Ms. Park,

i am writing to you as a survivor of the physical and emotional violence inflicted upon so-called “clients” of the DHS shelters which you and your administration oversee.

on January 23rd, i was body-slammed into a brick wall by the supervisor of Franklin Women’s shelter and a DHS-N.Y.P.D. officer after i was awoken from my sleep to the sounds of a woman screaming for help and went downstairs to help her by documenting the assault she was experiencing. she was screaming for the people restraining her to stop hurting her, pleading that she was hungry. the pleas for understanding that she was hungry tore fear through my spirit as someone who saw the videos of the unhoused New Yorker, Jordan Neely, being murdered on the subway by a vigilante civilian who forced the man into a carotid chokehold after his distressed pleas for help and understanding that he was hungry.

when i heard the woman shouting that she was hungry, i was terrified that someone else experiencing homelessness in New York City was about to be tortured to death in the very building i was sleeping. so, i grabbed my Canon camera, my Neumann microphone, and my cell phone and went to investigate the source of the terrified screaming.

i went down the stairs to the first floor of Franklin to discover a group of DHS NYPD officers and at least two staff members of Franklin Women’ Shelter crowded around the holding cell behind the staff’s station. i began to film, recalling the facility’s terms on filming in the premises. one is not permitted to film anyone in the shelter without their consent. my camera only started rolling in response to that woman’s cries for help, i had her consent from that moment forward.

i was confronted aggressively by the facility’s supervisor and the interaction culminated in me being body-slammed into a brick wall as the supervisor and an NYPD officer used their full weight to try and rip my Canon camera strap off from around my neck. the gag is, i’d filmed everything on my cell phone; it was so early that i was awoken that i’d forgotten to put my battery in my DSLR camera. 

as a result of the physical attack, i am left with scarring on my wrist from the assault. with the help of some powerful lady lawyers, i am pursuing legal action for restitution for the unjust and vicious initial assault and severe mistreatment, discrimination, and misconduct i experienced afterwards by multiple staff members of the Franklin Women’s Shelter who collaborated to make my experience at the assessment shelter as difficult and miserable as possible for the period of time that i was there.

i have continued my journalistic efforts while navigating the NYC-DHS shelter system and as a result i’ve interviewed multiple women with stories of physical and sexual assault; retaliation, bullying, and emotional abuse; starvation as punishment; lockouts before curfew; retaliatory transfers; discrimination based on age, gender, disability, orientation, and race; excessive use of force and verbal threats of violence; sexual misconduct; and violations of privacy both recently in 2024 and at least as far back as 2002. many of these women have signed onto my petitions for immediate DHS policy changes.

i am calling your attention to the reality of what the shelter system has become, as opposed to allowing you to keep thinking wishfully that DHS shelters operate as it appears they do on paper.

DHS shelter “clients” are TENANTS with rights— both human and tenants’ rights— who are entitled under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to housing and under our own constitution to fair treatment under the law.

Ms. Park, as acting DHS commissioner, you are responsible for the state of the DHS shelter system, which has become a hive of rampant human rights violations and abuses. most New Yorkers are just ONE missed paycheck, just ONE medical bill away from experiencing the abuses of the crooked NYC-DHS shelter system.

i am writing you this letter to call your awareness to the fact that times are changing in New York City and in the U.S. in general and our city’s policy must reflect those changes.

the “continuum of care” approach— a.k.a. the staircase approach— to addressing homelessness does not work; racist, obsolete housing policy is keeping NYC from being the world leader in housing policy that it should be. the times we live in demand HOUSING FIRST to stop the human rights abuses and to solve the public health crisis that is homelessness during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

we will keep raising your attention to the human rights abuses happening inside DHS shelters until the criminal misconduct stops and shelter tenants human rights are respected and restored. we will press on until HOUSING FIRST is the new norm. we will persist in our demands until you open the doors!

 

sincerely, 

 

~ọnṣé