Interview by S.V.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2021
Hi, I will use my initials here, S.V., I have reasons I want remain anonymous, for now. What you will read here is a real interview with a disabled man I met only once about 3 years ago. I’m not a reporter, maybe just a senior citizen busy body, but I am also a disabled person, handicapped as a child, loss of use of legs in a car accident and additional internal injuries, but this isn’t about me.
The person this is about is named Ken. I met him in a Walmart parking lot while visiting friends in Virginia, he was yelling to me as I was pulling away, I wasn’t sure why, I’m not from the area and at first was worried until he pointed down shouting my tire was mostly flat. I have a van set up for hand controls and get in on the passenger side, I almost never look at the driver’s side, the back tire was very low. He filled the tire with this small air pump, one of which I now own, along with run flat tires which he suggested I buy since my legs are wheels, this way if my van does get a flat, I can make it to get help from a mechanic. I didn’t know at first, he was a disabled person, the cause for him is a brain injury. And it seems one of his hobbies is just talking to random strangers, and he is incredibly interesting to have a conversation with, I think we had spoken for over 30 minutes, being a senior citizen in a wheelchair people usually don’t just start a lengthy conversation out of nowhere. We even exchanged phone numbers, and parted ways and that was that.
Until recently, when I received a phone call. Ken was looking through various items of his, he needs to decide what to abandon, he’s about to become homeless and must abandon almost everything he owns. He found my number among things he was looking through, and we talked about what’s being done to him. It’s appalling by any standard. I offered to make this page for him and share his story, and the evidence he has managed to collect, some of it disturbing. At first, he didn’t want to do this, but after we talked for a while, he agreed to let me tell his story, but only if he could edit out anything extremely personal about his health, which is fair, but, as long as I could edit any foul language, it’s my religious upbringing, which he was happy to accommodate as long as any intelligent adult could understand what he was saying, fair enough. It’s obvious he will not receive any justice, or help, and will be residing in his car before September is even over, and even though he will fight it, he knows he’s fighting a losing battle, but it’s a battle he shouldn’t have to be facing at all. As I stated, I’m not a professional reporter, just an old busy body, trying to help someone who once helped me and someone who needs help that he knows will never come, so I will tell his story for him here.
This interview with Ken is via a phone conversation, I live about 2,000 miles from Virginia. I will transcribe it as accurately as possible, but I’m not a professional, and this was a lot of work. Even though it’s been about 3 years since the only time we talked in person, he didn’t sound the same at all, there was something missing from him that he had 3 years ago, I’m not a professional anything but have done a lot of volunteer work, during our conversation I did finally realize what it was, you probably will too.
S.V.: “I’m glad you decided to let me make this page for you, I know you have zero expectations and your personal view of hope is that it only leads to disappointment, which I don’t actually agree with, however I know you never force your views on anyone, to you it’s just observations, but at least people will know the truth about what you’ve been forced to endure.”
Ken: “I wasn’t sure about doing this, I still but can’t help but feel this is somehow going to make my life even worse. And like I told you, when I found your number in a box of stuff, I couldn’t even remember who you were at first, I actually start conversations with people all the time, well, I use to, COVID put a damper on that and lately haven’t been up to it. So, I can’t really say I know how to be interviewed, but I do want to do this, but not all day, I do have to figure out how to file an appeal on my own and other legal papers”
S.V.: “Yes, let’s get on with it, what you need to do really is just tell me what’s been happening to you, I’ll ask you questions as I need to, I’ll transcribe our conversation and allow you to be sure what I post isn’t to personal, and I’ll put the audio recordings in the page where we talk about that, over an hour and a half worth of audio behind closed doors, I’ll put the proof of suspected financial crimes by one particular individual as well as the other documents you shared with me, and the photos will be included, and some of those photos you took are intensely offensive to me as a person and the way they were just ignored is very upsetting.”
Ken: “Ok, so, as you see my name is Ken, I’m a 54-year-old man on Social Security Disability, NOT S.S.I., I worked before I became disabled, my disability is a Traumatic Brain Injury, the modern-day version of permanent brain damage. My current benefit amount is $862, yup, and just Medicare insurance, no dental or vision, I do have prescription coverage. In November 2015 I ended up homeless, mostly was coerced into leaving the room I was renting. First, I was renting a room in a place that ended up with bed bugs that the homeowner wasn’t interested in addressing properly, I put an ad on Craigslist looking for what I could afford. I found a room but turns out the woman just needed help paying the mortgage until her husband was released from jail, me and another guy were essentially coerced to leave, the probation office told us if we kept living there than he couldn’t come home, I was almost gonna say looks like he’s not coming home. This was laid on us about 10 days before he was due to be released, both the other guy and me ended up homeless. Now the other guy was an experienced homeless person, former crackhead actually, he went to Fairfax where he ended up in a legitimate program called Facets and ended up with his own apartment for 27% of his S.S.I. check. I ended up in a tent for 30 months where I almost died the first 3 weeks.”
S.V.: “You almost died? How?”
Ken: “Carbon monoxide poisoning is how; it was rather exciting. November 3rd, 2015 is when I ended up in a tent, the day I get my Social Security, tents and the things you need to make them a residence add up fast. I honestly don’t even like camping, not in a tent anyway, and I like the outdoors, especially fishing, and I would never sleep in a tent in the cold, and it was getting really cold at night. So, I went to Walmart and bought a propane tank heater head and a propane tank, put some pieces of block in my tent to make the tank level and secure, and drifted off to sleep, almost drifted off to death actually. I woke up in the morning to an alarm I had set on my phone not feeling well at all, and not even sure why. I had set an alarm because I was going to help someone I know with something I can’t remember offhand. But before we were to go do whatever I was gonna drop off a half bushel of apples at the Drop-In Shelter by the bus station just down the road from where my tent is, I would go with this acquaintance to W.V. to pick up apples he would resell for a profit, and they came in half bushel bags, he made some decent money. So, he picked me up and I had him drive down to the Drop-In Shelter and I dropped off the apples and told him take me to the E.R. because I wasn’t feeling well, where I spent the next few days in the hospital because it turns out I was messed up pretty bad. I walked into the E.R., it was the morning, not even 8 a.m. and wasn’t busy at all, I walked up to the desk and the admissions person asked what the problem was, I told that person I think I have carbon monoxide poisoning, they sat me down in a wheelchair next to the admissions desk, put a blood pressure cuff on and one of those oxygen things on my finger, literally in 15 seconds I was in a bed with half a dozen people around me. I don’t remember a whole lot of that day, I remember both numbers of my blood pressure being triple digit, one in the 200’s, I remember someone putting a needle in my arm and blood literally squirting 10 feet across the room, I remember one of the doctors asking me what time I called the ambulance, I said I walked in, the doctor looked at me and said “Really? Wow.” So, I guess it was a good idea to go to the E.R. that day, having only Medicare I’m not a fan of the E.R. This all happened Monday November 23, 2015, 20 days into becoming a homeless person, it was a two-and-a-half-day hospital day.”
S.V: “Wow, rough way to start homelessness. But I find the fact you as a newly homeless person trying to survive in new and adverse conditions taking the time to drop off the apples to a shelter down the road from your tent before going to the hospital, where you obviously needed to be right away not out galivanting around, well I think that is just so neat.”
Ken: “I honestly didn’t give it much thought, my brain was pretty much on some kind of survival auto-pilot that day, but they were Golden Delicious apples. But after the hospital stay, I returned to the only place I had, and found a few days later my tent was set up on state land, so had to move it. I did get a better heater, a Big Buddy heater from Lowe’s, almost $300, but automatic low oxygen shutoff so no more dying. But after I moved my tent, I did make the nicest camp back there, I didn’t want to, just how things ended up. When you have a fixed, low income surviving that way becomes more expensive than you realize at first. But eventually the homeless camp was shut down and everyone was ordered to leave the property by February 28, 2018. I live in Prince William County, Virginia, and like a lot of places the government idea of ending homelessness is making sure there is no place for anyone to set up a tent, they prefer homeless humans just leave, or at least mill around all day and sleep in a shelter at night not have a camp, but, in all fairness, some of the people in those camps are real slobs, I’m not trying to be mean in any way, it’s just the truth and most likely the cause of that particular camp being shut down, trash everywhere, and the man who owned that particular land once the county he wasn’t throwing people off his land cause there were vets there too, but I guess fines just got out of control because parts of the place were just a trash dump, though there were a few occasions someone would show up with a Lowe’s or U-Haul pickup truck and dump trash, that was annoying.”
S.V.: “So when did they let everyone know that February 28, 2018, the place was closed and what did you, and other people there, do about a place to live?”
Ken: “They put up flyers all over the camp at the end of January, so a month in advance, the camp was about 10 acres sandwiched between a shopping center and a long exit ramp for I-95 South. So, at the beginning no one really knows what to do, then various program people start showing up, first a group called ACTS, with really nothing to offer anyone, I think a boyfriend/girlfriend couple had a room for rent found for them with 3 months paid and that was it, although me and maybe a dozen other people filled out papers. I somehow ended up meeting a person named Jimmy Rogers who then worked for North Virginia Family Services I believe but can’t guarantee that, who signed me up with this program on February 22, 2018, that’s part of the Continuum of Care documents I sent you. Mr. Rogers made it sound like I was going to be getting my own place for 30% of my Social Security and told me it was a federally funded, federally mandated program, turns out it was just a room in a 3-bedroom apartment with two other people. I did try to call him after I found this out, but he never returned my calls. Tenants for the housing “program” I’m in are recruited, they look exclusively for people who receive a government check, Streetlight themselves recruit weak willed drug addicts and alcoholics or people with those plus legal issues who they gently manipulate, but Streetlight didn’t know I didn’t fall under any of those categories (you will hear live audio of this), but Jimmy Rogers didn’t work for Streetlight and was unaware of how they operate. Turns out I was the only legitimate disabled person back there and turns out Jimmy Rogers was just trying to help a human being in need, I remember one day just walking around the whole property with him because he wanted to see if other people were out farther, but Streetlight got stuck with someone who will stand up to bullies. And even with that I wouldn’t be able to move into where I currently live until March 9, 2018, I stayed in the “Honda House” from February 28 until March 8, I was even on a news interview in February 28 for the evening news, channel 9 with Peggy Fox, nothing major, just some chit chat about the camp closing, stuff like that, talked to her about how I had a place to go while others were severely displaced with no hope, a guy I met from the V.A. named George asked if I would speak on air as I’m fairly good at verbally engaging people.”
S.V.: “I think when people take the time to listen the live audio, they will have a lot of thinking to do. But what is the Honda House, a shelter of some kind? And I’m going to look up this interview and see if I can add a link to it, bet you seemed relieved you were eventually going to live indoors, I really want to hear what your voice sounded like then compared to now. But someone from the V.A. asked you to speak? Why? Are you a vet or something?”
Ken: “Well, the audio is live, in person, candid, no one knew I was recording. But (ha-ha, he was laughing) the Honda House was my Honda Accord 4 door, I’ll send you pictures of it to put here. But a few days before the deadline I had managed to store my property, I removed the backseat lower and the back folds down and opens to the trunk, I cut the futon I had in my tent in half longways so it fit from the backseat into the trunk, you’ve seen me in person, I’m 5’6” and lean, and I would crawl back there and sleep at night, I had a really bad minimum wage job at the time because it paid more than looking at a tree and that helped pass the days, the owner was a bad businessperson and the place sank, and like a lot of homeless people I had a gym membership, but I used it for more than a shower, I’m paying for it and all that nice equipment, I was a member at L.A. Fitness in Woodbridge, I joined because they had a pool and racquetball courts, machines and free weights, the place a ton of stuff to spend part of a day, even a hot tub. Now, the guy from the V.A., George, first, no, I’m not a vet, but I do come from a Navy family for the most part and had a lot of friends from school who served, I went to a vocational-technical high school for welding and related processes to welding and was loving the income right out of high school. I met George literally 2 months after I ended up in the camp, I was talking to another person when he came back to check up on an Army vet, he couldn’t get hold of, Danny Glass, turned out he was deceased, maybe a few days, it was January and very cold. Sadly Danny’s remains went unclaimed and it turns out there is a group that inters the remains of unclaimed members of all military branches and has ceremony for them, it’s a group called the “Missing In America Project”, awesome bunch, even though I’d had met Danny in passing only twice and only spoke briefly, it seems I was the only person back there that accepted George’s invitation to the service, in which I actually participated, the first part I carried a folded flag to my heart, the second part I actually carried Danny’s cremains to the final resting place. I even still have the pamphlet from it, scanned it too, I’ll send it to you, that’s how I came to know George. Now, on the final day of the camp, February 28, I already had the last of my personal property squared away and stored and knew I was gonna be in the Honda House for 9 days. Another person I knew back there was an Army vet, he had no driver’s license, most of the people back there didn’t, but he had a friend with a pickup truck, nice truck too, F250 Super Duty Diesel, I enjoyed driving it, A LOT! But I spent pretty much that whole day helping the army vet and a few other vets back there try to find a place to set up a camp, we even got run off a few places we pulled up, we got back to the camp the only plan for these guys being load up the truck with their property, put their items in a storage facility, and stay in a hotel. When we got back to the camp Channel 9 News from D.C. was there, Peggy Fox and a cameraman, George asked if I would make some kind of appeal on the news to try and find a place for the vets I’d been driving around all day, because from conversations him and I have had he knew I could speak well enough to get some kind of plea to try and get help for these guys, even just a plot of grass to put up a tent. But it was to no avail, it ended up being the stuff in storage and hotel with what was left of their own for the vets. So I helped load and unload the truck, maybe 5 loads I think, they went in on one big storage unit just down the street from the camp, so it was a close drive at least, then I took them to a hotel out on Rt. 1, then I drove the truck back to the owner in Nokesville, a guy named Carl I now know better and who sold me my Jeep after my Honda transmission went, I got in the Honda House, drove back to Woodbridge, pretty tired, it was maybe 7 pm now, stopped at the gym and washed up, had a soak in the hot tub, after I left there I went and parked in a safe spot, and went to sleep, it was a long day. I remember Peggy Fox gave me her phone number to let her know how my move in went, I did call then, wish I still had her number.”
S.V.: “The Honda House is neat, but still looks like a bad place to sleep in March. But I’m finding this interview you did on Channel 9 if it’s out there and adding a link, you said you talked to them about finally moving indoors, but apparently there’s more because you spent your day driving around homeless vets trying to relocate them, with a borrowed vehicle, and when that didn’t work you helped move everything into storage and drove everyone to a hotel, and got on TV to try and make a plea for just them, then slept in a car for 9 days. I’m so glad you called back and changed your mind; I’m finding out so much more about you than is apparent. I wish you still had the phone number for Peggy Fox also, I looked her up while we are talking, she’s retired from media I see.”
Ken: “I don’t see what the big deal is, I had time, someone had a truck for me to use, I’m sure anyone in my position would have spent the day doing the same thing, I had a guaranteed place to sleep that night, my car, and my property was safe, these guys didn’t.”
S.V.: “Sorry but no, not just anyone would have taken the time to do what you did, I enjoy how you can be nonchalant about both the decent things you do as well as what you’ve had to endure being in the Streetlight program, like a lot of disabled people you’re skilled at hiding pain, I’ve had to do it in my life too. So, now homeless life has ended, the days in the car ended, and it’s time to move into a room, when you were led to believe by Jimmy Rogers it was your own place.”
Ken: “Yes, that was what I thought, but when I signed a lease with Streetlight, I found it was just a room in a 3-bedroom apartment, it’s at an apartment complex in Dumfries, VA called Briarwood. Streetlight rents I believe 6 apartments here, and along with that they own a number of houses where they rent 5 and 6 rooms per house. The “case manager” a Gabrielle Tibbs, she’s the one I signed my lease with, before moving she told me about the two people I would be living with, the one guy, the problem guy, Kent Brady, she told me “He’s kinda mean”, the man is a rotten, dirty little racist monster. From day one it has been nothing but conflict with this guy, and he is allowed to do anything he wants because I won’t fall to my knees in gratitude to this Mrs. Tibbs. I am in medically sensitive housing, I’m interested in taking care of my health, living as long as I can in reasonable health actually matters to me and I was told I’d have a healthy environment. Not even one day here have I had that. Kent Brady is a smoker, there’s supposed to be no smoking in here, but he seems to be immune to any rules. When I first moved in, he claimed the living room as his personal bedroom, on top of already having the master bedroom. I’d sit at the table and eat, and he’d be on the couch and light a cigarette and blow the smoke my way, yes, intentionally. The first day I moved in I needed to vacuum after unpacking, I went to get the vacuum out of the closet where Gabrielle Tibbs showed it was when I moved in, Kent Brady had locked it in the master bedroom, the endless passive aggressive harassment started that day, and has NEVER ended no matter how hard or what I’ve tried, I called Mrs. Tibbs, got her voicemail and left a message about needing to vacuum my room. She never called me back but sent him a text, which he wasn’t happy about, and actually tried to get me to hit him, he pulled up his shirt, jiggling his colostomy bag around saying “come on, hit me, hit me man, that’s right, you won’t do it, I’ll get you arrested”, now, this was quite a site, first of all Kent Brady is about 5 feet tall, about 80 lbs., and very feeble, jiggling his colostomy around, if I was gonna hit him it sure wouldn’t be in the colostomy bag, I just wanted to vacuum my room, not beat up a weak person who right away says if you hit me I call the cops. He kept the vacuum in his room 6 days, I bought one at Walmart the next day for $50, lowest price one they had, this also started a trend of me having to spend extra money all the time for stuff I shouldn’t have had to buy. Now the other roommate at the time was a man named Deen Koroma, he was a stroke victim, from Sierra Leone, interesting to talk with, like me he became disabled in a way he didn’t plan on, not destroying his body with drugs on a daily basis, he did sleep 16 to 18 hours a day often, Kent Brady is a horrible racist, he would leave signs around the apartment for Deen like the one in the photo I sent you, I actually have possession of that sign, Kent Brady wrote his hate message on both sides so it wouldn’t be missed. I would often hear Deen screaming and tearing these signs up and Kent Brady would laugh. Deen left to go to full time assisted living because he had really bad stroke, I feel that him having to endure these signs wasn’t of any help to his health. I sent you a photo of both sides of the sign. So, on top of being choked death by cigarettes that I wasn’t supposed to be choking on, and enduring the racism of Kent Brady, I actually had to make him stop talking on many occasions when he took his color bias hatred against the children in the apartment complex, it was just sickening, but, on top of all of that I’ve been forced to endure Kent Brady working on his colostomy bag anywhere he felt like it, including the kitchen sink, I have some photos of that to share also. And to this day that continues also.”
S.V.: “Oh wow! The sign he wrote, it’s something I take extremely personal, and anybody who reads this who knows what I’m saying ”knows exactly” what I’m saying when I say I take personal offense to this kind of hatred. And I’m inclined to agree about these signs being shoved in that man’s face could not be healthy for him. But working on his colostomy, at the kitchen sink, the dish drain rack is right next to him in the photo, that is just plain disgusting and outright intentionally rude. You did complain right?”
Ken: “I’ve been trying to get things made right since I moved in. I’ve never asked for more than I was told I would get, a clean, healthy, safe place to live for my money, from day one I never had that but kept giving my money, and trying in vain to work this out with Streetlight, to only be bullied by them, finally I said if you don’t fix the broken problem I will have to stop paying you until it’s fixed, I had no option in who I live with, tenants are “recruited” and “installed” into their housing program, so this is a problem that they are really legally obligated to fix, no different than a broken heater, but since I didn’t have the right papers to show I tried to resolve this on the court day I lost, actually I got completely railroaded in the PWC General District Court, I can file an appeal but we will get to all of that in a bit. I’m trying to look at the papers I sent you to keep things in order, I’m a bit stressed reliving stuff down to the moment, and I might jump around here as far as a timeline is concerned, I’ll do my best, and I guess you can insert the photos and audio and video that I sent you where they fit, I suppose.”
S.V.: “Well, I will put captions with some of the photos, some will be gallery style, you sent me a lot of material to work with and your interview along with the material you sent me will show the overall picture of what you’ve essentially been forced to endure just to live indoors. But now we are at where you have begun living in that apartment, so let’s try and go in order of time as best you can from there.”
Ken: “Ok, so, the vacuum incident was literally from the get-go. When I moved in it was pointed out to me that there was no cabinets available to really store my food in, Deen had just the tiny cabinet above the stove for his stuff, and the cabinets that didn’t have dishes, glasses, and cookware already in them were the property of Kent Brady, there was 1 upper cabinet with dishes, 1 small upper cabinet above the sink with glasses, 1 drawer with silverware, and below that drawer is where the cookware is. But this Kent Brady is entitled to anything he wants, his kitchen storage consisted of 2 large upper cabinets, the small upper over the refrigerator, a lower, and the only other drawer in the kitchen, in other words more than half the kitchen cabinets belonged to him, and essentially Gabrielle Tibbs allows him to do as he pleases. So put a simple plastic shelf from Walmart in the corner of the kitchen, more money I shouldn’t have had to spend, and I kept my food on that. Of course, Kent Brady talked about he was going to move my shelf and put something across the whole wall for himself, I made it drastically clear moving my shelf would be a really bad idea, I don’t tolerate bullies of any type. But he did make my shelf his personal snack shop, and the blamed Deen and the helper who came from and organization called Helping Hands that Streetlight sent, the helper would cook for Deen, yell at him sometimes, loud too, it was annoying, and she would nap on the couch for extended periods. But it wasn’t Deen, or his helper, it was Kent Brady, not only would he just take what he wanted from shelf, he would even take the last of my stuff, repeatedly. I would buy a quart of ice cream, eat half and put the other half back in the freezer, he would come, eat it, and say “well it was half gone anyway”, yea I know, I ate the first half and saved the rest for later, this was endless, and if I still kept ice cream in the freezer, I’m sure it would still be happening. I finally built my own cabinet, with locks, more money I shouldn’t have had to spend, because the last straw came when he took the last of my coffee beans, then used my grinder and my coffee maker to make the last of my coffee for himself. Did I report this to Gabrielle Tibbs, you bet I did, she said she’d talk to him, didn’t work. Now the cabinet I built is nice, very nice, I used actual cabinet faces to make it. At first I had only put locks on the cabinet doors, not the drawers, until one day Kent Brady pulled a drawer out entirely so he could reach into the locked cabinet under it, except he didn’t put things back correctly and that required I spend more money since I was housed with a sneaky little thief, and throughout the my time here it has never ended, I keep very little out in the kitchen, apparently I’m not allowed to have anything out there. He has even rearranged my stuff on my shelf in the refrigerator. I remember one time he walked up to me while I was in the kitchen and handed me a can of ravioli, I asked what this was for, he said a few weeks ago when I was doing something and my cabinet was unlocked he took a can from my cabinet when I went to my room and came back to the kitchen, I literally can’t walk away from my cabinet unlocked for 60 seconds if he’s present, it’s that bad. Thing is, a FOR REAL hungry person only has to ask me if I have extra food, and if I have it that person will get to eat, ask ANYONE who really knows me, and they will confirm that as true. Thing is, I’ve even told him this, as despicable as this individual can be I would still give a hungry person food. I’ve had other various things go missing, small tools, etc., he once took my gloves, admitted it, he said mine were better suited for the weather, if you’d seen his hygiene the way I do you would have said the same thing, “just keep the gloves”. So, I can’t keep gloves anywhere except in my room or car if I want to be sure they remain mine. Eventually, he caused the Keurig that was gifted to me to burn out leaving me to have to buy another coffeemaker, I bought a Hamilton Beach, nicer machine in my opinion and a better value on top of that. And even though I had told him numerous times to keep his hands off of my stuff he does what he wants, and Streetlight allows this to happen.”
S.V.: “So if you don’t keep much in the refrigerator in the kitchen what do you do? I think it was inconsiderate of this Gabrielle Tibbs to bring you in and show you that this guy gets all the space, and she has no intention on creating any kind of equal division of storage space, something that should have really been done before anybody lived in that 3-bedroom apartment. And I don’t doubt for one second you would give a hungry person food if asked, most anybody would really, in this day and age it’s mostly unnecessary to steal food, it’s out there, but there are people hungry everywhere who really do have a hard time locating food they need, even here in this country. I’ve looked at the Streetlight website, seems they have food to give, why didn’t he call them to bring him food? I don’t think I’d want the gloves back either, not after some of the things you’ve told me, and showed me, even after a trip in the laundry I’d be concerned about putting my hands in them. And having to build locking cabinets to keep your stuff from being stolen where you pay to live shouldn’t have to happen either. But to blatantly steal in the time it took to walk to your room and back is just plain horrible.”
Ken: “As far as cold food storage goes; I acquired a small refrigerator I keep in my room that I keep stuff in that I would like to actually finish myself. I moved in March 2018, Deen had a stroke that made him leave to assisted living in either July or August of 2018, not exactly sure, the refrigerator was in his room, and I received it for helping clean that room out, and repainting the room too, so my ice cream gets eaten by me and me alone now. And Gabrielle Tibbs has control issues, anyone who listens to the audio will hear that, and Streetlight don’t really care, sign the papers and hand over money, and don’t expect fair treatment, unless you fall to your knees and start kissing butt, there already is no pride to having just a room, no dignity either, especially in the living situation I’m in, and anyone that thinks there is pride and dignity in this hasn’t actually done this for real, so I’m not getting on my knees for anyone, especially someone who treats me like this. I heard a number of stories, bad stories, about this program before entering, they are all true. Now, here’s the funny part, why he won’t get food from the pantry, he doesn’t take handouts, but stealing is ok. But he does take handouts, he stands in front of a few different 7-11 and WaWa stores panhandling, taking handouts. And I could bring back food from a pantry, and he will steal that, so he doesn’t take handouts, he steals them. After Deen left, we got a replacement installed, Doug, I remember in the beginning when he saw locks on my cabinet, he thought I was crazy, until he was there only a few weeks and walked into the kitchen to literally catch Kent stealing his stuff. And what cabinets were left for Doug to use, just the tiny cabinet over the stove. I also let him use part of the one I built and a drawer in the one I built so he’d have some space. And during 2018 along with all of that nonsense I had to choke on cigarette smoke every day, this medically fragile housing, I was assured it’d be safe, it’s not, having to put up with Kent Brady working on his colostomy wherever he wanted, even the kitchen, constantly having food and other items just plain stolen, from April 2018 until I caught him in at the end of august 2018 he was doing a “return to sender” on ALL of my medical insurance mail, and that’s why I had to do without ANY of my migraine medicine for almost 6 months, United HealthCare was whining about the price of that medicine, $18 a pill, and because Kent Brady kept playing games with my mail from them I was left to suffer, I’d get on the phone with them and they would say we sent you this, we sent you that, and they were, it’s just Kent Brady was getting the mail and sending my stuff back, I only found out that day because he left it in plain view, he even went to the post office and wrote a new residence card leaving my name off, I found that out because I went right to the post office to complain about mail tampering, of course not a thing was done, as usual. I had some nice oriental rugs, I had put them in the living room, they are now ruined from cigarette burns. When I first moved in here, I had the smallest room, Kent Brady had the master bedroom, they gave him that for his colostomy since it had a bathroom, that he never used, he used the kitchen, he used the bathroom that was for Deen and me to use, I would go in, and flip on a light switch coated with feces sometimes, Kent’s Feces. When I moved in he also claimed the living room as his personal bedroom, it was really creepy, so he essentially owned the apartment, I remember once I was having a bowl of cereal about 11 at night while he was sleeping on the couch as usual, he actually told me I was inconsiderate and I should go stand in the kitchen and eat, my response was on the rude side, I wasn’t in any mood for his nonsense, I had migraine coming on and had to eat so my medicine wouldn’t get me sick, and my migraines can actually be crippling and had no intention on listening to his mouth, especially since he had zero right to say a thing. He literally never takes trash out, he will put at the front door, he will do the same with his used colostomy bags, put them in a small bag and just leave it until the next day. And I’ve actually tried to be nice, driven him to doctor appointments, let him eat food I’ve cooked, or bought, pizza, KFC, he even gets greedy with that, he will eat some, then take more and stash it, but being nice to this type of person means they crap on you harder, people with real world life experience know the exact personality type I’m talking about. And I tried in vain to work with Gabrielle Tibbs and Streetlight, phone calls, texts, I hate texting, and emails, meetings where I’m attacked, nothing is ever done, I’m the squeaky wheel, no grease, just removal and replacement with a wheel that does as told.”
S.V.: “I’m not even sure how to respond to all of that except to say I’m sorry you’ve been forced to suffer in this way with no help. So, in November you had a new roommate, Doug, move in, who got to experience his stuff being stolen right away, and who also had more space to store food thanks to you. And what is Doug like?”
Ken: “Doug is ok, senior citizen aged, heroin addict. He told me he is a “functional drug addict”, I’m not really sure if that is even a thing, sure don’t sound like a thing to me, but there were a few times he was prancing around calling himself a piece of s@@t junkie, I think he might have been high at those times. He was on probation when he moved in and was sober but bought like a kilo a month of this stuff called Kratom off the internet, he would complain about various afflictions, so I looked up kratom and sustained heavy use showed all his symptoms. I did see him high on heroin once a few times, I haven’t been a perfect angel in life, in my younger days in the 80’s we’d go clubbing all weekend, literally, where I lived one bar closed at 5 a.m. and one opened at 6 a.m., and right between those two bars was a Denny’s, perfect pit stop, those were weekends, during the week you worked, but I’d never seen anyone on heroin in person before, it’s bizarre, they bobble around like a rubbery, jiggly, gooey marionette, a lot like you see in movies, he offered to help me carry a 12 foot kayak that didn’t need carrying anyway, I wasn’t sure what was holding him up. He’s in his 70’s, not a healthy thing at any age, but I didn’t lecture him, if someone wants to drop a bowling ball on their foot over and over that’s on them. But, Doug doesn’t steal anything, Doug doesn’t leave a mess, Doug is also the one who usually carries the kitchen trash to the dumpster that Kent always leaves sitting at the door, Doug cleans his dishes after he’s done with them, Doug doesn’t just leave his dishes in the sink endlessly like Kent does, aside from colostomy cleaning the endless dish parade in the sink from Kent is why I went strictly microwave, just got tiresome moving his stuff 90% out of the way in the sink to cook, or wash anything. Doug is a generally considerate roommate, except the time he used my coffee grinder to grind that Kratom junk, I opened it up to grind beans and there was some green dust and a really foul odor, I bleached it up real good and hit it with Dawn dish soap, it saves oily wildlife after all, and of course it never happened again, all clean no biggie. Other than that, onetime thing a decent roommate, but he has been acting out of character since the end of July, I have some weird stories to tell you of things recently. Kent’s past is supposed to be alcohol and crack, he’s told me stuff about crack when he lived in Florida, apparently, it’s a good crack place, but he wrecked his body bad over the years, drove himself to an incredibly serious stroke and almost died, and still don’t take proper care of himself, but doesn’t mess with either as far as I know. Though I’ve heard he blasts through his pain meds fast, but I honestly don’t know because I don’t like being near the guy, so I have to go by what I hear. Although I did see him returning a shoplifted lawnmower blade to Walmart once, I don’t think he was expecting to run into me. And I have a photo of him waist deep in the dumpster at the apartments here, he even brought some of the stuff down to the apartment. I was like, “Really Kent?”, he’s like “You never dumpster dived?” , me, “No, I’ve never had a desire to pull trash out of a dumpster”, one thing was a milk bottle, which he used, but mostly would just spend time in the fridge empty. But one place I worked in the 80’s way before getting hurt was as a welder at a waste disposal company, I welded in the vehicle maintenance shop, way better than the container shop where they worked on dumpsters and roll offs, I felt bad for those dudes on hot days, the smell before the cans were washed was pretty bad sometimes, so knowing about “the sauce” in the bottom of those cans, nah, I have no desire to be putting my body in a dumpster in any way at all, needles, other sharp stuff, nope. I try to be cordial because it’s in my nature but it’s not always easy and sometimes impossible, how can anyone walk in the kitchen and see someone working on their colostomy at the sink and not have something to say, or shout, especially since it’s not an isolated incident. Not to mention the kitchen is twice as far from his bedroom as the bathroom is. There is still more of the timeline to go through, between Deen leaving and Doug moving in.”
S.V.: “You did say you’d get out of order, it seems a lot to think about, and we’ve been on the phone a really long time, so if your mind drifts some it should still be complete at the end. I’d have to agree with you on there is no good age to do heroin, and I’d be more upset about someone using my coffee grinder to grind internet drugs than you were, I’d call that an inconsiderate roommate. And I have to agree that sticking any part of your body into a dumpster isn’t really the best idea, he’s waist deep in there too. So, there is a part between Deen leaving and Doug arriving that you jumped over, so tell me about that.”
Ken: “So, Deen vanished around the end of July 2018, I didn’t even know he had a bad stroke at first, I did know Kent was harassing him with the little notes he’d leave, along with muttering things under his breath, he does that a lot, it’s annoying. I moved in March 2018, almost all of my complaints were by phone, a lot of them in person when I paid rent, I did finally get past Gabrielle Tibbs to Rose Powers, the Executive Director, about these complaints, being choked to death by cigarette smoke, the living room being Kents bedroom and private personal space and the master staying empty, really just a place for his clothes, the whole time he had the master bedroom he NEVER spent one night in it while I lived here, I complained about his feces all over the bathroom that was for me and Deen to use, I complained about my stuff being constantly stolen, this is the one and only time I ever received a reprieve of any kind, I think that’s because Gabrielle Tibbs was in Germany visiting family. But Rose Powers made Kent move out of the master bedroom, he wasn’t using it anyway, and into Deen’s old room, which I painted, I think for free or maybe I was given Deen’s old little refrigerator for the work, hey, I just remembered I helped their workers move furniture for 2 and a half hours in March or April 2019 I never was paid for, I remember ordering a Papa Johns cheeseburger pizza that evening for myself and that’s when I stopped and went back to the apartment, I used my bank card so all I have to do is check my statement for the exact day, I order from there only like twice a year, I like Boli’s Pizza more, and I got sidetracked, sorry. So yes, I got the master bedroom, Kent got Deen’s room, Doug was set to move into my old room in November. Kent was bitter about it and of course just kept using the living room as his bedroom anyway. But now, no more fecal surprises on light switches and sink handles, and just in random places, he would blame Deen for it too. The master bedroom has a bathroom, oh man it was so gross, I used a mask, rubber gloves, old clothes I put in the trash afterward including a long sleeve shirt, fecal material just everywhere, down the front of the vanity, inside of it, the wall, the mirror, some on the ceiling. It was brutal, but once I knew it was clean, I’d knew I’d never see it again, I even put a fresh coat of white semigloss on it. The only reason I think this happened was because Gabrielle Tibbs was in another country and it was out of her hand, since then I’ve only managed to talk to Rose Powers one more time in person, about the same stuff, mostly how I had to actually tape up the vent in my closet, the HVAC system was pulling his smoke through the system and all of my clothes were starting to stink, Rose Powers did say she’d take care of it but that never happened, and since have never been able to reach her, even though I’ve called and left messages a few times, unless her number changed. My hanging clothes are under the vent so it must be my fault. I even personally bought smokers HVAC filters so I could breathe, those things aren’t the cheapest ones you can buy. Sorry, sidetracked again, I might need a break here in a bit, as we talk about this my mind is getting pulled in a few different directions for some reason. So, yes, I ended up with master bedroom during the transition, it is the nicest room in the apartment, I may have to send you a few photos, I have to abandon it anyway, the only actual difference is a clean bathroom and more space, which is good since I can only breathe in my room and believe me, I love every second of that. And like I said when Doug moved in he thought I was nuts for having locks on my cabinets but he wasn’t there two weeks when he walked in on Kent stealing something or other from his food. So now it’s November 2018 and Doug has moved in, I was still cooking often then, even letting Kent eat the food I cooked, I cooked some great stuff on occasion, even had a nice thanksgiving meal.”
S.V.: “ Sure, let’s take a little break, I don’t think I’ve ever been on the phone this long, I hope my computer don’t explode when I try to transcribe this to text with software. But I can’t imagine it was a very fun cleaning that bathroom from the sound of it, but at least you had a space you could keep cleaner, hard to keep smoke out, secondhand smoke kills also.
Ken: “A break sounds good, I feel like I’m talking to the air for some strange reason, I know I’ve never been on the phone this long, my phone is at 20%, plug in and a snack and I’ll call you back.”
S.V.: “I’m glad you called back, that was a long break, I thought you weren’t going to call back.”
Ken: “Well, I plugged my phone in, ate some, then suddenly felt extremely exhausted and fell asleep for longer than I wanted to, I don’t like looking in the rear view mirror of life, it makes going forward a lot more difficult, plus it I find it mentally taxing and I don’t want to incite a migraine, that would be a real problem with everything I have to try and get done this week with this appeal and indigent appeal retainer form, and I have a doctor appointment Tuesday that is going to eat up a lot of that day. But I feel more refreshed and still up to this, but having to think about this and other stuff is becoming a distraction to everything in my life in general right now, I swear sometimes I felt my head spin in a weird way, just tired I guess, I’m not really a long phone call person and I absolutely hate texting, I find it annoying unless someone is sending a photo or something similar that needs to be shown fast. I knew a person who would “talk” his texts into the phone, I said why don’t you just call if you’re just gonna scream a text at your phone? You’re already talking, right? Plus, I’m horrible at typing on a phone, and I like to talk to people.”
S.V.: “You were sounding like a nap was something you needed, you have some sayings I really like, I think I might borrow the rearview mirror saying you used. I actually love to text, and I love emoji’s, but we couldn’t do this by text, it would take a week. And you’re head is spinning because you are reliving more stress than you realize in a very short time, so don’t push yourself too hard, I don’t want it cause you any problems, we are covering 3 very rough years in what is a very short time on the phone, so if you need to rest some more before we continue maybe you should, honestly you sound even more tired than we took a break, that was about 2 hours ago and we were on the phone almost 7 hours altogether, can you try and sleep just a bit more?”
Ken: “Yes, I think I need to sleep some more, but I’m having a lot of problems sleeping, I’ll sleep a few hours then wake unable to sleep at all but just wiped out physically, but I don’t just feel tired, I feel some type of exhaustion where I feel glued down, it’s so odd. I have melatonin for such instances, but once in a while it makes me have nightmares and it’s just 3 milligrams, but I will try and rest some more and call you back.”
S.V.: “Thank you, you really sound like you need to rest more, so please just do that and we can get back to this after you recover some.”
Ken: “Recover some, the way you sounded when you said that you sounded like I had some kind of attack or something.”
S.V.: “It’s or something, but you really do need to sleep, you don’t sound good, so please just at least a few hours if you can manage it.”
Ken: “Ok, let me try a melatonin, I hope I don’t have any nightmares. I’ll call back, bye.”
S.V.: “Bye” (it was almost midnight, he didn’t call back until the following morning, I didn’t think he would call back in a few hours, the sound of total exhaustion in his voice was clearly obvious, and I had actually been up since 4 a.m. this day and had a long day and sleep sounded great to me as well.)
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2021
It was almost 8:45 a.m. when Ken called back, I passed on church Sunday morning so we could finish our talk, he wanted to be finished by 1 p.m. because he’s a huge fan of football in general, and an Eagles fan who lives out of the area so televised games local aren’t always available, and the cable package they have is decided for them here, and wait until you see what was done to the cable package so a Streetlight employee could make some quick money, but his team is on at 1 p.m. today and he said he was really disappointed with the pre-season, I admit I don’t watch sports or really much in the way in tv at all, just the news really, so I had no clue what he was really talking about, but let him know if we don’t finish before his game we can finish after, he said no, he watches games all day, there might be an hour before the Sunday night game but he will be watching highlights of other games and the Sunday night game won’t be over until the area of 11 p.m. his time, so I was able to make afternoon church in my time zone, and he did call me Monday just to take a break, and see if all the information he sent was legible, some photos were a little blurry but obvious in the content, he was working on the court appeal himself to prevent his potential eviction that could be a reality by September 25, 2021, which is really what this page is about, and apparently his football team won in a big way he said.
S.V.: “Did you sleep well? I didn’t think you would call back anytime soon, and I also went to bed.”
Ken: “I slept like the dead, I’m one of those older guys that has to sometimes has to get up to use the bathroom a few times a night, I didn’t stir at all, I also think I didn’t drink enough water yesterday, I told you about that odd health issue that’s on again off again where both my appetite and thirst vanish, it’s so crazy to not feel hunger or thirst at all when it happens, I remember one nurse when I was getting tests done 3 years ago while doctors were still stumped, she said “oh, I’d love that problem”, I told her that she would hate it that problem, first they didn’t even know what was causing it yet, but a doctor finally did, I’m a huge fan of modern medicine, I don’t care who hates it, of course as anyone there are things in that industry I don’t agree with either as any intelligent person would, such as my migraine medicine is $18 a pill, really? And without prescription insurance I could never afford it, and I’ve been taking this particular medicine for maybe 9 years, I’m not even sure of the cost per dose when I started taking it, the previous medicine was making me sick all of a sudden for some reason, that’s one of the nice things about some medicines, a lot of the time there is something different that works, of course it’s usually really expensive. But she didn’t want even the symptoms to what it was, it’s strange to not feel hungry or thirsty, you don’t even desire food. For instance, you get hungry and think, man a big fat greasy cheeseburger will make me a happy human, well that wasn’t happening at all, I lost almost 25 pounds in 3 weeks when it started before things got in some kind of check, I didn’t even realize anything was wrong until I just plain blacked out at someone’s house, that was an exciting moment, and I never gained it all back and a lot was muscle. I got rocked by that crisis pretty good, it’s a bummer when your body reminds you in certain ways that you still happen to be a disabled person. And at the moment I’m still just waking up and my mind is wandering, not even done my first coffee, but I keep track of water by drinking water bottles only and crushing and saving each bottle throughout the day when this issue flares up, I have only one half liter bottle from yesterday, with about 25% left in it, I had court Friday, I was totally railroaded, I can’t even remember how much I drank but I think two bottles, it was a stressful day.”
S.V.: “Ok, after the coffee can you get a bottle of water, you’re right, you probably need it, and drink it all, then drink another, then another, I remember you said you try to have 5 empty bottles by the time you go to bed when this happens, so try to get back to that. So, do you want to continue where you left off?”
Ken: “Can you remind me about where we left off, I was really tired when we finished, and I’m still a little tired.”
S.V.: “Yes, you left off at it simply being November 2018, Doug was the new roommate, you made a thanksgiving dinner.”
Ken: “Ok, they both had it so good until I got to grossed out to cook in the kitchen, I would cook some big meals, good stuff too, too much for just me. I would go to the odd food pantry once in a while, and sometimes you get loaded up with a big chunk of meat, so I’d make something and share with everyone because you often have to use some food pantry stuff fairly quickly. But I just couldn’t cook in the kitchen after a certain point, for all the times I’ve seen him working on his colostomy in the kitchen sink or washing his body in front of the kitchen sink I don’t even want to imagine the times I didn’t walk in, once when I caught him I didn’t have my phone, I flipped out and said I was grabbing my phone, I don’t think I ever saw him move so fast to his room, but the blue sponge in the photo was my personal sponge that was there after he ran to his room, I almost saved it to put in my freezer but just couldn’t bring myself to do anything more than throw it out, I keep my sponge in my room now. And to think if he was bold enough to dip his finger in his colostomy then my milk or some other food of mine when he knew for sure I wasn’t home. Not only a lot to think of but also a lot you just don’t dare to imagine. But life continued on in this fashion, more or less, as we move into 2019, Kent sleeping on the living couch every night still, Doug not happy with it, Kent got in Doug’s face trying to do the ‘hit’ me thing he did with me, of course he does that only when there is absolutely no one around. Sleeping on the couch he was 8 feet away from the HVAC return, just pouring his cigarette smoke into the system, along with other odors, that was why I had to tape up my vent in my closet, it was sickening, colostomy servicing wherever he felt like it, oh, and when he changed colostomy bags he would leave the refuse bags lying around, those are the photos of the little bags I sent you, sometimes they ended up in the laundry room trash. Now as you know I’m a football fan, they didn’t have NFL network and I asked how much extra it would cost, they said only $5 extra a month, I paid $10. In March 2019, Gabrielle Tibbs showed up with the memo from her, on Streetlight letterhead, about how the cable was no longer included, with some ridiculous excuse as to her breaking up the group account into 12 separate accounts, blah blah blah, I’m not sure why she even felt the need to explain why she was explaining things at the level of detail she was, maybe it confused my roommates but it made me suspicious, and I stumbled onto what is I believe a financial crime of some type, and really bold also.”
S.V.: “I really want to hear more about what you claim as a potential financial crime, I have the memo you emailed she gave all of you and you told me already but please, tell it here, I agree with you, it was very bold.”
Ken: “Ok, on the day Gabrielle Tibbs brought these memos stating the change she said they had a group account for all the different properties, she said 12 in all, 6 apartments here, and they have some houses they own that they rent rooms in, 5 rooms in some, I think 6 rooms in one of them, I’m not sure I don’t live in those, Kent has and he’s talked about them, I heard he was kicked out of one for stealing money and just moved to another, not sure why he just gets to skate by. Anyway, she said she broke up the group account into 12 separate accounts because it was cheaper and she changed the cable package, and in addition to us having to fork an additional $50 each, she was also removing the cable box from the living room, the common area, this is actually the ONLY thing I think that stopped Kent from sleeping in the living room any longer, a box at the time was $6 a month. The lease says cable, internet, and phone included, subject to change, of course, but I wasn’t ok with the real reason, for Gabrielle Tibbs to pocket gift cards. I said the lease says it’s included so I’ll take my chances with a judge, so no can do, which she wasn’t used to being told by people in the “program”, you should have seen her face. Kent happily forked over his money, I think he paid her before she ever showed up, he’s like a pet I just realized, except he gets to shit on the carpet. Doug surrendered his box without the slightest appearance of a spine, another $6 off the bill, but had the xfinity app on his smart tv until it messed up somehow and he never bothered with it afterward. Now, if the programming hadn’t changed so drastically, I never would have discovered what I had found out. I watch sports, football being my favorite, the NFL network I paid $10 a month for was gone, so I stopped that extra payment the next time I went in to pay rent, and I watch learning and documentary type stuff, more than half the stuff I watch was gone, DIY, Science, most of the NatGeo stuff, all kinds of those channels. So first I looked at the account info on the cable box, I’ve only been homeless for real just the one time, and guess what, I’ve had cable tv in my life and I know how to look at the account info, with 2 boxes now gone, that’s minus $12 right off, the bill was actually $1.98 more than it previously was before the change, and there were less channels. So, I now needed to see what channels we had in this new package she signed up for, 12 accounts remember, she said she broke the group account into 12 accounts because it was cost effective to do so. So instead of just going channel to channel on the tv box I just went online, and I found our package, our package, all 12 packages, came with a brand new shiny $200 VISA gift card courtesy of Comcast. I don’t know about this moment in time, but back then ALL of the tv was in her name, exclusively, her personal email associated with it, her personal phone number, it’s on the account info screen, I’ve actually been on the phone with Comcast a few times with a problem, she gave me the account number, it’s associated with her personal residence, so cards would go to her. I asked her about them even, I bet that threw her for a loop, I never got so much as an acknowledgement of existence. I know she pocketed those cards; I don’t have the authority to prove it. Now, the comcast account info still has her phone number, but has the email for Jenny Trahn, some new employee I’ve heard, I looked not too long ago because about 3 months ago some channels seemed to disappear, I didn’t bother looking on the internet to see if there was a gift card promotion, I just didn’t want to take the time, I’m not even sure what to do with this information, I’ve even called around, I know this can’t be legal for the employee of a nonprofit to do, probably not legal for anyone to do but I’m not in law enforcement and so far haven’t been able to get an answer yet.”
S.V.: “I’m not in law enforcement either but there is no way that can be legal, who did you try to get an answer from? You should try the IRS, old people do know some stuff, fill out something called a whistleblower report, as with anything IRS like this it won’t be fast at all, but if they get hold of it you can bet it will be thorough, and with these you are entitled to some kind of percentage of recovered funds, you should look that up, but first finish your appeal and the indigent form since they want a thousand dollars for the appeal bond, that’s not justice, you can appeal but it will cost a thousand dollars.”
Ken: “First of all, old people know all kinds of cool stuff, second I am so doing that whistleblower thing with the IRS, I never heard of that, I hope it’s not a 20-page form or something. Yes, it’s crazy, to file my appeal I’m supposed to pay, but we will get to that at the end, you said let’s just go through my living here, so let’s continue with that. So, this took place March 2019, life moved forward the same, choking on cigarette smoke daily, slowly losing any desire to cook in the kitchen ever again because of possible feces, trying to leave as little as possible out for Kent to steal, what my life had now become. But Kent Brady had to stop sleeping on the couch now that the tv was gone, good and bad. His room is next to mine, if I leave my door open the smoke just floats right in my door, and he looks in, it’s creepy, the photos are in the gallery, he positioned his bed so he could see down the hall into my room when he laid down and walking to and from my room was really creepy as he watched. Sometimes me and Doug might be having a conversation about nothing important, and you’d see him standing at the edge of his door trying to be sneaky, no respect for privacy. Streetlight had no respect for privacy, when I first moved in Gabrielle came by to see how it was going, I told her then something needs to be done, she’s looking at my room, starts opening my closet and catches herself saying “Oh, I can’t do that”, yea, I know you can’t. And anyone from there just stops without any prior notice to have a look around, seriously, rent a room from them you become a pet, they even speak to you in a condescending manner, it seems no one is their equal or something, just pets. So around May 2019 was the last time I ever was able to speak to Rose Powers, showed her photos of my vent taped up and asked her to do something about it, she said she would, I’ve even said to both Gabrielle and Rose that I’d accept Kent putting a decent fan in his window blowing outside and closing his door and standing in front of it, they’d both say “oh no, there’s no smoking”, well there is for this guy and there is going to be homelessness in my future because I got tired of paying to be poisoned and then always put off, and eventually harassed, by the people who were supposed to stop it. So we move through 2019 in the same fashion, endless passive aggressive harassment from Kent, especially with his dishes, in the sink 90% of the time, he’d say they were soaking, look at the photos, some have clear water, he would always find a way to put an obstacle out or make life just a little extra annoying each day, excelled at being inconsiderate, even though I was now cooking less there were times he’d come from his room while I was cooking and add stuff to the sink or just plain put stuff in there, like he had dishes waiting for the occasion, it was maddening. My regular doctor by this time had asked me to try anxiety medicine, which I still take as needed but try not to because it makes me to tired, and she told me for anything stronger I’d need to see a psychiatrist, I said no, I don’t even want to take these, plus I don’t need any more doctors in my contact list, I need less actually. So, things progress but my stress levels are at a point they need to do something about my health being put at risk daily, unable to get a response from Rose I tell Gabrielle I just want to plain meet with whoever is in charge of this clown college, in those exact words also, according to the grievance procedure they have a board of directors, boards have a head chair, I tell Gabrielle Tibbs that is the person I want to talk. I meet with her and some guy named Roger, who definitely isn’t in charge and whose last name I still don’t know, and from here no complaint of mine ever gets any further, September 2019 is when I meet this Roger person, the meeting is beyond a waste of time, completely counterproductive, just a new person to harass me and speak down to me, and another Streetlight employee who just “drops in”, which he did often, you can hear this person on the recordings. Thanksgiving comes around, it’s the last time I cook a big meal. December 2019 comes around, at this point my doctor gave me a note for a companion pet 5 months prior, I’ve always wanted a Havanese puppy, and found one for a companion pet price, and got scammed bad, had my personal info stolen, and most of the money they took was never recovered, out of almost $700 stolen I got almost $50 back, better than getting nothing back though. Third time I was the victim of identity theft, not sure how that one got by me, but it was how I joined PayPal to pay them I think, I don’t use that stuff, I’d rather use my bank debit card because Mastercard will come kick your butt if you rip off one their customers. I didn’t set up my little Christmas tree either, just wasn’t in me, New Year came and went just like any other day, I think I was in bed before 10 p.m., yay happy new year. Considering I might be homeless before September is over maybe it’s good I didn’t get the puppy, plus these days I try to fish too much to have a pet anyway”
S.V.: “I’m not even sure what to say Ken, other than continue unless you need a break for a bit, I hear the stress in your voice, I’m not a pro at this or I might know better what to say to you, or even ask you. I do like the breed you’re talking about, I have a Pomeranian , my baby, I bet you would have been happier with the dog, but as you say you wouldn’t want to make your pet homeless along with you.”
Ken: “I’ll continue. So, countless attempts to try to resolve the danger to my health, phone, texts, and email. I got so tired of it I said if you don’t fix it I’m going to stop paying you people, this is a broken item making me sick, and I can withhold monies under repair and deduct statutes. In February 2020 I said fix things and I’ll pay, I told them they were in breach of contract from day one anyway. By phone, and email I informed them of this, I’m using the email for my appeal but I think I’m going to get shot down over the appeal bond and being indigent and the end result will be me never getting my day in court, and becoming homeless before the 15th of September, I should go fishing instead of even trying the appeal, but it’s hard for me to just give up on things, even when I’m not sure what I’m doing and my housing relying on it, gotta try. So, time marches on, Gabrielle Tibbs unhappy her hand isn’t graced with my money, making it clear in no uncertain way. Me being made sick as can be from where I reside. August rolls around, Roger shows up with a Continuum of Care paper for me to sign, but it’s dated from March of that year, I never got a copy, but I take photos a lot. So, a meeting with me, my two roommates, Gabrielle Tibbs, and this Roger person was finally set up to address the issues. This meeting was to take place in September 2020 at their offices at Vineyard Church in Woodbridge, VA. I’m not sure why I even need to be at any meeting, I made a pretty simple and fair request over and over, make the dude smoke outside, make him use the bathroom for colostomy work, stop stealing, and stop writing racist notes for the next-door neighbor, a woman with kids. I didn’t have to go, they are landlords and nothing more, not to me at least, but at this point I had taken to voice recording meetings with these people upon every single in person meeting. I complained about that racist note to a lot of people, even to the vice president of apartment operations for Gates Hudson, Sheila Jones, the management company for this place. And it has been ignored to this day by everyone, the stuff this Kent Brady gets away with is just ridiculous, he never suffers a single consequence for the things he does. That photo, and two recordings from this meeting are in the gallery you are setting up for this stuff, one recording is 55 minutes, the other is 32 minutes, I didn’t have to sit through any of this, I did it so I could make recordings showing what these people are like behind closed doors. You sure don’t get to talk to me like this and then ask me for money, these people are landlords, not Starsky and Hutch. So, after this meeting I’m pretty much sick of these people, Gabrielle asks for another meeting at some point, I say no, I need to meet with someone above you Gabrielle, I never get that, ever, meeting after meeting with her, and then her and Roger, produced nothing but misery for me, it’s dumb to drop a bowling ball on your foot over and over and then wonder why your foot hurts. Besides, I wasn’t smoking, making the place gross, writing racist notes for the neighbors, Kent Brady was, have a meeting with him and make him stop and then we can talk about money, secondhand smoke kills people, I have nodule in my right lung I didn’t have when I moved in here. I’m really mad, I never asked for more than I was promised, and that was a clean, healthy, safe place to live, I haven’t had from day one, and the last thing they want is me telling my side and proving it. Time rolls on, October, November, December, I just endure the misery here as I have from day one, same stuff, sometimes worse, because with COVID he was here more often, so it was gross here more often, oh, and the thermostat wars between Doug and Kent, Kent would always just put it where he wanted, I stopped caring at this point, if my room got to cold I put my heater on, if my room got to warm I took clothes off as needed, they fight over it to this day. And Kent sometimes makes it worse by adding air spray to the smoke and feces odor, I’ve stood out back on porch in 50-degree weather after waking up to eat a bowl of cereal without being sick. I really don’t like to eat in my bedroom, I’m strange that way, a lot of people are. I eat at the table, I’m pretty much the only one that eats at the table still. When I use to cook a big meal or come back with KFC Doug would usually sit at the table, Kent would generally grab something and head to his room. But I don’t cook anymore, except coffee if that counts as cooking.”
S.V.: “Again, I’m at this incredible loss for words, the word resilient comes to mind when I think of you, but the meetings are just outrageous that you recorded, no doubt it would be different if they knew you were recording them. And I don’t think that’s a too much to ask for a residence, clean, healthy, and safe. I don’t like to eat in my bedroom either, you are normal in the higher percentage of people on that, full blown dinner in the bedroom when you have a dining table doesn’t make sense to a lot of people.”
Ken: “Yes, where I live is a crap shoot, sometimes literally, I’ll have to take a photo of our kitchen counter, it’s crap camouflage color, seriously. But a rundown of 2020, COVID times for everyone, simply went like this, all year long choked by extra smoke because everyone was home more often, more fecal fragrant times of course, COVID made me hate this place, the smell most of the time was just nasty, I could NEVER leave my bedroom door open. I have complaints about the smoking, and other nonsense, in the form of texts and emails to Gabrielle Tibbs from 2019 and 2020, so I will use those for my appeal, I didn’t know I needed to bring them for the first railroading by Judge Jarvis in PWC General District Court. I told them in February 2020 I can no longer pay until I’m not being poisoned, harassed, and stolen from, so I withheld rent based on repair and deduct statutes, because the only people who could fix this was Streetlight, I couldn’t just call a repair service to fix an inconsiderate racist, I don’t think there is one of those around. So only they could fix it. Now at the time I didn’t know about something called tenant assertion where you give your money to the court to hold on to. This way they can just give to your landlord when you get around to going to court, besides, I honestly used most of it to eat. Eat? Yes, eat, no one clean could tell me they would be ok eating in a kitchen where someone changes their colostomy bag , I tried for a while. It’s not cheap to eat outside the house every day, even if it’s just fast food, cold sandwich from Walmart eaten in the parking lot, oh joy. I shouldn’t have had to endure any of that. On August 4, 2020, this Roger guy shows up with a Continuum of Care paper for me to sign, that’s the government funds they get that they constantly tell me they don’t get, I have this meeting on audio with a photo of the document, I never received a copy, you’ll notice the document was pre dated back to March 10, 2020, a bit late, I wonder if there is a forgery with my name submitted at that time and catch up was being played for records. August 13, I find this racist not by Kent Brady directed at the woman next door in apartment 1, a woman with children, who has moved and who can blame her. Also, there are 14 apartments in our building so who knows who leaves what in there, and when people see the video of our laundry room the place itself is a mess, I reported this hate note and it was swept under the rug, even by Gates Hudson, the property management for Briarwood Apartments. I receive a notice dated August 11, 2020, a week after I sign the C.o.C. 2-year allotment paper for them. Here is that paper. They want to be paid of course, and I don’t want to be poisoned and pay for it anymore, of course who would. They also decide they are going to go ahead and just add the cable scam money. It’s funny to me, the second sentence says, “there is a serious problem that needs to be corrected now.”, yea duh, I’ve been complaining about that problem since March 10, 2018, and nothing is getting done. We finally have a meeting in their offices September 3, 2020, like I said before, have the guy who breaks the rules Streetlight put in place stop breaking them, I wasn’t asking too much. I recorded these meetings, I was in that office almost 2 hours altogether, for landlords, I only have a lease with these screwballs. You said you would link the recordings and other material up so people can access them, so everyone reading this please look at ALL the other material also. So, this meeting is a complete waste of my time, gas, effort, and life, as anyone can hear. So, September moves along and all of a sudden, it’s 2021, the rest of 2020 was just blind misery to be honest, didn’t cook anymore, holidays were just any other day, my little Christmas tree stayed in the box the second year in a row, and New Year’s Eve was just another noisy night. It’s New Year Day, 2021, yay. So that was 2020 in a nutshell.”
S.V.: “I don’t know what to say, you tried, the note in the laundry room is sickening to me and the fact that not a single thing was done is nothing but a complete injustice to the woman it was directed at, and you get to become homeless, and he gets rewarded with living indoors. So now it’s this year, 2021, COVID still has things a mess, the unhealthy living conditions you’re surrounded by continue, and you are still unable to end the problems. I find myself wishing I was a better reporter or interviewer, I never realized there would be so much, I have to admit I’m overwhelmed by how much information you’ve given me, and I’m finding myself not quite sure to pose questions at this point, and how long it’s going to take to assemble, but I will get it done for you. All I can say I suppose is to keep telling your side, the side you show proof for, you told me about more you have no way to prove, but I think what you have is more than enough to prove your points.”
Ken: “We need to jump back to 2020 briefly. At the end of August, I paid $35 to the PWC Bar Association Lawyer Referral Service to have a 30-minute consultation with a lawyer, I never really had one, I still mighty be entitled to a consultation, I really need to check that Monday. I did talk to several lawyers, but not a consultation, they never seemed to be the right kind of lawyer was the problem I was having. One even said wait until COVID is over and go to court and show the judge your evidence, Judge Jarvis only seemed interested in seeing my back as I walked out of the courtroom, he didn’t look at a shred of paper I had, more on that later. One lawyer I spoke with by the referral service, a Jane Reynolds, turns out is a donor to Streetlight, but I didn’t know that right off, I explained my whole situation, then she asked who I rented from, I told her Streetlight. She said she couldn’t do anything, she donated to them, conflict of interest. But I never really had an actual 30 minute consultation, it got frustrating and in November 2020 I got smashed with a long term migraine that basically lasted until almost the end of January, I hate those because I don’t like having to take the medicine that often, my prescription insurance isn’t crazy about it either, I think that medicine was the reason United Health Care dropped me, mid-year in 2019 also, when I had a Medi-gap plan with them, all I did was fight with that insurance company. I got really mad one day, totally insulted by whoever was on the phone, fighting over prescription coverage, again, I explained I’m on SSDI for a brain injury and my migraines can be pretty bad, and having zero medicine, for 4 months at this point because they claimed it was too expensive and I should try this or that, I explained it’s been working for 8 years so don’t mess with it, I had already had to change doctors because they were an HMO, actually never saw more than a physician’s assistant my whole time with that insurance, she was a really good PA though, but the operator I was speaking to said “oh, I have a brain injury also”, I was like oh really? And she really said “no, not really, I was just trying to identify with you”, for real, I couldn’t actually believe she said that and had to ask her if she really just said what I thought, she sure did. I asked if she would like to have a brain injury? I’d trade her mine any day of the week, it’s not actually fun. And I can’t exactly recall but I think I offered her some advice on how to obtain a brain injury for her very own in some form or another. And I think I told you earlier Kent was sending my insurance mail back, oh, I ended up getting a PO Box to receive important stuff, more money I shouldn’t have to spend, but at least I have a box in place for when they make me fully homeless.”
S.V.: “I wish people could have heard me laugh over the “offered some advice on how to obtain a brain injury” comment, the way you said it live to me was absolutely hilarious, actually you’ve set me off on a few laughing bouts sometimes by just the simple “matter of fact oh well” brush it off way you take some things, but some of the one liners you just throw out there are really funny. I once tried a state bar referral service, not in Virginia, it was just a big waste of time for me, one lawyer even told me that they don’t actually have to consult with me, I just could be sent bouncing across lawyers until the right one popped up, didn’t sound efficient. This was maybe 30 years ago in a different state, so maybe the system is better now.”
Ken: “Now, to 2021, end of January, previous 3 months a migraine blur, I hate these also because when they end the world is different, season, temperature, news, everything is changed, and I end up completely out of kilter with the world, it’s really hard to explain, like going away someplace completely different then coming back to where you were and now that’s completely different, leads to some confusion and catching up, and alone that can take time. So, I took time to catch up on the world, and was definitely looking forward to fishing when the weather got nice. And living in unhealthy conditions daily, as usual. Either Roger or Gabrielle called on the phone to request another meeting with me, I declined, listen to the audio if anyone out there is asking why. And I told whoever called it’s not me who needs to sit in your office all day, it’s the guy breaking the rules, give me what you promised, and I’ll be glad to pay you. I don’t mind paying for what I’m promised, I like having a kitchen to cook in that I don’t have to worry about feces anywhere, so have a meeting with Kent and end the problem. In the gallery section people will see a text where I am furious, Kent took the splitter off one morning, so cable didn’t come to my room, there’s a photo of it. I didn’t notice at first and thought it was a problem with the cable company, so was on the phone with them over an hour, for no reason. When he returned it was put back, by me, my tv worked, but because I called the cable company, with Gabrielle’s blessing, she even gave me the account number, and the cable company tried pinging the boxes in my room, and Kent’s room because the splitter went there also, his box ended up not working because of the splitter being gone when they reset his box lost registration, mine didn’t because I was on the phone with them giving them numbers from a box not even connected because Kent decided to take the splitter to make my life miserable and he ended up without tv for like 3 days because a new box was required. But, in the texts to Gabrielle you will see I tried to get his box working even after he decide to be a jerk to me, I can’t figure out why I do that sometimes, sometimes I just wanna punch myself in the face for being nice and helping someone who just crapped all over me when I just shouldn’t bother. I’m not even sure why I went into that, I need a break, I’m wandering.”
S.V.: “A break sounds good, I’m getting hungry. And looking at the texts and photos, shows he took it, shows you were mad, shows you tried to get Kent’s box working soon after you put the splitter back. You do it because you help people who need help when you can, and you can’t seem to not help people, don’t punch yourself in the face, it’s your nature and one you sometimes fight, and to be fair I can’t blame you on some accounts from other things we’ve talked about, but it’s part of you, just like your hands are, just like you walking up to anyone and having a lengthy conversation for no particular reason at all about anything at all. But I’m starving.”
Ken: “Ok, I want to make a coffee anyway, but after a little break we get into the end of things to this point, the 30-day notice of termination, the building is collapsing, me getting railed in court and no chance of a lawyer, the craziness that came way in summer has not stopped, wait until you hear some of this lunacy.”
S.V.: “Building collapse? Now I can’t wait to hear it, call back after you’ve calmed a bit, bye”
Ken: “Ok, bye”
S.V.: “So, let’s get back to the things going on. Try not to let it agitate you too much, pulling up 3 years of this in this short time is a lot to filter.”
Ken: “Yes, it’s like filtering Lake Superior. So, as I move deeper into 2021 things get just plain bizarre around here. Now to be clear again, the lease is in the gallery, these people NEVER gave advance notice of inspections, just showed up, “just having a look around”, always, they treat tenants like pets. But this Roger character shows up with the 30-Day Notice, at my bedroom door, literally 5 minutes after I got back from the grocery store, he must have been waiting outside, like a stalker, not sure if he just let himself in the apartment if their pet Kent Brady let him in, and then he’s acting all stupid , saying, more than once “don’t shoot the messenger, don’t shoot the messenger”, I couldn’t understand why he was acting in such an unprofessional and childish way, these people really just talk down to everyone in their “program”, what he should have said was “I’m hand delivering this 30-Day Notice Of Termination From Streetlight, not something stupid, don’t shoot the messenger”, he practically walked in so I didn’t have a chance to record it. I’m smelling cigarette smoke coming from my vent right now, time to move across my bedroom and away from my vent. Sorry, sidetracked by a little bit of death there. So, I took the paper, asked him if that’s hit, he said yes, I said thanks, you can go away now, these people really hate being dismissed by us “pets” out of hand, he looked really insulted. Don’t shoot the messenger, dude, you want to make me homeless because I want to protect my health and I got tired of paying to be made sick, then harassed by the people that assured me that wouldn’t happen but has never stopped, and no, I don’t want to shoot the messenger. However, it would be wonderful if it was perfectly legal to take the messenger up to the parking lot and smack them around for a bit, but that is a fantasy that has no bearing in reality because an act such as that would be a crime and I have no intention of being part of any crime, a warm and fuzzy thought though. The document he brought is in the gallery, it was towards the end of June, said for me to be out by July 31, pretty standard, most likely an internet template. Thing is I wanted to go court to show a judge my evidence, doesn’t seem to work that way though, I was tired of being pushed around. So, I had no plan on just packing up and going, go where? I wanted the clean, healthy, safe place to live that I was promised and was still waiting on. Now during July there was someone from Streetlight there at least once a week, to see if I was leaving really, but in the form of some other ruse, and Kent always actively kept an eye on me, I would love to put him on a witness stand so bad, but someone was always “dropping something off”, it was a joke , and was really becoming annoying.”
S.V.: “If that’s how he came in talking I’d have to agree such a thing is unprofessional, especially in the circumstance he was there, to tell you they want to throw you out and joke around, not unlike the call you said you had with the insurance company. I’m sorry you have to move across your own room to breathe so you can talk on the phone, just doesn’t seem right, but I really want to hear about the building collapse because my curiosity has been peaked since you said it, are we near that yet, and I have to admit I can’t believe how you I get to hear you literally laugh at some of this. I don’t think I’d laugh if some of this was done to me. And how much more bizarre can it get?”
Ken: “Oh, it gets plain weird before the preliminary court appearance, everyone goes slightly insane, thinks they are James Bond, that’s right you don’t watch tv or movies, he’s a spy, he’s in books to. So, as time moves into July, more frequent visits from Streetlight people, the end of July I also start to notice items missing more and more from Kent’s room, as I walk past his room to get to my room, it seems fairly odd. Right at the end of July I was at the dining room table doing something for my kayak and Doug appears from his room, chit chatting, and stands there calling himself a “piece of s@@t junkie”, this is very out of character for him, because since I’ve known him he claimed to be a “functional drug addict”, and also claimed he was never a junkie, and now all of a sudden he is one, August is only a few days away and something weird is going on, that’s obvious, so time to be more aware, and maybe be entertained, there was some amusement. So, we move into August, seems I’m still here, 30-Day Notice can now be acted on, they waste little time, it shows up August 5th, wasn’t on the door, it was in the door, in other words someone opened the door and put it half in half out, a roommate, not sure which, court date set for August 27, I bet they wanted a sooner one. August is when Doug starts feeding me information, problem is he does it too much and occasionally loses track to small degrees. I’m made aware that Gabrielle is in Germany visiting family, and the thing is I could care less where she is, she’s been making choke on smoke since I moved in, but that’s where she’s from, Army marriage. But I’m made aware of this by both roommates, totally out of the norm, I notice Kent seems to be more chatty. Doug is also feeding me lines of some variety that aren’t always the same, and that line basically is “Gabrielle is moving Kent into assisted living”. Again, Doug would know I wouldn’t care, but this line comes my way literally every 2 to 3 days, way out of character for Doug. Now, on Thursday, August 19, 2021, was the “building is collapsing” lunacy, it was the craziest thing, and I still haven’t gotten all the answers about that weird incident. But, between the beginning of the month and the 19th, Doug’s “son” managed to get a no trespass order against himself. Doug was very adamant about getting in touch with Gabrielle, someone he doesn’t care for either, and someone who has told Doug about his “son” spending the night being against the rules, all the while Kent’s room has less property in view as I walk by it, one morning Kent even says to me, “hope I didn’t make to much noise in my closet last night putting stuff in boxes”, oh no, I didn’t hear a thing. And I didn’t, there is a 12” block wall between our closets. Now, somewhere around August 7th I started noticing Kent going in and out of the next building over, sometimes in the front and out of the back, it was amusing, slightly. He would also have a few small “trash bags” to take when he left the apartment almost every day for some time, Kent never takes trash out, not at that rate, he will leave his used colostomy bag trash by the front door all night, but he’s taking a few Walmart bags a day out as his variety of small trinkets always in view disappears. Circumstance? Maybe. But at one point I tested Kent and said “you’re gonna hate living in a home”, he said, I’m not going to a home. A few days later Doug told me that Kent said to him “Kenny said I’m going to a home”, I don’t think Doug even remembered half the stuff he told me at this point.”
S.V.- “I’m sorry you will end up sleeping in a car over what is some of the strangest things I’ve ever heard, so they are slowly moving their property to the next building over thinking they are tricking you? Why would they even need to trick you, it’s not like the conflict you have with Streetlight is a secret from them, they should just move them out if that’s what is going on, but why would they move them out and leave you there with court coming up at the end of August, it makes no sense.”
Ken: “It didn’t make any sense to me either, still doesn’t make complete sense, but it gets even more crazy on August 19th. I wrote a timeline by hand in a notepad to try and make sense of this madness, here I go into detail about one of the weirdest days in my life. But on this day some serious crazy was all around me. What I’ll go into here is some of the finer details that I didn’t write on the paper sitting at a medical visit on the 20th the next day. I had a medical that I knew would take longer than I wanted, it’s just how some practices are. So, I brought a legal pad with me so I could write a timeline of whatever in the world that was that happened, I timed it by the calls in my contact list, it helped occupy an otherwise boring medical visit, actually pretty much all medical visits are boring. So, what is going on around me at the apartment is completely screwball as it is, at 3:47 pm I get a phone call from someone at Briarwood Apartments number in my contact list claiming to be the regional manager, whose name is Julie Biasillo. This here adds details I didn’t take time to write on the legal pad, I just needed a timeline on paper asap. So, what Julie tells me is “the building is imminent danger of collapsing.” “Really?” She dramatizes how it could be like the Florida collapse, I point out that it would never be anything like the Florida collapse, this building is an entirely different type of construction process than that. I trained as a welder in a vocational technical high school and have worked in that field primarily until becoming a disabled person, but I had tried other things, but I was always in some kind of construction field, including as a private building inspector for concrete and steel for a private firm when I lived farther north, I mostly worked the concrete areas, biggest job being the Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City, honest, I really didn’t enjoy the work that much either, but I knew this building wasn’t going to fall and found this ridiculous. First, at that time of day why is she calling me and why isn’t some form of emergency services knocking on my door, a responsible manager would have had the county building inspector out there, especially before 4 pm, but those inspectors will come out at 1 a.m. if you think a building full of tenants is going to collapse, it’s what they do, you’re not actually bothering them when you call them at any time of day. She tells me “I need to evacuate by 5:30, take some stuff and go to a hotel for the night”. I asked her “is the owner paying for the hotel?”, she says “no”, I say “well, if the owner isn’t concerned enough to pay for a hotel than I’m not gonna be concerned either, I’ll be staying here, it’s where I live”, then I ask “who claims the building is falling down anyway”, she says something to the effect “ the maintenance company we use often was doing work in apartment 1 and found an unstable wall”. Ok, sidebar here, I’ve seen these maintenance guys in action, they solder a pipe, and they think they are awesome. When they fixed a few plumbing leaks in here, we had 2 leaks in our ceiling in 3 days, big mess, they also patched the sheetrock and put mud on it, I asked Eric, the maintenance guy here, if they were gonna be using dust collection equipment when they sand. He said, “no there’s gonna be a dusty mess”, I said “no, I’ll do it myself”, I have basic dustless sanding equipment, pretty easy to make up. You don’t go into an occupied residence and just get sanding dust all over the place, a true professional service who does residential would have dustless equipment. A customer would rather have a vacuum sound running during sanding processes then have a house full of sheetrock dust, and they would want that sound every time, no question, customers love that level of service and detail. Anyway, I sanded their work so it would be done professionally and nit leaving a cloud of dust, they literally used 10 pounds of spackle. Sorry, I got badly sidetracked, some things just get me angry when I think back on them, and the past few days is starting to kick me in the shins in a way I wasn’t planning on. But, back to the night of the numbskulls, so I continue talking to this woman, asking her questions and getting answers that make no sense. A structural emergency requires all kinds of attention, engineers, inspectors, the government will insist on being a part of it in a big way, police with barricades and yellow tape, fire trucks and ambulances , cranes and heavy equipment, the news, big crowds. There was nothing but crickets and weird people around me currently, no emergency services, I felt like telling “well let me hang up and call the county”, just to see where it would go. But I was honestly in a selfish mood that day, I was trying to finish a few things on my kayak to get back out fishing because that is really the only thig that makes me happy these days, fishing, and it was Thursday, the preseason football game was an Eagles game that night and I wanted to see it and let this odd lot do whatever they are going to do. I tell her that I sublet, something I think she already knows, and I ask her why she is calling me anyway, because I don’t hold the actual lease, I rent a room, my name shouldn’t be on the paperwork in your office, the number for Streetlight should be there, she says that my number is what they have. This is making no sense at all to me. I tell her call Streetlight, but I won’t be leaving. And the first act of the night concludes, I’m left scratching my head at what someone is trying. Because the reality is, I actually know, and have known forever it seems, that if such a state of emergency was real than a phone call from the regional manager of Gates Hudson, who just happens to be in the Briarwood office that day, someplace she normally isn’t, would not be the reality and a fireman at my door to ensure my safety would be reality. I almost called the county myself, but I was in a selfish mood, and I wanted to see how this was going to unfold before I went down the street later to watch football, we no longer had the NFL network, so I had plans to watch to just down the street. So, I got back to work on the pieces for my kayak, wondering what this going to turn into. I ended up wishing I had just called the county and ended it after I got off the phone with the regional manager.”
S.V.: “I again finding myself wishing I was a trained reporter, at least you’re not short on dull moments where you live, but they sound like frustrating moments. So, it’s just a phone call from this one person, nothing else to confirm you are really in imminent danger?”
Ken: “Nope, just her, I wasn’t buying it, I did ask who was confirming the structure, she said an engineer would be out in the morning. Again, not important enough to have one here now with the building ready to fall on top of me right now but as long as I evacuate by 5:30 I should be fine, I’ll be fine here until I die of old age, plus I wanted to speak with the engineer myself the next morning. But now things start warming up, at 4:29 p.m. I get a call from a number I don’t recognize, so I let it go to voicemail. It’s someone named Jenny Trahn from Streetlight. So, at 4:34 p.m., like an idiot, I return the call, should have not bothered. Again, you guys are in imminent danger because the building is going to collapse. Again, I wonder why some responsible person hasn’t called a government agency about this and know I should call just to end all of this stupidness, because now I’m getting distracted from what I’m doing in an invasive way. I put it on speaker so both the roommates can hear it as well, she tells us they have rooms at Motel 6 for all of us, again, I decline, Kent declines, Doug actually jumps at the chance. A labor worker from streetlight is there to get Doug in literally less than 5 minutes after the phone call, they keep the van in Woodbridge, and we live in Dumfries, which is much more than 5 minutes apart. When the guy knocked on the door, I didn’t say anything, but thought he got here way to fast, and Doug was packed and ready to go out the door. 1 down, 1 to go, or 2,I never left. And that concludes whatever that was, I still can’t figure out what the goal was in all of this. I never saw any other tenants leave the building, it has 14 apartments, two were vacant. And the Motel 6 here by us is an armpit, I’d rather have a building fall on me, I’d have a better chance at remaining healthy. So, I got back to work on my kayak just plain tired of the interruptions.”
S.V.: “And so whatever this is continues on? This sounds so crazy, I can’t imagine what you have to tell me next, but I can’t wait to hear where this goes, I’m really intrigued, and you won’t jump ahead and tell me the end. So please, continue.”
Ken: “Now, as I continue, bear in mind that July 31st has come and gone, and the preliminary hearing is scheduled for August 27th. Somewhere between 5 to 5:15 p.m., there is a knock at the door, all I can think is what in the world is it now. I didn’t really bother to record any of this nonsense because I was using my phone to listen to music while I was trying to relax and work on my kayak while surrounded by this clown convention. I open the door, well what a surprise, it’s Gary Tibbs, husband of Gabrielle Tibbs, who I’m sure doesn’t like me for calling out his wife on snagging $2,400 in VISA gift cards from Comcast, and who allegedly works for Streetlight in some capacity, he might me a spousal ghost employee to help draw down for a full admin take since they are a nonprofit, I’ve never checked but I guess they pull the maximum admin percentage, like I said, I’m guessing, or he might be a volunteer, regardless of me knowing who he is he can’t produce ID that says he works for Streetlight, and I’m pretty sure that volunteers are required to have some sort of proof of who they are and who they volunteer for to be entering a private residence. Gary says, “do you know who I am”, as if I care who he is because he’s not someone from the government telling me the building is collapsing, I tell him “yes Gary Tibbs, I know who you are”, he asks “can I come in?”, I said something simple, like “no, we have nothing to discuss”, and we didn’t, this was really getting on my nerves now, he asks “is Kent here?”, I tell him yes, he asks if he can speak to Kent, I say “sure, let me get him”, and closed the door, I wish I had a camera for the look in his eyes as I slowly closed the door, he had a mask on, but his eyes were full of disbelief and hatred, I was now being amused a bit. So, front door closed, I literally holler for Kent from the door, and walk back over to resume my work and listen to music. Kent comes out and I tell him the door, he opens it, I swear it was like a dog greeting its master, there was a level of servitude in Kent’s manner. I’m 10 feet away standing at the dining room table working on my project, annoyed at the endless intrusions on my life. Gary says to Kent something like “can I come in, no one else would invite me in”, oh wow, my feelings are so hurt, this spectacle is beyond stupid. He invites Gary in, Gary tells Kent, not asks, but tells Kent, “Pack some stuff you’re going to the motel”, it was an order, he basically kidnapped him, he was made to leave, and it was obvious that he didn’t want to go but obeyed like a good pet. Then Gary turned and looked at me as Kent walked to pack with his and thought he could give me an order and said simply “Oh, and you’re going too”, now I wish I hadn’t been listening to music and recording this idiot. I looked at him and straight out told him “I have no intention of going anywhere, and you can go f@@@ yourself buddy, you don’t walk in here and tell me what I’m gonna do where I live”, I was beyond livid at this point, I have no idea where some people get off. He’s still wearing his mask, making these tough guy googly eyes at me or something, I say something funny I can’t remember, funny to me, maybe not to him. I grew up in Camden County, NJ, I was actually mugged for my Halloween candy when I was 10 years old, by a grown up, you are going to have do a whole lot more than make silly tough guy googly eyes and mean faces to even get me to do more than insult you, he didn’t like that I found him comical, this is where I had some fun at his expense, he should have stood by Kent’s room instead of 7 feet from me trying to be what I guess was supposed to be intimidating or something I guess, but to me it was comical and I made Gary aware of that. You could tell he was a bully who was not used to being challenged at all, he was at a real loss for words, all he could say is “yea, I know you, I know you”, I’d say tell me all about me, again “yea, I know you”. But now he put the gauntlet down, and actually said “if you don’t come with me, I’ll have the police escort you out”, I told him go ahead, there is nothing wrong with the building requiring evacuation. And still, all this time no one has called the government about my collapsing building. The nerve of this guy, he takes out his phone and calls someone, whoever it is answers fairly quickly, he says into the phone “yes, he won’t leave, have the police come escort him out”. I’m thinking the audacity of these people is on a level like I haven’t seen, come in where I live and threaten me, twice, because those were threats. I ask him who he calls, he says your smart, you figure it out. Ok, at first, I think the Briarwood office, but no, no matter what time you call there you don’t get right through, a 24/7 phone system even at 10 a.m. on weekdays, yay for personal service. Must be that Jenny person who called me earlier. He gets off the phone, all tough guy googly eyed, says “looks like the police will be escorting you out”, I look at him and say, “no they won’t, I’m at home, not breaking the law”, again, no responsible adult has called the government for my collapsing building, because, as you will see in the photos, it’s a foundational crack, repairable, insurance should cover it, it will be expensive, you have to maintain water runoff when you build structures on a hill, they don’t fix anything around here until it’s broken, badly. But this type of building requires a wrecking ball to take down, this construction don’t just collapse and sure don’t accordion down like the building in Florida the regional manager was trying to compare things to, plus this building is 4 stories built into a stable hill, not 10 stories on sand by the ocean. I honestly have zero concern for this building or my safety being in it because I have no doubt it’s fine, when things like this are actually happening someone responsible calls a real professional, not just says the sky is falling. So, Kent the puppy and this ding dong Gary finally leaves. Peace and quiet, and I quickly realize tonight I will be able to sleep in my own bed and not breathe secondhand smoke through the HVAC system at various intervals throughout the night when Kent wakes for a cigarette. When he leaves it’s about 10 minutes to 6, he made his “call the police call” around 5:40 p.m., and now I think this stupid stuff is finally over, nope, just not that lucky, and I’m still trying to figure out the game, because in between stupid people I walked out back and looked up at the building, 5 different apartments at least had people home, some with kids living with them I’m aware of because I’ve lived here 3 years and you see neighbors, I felt like knocking on doors but like I said I wanted to be selfish that day, something really was screwy here. And it gets even wackier, and entirely ruins my night at the end of it.”
S.V.: “I’m entirely mesmerized, and yes, this Gary sounds like a bully, and I really wish you would have recorded that encounter, I have learned a number of really funny sayings over the course of our conversations, and they just flow in a way when you say them out loud it’s hilarious. But listening to you it seems about 2 hours of this so far and there is still more?”
Ken: “Yes, still more. Now, Doug called literally right after Gary left to feed me some information. Right around 6 p.m. there is a knock at the door, all I can think is when will this nonsense end. I open, it’s Gary Tibbs giving me a second chance to go the Motel 6, aww, I again decline his offer. Now, when Doug called, he commented on some 2-bedroom apartment in another building where the 3 of us were supposed to move, but two of us would share a room, along with some other strange info, he sounded high on something to be honest, I won’t guess what, but he didn’t sound right. Also, over the next few days Doug always had an answer to something I was curious about. So, now Gary offers to let me stay in this other apartment, just take some blankets and pillows, I think I laughed and asked what about my bed and stuff, apparently that could be done later, again I passed on the completely stupid offer. Right about now two officers show up, a woman and man, I wish I would have gotten their cards from them. Nice officers, but I don’t think they will ever make detective, not very aware or inquisitive. Now I was so angry I was really gonna push whatever this nonsense was but knew I would miss my preseason Eagles football game if I did. They said something like “these people are concerned, blah blah blah”, I actually apologized to them for these people wasting their time. Now, I wanted to ask them exactly the nature of the call they responded to, I don’t think it was an imminent building collapse, I think that the call they responded to was some kind of domestic call and when they arrived the maintenance man here, Eric, caught up with them as they arrived and fed them the “sky is falling” story on their way in, so that is what would be fresh in their minds. And they sure can’t have ever been to any structural emergency, if the building was in real danger collapsing there would be all kinds if emergency equipment would be around. I felt like asking them to call the county inspector and turn this into something official since they now wanted to waste the time of police officers who could be out stopping crime, get some fire trucks, and hey, let’s start knocking on doors, there is at least 7 other apartments with people home. And the stairwell the officers were standing had a blown out light, it took Eric 10 days to change it, and they would have noticed that the front door closer doesn’t work right, hasn’t in years, almost fell on my head once when one side came off, glad it didn’t, I already have a brain injury and it was the heavy hydraulic end that came off, and they took his word the building is going to collapse. But I didn’t push it, and I regret not doing it, because this still wasn’t completely over. As the officers and Gary left, I really wish Gary hadn’t been wearing a mask, I wanted so badly to see his expression. Gary was the last person in the train going up the steps, I said to Gary as he left “oh, don’t think I don’t appreciate the effort”, of course it was nothing but an intrusion, and I appreciated nothing that happened that night so far, and I knew my being gracious would sting him more any than insult I could hurl his way. And away they went.”
S.V.: “He gave you a second chance to go sleep in a dirty motel, how nice, but all of this really happened? And it’s still not done, what else is left? And I agree about the officers not being observant, like you said, no emergency anything, and I now wonder about what call they had. You can probably find out, you know the time and date, you said them here, and they were called to your address, you can call the police department and obtain that information, probably with just a phone call, you should take the time to find out, and speak to at least one of them and confirm your theory on what call they responded to and if they were misdirected when they arrived, I can’t imagine these two officers were part of whatever this is, so there should be some sort of record on the event they responded to at the very least. But now this Gary wants to move you, and eventually your belongings out, now it’s getting very suspicious.”
Ken: “So, I give Doug a call, tell him about current events and see what other info he might offer up, Doug says “it’s probably Eric getting kickbacks from the maintenance company friends he always has out here”, I don’t think anyone would be dumb enough to that for a kickback, Eric is a maintenance man at these apartments and always pushes for these guys to get work, that doesn’t actually means he gets kickbacks, people try to get work for their friends, that’s how the world works, but Eric does drive a 2021 pickup truck that probably cost around 70k, he might make 40k here at the most and I doubt that, but that doesn’t mean he don’t have another job, or a family with money who bough it, not for me to say and I honestly don’t care either way if he makes money, it’s not out of my wallet. Doug is sounding the worse for wear as I hang up. At this point it might be about 6:30 p.m., I’m entirely frustrated at this point because this all started at quarter to 4 this afternoon, and actually feel violated in some way at this point. So, 7:25 p.m. rolls around, I head up my truck to go down the street and watch the football game which comes on at 7:30 p.m., I only had to drive a mile and half away, there is nothing unusual about the parking lot, the front of the building has 6 apartments, all one bedroom, 2 were vacant at the time, leaving 4, people were home in 3 of those apartments for certain, and 5 in the back of the building. So, I’m trying to relax and enjoy the game, I’m gone a little over 30 minutes at this point, at exactly 8 p.m. I get a call from Eric, the maintenance man, he tells me people are here to move my property out of the apartment. Really? I ask who’s there to move my stuff and who authorized people to move my stuff, Eric says that the regional manager said to move my property over to the two-bedroom apartment. I make it clear that if anyone touches my property then that person will be getting arrested, I tell him take Kent and Doug’s stuff, he said they just said your stuff for now. I told him you better not even be in that apartment, he said he wasn’t, the call ended. Now, we are past the 31-day notice, if I vacate, I don’t even get a chance to fight in court, these people were trying to get my stuff moved out, for real. So, I give Doug a call and see what kind of response he has to my call with Eric, I tell Doug I think I need to call a detective to gauge his response, he works diligently to talk me out of it, I wasn’t going to call a detective, I just wanted to see how he would react, he reacted suspiciously. He says he’s gonna call Eric and tell him to leave his stuff alone. At 8:36 Doug calls, sounding really high, he says he called Eric and told him not to touch his stuff. This was a Thursday, I didn’t see Doug until Sunday, when he said he never called Eric, go figure right. So, at this point my night is completely ruined, I can’t enjoy the game, I leave at halftime to be sure my property is safe, and yes, I would have had someone arrested. Now, during this time Gabrielle Tibbs is in Germany visiting family, I’m completely certain she’s aware of the goings on here. Now, throughout this month I’ve watched Kent slowly move his stuff out Walmart bag by Walmart bag, then creep into the other building, Doug, on a number of occasions would tell me about hike going to assisted living. And on the whole sky is falling nonsense Doug always had the answer I was looking for, I asked him, “I wonder why I called immediately?”, he said on his way out he stopped by the office and saw a woman with a clipboard with highlighted lines on it. I thought was an over description of anything, but he never stopped at the office, I know Doug, he ran out of here and up to the van to meet his “son” at the motel, he didn’t take a second to stop at the office. I told him when I left for the game the parking lot was normal, but he saw all kinds of people with bags of stuff. Wow Doug, how convenient. I never could get a straight answer out of Eric on who wanted to move my stuff, he doesn’t even use a name, he just says the regional manager, Eric and I would chit chat once in a while, now he avoids eye contact. I was told an engineer would be there the next morning, I waited and listened. Someone showed up about 8:30 a.m., when he came out, I asked if the building needed to be evacuated, he looked at me like I was half joking and said “no, not at all”, but before I could ask more Eric moved him along. I saw them walking around out back later before I left for a medical visit, talking about the fences out back, so I’m not sure who this individual really was. But this was the craziest bunch of nonsense I believe designed to get me to let my property be moved out. I really want some answer to this, and I have a few different theories on possible scenarios.”
S.V.: “This is one of the oddest things I think I’ve ever heard, you really must find those two officers who came out, but I’d like to hear what theories you have on whatever this was these people were doing.”
Ken:- “Well, one of course, was to get my stuff outside the apartment, I’m thinking it would have been left outside and not moved anywhere and I’d have been called out on abandoning my residence and no court on the 27th, it would have been over they would win by default, then the writ gets filed and have 72 hours to vacate once it’s posted on my door. In that event, Kent and Doug would move over to the 2-bedroom apartment, I’d be in my truck, and this apartment would revert to Briarwood. This is a 3-bedroom apartment 30 minutes south of D.C., right next to I-95, Streetlight pays about $1,600 a month, it’s worth almost twice that a month. As the 27th gets closer Doug is still handing me the Kent is going to assisted living line as more and more disappears. Then around the 24th or 25th I’m finishing up working on my kayak, Doug starts taking backpacks of stuff out, he’s gone s very short time each trip, he says he’s taking the stuff to his son up on the road, he makes 6 or 7 trips, but each trip out the door he’s sure to inform me what he’s doing, I’m wondering why he’s over explaining things but I figure he’s taking stuff to the 2-bedroom apartment. Doug’s “son” doesn’t drive or have a car, and Doug is taking a lot of stuff out, takes a backpack full, it comes back empty. Thing is, Doug packs light, he doesn’t own much, except for his furniture, which belongs to Streetlight, and his electronics, a tv and speakers, he just has some clothes, those trips could have moved all of his small stuff over. It really seems people think I’m not gonna show up for court on the 27th. About 30 minutes or so after Doug finishes, not exactly sure I didn’t time it, I’m working at dining room table and Doug’s “son” shows up at the back door, with nothing, hmm. But I do show up for court, which gets continued to September 10th.”
S.V.: “I’m curious though what stake Doug might have to act in this deceptive manner? I have to take your word that he’s acting in way that isn’t typical but is there something for him to gain. And I like your theories, I’d like to see someone official look into them, because if they were trying to trick you into moving your property out, they went and involved the police, so if it was some kind of crazy conspiracy, they could be in a lot of trouble for involving the police. I’m not sure, I’m not a lawyer or police officer. It would be terrible for you to be made homeless so the apartment can be rented for more money as well.”
Ken: “Well, Doug has his “son”, who is perpetually homeless, when Doug was saying about the 2-bedroom apartment, he was saying,” 2 in room, 1 in the other”, I think the two are him and his “son”, the other Kent, Doug sounded really high at the time. Gabrielle has leaned on Doug often about his “son” sleeping over, you’ll hear about it in a recording. And Gabrielle leans on Doug for other reasons, when he was on probation, she got him to sign papers that basically made her his second probation officer, and he signed because being homeless can be a probation violation, so she could get him to try and run a smokescreen on me with that offer to Doug. Doug has no allegiance to anyone but himself and his “son” and even says it. And I think the end of July when he was prancing around the living room when I was out there, he was calling himself a piece of s@@t junkie, I knew something was up with him being some kind of part of something. Of course, me fighting in court is slowing up the move, I wish they would just go ahead and move there already, at least I’d have a smoke free time for what time I have left here.”
S.V.: “I guess that would be good motivation for Doug to play along, although it’s wrong of them to put pressure on him to act in such a way. If you ever get a real answer to all of that please let me know so I can post an update, I know you want a clear answer to whatever in the world that was they were trying to do. So, you jumped around on talking about court, so do you want to get into that in a way that doesn’t jump around.”
Ken: “Sure, sorry, I don’t mean to jump around, pulling all of this up this fast is causing me a problem I wasn’t planning on. But court, endless joke. First was the preliminary on August 27th, in PWC General District Court, their attorney, Weasel Weasleton, III, was there, not his real name but that’s how I would like you to type it up. He said something stupid like, “the client will be ok with him paying $250 and vacating in 3 days”, I’m sure they would. I said no, I want a trial. So, a trial was scheduled for September 10th, something I’m sure no one was planning on, they were planning on me not even showing up. Out in the hall Weasel Weasleton, III, tells me he gave me an out? I ask him an out to what, to be homeless? I tell him about the financial crime I have evidence of, and he asks for the copy of it, and I even give him a flash drive with the 55-minute audio track on it. He goes his way, I go my mine court, is in two weeks. So, I call legal aid, more specifically Legal Services of Northern Virginia, LSNV, and appointment is made for someone to call me, on Tuesday September 7th, yes, 3 days before court. I talk to a woman named Jessica Harris, who I can tell has no interest because the case isn’t easy and cookie cutter, and I apparently hadn’t been dotting my ‘i’s’ and crossing my ‘t’s’ because I didn’t spend 7 years in law school, she basically said I was on my own and didn’t even give me any useful advice, I found this discouraging, she talked about how I should have filed a tenants assertion, where you just give your rent to the courts. They do that in Virginia, this is so the judge can give your landlord money should you not fill papers out right, you can only withhold money for “deduct and repair”, which is my complaint anyway. The thing that bothered me most about this Jessica Harris person is she’s not who she used to be; I could hear it in her voice. To me, she sounded like someone who got out of law school all full of piss and vinegar, fire and sass, and said “she would fight for the little guy no matter what and that won’t ever change”, but she changed because people change, an accident changed me, she probably carved a nice niche for herself, and staying inside the box is safe, and comfortable, and since has become complacent. My case is one that can be argued in court, but since I don’t have money for a lawyer that won’t ever happen because I can’t figure out quick enough how do it myself. As far as giving my rent for someone else to hold on to, no, I needed it. Look at the photos, I just couldn’t make food in that kitchen, and anyone who says that they would be ok making food in a kitchen where someone is servicing a colostomy is a liar. I live next to I-95, there’s a lot of places to eat, but I would try and be cheap about it, but you can’t eat fast food every day, its gross. So, I would go to sit down places too, usually The Waffle House, it’s pretty cheap for a decent meal, my favorite being Montclair Family Restaurant, I’d only go there once or twice a month because it’s on the higher price side, but the food is so good, I would always feel-good eating there. And I hated having to spend anything, I would rather have a feces free kitchen to cook in, but I wasn’t entitled to that. So, September 10th rolls around, we go into one courtroom, I want a continuance, because I dropped evidence off to that lawyer’s office, Jessica Harris, and she didn’t call me until Thursday the 9th to tell me I was on my own. So really no time to prepare. I’m not even given a chance to ask for a continuance, sent to trial in courtroom 6 in front of Judge Jarvis, who just railroads me in my opinion, the trial was less than 10 minutes. But Gabrielle Tibbs goes up and said, there’s no smoking, and I’ve been complaining since the beginning, and she lied about the photo of Kent at the sink. And because I didn’t have the right papers, of course I had no idea what I needed, I just found the day before I would be on my own, and there is no transcript for General District Court. I just want my day in court, my fair day in court, I won’t ever get it because in Virginia justice usually goes to the highest bidder. So, it’s ruled in their favor because I didn’t do something exactly right. On the 10th I’m given 10 days to file an appeal, and a one-thousand-dollar appeal retainer, so now I have to pay for just a chance at justice? I make $862 a month, so that’s not gonna happen, and I believe if I gave them a thousand dollars they would say thanks for the money, appeal denied. So, I will be filing an indigent retainer, before I can file an appeal this has to be accepted, I’m not sure how to any of this so I will take all week and do my best, I feel it’s a waste of time. I’m waiting to the last day because I bet they already have the writ filled out, if I go sooner and fail they can file the next day, I bet I will get turned down on my indigent retainer, the writ filed the 21st, and me sleeping in my jeep by Friday night. So, when I get back Monday the 20th, I will get in touch with you for an update on my progress. Like I said, my complaint is one of deduct and repair, which is a health statute really, but there is something where I live producing toxic gases, Streetlight as my landlord is legally obligated to make a repair. But this an entirely, out of the normal living situation. We rent rooms, subsidized rooms, you just don’t answer an ad for these rooms, you are installed here, only certain people qualify. If something is broken Streetlight is obligated to fix it, even if that something is a person making an unhealthy living situation. Now, I can’t hire someone to fix the problem as if it was a bad heater, only Streetlight can fix it, so I kept my money to go eat because as I’ve stated, who would want to eat in that kitchen. Now, anybody that listens to the evidence knows I have a lot of other complaints also.”
S.V.: “I really hope you get your appeal and that you’re not living in your truck before the month is over, that would be very unjust, but if you lose, what plans do you have? Are you really going to sleep in your truck? What about a shelter? And what about your belongings? Will you store them? How will you move them? I feel you have a legitimate complaint but have an oddball legal system to contend with, I live across the country, and I’ve heard things about common law states legal systems being really unfair. And it sounds like a bad deal for you, I think without a lawyer with you that you won’t be taken seriously by a judge and that will be it, you will never have a chance. But I will put this up here for the whole world to see, so while you are sleeping in your truck people will know the truth. And I know that don’t make the situation you’re facing any better at all and will provide you no comfort sleeping in your truck at night and not going to try and convince you it will, but people knowing the truth will be important.”
Ken: “Yes, I will sleep in my truck, Streetlight runs the shelter, I’m sure they’d love to see me there, they won’t, I refuse to live like that, I seriously mean it when I say I’d rather die sleeping in my truck than ever stay there. I will join L.A. Fitness again like I did when I was homeless to go shower. As far as my personal property, I’ll be abandoning maybe 98% of my stuff, no joke, I’m not moving it into storage, I don’t even have help to do that. I will be destroying anything useful, now even though sounds selfish it’s my stuff and Streetlight can’t have it. And as far as needy people using it, when they make me homeless, I will be needy as they come. I have a brand-new bed, bought it from QVC on payments, I have arthritis in everything I need to stand up including my back and neck and needed a better bed than what was provided to me, now it will be gone, I will destroy it, and anything else useful, and let them toss it in the trash like they tossed me. And once they run me off from here the only roof I will ever live under will be my own, no more rooms, I’d rather sleep in my truck until the day I die if it’s the only roof of my own I’m entitled to have. I just can’t do a room anymore, people mistreat you, use you, think they own you, there’s no dignity, no pride, no privacy, in renting a room. I will just have to wait and see what happens. And thing is , they not only get government money, but they also get private donations, which we talk about briefly.
S.V.: “yes, let’s talk about the private donations, when I looked at their website it seems the only thing recently updated are things asking for money.”
Ken: “Ok, I will give you a rundown on names of donors, some of which I want to apologize to, which I’m sure you’re wondering why. Streetlight has fundraiser’s, they have people they just recruited into their program talk at these fundraiser’s. Gabrielle Tibbs asked me to speak at one pretty much right after I moved, she asked me to right a 5-minute speech, so I wrote one, that she altered the day of the fundraiser, like an hour before I was to speak, she wanted it to reflect what she wanted me to say, my first run in with her wanting to control everything and everyone. And I said these words to these people to get them to write checks, and these weren’t entirely my words, so I feel as if was led into deceiving these people into writing checks, checks that are paying the Weasel Weasleton. III lawyer who is making homeless. Also, they have this thing called the “Hope Center” they have been collecting money for, I think it’s a scam, no nothing about this hope center except for talk for many years, I’d love to see the account balance for the money being put together for that, I think there is real scam here. The only drawing I’ve seen looks like just a plain stock photo from somewhere of the front of a building, I think what they are doing is scamming money, and if they do build this thing, it’s just going to be e big atm for government money. There is something really wrong about that whole thing. For to long people have been taking what these people say at face value. Some of the donors to Streetlight include; Jewelry By Design; All Saints Church; Move Church; Chick-Fil-A in Woodbridge; First Mount Zion Baptist Church; Gospel Community Outreach; Grass Roots Christian Fellowship; Jack & Jill of America in Woodbridge and Manassas, VA; Kizan Corporation; Lake Ridge Rotary Club; Latter Day Saints Relief Society; Lead IT Solutions: Old Bridge Methodist Church; Mount Olive Baptist Church; Pathway Vineyard Church, this is where they work out of; People, Inc.; Saint Michael’s, Inc.; Sim Ventions; Spirit and Life Church; Victory Outreach Church; World Life Church. And that is just to name some.”
S.V.: “I thought it was strange you would want to apologize to these people, I think they owe you an apology, but I think I can understand just a tiny bit what you meant by wanting to apologize to them, you were telling something that wasn’t what you intended on telling them. Their website, as I said, just seems geared to asking for donations, the only thing current is asking for money with just a touch of human interest to try and make them look good. There seems something phony about it all. I think if their lawyer reads this, he won’t like the name you gave him, but I will leave it as we discussed, this not about me. But it is a funny name for a lawyer. They are a suspicious organization.”
Ken: “Oh, they aren’t the only suspicious homeless group around here. In 2010 there were a series of grants issued around here for the Neighborhood Stabilization Program, Streetlight got two houses, free, with a grant for repairs, they rent rooms in those houses, 5 in one, and I heard 6 rooms in the other, although it’s only legal to rent out 3 rooms in a single-family home, which is what these are. About a dozen houses were essentially given to various homeless groups, but the one that Volunteers of America got was just ridiculous, a 3,000 square foot luxury home on 6 acres in Woodbridge, VA, not used to help homeless at all, the person in charge of VOA got to keep that. How great is that? I will be residing in my truck before the month is over, and the people in charge at VOA get a free luxury home. I understand that life isn’t fair, but it shouldn’t be this lopsided.”
S.V.: “Sounds to me like there is a lot of scandal and corruption in the homeless organizations near you. Hopefully the government looks into some of it one day. But tell me, I know you don’t rely on hope, but I’m not sure how to put this other than asking what your future hopes are?”
Ken: “So, the future, wow. Well, I’d like to be treated fairly and have my health protected, I’d like my day in court, but I don’t see that happening, I’d like to have my own place that I can afford on my social security, I just can’t live with strangers after this experience, I’d like to see the bad element of Streetlight removed, and I’d like to see Streetlight completely restructured. There’s an organization in Fairfax called Facets that’s a lot like Streetlight except they aren’t driven by greed, they get similar money but the people in the Facets program get dignity, they get a place of their own for 27% of their government check, cable not included, but you have to be a disabled person homeless in Fairfax for 12 consecutive months, maybe I’ll park and be homeless in my truck in Fairfax. But I’d like to see someone come from Facets and teaches Streetlight to do it right. Everyone deserves their own place, even if they are poor, even Kent Brady deserves his own place, as much as it pains me to say it. And I would like for once in a while for life to not be too hard. I also have professional goals also, if I live to retirement age, I’d like to not be on SSDI when I get there. But, with the fact I can be hit with a long-term migraine at any time limits my options to working for myself. You know some people say, “I wish I would have wrote that down”, well I do write my ideas down. I buy those one-dollar composition books at Walmart and write all kinds of ideas in them, invention ideas, menu ideas for fast food, advertising ideas, tv show ideas, even movie ideas. I’ve been trying to market some of these ideas, but it is a lot of work. For instance, one thing I do, and seem to have a natural ability for, is to write song parodies of all sorts, so I’ve been writing advertising parodies. I wrote a really good one that works for Progressive Insurance, Arnold Worldwide handles their advertising, I managed to get in touch with someone in the NY office, and that person informed I need to make a contact in the Boston office because that’s where the Progressive account is handled, so I’m working on achieving that, but obviously my life has been upended. And I’m slowly writing a story for the purpose of it being a movie, I have the story all in my head and have started writing it, but again, a lot of distractions lately. And the movie is a Star Trek movie using the cast that JJ Abrams used for his version of the franchise, except one of the primary actors was accidentally killed in a freak vehicle accident, but I figured how to make it all work, and it’s spinning in my head in a holding pattern, and I write as I have time to. I know you don’t watch tv or movies so you may not know the show I’m talking about. And I want to get in my kayak and fish as much as I can before it’s too cold out. Fishing and just sitting on the water are the only things that brings me and kind of peace and joy, even if I don’t catch anything. Sometimes I take my kayak right out into the middle of the Potomac River and anchor, and catfish all day. I do get people who look at me as if I’m a little crazy while I’m out there. One time a police boat pulled up because they had never seen a kayak anchored in the middle of the river, halfway between Virginia and Maryland pretty much, they were checking on me, mighty nice of them, I got to talking to one officer who had a twelve and a half foot Field and Stream fishing kayak, I told him he needs stabilizers like I put on mine, I’ve taken my kayak through 4 foot wakes, better than a roller coaster ride.”
S.V.: “Ken, I really want something good to work out for you, you’re right, everyone deserves their own place, even that person you live with. I think when people read this, and see the photos and audio you provided, that you will find you won’t be totally alone in this, you may really end up living in your truck, I know you told me you can’t live in a vehicle, you can only die in it at faster rate because of all the automotive chemical fumes you end up breathing throughout the night, but I don’t want to put it as “dying in your truck, not living in your truck” as you say. You are prepared for the worst because that’s what you are use to being ready for, which is good, it sounds like you have your survival planned out for now, and I understand you just want to take a break from trying, we talked about things I wanted to put here but I understand you wanting to not share every last thing you’re going through, plus this interview would be twice as long probably. I like the things you’d like to see different. And I have heard of Star Trek, before you ever did, remember I’m as old as the actors from the original tv show, and I had a neighbor a long time ago who was crazy for the show, however, I don’t know the version you speak of. And you let me hear that Progressive parody, again I don’t watch tv, but it was very clever and I think you should pursue sharing that with whom you are trying. But I really do you wish you the best of luck and keep me posted and I will add updates. You may not realize it yet, but you have suffered a form of abuse all of these years, and when you realize it can you please talk to someone about it.”
Ken: “Thanks, good things don’t come to those who wait, they come to those who get up and work their butt off for them, I need to do that, I’m just not sure how anymore. But I will keep you posted. I need to spend the week figuring out how to do the appeal on my own. I’m not trying to think about anything other than getting this appeal and indigent form done, the past two days have really caused me think too much really. I will talk to you again, goodbye.
S.V.: “Not goodbye Ken, more like talk to you later. Please, keep your head up, real help for you is out there somewhere.”
I will post updates as Ken informs me of them, I can’t imagine any of this is even close to fair. And maybe justice does go the highest bidder. But I don’t think he’s wrong for trying to protect his health. I hope things work out for Ken.
-S.V.