It seems that it wasn't enough for some of the staff people at the Pine Street Inn that I was stalked and harassed by a male employee of that shelter for 8 months, while they lied and laughed and said that I was crazy when I reported it, until they had emboldened him to harass and stalk so many other homeless women that they also reported him and he was finally fired. That happened in 2015.
Tonight was the second night since I had to go back to living at the shelter after being forced into homelessness for the third time since 2010 that I felt that, for my own safety, I could not be at the shelter overnight. I've been awake for almost 24 hours; yesterday morning began with one of the overnight staff people possibly taking pictures of me and other guests in our beds, which is inappropriate.
Last night, I was told by someone who I think probably knows that a staffperson, and not the security guard who harassed me when I first returned to the Pine Street Inn in June 2017, is supposed to search my bag and use the metal detector to scan my body, told me that I had to be checked in by that security guard. It's not the person who harassed me in 2015; it's yet another person who harassed me, whom I reported, who was told to leave me alone, whom I'm supposed to be able to avoid, and around whom the staff people who lied about me last time are building yet another situation of my being abused for reporting being abused.
I told her that the director of the women's side of the shelter had said that a staffperson was supposed to check me into the building. She yelled at me "I didn't get the memo." She also yelled at me "Let him search you," to which I yelled back "No," and then she told me, "Then go to Woods-Mullen," even though she knows I am permanently barred from Woods-Mullen because I was grabbed by a male employee at the Long Island shelter a few years ago and I punched him in the face. From what I heard after I was permanently barred from those places, there were women who were raped by male staff people before the Long Island shelter was closed.
From what I have also heard from women who are not barred from the Woods-Mullen shelter, it is as disgustingly dirty and awful as it's been for years.
No code. People SUCK, not least the government of Boston and Massachusetts. When are you going to stop treating homeless people as if they don't have the right to humane, temporary shelter and higher goals than being servicepeople?
All homeless shelters are full of abusive staffpeople; all of them.
Last night, I called the shelter at around midnight; I knew that the staffperson who had tried to force me to be searched by a security guard who had harassed me would be gone. Unfortunately, the supervisor who was working overnight last night was also the person who had possibly taken pictures of guests yesterday morning. Since she'd been confronted about it (and denied it) this morning, it wasn't a surprise when I said "I'd rather not have to walk around all night," and she said "You may have to; all of the beds are full, and the lobby's also full." She would not even allow me to be at the shelter to sit in a chair in the lobby overnight until the morning.
People don't know what homelessness is like. They think that homeless people were born to be homeless. I was awake all night; I finally went to South Station and am waiting for the first train. I was so tired that I put my arms and head on my backpack; almost immediately, a male security guard was telling me "You can't sleep here," even though there was a homeless man sleeping on the bench behind me.
To be this tired is when you can fall asleep on a stone or wooden floor with no pillow and no blanket; you fall asleep as soon as you're not moving. Homeless people don't sleep on streets and park benches because that's the natural habitat of homeless people.
Copyright L. Kochman, August 7, 2017 @ 5:22 a.m.