012
Christmas Night At The Peachtree Pine Community (2012)
December 28, 2012
On Christmas night, December 25, 2012, The Peachtree Pine facility in Atlanta sheltered 694 people, human beings, mostly citizens of our city that is too busy to hate. The breakdown of that 694 total is as follows: 676 men; 12 women; 6 children. These are the typical numbers that Debi Starnes questioned during those interminable years of her reign as Mayor Franklin’s homeless czar. This 694 number represents the people that the City of Atlanta and Central Atlanta Progress and The Chamber and Georgia State University and Emory University Hospital and Peggy Denby’s NPU and United Way and Alan Harris and Rector Hoare of Varsity Grill Episcopal Church want to “FREE” from warehousing at Peachtree Pine.
For a decade plus six years, these doers of all good have fought to disappear homeless people from downtown and to put out of business the shelter at Peachtree Pine. TEAM GOLIATH, that hideous strength, finds itself at the moment hogtied in three lawsuits, all under appeal. Who’d a thunk it? Poor and weak and helpless and penniless Little Team David somehow stays, somehow lingers, somehow continues to do what it does where it does it and how it does it.
These 694 human beings did not spend Christmas as most of us did. They were not found Christmas morning around a lighted Christmas tree giving and receiving gifts. They didn’t spend the afternoon, as I did, feasting and enjoying loved ones. Most of them had no place to go, no place to be, nowhere to turn.
United Way has flipped and flopped like a flounder on the griddle on what that organization can do to help homeless people. One month a United Way attorney in open court tells a judge that United Way can take care of these people at The Pine. The next month the Executive Director of United Way’s Regional Commission On Homelessness publishes that the United Way does not provide emergency shelter. That’s not what they do. And the next month, United Way is asking relief from an appellant court not to have to do what it said to a judge it could and would do.
Having seriously studied the life of Charles Dickens and the incident at Staplehurst in 1865, I know a little about train wrecks. If the zillion dollar Atlanta United Way hasn’t created a TRAIN WRECK, I don’t know what to call it. And United Way’s OUT for its do nothing posture is always to say as they have dozens of times, we can’t get to the men at Peachtree Pine to assess their needs. “Mean ole Anita Beaty won’t let us in.” Any second grader knows that the needs of 90% of the people experiencing homelessness are the same needs of Jack Hardin and Milton Little and Lexis Wilson and Deepsix Biswas and the rest of us: a job, clothes, transportation, groceries, a place to piss, decent housing and a pinch of respect. United Way’s NEED, to the contrary not- with-standing, is to gain the names and serial numbers of homeless males, especially Black ones, in order to issue warrants for arrests. Oh, where hangs hanging Judge Bill Riley and his Community Court when Protip so sorely needs him.
United Way is as interested in touching homeless people’s lives as a jackrabbit is in teaching Sunday School. United Way stands as an arm of the draconian Central Atlanta Progress who at one time thought that they could “arrest” their way out of the problem of homelessness. Reindeer A. J. Robinson wrote exactly that in one his more erudite emails. United Way perpetually accomplishes three goals: it fattens its own coffers; it serves as the footstool of Atlanta City Government, and it wears the badge of Central Atlanta Progress’s errand boy. How could it exist otherwise? It’s a member of the club.
Remember that United Way laundered money through its book s in order for Central Atlanta Progress to pay the salary of the last leg of Debi Starnes’ tenure. In a lineup of corrupt pretenders, Atlanta United Way stands alongside The Chamber of Commerce, Central Atlanta Progress and Atlanta City government. In fact, while standing there with its small clothes around its ankles, United Way holds hands with its other club members, its protectors.
Every adult in this 694 gathering on Christmas night entered The Pine and left The Pine voluntarily. One of the most egregious of TEAM GOLIATH’S lies of the decade (and I’m gathering them) has been that Peachtree Pine captures people and keeps them imprisoned. Both Debi Starnes and Horace Sibley reiterated the “warehousing” drivel under oath. Since the attacking TEAM GOLIATH provides no place or places, no alternatives for these 694, what choices do these people have? Recently, a wealthy financial backer of the Task Force said recently that “those bastards” should thank you guys everyday for carrying their water, for doing what tax payers and United Way donors expect them to do. Instead, the attackers bash you for providing care for Black men on hallowed Peachtree, “their sanitized zone.”
In his quote praising the City’s acquisition of Kristin Canavan Wilson from LexisNexis Risk Solutions division, Mayor Reed said that she would be assisting “chronically homeless” people in Atlanta. Wilson heads the 1.4 million per year Innovation Delivery Team funded by philanthropist NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg. In future pieces, I hope to look deeply into the term, “chronically homeless.” The expression came out of the George W. Bush debacle. I scrutinize individuals who use it. Users of the term make some of us smile. But ONE thing is certain, if Kasim Reed has brought in a superstar to assist that group of “chronically homeless” people, and if she, LexisNexis Wilson helps RISKS, we can sleep peacefully.
We remembered 43 homeless people on All Saints Day, November 1, 2012, who had died on or near the streets of Atlanta in 2012. Those dear ones were all at RISK. We pray that the superstar from LexisNexis Risk Solutions division will have some real solutions. She’s been on the job for over a year; women with their children in our lobby could use her expertise. Last night, Thursday December 27, 2012, 13 women with 6 children “slept” in the Task Force lobby.
We are not clear when Kristin Canavan Wilson begins delivering her RISK SOLUTIONS. Perhaps CUSTOMER SERVICE has her attention. Are the 13 women and 6 children “chronically homeless”? Wait a minute. Or are they just homeless? Which category are we assisting this year? I’m sorry I can’t keep that straight. I’ll call 311 for the Innovation Delivery Team. What and when do they deliver? Perhaps United Way’s 211 24-hour help line is answering today.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 28, 2012
December 28, 2012 The Third Day of Christmas
December 28, 2012
On the third day of Christmas
Debi Starnes sent to me
Three bogus letters signed Greg Pridgeon
Two Innovation Delivery Team members
And a family living in a pear tree.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 28, 2012
December 27, 2012 The Second Day of Christmas
December 27, 2012
On the first day of Christmas
Horace Sibley sent to me
A family living in a pear tree.
On the second day of Christmas
Mayor Kasim Reed sent to me
Two Innovation Delivery Team members
And a family living in a pear tree.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
January 27, 2012
December 26, 2012 The First Day of Christmas
December 26, 2012
On the first day of Christmas
Horace Sibley sent to me
A family living in a pear tree.
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 26, 2012
TEAM GOLIATH’S “Night Before Christmas “ 2012 Version
On Christmas day, 2009, I posted a piece called, TEAM GOLIATH’S “Night Before Christmas.” On this First Day of Christmas, December 26, 2012, I am posting the revised version of that 2009 piece. Some new readers far away from Atlanta have requested that I elaborate on the term, TEAM GOLIATH.
In January of 1997 the Wardlaw Family Fund purchased the 96,000 square foot building that borders Peachtree Street, Pine Street and Courtland Street. The Wardlaw Family Fund immediately donated the Peachtree Pine facility to the Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless, Inc. The building’s address is 475 Peachtree Street just south of Emory University Hospital and just north of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. Incidentally, St. Luke’s sold the building to Mrs. Edna Wardlaw for $1.3 million. That facility has served homeless people since then and is known as Peachtree-Pine. When the Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless, Inc. opened its doors in November of 1997, the good ole boy urban regime that runs downtown Atlanta suffered serious apoplexy.
City government, United Way, Central Atlanta Progress, Georgia State University, Emory University Hospital and many other movers and shakers were visibly nonplussed. Some of the haters of the poor within those groups had fought for years to disappear homeless people from the downtown area. Scholars like Larry Keating have shown that Central Atlanta Progress has been removing any hint of poor people since the early 1940’s.
Now, in 1997, the prospects of the Task Force for the Homeless sheltering Black men on Peachtree Street was simple unacceptable, downright unconscionable. Atlanta citizenry, too busy to hate, overnight resembled the demoniac in Mark’s gospel (Chapter 5) who runs unsubdued among the tombs. I see him as naked and certainly homeless. Members of the citizenry broke out in hives, they fouled their small clothes, they experienced flatulent disorders that exceeded reasonable limits, they rent their garments, they gashed themselves with broken Budweiser bottles, they gnashed their teeth, they cried out for the rocks to fall on them, they lined up to be given counsel by Rector Hoare at Varsity Grill Episcopal Church.
Groanings too deep for utterance coming from Central Atlanta Progress could be heard all the way to City Hall, yes, as far as The Chamber of Commerce. Paul “toxic waste dump” Kelman and Dave “Great news!” Wardell wept openly in Hurt Plaza. On a clear night their wailings could be heard on the front porch of The Iron Magnolia in Inman Park.
However, that hideous strength, that throbbing organ can never be stopped. Their forces rallied and clustered and coagulated into a conspiracy whose raison d’etre for more than a decade had been the removal of homeless people and specifically the Peachtree Pine facility where mostly Black men reside. That hideous strength recruited everything and everybody from the nun-run Mercy Housing, Inc. in Denver to the slippery developer Emanuel “Do I smell a fault?” Fialkow in Atlanta.
During the conspirators’ early maneuvers I named this festering sore, this misbegotten monster , TEAM GOLIATH. Long before the appearance of the giant in I Samuel 17, the Hebrews had used the term “goliath” to identify any huge, evil monster. The Philistine champion who challenged the best Israelite warrior gained the name Goliath for his mass and his strength.
When at a breakfast many years ago, I heard Episcopal priest Woody Bartlett thank United Way or Central Atlanta Progress or The Chamber or some other power for bringing their “muscle” to the table, I then and there got my name for these clowns: TEAM GOLIATH. They have the muscle; they have the strength; they have the money; they are the victors; they are that hideous strength. And where there is a TEAM GOLIATH, there is a little Team David with nothing but five smooth stones.
In the NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS that follows, some of their team players have gone by the wayside, and I have deleted them from this version. Some others have gone by the wayside but I have retained them because they need to be remembered. Debi Starnes and Horace Sibley have gone by the wayside; however, they will always be with us. “Their song has ended, but the melody lingers on.” They ended homelessness as we know it in downtown Atlanta.
Newer conspirators have joined the Grinch, Horace Sibley as reindeer: Manny Fialkow and a star at United Way, Protip Biswas. These new reindeer replace Greg “3 bogus letters” Pridgeon and Pete ‘put them into default” Walker who linked nuns like Sister Jane Garety of Mercy Housing, Inc. with Central Atlanta Progress. Sister Jane Garety wrote in an email to Horace Sibley that the City of Atlanta will always be in debt to Mercy Housing, Inc for foreclosing on the building at Peachtree-Pine. I must applaud the nuns of Mercy for one thing. They would not deal with Central Atlanta Progress on the foreclosing of Peachtree-pine. They chose the less besmirched, Manny Fialkow to do the dirty. These wives of Jesus know sin when they see it.
Atlanta Mayor Reed received $1.4 million for three years from NYC Mayor Bloomberg to fight homelessness. That grant came in the summer of 2011. Mayor Reed appointed two women to run his INNOVATION DELIVERY TEAM. They are Kristin Canavan Wilson, Director, and Susan Lampley, formerly with Dr. Renee Glover at Atlanta Housing Authority. Reed calls Wilson a “superstar” because she managed about $50 million for LexisNexis Risk Solutions division. She also helped coordinate the overall integration of the $4.1 billion acquisition of ChoicePoint by LexisNexis in 2008. Of the work Wilson will do, Mayor Reed was quoted by the saportareport November 29, 2011, “Her strong corporate background will be an asset to the City as we seek to improve business functions and efficiency across the City and make real progress on the issue of chronic homelessness.” Improving customer service at City hall and arresting panhandlers helps homeless people about as much as Horace Sibley’s laptop computer.
Homeless people who talk with me see a strong resemblance between the Mayor’s INNOVATION DELIVERY TEAM and United Way’s Regional Commission on Homelessness. Neither one can be found. The Innovation Delivery Team has a 311 number but no one answers. United Way has 211. Only heaven knows what may happen when a person in need calls 211. Let’s look at the 2012 version of TEAM GOLIATH’S “Night Before Christmas.”
Twas the night before Christmas
When all through downtown
There were vagrants aplenty,
Panhandlers abound;
CAP’s stockings were hung, filled with arsenic to spare,
In hopes that the homeless soon would be there;
Gateway’s staff were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of bonuses danced in their heads;
AJ in his kerchief,
Protip in his cap,
Had just settled down
For a long winter’s nap;
When on Woodruff’s lawn
There arose such a clatter,
AJ sprang from his bed
To see what was the matter.
Away to the window
He flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow,
Shed light on bleak Hurt some stories below,
When, what to AJ’s wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer,
With the Grinch for a driver, so angry and quick,
AJ knew in a moment it can’t be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his courses they came,
And he whistled and cursed them and called them by name:
Now Debi! Now Protip!
Now Manny Fialkow!
On Milt Little! On Lexis Wilson!
On, Lampley and Banda!
To the Chamber’s big porch!
To our fine City Hall!
Now dash away! Dash away!
Dash away all!
As dry leaves that before
MORE subpoenas do fly,
When they meet with an obstacle,
Mount to the sky,
Off to the Pine
The coursers they flew,
With their sleigh full of sticks,
And good Horace Sibley too.
And then in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawning of each poisoned hoof.
As I drew in my head and was turning around,
Down the chimney dread Sibley came with a bound.
He was dressed in fatigues, from head to his foot,
And his gear was all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bunch of bus tickets he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a bully just opening his pack.
His eyes how they twinkled
His dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses,
His nose oh so scary.
His droll little mouth
Was drawn up like a bow,
And the scowl on his face
Was as cold as the snow;
The stump of a pot pipe
He held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled
His head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a growling old belly
That shook when he laughed like a bowl full of jelly.
He was wary and lean – – a right slippery old elf
And I laughed when I saw him in spite of myself.
One word from his mouth and a twist from his head
Soon gave me to know I had so much to dread.
He sneered with a snarl and went straight to work,
And filled all the stockings with ashes and dirt,
And using one hand to blow his red nose,
He gave me the finger; up the chimney he rose.
He sprang to his sleigh,
To his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew
Like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim
Ere he drove out of sight,
“We’ll be rid of all homeless
And to all a good night.”
James Wilson Beaty
Jeremiah 22:16
December 26, 2012
Dr. Jim Beaty 