compassion

The good news is that a DCF employee, who is furious at COTS, has temporarily given us a spare room... it was a teen boy's...

Parent and child in one room is not the best solution.

appeal refused.

COTS refused an appeal and has been unclear as to their appeal process.

Mary Anne Kohn has shown no remorse for the effect of her actions on a young child.

Mary Anne Kohn finally admitted that I responded in her time frame. However, she scheduled a meeting this week at a day and time she was clearly told I was unavailable.

Hmmm...

Apparently she wanted to meet with me, no matter what, the week of the 16th expecting me to miss work and lose pay. Makes no sense to me. Work = Money = permanent, stable housing.

trash??

COTS said, "you have 48 hours to get all of your possessions or they will disposed of."

Uh... is that legal?

Child worried about her toys

We went to get some clothes and saw all our things piled in garbage bags in the COTS office. My child started screaming / crying. She said she was worried about her toy box and asked why it was there. The staff person said to her, “We took your things out of the room so that another family can have the room.” Wrong thing to say to a three year old!

Staff could have said something more developmentally appropriate like:

"We’re keeping it safe for you because we know it is important to you."

“Get out”

Tatum, COTS employee, called me at 7:40 p.m. on my mobile phone while I was studying for my class. He said, “You have 20 minutes to get your things, then you need to be out of the shelter. You have to get out so we can give the room to someone else.”

My three year old cried, worried about her stuffed animals. When she went to get them, Hillary said in front of her, “You have 30 minutes!” [gee whiz, when we moved in they said we had four months; it hasn't been four months yet]

She cried and said to me "what will we eat for breakfast?"

Why would a homeless agency intentionally harm a child?

"Quiet Hours"

The TV in the room next to me is very loud. My child is having a hard time falling asleep due to the noise. It’s interesting that they claim there are “quiet hours” that they supposedly issue points over. My child asked me to knock on their door to request the TV be turned down. A seven year old child was alone in the room.

I have bronchitis again; all I want to do is sleep.

Child chose to move out

The parent of a 12 year old child told me that the child has moved out. It was the child’s decision because he was tired of the degrading way they treat us here. Staff doesn't even realize that he's gone!

no show

I had an appointment with Kristi Cruz, shelter manager, this afternoon between 5 pm and 6 pm. When I arrived, staff told me that she had left at 2:30 p.m. I told them I was going to the library and asked for her to call me if she returned. She never contacted me.

Bedtime and quiet hours not being enforced

I woke by two adults from different rooms talking in the hallway (before quiet hours end at 7 am). One of them told me that she does not get points for her child being up after 9 pm at night. She said she’s told as “long as her child isn’t downstairs or outside and if she is she just gets a warning.” (Staff issue 3 points for the bedtime violation to other families; after receiving 20 points a family is kicked out to the streets; IF they consistently enforced this there are a number of families that would have been kicked out after one week!! The maximum scheduled family stay is four months)

She said that if they “don’t like a particular family, that’s it.”

7 year old cannot find mom

Seven year old child in room 7 is standing in the hallway saying, “Mom?” It's after 9:30 at night!

Bedtime

3 guests have their children still awake and downstairs or outside. It is 9:21 p.m. Room 1 adult and child (under age 12) are outside. Room 1 child is up every night very late. She has been in other person’s rooms as late as 11 pm. They have been here for a few weeks. If staff had enforced the bedtime rule (children in bed by 9 pm) she would have received 3 points every night in one week for a total of 21 points, thereby kicking her out. It appears that points are not enforced consistently and only used when staff wants to exercise power and control over a particular client.

Preschooler mad about being homeless

My child is crying because she is upset we had to come here after the adult we were living with died and her children changed their mind about us living there and kicked us out (the house was then vacant for months). She’s been very upset about this for a long time.

Forced relocation and homelessness has been hard on her.

Room to spare?

A guest said that two other guests recently spent a night at a hotel together. Apparently even though they have separate rooms here, they sometimes share a room at night.

Washing clothes

I am washing clothes and need to dry them. All staff know that I go to sleep at 9:30 p.m. At 9 p.m. another resident emptied the dryer so I can dry my clothes. A staff member says, “I need to remind you to not wash your clothes so late.” (completely disregarding my day full of appointments and the fact that we have one assigned day to wash clothes). The “reminder” felt condescending. The dryer took two hours to dry the flannel sheets! Perhaps the issue is the dryer; not a person who deserves to be treated with dignity.

Homework

I was given the key to the resource room to complete homework for a class. I had just started and was in the middle of typing a response when Leah Sohotra told me to stop using the computer. When I said, "excuse me" she said, "I don't know how to explain it differently." Since did not seem concerned that if I stopped without submitting I would lose my work as I was on a web entry screen. She did not seem concerned that I was competing an assignment for a course*. When I said that I needed to finish my work, she said, "this is so petty."


* Courses are mandatory for work. Work = money = permanent housing (Not petty; imperative!).

Staff took my keys

I was mopping the downstairs hallway. Leah Sohotra, staff person took my key ring, which contains vehicle keys and keys for my place of employment.

I went into the office where Leah, Jill, and Hillary were. I asked for my keys. Hillary did not respond. Jill looked confused, looked around, and said, “has anyone seen any keys?” Leah, standing next to her, did not respond. Jill looked back at me, concerned. I told Jill to ask Leah for my keys back. When Jill did; Leah finally acknowledged that she had them saying, “oh, these?” as she pulled from her pants.

Communication

I emailed COTS employees and they said that I did NOT communicate with them. I returned their calls and they wanted to know why they didn't hear from me. I'm as confused as you are.

pain killer

My understanding is that it is against federal law to give medicine unless you are a medical professional.

Other shelters in this state provide lock boxes for residents to to individually lock their medicine, keep it safe from children, and monitor their own medicine.

This shelter wants everything locked in the office so they can control it. COTS makes some adults take pain killer in front of them in the office (pain killer = Aspirin or Tylenol).

phone calls

I call COTS employees for assistance with my situation and ask that they call me because it is free incoming calls on my mobile phone.

I've left them messages. Julie Lowell has pretended to not receive the messages. She has not returned or acknowledged my calls to her. Her supervisor wants me to call her AT MY EXPENSE!!! I do NOT have money to pay phone bills.

UVM

Why are most shelter staff UVM students?

They haven't a clue about parenting or real, adult life. They may be "well meaning", but they do not know what we are going through.

new family

The new family across the hall is loud every night in the middle of the night.

They smoke in the room; then spray heavy incense to try to cover it up.

There's a no smoking policy in the shelter.

no drinking water for a child

AmeriCorps vista volunteer put my three year old in tears by telling her she couldn’t drink water!

Mother’s day

Leah Sohotra locked in the office on the telephone. She said she was on the phone with her dad. At another time that day, she was sitting on the couch and seemed annoyed that COTS guest walked in asking a question. She said, “I’m on the phone with my sister.”

safety

The COTS Main Street family shelter has safety concerns. Mops are left standing in hallways and have fallen on the backs of very young children.

There is a long, sharp, wire on the floor, attached to the heater in a bathroom on the end of the hallway on the second floor. Staff has been asked many times to remove it as a young child has become tangled in it.

The sink fills quickly with water and does not drain properly. It's disgusting. This makes it hard to wash hands and brush teeth. We've asked staff for three months to fix it and they haven't.

There are open windows on the first and second floors without screens that young children have opened on their own and that they can easily fall out of.

Baby Shower

We planned a surprise baby shower for a woman with lots of gifts, food, and a cake. When we went to decorate the living room a staff person told us to not decorate, told us we couldn't have the food in the living room, that everything would need to be cleaned up afterwards (as if we didn't know that), and that the glass doors between the living room and the dining room had to remain locked. The staff person did not acknowledge the baby shower. We had the baby shower in the dining room instead. The staff person who worked afterwards was shocked by how we were treated.

The pregnant parent did not chose this situation. I wonder how many people think that someone would actually want to have a baby while living at a homeless shelter.

Show of hands?