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As judge orders eviction

Supporters galvanize to save Atlanta shelter

Published Feb 11, 2012 10:16 AM

On Feb. 3, more than 200 supporters of the Task Force for the Homeless filled the hallway outside the courtroom of Fulton County Superior Court Judge Craig Schwall. Only a relatively few made it inside to witness the hearing on a motion to force the eviction of the Task Force from its building located at Peachtree and Pine in midtown Atlanta.

The building serves as Atlanta's only emergency overflow shelter where 600 to 800 men sleep every night. In extreme weather, the number can climb to 1,000. It is also the only place men can find respite from rain, cold or heat during the day.

The Task Force also operates a 24-hour hotline that provides referrals; assists clients in securing IDs, veterans' benefits and food stamps; runs a residential housing program; conducts GED and other classes; and has a medical clinic. For those seeking help with addictions, there is a 12-step recovery program and on-site counseling. The large building also has a rooftop garden and maintains studio and gallery space for homeless artists.

For the last several years due to a precipitous decline in funding, these activities have been staffed by volunteers, many of them residents at the shelter.

How the Task Force — once the recipient of millions of dollars in public and private money — came to such a dire financial state can be found in legal briefs filed by lawyer Steve Hall. In a lawsuit charging “tortious interference,” such powerful business entities as Central Atlanta Progress, the Downtown Business Improvement District, the City of Atlanta and, most recently, Emory University are named as engaging in an illegal conspiracy to drive the shelter out of business.

The Task Force earned the enmity of the business community when it successfully challenged “quality of life” ­ordinances designed to drive poor, homeless African-American men out of the downtown area during the 1996 Olympics.

The Task Force’s stand that “housing is a human right” and that public space belongs to everyone counters the for-profit developers who are gentrifying the area around the building. More recently, the Task Force fought the demolition of public housing throughout Atlanta and campaigned for a moratorium on evictions. Its presence on Peachtree Street, Atlanta's main thoroughfare, is an unpleasant reminder to the city's 1% that Atlanta consistently ranks as one of the metropolitan areas in the U.S. with high concentrations of poverty, unemployment, low wages and lack of affordable housing.

Two years ago, Judge Schwall had originally prevented the transfer of the building to a phony charity, citing the clear appearance of underhanded dealings that could prove the sale of the shelter's mortgage and immediate foreclosure to be illegal.

However, at the recent hearing Schwall declined to hear any evidence establishing the racist motives and diverse methods used to deprive the Task Force of public funds, undermine private donations and slander its reputation in the media. These communications outline plans by developers and others to drive the Task Force into debt, buy the mortgage and get control of a very valuable piece of property for a song.

Instead, Schwall criticized Task Force Director Anita Beaty and President of the Board Rev. Jim Beaty for receiving a salary from another nonprofit and for allowing Occupy Atlanta to use space in the building — issues the judge referenced frequently.

A graduate of Emory Law School, Schwall seemed particularly incensed that Emory University and the hospital it operates across the street from the shelter were included in the conspiracy charges. A recent article in the “Emory Wheel,” the student newspaper, publicized the content of damning emails that showed how these influential and wealthy institutions plotted the ruin of the shelter.

At the end of the two-hour hearing, Schwall, responding to the irreparable harm an eviction would cause the Task Force, said, "Why don't they find another place for those people? There are plenty of empty warehouses in Atlanta."

He then ordered the Task Force to vacate the building by Feb. 15 and mandated that the United Way operate the facility for six months until its closing. The United Way representative indicated that even with its resources and millions of dollars at its disposal, at best 25 men a week could be placed in temporary housing.

In its over-30-year history, the Task Force for the Homeless has not just been a provider of services to poor and homeless people. It has consistently been an advocate and fighter for human and civil rights for those marginalized populations. It has fearlessly challenged Atlanta to live up to its claim to be “The City Too Busy to Hate.” The battle for the Peachtree-Pine shelter is not over.

For more information, go to www.homelesstaskforce.org.