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Adelaide Homeless Journal
1 January 2007 to 30 June 2007
Jabberwocky
Tony Roach, the boss of Fred’s Van referred me to Mike Wock of St Vincent de Paul Society when I asked why the Society kept the old Iliad Restaurant empty 23 hours each day while people were served food outside via Fred’s Van in all weather and where toilets were not available. Mike Wock hasn’t replied. Yet again. Is this corruption within the charity industry? Ooh, that's a bit exaggerated. Perhaps gross conscious inefficiency? That sounds nicer. 3 January 2007 Emo A white fellow wearing a top hat but no shirt was at Fred's Van last night. He accused the African man of living somewhere because he said he saw him leave a building with a security pass. He also said the black fellow's scars weren't real tribal scars and wanted to know what country, what tribe, what village he came from. He shouted this while being served a greasy pie and a hot dog. A white woman, who was with the top hat man's group, called the top hat man a "dickhead" while the white homeless people and Aboriginals visibly backed the African man. Celebrity Can Collector, Phil, said the man was an "Emo". 3 January 2007 Our "Homeless Culture" includes more people than just those living outside The top hat man made a point that a number of Fred's Van clients live inside buildings. This is a constant point of issue in the homeless scene. Many housed clients are ex-homeless living in horrible places who go to Fred's Van because it is their cultural milieu. They also supplement their meagre income with free food. Others pick up food to take to sick and despairing people who don't eat properly. One type of weirdo you never see at Fred's Van are those from Street-to-home. They know some of the homeless might want to express their anger to these psychiatric drug-pushing social workers. Cappo has made himself scarce also. Someone might ask about his humble dwelling. 3 January 2007 Increased Roughage There was sand in the stale bun with pink icing at Fred's Van last night. I felt the crunching on my teeth for half an hour after consuming the delicacy. Maybe it's a new government program to increase dental health. Last night saw a huge crowd, mostly friendly with a mob down from the PitLands. There wasn’t enough food and the cordial ran out, as usual. 3 January 2007 No Exit, Kilburn A 35-year-old woman died from a drug overdose in Garland Street, Kilburn last weekend. This was where Street-to-home tried to dump the homeless woman with cancer symptoms. What a place to attempt to place someone fighting a deadly disease. Chris Salter, writing in The Advertiser called it, physically, a "dead end street". The homeless woman is fighting to live. 3 January 2007 The Law Makers and the Enforcers Three sentiments in the homeless scene are: 1) treat women with respect 2) hate child molesters 3) never rip off other homeless people There are unofficial enforcers in the homeless scene who maintain standards. 3 January 2007 Retreat into solitude and visiting relatives Numbers were down at some homeless Christmas parties. You could see the despair amongst those who did go. Christmas is a horrible time when you're living outside and made worse because homeless joints reduce hours. A veteran welfare worker said he still doesn't understand why numbers are down. 3 January 2007 Green Interests I told John Green in better days that a friend in the environment scene lived simply so he could donate his money to benevolent causes. Green pounced on my indiscretion and last week attempted to ingratiate himself with my friend, pretending to have an interest in "Green Issues". I've warned my friend and apologised. 8 January 2007 More Sad Man John Green pretends to be many things. He claims to be an ex-ABC journalist, but the ABC told me that they'd never had him as an employee. He also claims to have been a journalist on the Northern Territory News. One veteran journalist of 25-years at the NT News says he's never heard of him while another said there was a record of Green working there from 1989-1991. He wouldn't act as referee for him. 8 January 2007 A spot of travel Scam Artist John Green was seen in Escape Travel at 4pm on 2 January, 2006. Then he disappeared. Staff said he was in a rush to "catch a train". They knew his name. He must have changed his mind because he was with a mate in front of the State Library an hour later. "What's all this sh*t on the website?" he demanded. "You stole $1400 from me, you thief," I replied. He wanted to talk away from his mate; I wanted him to hear what I said but the Scam Artist shooed the poor fellow away. Green spoke as if he had been trying to repay the money but that I'd impeded his progress. He did say he'd repay $500 tomorrow (3 January) but walked away saying, "Have it your way," as if I was still blocking his valiant efforts to repay the money. He didn't pay anything. But Escape Travel? Is the Barmera Scam Artist planning a move to greener pastures? Posted 8 January 2007 John Green scams money from people saying he needs it to help his children. He claims to have three sons yet someone once close to him says he has just one son, an adult who lives in Adelaide. This Scam Artist has presented two children, a boy and a girl, as his own to a victim who lent him six-hundred-dollars. This victim would drive the scam artist to his psychologist appointments. He also drove the Artist to Janet Frost, his GP who pulled strings to rush the Scam Artist to hospital for surgery for cancer. The surgery was successful. The Scam Artist responded by borrowing money from the driver, not paying him back and then disappearing. He repayed the GP by saying she was crazy and has sold out. 8 January 2006 Young Male Aggression There was almost a fight at Fred's Van last Thursday. The guy who uses tablets and has lots of facial expression and comment angered the black fellow with long hair. The latter went onto the road, threw his shirt to the ground and challenged the loud dude to a fight. The loud dude did go onto the road while traffic snuck around one side of them. The dude was careful not to get within hitting range but kept up a range of insults. The long-haired fellow looked much more dangerous and he spat at the loud dude and went back to the eating area. He could have murdered the loud dude yet the latter kept shouting insults and demoralising him. It was like Ali versus Liston 1966. Two loaded police cars turned up as the potential fighters made themselves scarce. 8 January 2007 No WorkCover Insurance A reliable source told me that some St Vincent de Paul women won't help at Fred's Van because of the violence. He said, "Didn't you notice how tense the women were tonight?" 8 January 2007 John Green spots another sucker The tall man, James Sheehan, who apparently lives outside, and wears three-quarter length orange trousers, better be careful. It is becoming increasingly evident that the Scam Artist sees every person as a potential source of gambling money. Even someone living outside has a fortnightly welfare payment that could be used by the Scam Artist at the Sky City Casino. Be careful. 8 January 2007 Green's Soft Side "Glad to hear John Lamprell is injured?" John Green, from Barmera, upon hearing that a St Vincent de Paul organiser injured his arm after falling in the kitchen while making the evening meal for the homeless people going to Fred's Van. "If you don't shut-up I'll rip off your other leg." John Green at the Disability Information and Resource Centre during an argument with a disabled man with one leg. 8 January 2007 Hope Springs Eternal One man from Spain goes to Teen Challenge each Thursday at 5:30pm at Hindmarsh Square. He's just over sixty. He worked for BHP in Newcastle and Port Kembla, at the blast furnace. He's had three strokes, inoperable, and takes tablets. He loses balance easily and collapses. He collects deposit containers. He lives at Crazy Cottage run by Sister Betty though he isn't crazy. That is just the name street people have given it. His support worker takes him and his deposit containers to a Bottle Recycler and the man gives part of his money for the support worker's children and visits coffee shops with the rest of it. He says he collects the bottles for exercise rather than the money. His voice is slurred from the strokes but he doesn't express a hint of self-pity. He is one of the people who lives inside a building but goes to the Homeless Places. Most people visiting these services are ex-homeless and most have suffered serious injuries or medical conditions. I haven't found anyone there who hasn't suffered extreme trauma. 8 January 2007 John Green meets Short Fuse Short Fuse Greg Calder of Street-to-home has reportedly told the Green that he requires psychiatric evaluation. It was trying to get a job with Calder's boss to fund his alleged gambling addiction. They should book a double appointment. 9 January 2006 Is someone avoiding me? Two diners at Fred's Van noted that career criminal John Green avoids places when he thinks his creditors may be there. It is a life of dodging and ducking, lying, taking back streets. 9 January 2007 Dad pretends to be someone else Kevin Naughton, Senior Media Advisor for the State Opposition Leader, Martin Hamilton-Smith, says that John Green's father, a retired businessman from Barmera, used to pay off those cheated by his son but that he, "got sick of bailing him out." Now he denies being related to his son. 9 January 2007 Internet Scam Artist John Green, the Barmera Scam Artist, is cultivating people in the Adelaide Homeless Forum. http://forums.homeless.org.au/showthread.php?t=9 He uses the pseudonym "shortyjag" and tells long stories about his "boys", who don't exist. He has visited the home of one lonely woman on the forum but discarded her after discovering she was poor. She sends friendly emails not realising she has been discarded. The Artist laughs with derision. He's working on another woman on the forum. She lives on Hindmarsh Island. She responded to my criticism of him by unleashing a barrage of abuse, accusing me of defaming the Scam Artist. You have to admit: he knows his criminal trade to cultivate this sort of response. She'll be good for a couple of thousand: one night at the Sky City Casino. 9 January 2007 John Green's 26 Convictions for Fraud and Forgery John Green claims to have good friends like Kevin Naughton, Senior Media Advisor for the State Opposition Leader, Martin Hamilton-Smith. "We were great friends in Darwin," John Green said. "Our families were very close." "Quite the opposite," Kevin Naughton laughed cynically when I spoke to him last Saturday. [John Green, the Scam Artist from Barmera] "has 26 convictions for fraud and forgery." "Did he get anything out of you?" I asked. "Lots," Kevin replied. 9 January 2007 John Green strikes again, almost The tall man, James Sheehan, living outside, and attending Fred's Van last night, offered to pay the John Green's debt to me. He said the Scam Artist was a good fellow and had lent him $500. Pretty good interest for the Barmera Scam Artist if the man payed the whole $1400. I told him I didn't want him to pay and that it was the Scam Artist's duty to repay the debt. Plus all the other debts the Scam Artist has accrued with others. But this incident shows what a persuasive conman is the Scam Artist, John Green. 10 January 2007 The Short-Fuse Fan Club “Ecstatic,” was the word John Lamprell used last night to describe someone from Street-to-home talking to his mob about Street-to-home’s success in housing homeless people. Perhaps someone dropped a tab of E-Skanck in his or her cocktail. 17 December 2007 Summer Derelicts “Jeez, youse were having a good time in the parklands last night, singing and carrying on after youse got kicked out of detox.” A man at Byron Place Community Centre 17 December 2006 Court Appearance for Donna Donna, the homeless woman mentioned previously, and with oncology problems, was charged by police with concealing a weapon. Wayne, her estranged husband said he will be at the court hearing and expects “lover boy” to admit he slipped the knife into her coat pocket without her knowing. Wayne remains loyal though admits it is over. 17 December 2006 No Conviction Recorded “D”, the ex-homeless woman, now in private rental, appeared in Court 2 of the Adelaide Magistrates Court today. She was charged with carrying a concealed weapon in Grote Street. It was a folding knife for “self-protection”, she said. She entered a “guilty” statement and was fined $15 plus costs. No conviction was recorded because she has no prior convictions. "D" conducted herself with dignity and was accompanied by “S” with whom she shares a house in the Elizabeth area. The couple quickly left the court buildings after the appearance. The knife was confiscated. 22 January 2007 Teen Challenge Now at Hurtle Square Teen Challenge has expanded to Light Square, Adelaide. Free sausages, hamburger patties, bread, coffee and cordial on Fridays at 12 Noon. It is called the Raven Trailer Ministry and their aim is to spread their religious message. While eating you can view the hole in the window of Stormy Summers's brothel through which her boyfriend threw a piece of furniture when they were being evicted. 22 January 2007 Teen Challenge Taking over St Lukes Rumour has it that Teen Challenge, which is a church similar to the Assemblies of God, is taking over management of St Lukes Mission. They're going to provide overnight accommodation. St Vincent de Paul once did that at their shelter until they switched to housing compliant medication users only. 22 January 2007 Someone was pissed off Food ran out at the Teen Challenge Meal at Hindmarsh Square last Thursday. They keep failing to order enough containers of food. That small Sicilian fellow got pretty angry, to say the least. Ten people missed out including the workers from Teen Challenge. Demi and Warren have been away for the last few weeks and Jonald and the other guy haven't quite got things under control. Warren, the diabetic, was spotted that morning buying non-diabetic food in the tunnel that runs from the railway station to Hindley Street. 22 January 2007 Rubbish Handed Out They were giving out boxes of high-protein health bars at Byron Place Community Centre last week - two weeks past the use-by date. They smelt horrible. You could eat them but you felt a little crook afterward. I got 20 bars but removed them from their wrappers and threw them in the grass for rats and birds. Six days later they're still there. Even the ants avoid them. I ate three. I'm thinking of going to a doctor? 22 January 2007 Bad Whiff Fred's van was giving away big bags of Bi-Lo or Coles chips, three months past the Use-by date. They were great as long as you didn't smell them. I put them with the protein bars and the birds and animals ate them quickly. An eighty-seven-year-old friend who lost his sense of smell during World War 2 might have liked them. 22 January 2007 How does Waterford fill in his days? David Waterford, a junior employee of the Social Inclusion Commission, still hasn't finished writing the final report on homelessness by Roseanne Haggerty. Her visit cost $250,000 of money that should have gone to people living outside so at least Waterford could churn out the final Haggerty report. Make it thick, David, so homeless people can use copies as makeshift mattresses this winter. 22 January 2007 "They have no morals" “They have no morals. Gave a 72-year-old man four nights then kicked him out onto the street.” DS on the street talking about the St Vincent de Paul Night Shelter at Whitmore Square 25 January, 2007 Smart Operators? “Street-to-home, yeah, they visit me under the tree on Sunday at 9am. Does it help me? No. They do it because they get triple time on Sundays.” DS on the street 25 January 2007 “Teen Challenge, they have a broader perspective. Street-to-home: gov’t, gov’t, gov’t.” Another man living outside 25 January 2007 A better neighbourhood “Someone stole my blanket at St Lukes. Left me pillow. The thieves are at the west end. It’s okay in the east.” 25 January 2007 Man living outside and talking at Otherway Centre last week. Wasted Property to be used “Good, they’ll open up that house,” DS on the street responding to the rumour that Teen Challenge is taking over St Lukes. A lot of homeless housing is kept empty by charities for political reasons. Posted 25 January 2007 John Green's Paranoid Life “He’s never there when you’re there, and vice versa.” A regular at Fred’s Van noticing the evasive movements of John Green, the Barmera Scam Artist. 25 January 2007 PJ's dangerous life PJ had a shouting argument with a young fellow at Teen Challenge meal at Hindmarsh Square. The other guy said PJ was taking too much of that rich fudge-like cake provided by the Jasmin Restaurant. 29 January 2007 His gamble paid off PJ yelled at him, followed him around, lunged at him, even. The other fellow eventually apologized and shook PJ's hand. PJ is over 65 but he certainly isn't a pushover. The other fellow was big enough to apologise instead of beating PJ over the head. 29 January 2007 PJ and the Freezer A computer programmer with Adelaide University was looking for PJ. There was a freezer full of food that belonged to PJ at his house. The food, anyway, belonged to PJ. The person wants to give PJ the freezer or at least take the food out. PJ has been difficult to nail down on the issue and the person doesn't want to throw out the food because he does not to get rid of the freezer. 29 January 2007 Scam Artist Pulls Another Dirty John Green, the Barmera scam artist, surrounded himself with a couple of pals, recently. One of them, James Sheehan, knew him from Darwin where the artist scammed "lots" of money from Kevin Naughton, when the latter was with the ABC there. James didn't know this about the Scam Artist, thinking he was a great sort of human. James got a little angry with me when I told him the Scam Artist was preying on people in the homeless scene. It is very dangerous to have anyone angry at you in the homeless scene. Then James decided to put my accusations to the test. James says he tested the Scam Artist in a pub. He deliberately left money on the table where he and the Artist were sitting. James went to the toilets. When he returned both the money and the Scam Artist were gone. Was James pissed off. The money was nothing. He was offended at the Scam Artist's attitude. The Scam Artist has made himself scarce ever since. 29 January 2007 Lomax-Smith We've heard Lomax-Smith is against the expansion of the Victoria Park Race Course. Oh, sure. She's supposedly making "big waves" against it inside the government, which has decided to go ahead with it anyway. She must pretend to be against it because her electorate in the CBD doesn't want the redevelopment. But she wants to stay in Cabinet so plays both side of the field. Similarly with people living outside. She backs housed residents in their attempts to remove all residents from the CBD who live outside. But publicly she plays the "compassionate routine" and repeats the platitudes of that meddling priest, Cappo. 29 January 2007 Working Man "I've got to get back to work," said Mark Parnell, Greens MP, as an excuse to avoid listening to a voter at the ShelterAGM in Parliament House. "Very interesting, yes, yes, thanks for that," said Mark to the same voter when he was seeking election. 29 January 2007 Charity Corruption The St Vincent de Paul restaurant at Whitmore Square that stays empty 23 hours a day is like the hospital in the TV series, “Yes, Minister”, that could only operate on budget if it stayed empty of patients while retaining a full complement of paid staff. 29 January 2007 The Patients' Friend? John Green, the Scam Artist from Barmera, has inveigled himself onto a patients’ advisory board at the Royal Adelaide Hospital giving him open access to the hospital and to vulnerable people with life savings. The Scam Artist needs a steady source of money to, according to two sources, fuel his gambling addiction. 1 February 2007 Enter, The Dragon The Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, Jay Weatherill, recently said that it might take the selling of 1000 homes a year to keep HousingSA afloat. Last year 400 were sold though the real figure of housing lost is kept secret. These lost houses are when public housing suburbs are razed then redeveloped. The loss of thousands of houses and units is counted as redevelopment even though they’re not available for years. Even bare ground left for years after two semi-detached houses have been bulldozed are counted as being “redeveloped”. 1 February 2007 Drop the ballast, dude. That meddling priest, Cappo, got another award, some Australia Day thing. He’s going to be so loaded down with accolades that he’ll have a hard time rising to Heaven. The guy at the Pearly Gates might have to advise Cappo, “Make up your mind, pal, its either the trinkets or Heaven.” 2 February 2007 WestCare Nice Experience I went to Westcare for their Friday soup, fish and chips, salad, coleslaw, bread with trans-fatty margarine, and trifle and cream. The meals were served by the paid office workers and volunteers. Everyone in the kitchen and those serving in the dining room wore gloves. The dining rooms were clean, spacious and customers could sit wherever they wanted. There was no demand for ID. It cost two dollars and those not wanting to pay got the same meal except not fish and chips but meat pies. John, the Portugese fellow who also speaks French and sells Big Issue played the piano prior to the meal. One client was helping an old man fill out some government form. The old guy was born in 1924. 2 February 2007 The Danger of Can Collecting Phil, the Celebrity Can Collector told me at the Otherway Centre yesterday that he was collecting cans at 2am in the morning near Thebarton when a car with three lads pulled up alongside him. One jumped out wearing a balaclava and holding a replica gun and demanded money. The man said he had just forty cents so one of them kicked his bags of cans over the street then they left. The man said the police wouldn’t be interested in it and didn’t report the incident. 2 February 2007 John Green, Researcher John Andrew Green, the Scam Artist from Barmera, has been seeking a $50,000 grant from the Central Northern Adelaide Health Service. “For research,” he told another person in the parklands last week. He has been hoping to gather intelligence on people in the homeless scene, where he lives, then pass it on Street-to-home and other bureaucrats who are too afraid to interact with people in the parklands and, in any case, don’t have the Scam Artist’s ability to gain the target audience’s confidence. Greg Calder, manager of Street-to-home, is quite hostile to the Scam Artist but Calder’s boss, John Forward, works with special projects and appreciates the fact that flawed people like the Scam Artist often have certain superior abilities, which thickheads like Calder can’t even dream about. The Scam Artist also has a sense of justice and wants to improve the services offered to people living outside. He isn’t all bad, just don’t trust him with your money, especially big amounts. 2 February 2007 To whom it may concern, Please be advised that the person referred to as the "scam artist" is not connected with the Royal Adelaide Hospital in any capacity. Thankyou John Hancock Senior Media Officer Central Northern Adelaide Health Service Department of Health 2 February 2007 see 5 February, 2007 entry for more details “Screwdriver”, said a woman with sunglasses and drinking a bundy and coke in Wright Street near Whitmore Square last week. A younger man had lifted his shirt and asked her what weapon would have caused the injury he sustained the previous night. 5 February, 2007 Cappo the Crime Fighter Cappo has wasted so much money on the homeless issue without much result. The money would have been better spent providing housing for homeless people rather than on the bureaucracy and Cappo himself. Now, this meddling priest is a self-styled crime fighter aiming for the Salisbury/Elizabeth Aboriginals. Cappo is a church version of Alan Jones, the Sydney shock jock. All fluff and stuff. 5 February 2007 The fuller story John Hancock, spin doctor for the Department of Health, has admitted the Scam Artist was on a committee, but won’t specify which one and says it was many years ago. The Scam Artist still flashes his photo ID badge from the Royal Adelaide Hospital to gain credibility with people he is cultivating for the purpose of “borrowing” large amounts of money. 5 February 2007 Poo Poo vapours “Ugh, I don’t want to sit near that,” said a woman at the David Cappo Skin Cancer Dining Area at the Otherway Centre yesterday. She was referring to the vent back of her chair coming from the toilets. “It’s not too bad, today,” responded Danny, the man who looks like a theatre director. 7 February 2007 Disability Information Resource Centre After getting kicked out of the Seniors’ Information Centre internet lounge in Flinders Street, Adelaide, for life, the Scam Artist moved to the Disability Information Resource Centre internet lounge over on Gilles Street where he obtained over a thousand dollars from a client there. He avoids this place now but still uses the Hutt Street Library internet terminals to communicate with those in the homeless scene (workers and clients), apparently in the hope of making new connects from which he can obtain large non-repayable loans for his “children” who, apart from an adult son, may not even exist. What appears to exist, according to others, is the Scam Artist’s gambling habit. 7 February 2007 Three Strokes and Not Out Tony, who has had three strokes, had blood in his eye last night. He says doctors at the RAH tell him nothing can be done and just to take pills. Robert at Teen Challenge got him to agree to go to the doctor at Hutt Street who might be able to pull strings to obtain better treatment. 9 February 2007 Sea food, I see Fish and prawns were the meal at Teen Challenge at Hindmarsh Square yesterday. It was prepared by Jasmin Restaurant at Hindmarsh Square. Quality cooking, quality ingredients. 9 February 2007 Mattresses Galore Cardboard recycling day in the city means mattresses for those living outside who grab cardboard from rubbish bins. All the welfare workers like Street-to-home, with all their tricks and money to burn, can’t arrange ground cover for those living outside. It takes a business like a bicycle shop to act as accidental welfare workers. 9 February 2007 Emos and Goths A few young people are camping in the parklands near the East End. The Adelaide City Council is trying to get the psychiatric body, Street-to-home, to deal with them. But Street-to-home has nothing to offer except psychiatric control orders. They haven't rental housing to provide at all. Even its employees often wonder what there role is except to replace and exclude Hutt Street Centre, Westcare and Byron Place from the homeless housing scene. But Street-to-home has a growing waiting list, itself. They're reduced to having extended meetings amongst themselves just to justify their presence in the office. The corruption is breathtaking. All the money supposedly going to help the homeless actually ends up with the bureaucrats. 14 February 2007 Remember Wayne and Donna Stumpf, the homeless couple? They are both "housed" currently. Remember all the reporting on this site of their meetings with Street-to-home? All that time and money spent on them by Street-to-home? Guess how they obtained housing? Wayne is living with a friend in Unley. Donna is living with S. in Elizabeth? Both obtained accommodation independent of Street-to-home. They said Street-to-home were useless time wasters. But let's guess if Street-to-home claimed in their reports to government that they solved Wayne and D's housing problem. 14 February 2007 Homeless Legal Service The Homeless Legal Service operates out of Byron Place Community Centre and the Magdalene Centre. Each place has a separate legal firm giving advice and the coordinator, Bill, says once you go to one place you can’t go to another on the same case. Fair enough. The annoying part is customers don’t know this until turning up at the other place after going to the first. A wasted trip. Another anomaly is the Magdalene Centre often closes at 10am when it reaches its quota of appointments. This means you can’t walk in there after this time and make an appointment for the legal service. They want you to phone, waste fifty cents, more if the phone is buggered, when you might be walking by the place anyway. This seems an unnecessary cruelty. The Magdalene Centre should put a notice on the door saying that appointments can be made around the corner at the other part of the Magdalene Centre on Moore Street. 15 February 2007 Botany Class? Does anyone know the name of the creeper that grows up the wall of the Department of Administrative and Information Services in the Gawler Courtyard where Fred's Van serves food each night? It isn't Ivy. [email protected] 15 February 2007 Now, what is that meddling priest up to now? Cappo has placed an ad in the Adelaide Advertiser newspaper welcoming phone-ins about “Repeat Youth Offending”. It’s part of another “broad consultation” with probable results like with the homeless issue where little has actually changed except a few new social worker and psychiatric careers have being bolstered with the influx of money taken from the housing sector. 15 February, 2007 John Green's multiple lives The Scam Artist is telling people his father was a long-time police officer in the Riverland. Police are often respected and maybe the Scam Artist thinks this will make himself appear to others as more trustworthy for a loan. 15 February 2007 Further Infrastructure Sell-off A man going to Fred’s Van says the government may sell 10,000 Housing Trust houses to repay a $800 million debt to the Federal government. He also says the Salvation Army has trouble getting volunteers for Fred’s Van due to the violence. 15 February, 2007 Where did he get that huge boat? The homeless services at St Lukes was closed down a few years ago due to management corruption, according to an inside source. Homeless clients couldn’t understand how the employees displayed such wealth. Even Christmas food hampers and other food donated for the homeless somehow ended up being sold in the coffee shop and money used.... It is finally being re-opened under Teen Challenge management. 16 February 2007 "RANN FIDDLES WHILE GLENSIDE CHURNS " From a Sandra Kanck media release 16 February 2007 Gladys who turned 80 at Christmas hasn’t been around Whitmore Square recently. “She’s in hospital getting her foot cut off,” said the woman who got married at Westcare today.” She’s going into a nursing home when she gets out.” 16 February 2007 The Secret Room at Hutt Street Centre The Cox Plates If you seek blankets and kitchenware from Hutt Street Centre and they say they don't have anything then just mention The Secret Room in the administration building. It is crammed with lots of good stuff. 19 February 2007 Self Esteem Damage "It's the religion. You feel obligated to believe in their faith. When you don't, you feel like you've gone there under false pretenses." A woman saying why few go to the Teen Challenge van in Light Squuare, Adelaide for Friday lunch. 19 February 2007 Very Good Food "Jasmin Restaurant quality" hamburgers and chips were served at Teen Challenge last Thursday. Even the vegetarian curry and rice at Fred’s Van was good. The rice was in separate granules instead of mashed together in some glug. The curry had enough bite and was fresh. Good cooks all round. The free bread doesn’t seem to appear anymore at the table at Otherway though there is heaps at Westcare. 19 February 2007 “You’re not going back to your unit.” Someone at Westcare quoting some social worker type trying to get someone institutionalized. It might have been Gladys they were talking about. A nursing home would kill Gladys, which I suppose is the agenda though no one involved admits this even to themselves. 19 February 2007 “He’ll do it cheaper.” A gentleman saying a mate was willing to “give the Scam Artist a beating” after the former Editor of this gossip column mentioned that someone else had already offered to get the loan back, one way or another, for $200. The former Editor thanked all concerned for their offers saying he preferred legal procedures and didn’t want the Scam Artist, John Green, physically beaten as long as he doesn't manipulate others to attack the former Editor. . John Green has been seen at Catholic homeless agencies: Hutt Street, Otherway and Fred’s Van because he is of the Catholic faith from Barmera. He will soon be earning people’s trust with his forthright manner and getting them to emotionally buy into his desperate situation. Then he will ask for a substantial loan for a short period then disappear. The whole scenario will then play itself out again until he finds a new target. What a life. 23 February 2007 Rest in Peace Leading Adelaide psychiatrist, Professor Rob Barrett, is reported to have shown the wider community that even mental health professionals suffer psychiatric disorders. He jumped off the car park at Adelaide University last month. He had been suffering depression for ten years. He leaves behind a wife and teenage daughter. His death is a loss to many people. 26 February 2007 "I know twenty people who have committed suicide," said a man at a free meal place. He overcame a life-threatening bi-polar condition and now lives a healthy, productive and moral life. He counted Rob Barrett as a friend on his road to recovery. 26 February 2007 "The Next Pope" That meddling priest, David Cappo, has produced another report, or at least put his name to one. It is called "Stepping-Up: A Social Inclusion Plan for Mental Health Reform 2007-2112". The deceptive language is difficult to decipher but it seems to indicate recommended changes such as bulldozing older buildings at Glenside Hospital; selling off the land; reduced acute accommodation at Glenside Hospital and building new Supported Residential Facilities (doss houses). This appears a continuation of the "normalisation" plan of the 1980's where most of Hillcrest Hospital was shut down and sold to a football club that later went bankrupt. By reducing "beds" at Glenside patients will be increasingly pushed into the psychiatric wards at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and other general hospitals. These are high stimulation environments, just the opposite of what many patients require, and to keep patients "subdued" they will be given even higher amounts of drugs, with the usual disastrous consequences to their bodies. Cappo also wants to reduce patient privacy and if he gets his way then personal medical details will be shared with a number of other agencies without the patients' permission or knowledge. The whole thing appears like the Housing Trust reform and we all know where that ended up. 26 February 2007 St Vinnies go Krishna? There was a thick, quality yoghourt at Fred's Van on Thursday. They wanted clients to add it to the rice and curry, but overestimated our culinary sophistication. Most took the yoghourt in a separate dish though staff used the rice spoon to serve it meaning that it contained small bits of curry rice. One man used an empty and cleaned food container from the earlier Jasmin Restaurant meal at Hindmarsh Square to take the yoghourt "home". 26 February 2007 Spice to the meal "Shut-up or you'll get a smack," said a man to his girlfriend. She had been yelling at him for twenty minutes because he had been looking at a white woman. He emphasised the point by smacking the leaves of a tree with a subtle piece of branch. 26 February 2007 Meanwhile, Back at the War Room Peter Bagdi got kicked out of Disability Information and Resource Centre last week. He had taken over a section of the library declaring it as "The War Room" to fend off an attack of 200,000 speed boats. He said he would be taken to Pakistan and become the next Mohammed though later changed his tune and said he was Satan. He said this change was okay because he had many personalities. He is a great fellow though his speech tends to make other people bow their heads and cover their faces with their hands and whisper to themselves, "help, help, help." He is being helped by the psychiatric and welfare system and has been plonked in a place in beautiful downtown Kilburn where someone has already thrown a brick through one of his windows. 26 February 2007 Trevor's Wisdom "It's human nature that people become dependent and if you give them everything free then they expect it and if you withdraw it they become angry," a client at Fred's Van told me. 26 February 2007 Roxy Café Generosity Robert, who uses Fred’s Van, reports that it is the man from Roxy Café, opposite Gawler Courtyard, who regularly leaves a cardboard tray of his end of day bakery products for the waiting Fred’s Van clients. There is no fanfare. He simply places the box down then walks down the street. Roxy Café is a business worth supporting. 27 February 2007 Stupid "Police Security" clowns Why do those dopes from “Police Security” turn up at Fred’s Van then not stay for the full forty minutes during which volunteers are serving the food. A volunteer was sorely tormented by one nasty dude who deliberately targets him when he serves once each five weeks. 27 February 2007 Child Molesters An insider reports that services for homeless are being reduced by churches because of big payments to victims of church child molesters. One thing you can say about "the Next Pope" is that in all his publicity photographs he never touches anyone. I expect he is a man of integrity in that area though it would be nice if he could do something about that Roseanne Haggerty-style shark's grin. 27 February 2007 Such kindness The government is responding to the deteriorating eyesight of mental patients due to the side-effects of the psychiatric drugs that they reduce eyesight to the point of “legal blindness”. They visit Supported Residential Facilities (doss houses) and give residents pairs of $5 reading glasses. 27 February 2007 No Conversion Needed A Dentist visited a Support Residential Facility in Norwood for mentally disabled people. The kitchen became the dental surgery and a kitchen chair became the patient chair. The dentist inspected residents’ teeth but faced the dilemma about what to do. Psychiatric drugs turn teeth brown within months and soon these dirty-looking teeth crumble. It isn’t the patients’ faults: brushing is as effective as screwing for virginity. The main treatment is extracting them one-by-one until they’re all gone. Then, cheapo dentures are fitted. 27 February 2007 Government Secrecy I wonder how much this latest Cappo report: "Stepping-Up: A Social Inclusion Plan for Mental Health Reform 2007-2112", cost. Sandra Kanck, Democrat MP, asked the government six months previously how much of Social Inclusion money is spent on office expenses and traveling. She said the government ignored the questions as they do to 99% of her questions. 27 February 2007 Another person not happy with John Green “one thing i will do though is, i will "out" you s.j. ... you know me. i have lent an ear, offered support and friendship to you. no more... you surprise me, i thought better than that of you.” Message on a chat forum. The subject is “shortyjag”, a user-name of the Scam Artist,John Green. I’m not sure of the writer’s identity. who appears new on the forum scene. 1 March 2007 Howard Williams, Politician "Anne Moran has lost her block," said Howard Williams, at the Adelaide Central Mission yesterday. He was commenting on Sunday opening at the Central Markets. 1 March 2007 Telescope Bye-Bye Wayne was at the back of Cash Converters in Gouger Street when he saw his telescope wheeled by on a trolley. He told them it was his telescope but they wouldn’t give it to him. His wife, “D”, living in Elizabeth Downs with “C”, apparently brought it in. ”C” has apparently got her to stop drinking alcohol. 2 March 2007 David Waterford of Social Inclusion Commission Will David Waterford’s Roseanne Haggerty report recommend projects and policies that have already been applied before Roseanne got her $250,000 contract? This way the government can later say everything has been achieved with homelessness that was recommended in the report, without actually doing anything. 2 March 2007 Long Live the Warren Warren is leaving the Thursday night meal scene with Teen Challenge in Hindmarsh Square and going to work in the Teen Challenge half-way house at St Lukes. It will be a sort of detox in preparation for clients transferring to a church-based rehabilitation from drugs and alcohol. 2 March 2007 An Old Hand Speaks “It’s always the blow-ins,” said one man who sleeps year-in, year-out in the parklands. He was referring to some loud arguing verging on a physical fight at Hindmarsh Square. 2 March 2007 Moral of the Story? Police emptied a wine cask taken from the handbag of an Aboriginal woman in Rundle Mall last night at 8pm. Nearby, other people were drinking alcohol yet not approached by the police. The reason was they were paying $5 a glass at “Buskers” outdoor café in Rundle Mall. 2 March 2007 You Stinking Disgrace, Rann Rumour has it that Premier Mike Rann turned up at the Hutt Street Homeless Centre 2006 Christmas Lunch to serve meals to the clients. Wasn’t that generous? Well, he served three meals while the media cameras were focused on him and David Cappo, then walked out of the building without wishing anyone, “Merry Christmas” or even shaking anyone’s hand. Pure political exploitation. Why do the Hutt Street management allow this to happen? Thanks to “Unseen, banned” 1 March 2007 That guy with the two vicious dogs The fellow who goes to Fred’s Van with those two pit bull terriers was charged with encouraging his dogs to attack and resisting arrest last week. His dogs allegedly bit someone walking through the parklands at 1pm. The dog owner once said to me, “Do yourself a favour and don’t feed my dogs,” when I gave them the pig’s meat from a Fred’s Van sandwich. I’m glad he didn’t request his dogs to attack me though he looked like he was going to do it himself. 5 March 2007 Thanks to Monika and David Norm asked me to say a belated thanks to Monika Baker and David Rigney of Welfare Rights Centre for saving him from the being kicked off the dole in 2000 when a vicious Centrelink employee stopped payments because Norm was handing out leaflets she didn’t approve of. It was totally political and the pair demolished Centrelink’s trumped up charge and the city office manager that did the corrupt deed was transferred sideways to a position where she no longer had contact with unemployed people. 5 March 2007 The Derelict Ambulance Service “Where’s the blue trauma box?” asked one Emergency Technology Ambulance officer at Fred’s Van. “I don’t know,” replied the other officer. “It’s the one with the bandages in it.” “Haven’t seen it,” the second officer answered. 6 March 2007 No Such Thing as a Street-to-home Free Lunch Beware of Greg Calder and other Street-to-home types offering free lunches. There isn’t anything as a free lunch especially from these types of people. 6 March 2007 Terrific Replacement Gerald (the man with the German accent) and Allan (the fellow who cooks sausages at noon on Fridays in Light Square) are replacing Warren at the Teen Challenge meal in Hindmarsh Square on Thursdays at 5:30pm. 6 March 2007 Salvation Army Compromised The Salvation Army can’t criticise the harsh treatment of unemployed or homeless people because the government will cut its funding if it does. Many big charity groups have sold out by taking government money, especially via the Job Network. 8 March 2007 Housing Trust Sell-Off About fifty people are being kicked out of their flats in Woodville Gardens and Ferryden Park. HousingSA is selling the units to Westwood who will redevelop the site then rent the units back at much higher rents than before and not to the former tenants. The evicted people, most disabled pensioners, are being offered places in Port Pirie and Elizabeth despite their social and support networks being in the Port Adelaide area. I wonder if that dope, Cappo, will have anything to say about it. 8 March 2007 Phil's New Rig One of Adelaide’s leading can and bottle collectors replaced his old fridge trolley with a big new red thing with inflatable tires. First one wheel fell off and he ended up pushing the thing around on one wheel. Then the tires kept getting punctures so now he is back with his old fridge trolley. A new fellow has entered the can collecting scene with a brand new scooter/motorbike and pulling a trailer. Who is this stranger? 8 March 2007 Sad Scam Artist John Green from Barmera was seen at the Roulette Wheel at the Adelaide SkyCity Casino last week. It isn’t known whose money he was losing. He was also seen on Tuesday at Fred’s Van. He spent most of the time talking to an older man who has a propensity to offer help to homeless people despite he himself being very poor. You can guess what the Scam Artist is up to. 9 March 2007 Everybody loved the Mitcham Girls The Mitcham Girls High School supplied the tuna mournay at the Thursday Fred’s Van meal last week. It was terrific though one gentleman said he would prefer the Mitcham High School Girls to the Mitcham High School Girls tuna mournay. Three of the school girls were present and served their tuna mournay. The gentleman said the tuna muournay was great but he preferred the girls. Another man said he wanted both. The Mitcham Girls High School girls didn’t smile as they served the mournay and it was a very strange evening. 13 March 2007 “This is our justice,” said a man amongst a group who were kicking and stomping on another man trying to hide under a car and shrieking like an injured dog being kicked to death. This was at Fred’s Van. Posted 13 March 2007 Greg Calder of Street-to-home accused of falsifying an “Incident Report”? Department of Health and a police report indicate that an alleged assault on a man in the Street-to-home foyer last year by Greg Calder, differ greatly from the alleged victim’s account. One accusation is that Calder allegedly made a false statement and had two subordinate employees act as witnesses and sign his account despite them not being present for much of the “fracas”. Who is telling the truth: the alleged victim or Calder and his two witnesses? Maybe everyone has exaggerated. What appears possible is that Calder allegedly may have assaulted the man but has the witnesses to avoid being convicted in a court of law. The crucial aspect is the integrity of the witnesses. 13 March 2007 Calder Calls the Police http://www.geocities.com/streettohome/caldercallsthepolice.html The updated page in "Let's Tour Street-to-home. http://www.geocities.com/streettohome A comment on Greg Calder's "Incident Report". 14 march 2007 "The next Pope" and his Showcase Housing Project “The next Pope”, David Cappo, must be feeling ridiculous now the State Government has announced further sell-off of Housing Trust properties. They're selling 16 houses and units per week for the next ten years. This will mean even less housing for people living outside. So what is “the next Pope” going to do? Some say the Social Inclusion Commission has bought a building in Light Square and will spend many millions fixing it up as “ShowCase Housing” for the homeless. The general public will think something productive is happening in homeless housing but in reality it will be an expensive political monument housing a couple of dozen people, and masking the fact that thousands of houses will be sold resulting in even less housing than before for people living outside. How will “the next Pope” incorporate this deception into his conscience? 16 March 2007 Weatherill's Reward Has Rann anointed Jay Weatherill, Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, as his successor? 16 March 2007 A Triumphant Return The gentleman charged by police with encouraging his dogs to attack another person returned triumphantly to Fred’s Van last night. His two dogs are still impounded and the Council want to kill them, but the gentleman has another Pit Bull Terrier, a puppy that doesn’t like Fred’s Van sausages but will soon grow up to be another adult Pit Bull Terrier. 16 March 2007 No Vacancies “They put me in Remand,” said another man at Fred’s Van. “The watch houses and jails are all full.” 16 March 2007 Coles Voucher Jessica McCormick, ph 8303 3850, is offered a $25 Coles Voucher to gamblers who complete her survey forms. Basically the questions assume people who gamble are victims of violence, sexual abuse and mental illness and she wants to know the gory details. One can imagine the gambling industry eagerly reading her thesis to further snare people with their gambling industry. 16 March 2007 Kiwi's Law “Haven’t you heard of a line you f**cking pigs?” said a man, pushing his way in and grabbing bananas at Fred’s Van. 16 March 2007 Government Housing Sell-off “One charity says they don’t know how they’re going to meet demand now that the government is selling Trust housing. There is no faith in Cappo.” A man at the Krishna meal in Hurtle Square 16 March 2007 Peter Bagdi not kicked out of DIRC A customer of Disability Information and Resource Centre emailed me saying that Peter Bagdi, who had opened up a "War Room" at DIRC to fend off a possible invasion from Indonesia, has not been kicked out. 21 March 2007 Threat to Fred's Van? Rumour has it that Fred’s Van has been told to find another place to replace Gawler Court because the government wants to build a hotel on the site. “The next Pope” and the Social Inclusion Commission will be happy at this because they appear to want to starve the homeless out of the Adelaide CBD, and force them into outer suburbia. That will make them look good because they can then say they’ve reduced primary homeless in the CBD. Closing down cheap accommodation is another winner for them as this achieves the same purpose with secondary homelessness. The thing in Light Square will be tokenism to disguise what these demons are really up to. 21 March 2007 Minister for Housing happy with selling off more of the Housing Trust “I think we do pretty well…,” repeated the Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, Jay Weatherill, on ABC radio 891 on 21 March 2007. He was explaining the selling off of 8000 Trust homes over ten years and responding to questions from listeners including a woman who has been on the waiting list for 25 years. 21 March 2007 Green dives for cover John Screen, the predator who preys on people in the homeless scene is laying low more than ever. Perhaps he has heard the rumour that someone is seeking him out to deliver him a Court Summons. Coming soon: the Predator's email where he tries to obtain a further $1600 from a victim after "borrowing" from him over $1000 the previous day. 21 March 2007 Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust Jay Weatherill is sending letters to people saying their tenancies won’t be affected by the Housing Trust sell-off. The problem is he is also sending them to people still on the waiting list. 22 March 2007 Manipulation Tactic Backfires An apparent trick by John Andrew Green, career criminal and Barmera Scam Artist appears to have backfired. He lent $500 to a fighting-fit man living outside then told him that one of his creditors was falsely claiming that the Scam Artist owed the creditor money. The fighting-fit man in gratitude to the Green took a somewhat angry attitude to the creditor, a client at a disabled centre. But the creditor then showed the man the Green's email trying to obtain a further $1600. He also showed him the receipt the Scam Artist provided for the initial $1400, never paid back. The fighting-fit man then realised Green was getting him to do his dirty work where he could end up injured or in court. He is angry with the Scam Artist who now has another person to be worried about. Green picks his targets deviously well. They’re usually elderly, docile or religious and rarely take legal action against him. Others may be too high profile to get involved with murky legal disputes. But has this Barmera Scam Artist’s bubble burst? 22 March 2007 Fred given notice Fred’s Van has been given notice to leave Gawler Courtyard within 12 months. Rumour has it the state government has sold the Education Department building plus Gawler Courtyard and is renting the building back. The courtyard is going to hold a ten-floor hotel according to my source. The Fred’s Van crowd are worried about finding a new location because distributing free food, it seems, requires Council approval. The Adelaide City Council is trying to stop it, of course, or at least relegate it to a remote and dangerous area of the parklands. But those Catholics always have a few tricks up their sleeve. 26 March 2007 Teen Challenge Not There Teen Challenge didn’t turn up at Hindmarsh Square last Thursday so the Jasmin Restaurant crowd had to distribute the chicken burgers. It was a shambles as the queue became a mob. 26 March 2007 Who stole the cookies? John Green from Barmera was seen in the pokies room of the Metropoliian Hotel. Staff are trying to get rid of him. 26 March 2007 "The next Pope" crying wolf. “The next Pope” is threatening to resign, again. One day the Premier may accept his resignation, but not before he has wrung out every drop of credibility “the next Pope” can muster. When David Cappo is as dry as a rag then Rann will say, “bye-bye next Pope”. 4 April 2007 Big Changes? Last night at an outdoor meal for people living outside I couldn’t help but notice that there seemed little change from two years ago. There were the same grim men and women collecting food and preparing for their night in the open. Some were wearing sleeping bags while eating.It was a sad evening. 4 April 2007 John Green Never Sleeps? The Barmera Scam Artist has chosen a new target: a middle-aged gambling man who owns a house. The homeowner was previously a target of a gambling addict/standover man who took thousands from him. But he still owns his house. Rumour has it the Scam Artist has been trying to make himself useful to the homeowner. Once a debt of gratitude has been incurred he may encourage the homeowner to obtain loans on his house and lend the money to the Scam Artist who, of course, won’t pay it back. This behaviour would fit the John Greens personality type. The homeowner has been warned. Bad luck, John. You'll have to find a new target. 4 April 2007 The next Pope's "friends" “I run out of food sometimes and it hurts inside so I drink four quarts of water, telling myself, ‘this is food, this is food’. This works sometimes and other times is doesn’t,” said a man in Rundle Mall last week. He is in his late sixties but doesn't get a pension. 4 April 2007 At a homeless meal "...one lady I often see there was seeing a man stalking her, and kept on going into the Police Station to ask for help. She kept on pointing him out to me, but there was no one there. Another one (an Aboriginal woman) was seeing some strange demons and screaming to them to go away, not far away." Dr "X" Posted 20 April 2007 “I asked him to leave but he continued to take photos.” Greg Calder of Street-to-home in an incident report. Calder was right about the photos but he didn’t ask the man to leave. Rather, he assaulted the man. Calder didn’t identify himself as a government employee, didn’t give his name, didn’t ask the victim to leave. Calder then ran to the Wakefield Street Police Station to lodge a complaint (Report No. 06/C12265) against the man. The police ignored Calder’s complaint not bothering to follow it up. The police recognise the tactic of aggressors running to them claiming they’ve been threatened by the victim. What is bothering Calder? Why is he so paranoid? 20 April 2007 Spending Boost for WestCare The state government has announced over a million dollars for Adelaide CBD homeless. Guess what they’re spending it on: housing, food services, tarpaulins, etc?? No, administration and counselling offices at Westcare. And what will the trade-off be? Will they have to allow Street-to-home to use their premises like Hutt Street Centre; to dilute the trust the church agencies have gained by a hundred years of serving the homeless; destroying that trust in a few years? 20 April 2007 St John's Youth Service Well, the deal sort of went like this: St John’s Youth Service was going to let a woman with four kids currently living in her car move in Chisholm House if she sort of broke up the family temporarily. The two kids, babies, actually, under one-year-old could move in but the other two children had to live with their grandmother, an alcoholic living “knee-deep” in rubbish and recently “fallen off the wagon”. And it couldn’t be right away; it could be maybe in one week. How is that for “social inclusion”? 2 May 2007 Police Clearances “The next Pope” is real keen on all volunteers in the Catholic Church having Police Clearances. So will the volunteers, including seventeen-year-old girls, at Fred’s Van require Police Clearances and training in mandatory reporting? Certainly, Greg Calder, the “short fuse” at Street-to-home should have a Police Clearance. He’s a bit of a risk with that temper. 2 May 2007 Beggars can be Choosers "Could I interest you in a Hi-top?" a charity worker at Fred's Van asked another in mockery of a homeless woman feeling the thawed, formerly frozen bread on offer. Do they think we're deaf? 3 May 2007 Arrested Sexual Development Social workers and Street-to-home types ask personal questions of homeless people applying for housing, seeking recollections of humiliating and compromising situations. The answers are shortened to insulting one-liner clichés to describe clients. These clichés are then used like an insulting shorthand to describe the clients For example, if Monsignor Vicar General "next Pope" David Cappo was homeless they would ask him if he'd ever been married, lived de-facto, always been single. They would describe him thereafter, based on his answers, as having "arrested sexual development". They might even call him "the lustful vicar" and have a good laugh whenever his case was mentioned. His personal details would be shared with many other agencies as part of the MARF procedure. It would be a cruel treatment for a man who chose celibacy and the Catholic faith as an occupation and spiritual journey. Yet when "the next Pope" urges reduced privacy firewalls for homeless people; more intense questioning of them to qualify for housing, well, this is what he is doing to them. He probably believes he is helping them but they'll simply be treated thereafter as a set of humiliating faults and described as if they're not real people. 3 May 2007 John Green Update John Green is lurking about at Hutt Street Centre, 258 Hutt Street, Adelaide. He positions himself on a bench just to the left of the main entrance for clients. This gives him three escape doors in case Creditors arrive. His days are lived planning movement around the City that avoid places where his creditors may be at that time; and telling people his sad story in preparation of asking them for a big "loan". 3 May 2007 The Affordable Housing Trust Whatever happened to the Affordable Housing Trust? Jay Weatherill of Alberton, the Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, doesn't even know how many directors it has; he thinks about eight, but isn't sure. On paper the Affordable Housing Trust exists but appears to be that section of the old Housing Trust that sold properties to tenants. It is little more than an accountant's sleight of hand. The spin doctors encourage him to publish grandiose media releases that Weatherill can't dream up keeping up with. 3 May 2007 Housing Trust 2945 new tenancies were allocated in the last financial year (2005-06). This was down from 3215 from the year before and from 6371 in the 1996-97 financial year. New tenancies in 2005-2006 46.1% were from category 1 23.4% from category 2 30.4% from category 3 The waiting list has dropped from 32,177 in 1997 to 24,016 in 2006 reflecting the futility of applying for housing unless you're Category 1. Waiting List Categories 5.4% on category 1 23.7% on category 2 69.9% are waiting on category 3 The Housing Trust (now Housing SA) owns 45,455 dwellings down from a peak of 63,022 in 1992 the year after the State Bank collapse. 3 May 2007 Feel Me "Feel me," a woman offered at Fred's Van on a rainy night last week. "I'm wet through." It was an unhappy meal under the awning of the corner building though someone said the vegetarian stew was good. All the yoghourt wasn't distributed and a young woman took it back to the van saying they'd save it for a rainy day. One man told her it would go off before they next returned the following Tuesday. He also told her it was raining already. She returned with two slabs which he shared with his close friends. Teen Challenge was really crappy last Thursday: everyone got soaked standing under the wet tree. Teen Challenge hopes to serve the food near the Health Department building next week. A new guy, Derek, was there who serves food in Salisbury. He says clients standing in the queue sometimes fall down when they're hit from behind. The Moore Street Day Centre has resumed its soup van service. 3 May 2007 Doctors not allowed to treat homeless at WestCare A few days previously the Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, Jay Weatherill, announced that Westcare was getting a large part of $2 million to build administrative and counselling offices for homeless people in their welfare complex at Millar’s Court, near Whitmore Square. Westcare wants to run a medical service there and has doctors available who will work for nothing. The Adelaide City Council refuses zoning permission for this type of activity so WestCare can’t provide this service. The reason for the Council decision is that medical services might help and encourage people who are living outside in the City while counselling is designed to ship them out to suburbia. WestCare could ask for support from the Social Inclusion Commission but “the next Pope” also wants to ship the homeless out to suburbia. But “the next Pope” has failed to understand that the “homeless” scene is a cultural entity and dispersing people into outer suburbia often hurts them. 4 May 2007 “A worm.” Someone describing Scam Artist John Green’s method of insinuating himself into someone’s life before obtaining a “loan”. 4 May 2007 That Strange Category 1 Category 1 with MACHA has extended beyond two years while a Case Manager says that one of his clients has been on Category 1 with HousingSA for seven years. Another person says she was told there is a section in the HousingSA Category 1 where you never get a place to live: a special dead-end section of Category 1. MACHA’s has one man waiting for four years though this may be an exception because housing may be delayed for this particular man for organisational political reasons. Street-to-home even has a waiting list except for Glenside Psychiatric Hospital were it’s immediate housing in the forced treatment lock-up ward. One youth worker told me that getting welfare housing depends on who you know in HousingSA and the agencies; not whether you qualify or how long you’ve been waiting. 4 May 2007 We want acid WestCare should put bottles of vinegar on the tables for their Friday Fish and Chips lunch. 4 May 2007 Waiting for bread “Corporate communists, creatures of monopoly…filthy, filthy animals.” A client at WestCare, waiting for the free bread, talking about big corporations. 4 May 2007 MACHA closes its Waiting List The Multi-Agency Community Housing Association that specializes in renting units, flats and houses to homeless people is no longer accepting new people on its waiting list. This might be joyful news to “the next Pope”, David Cappo, who has been trying for years to “starve” the homeless out of Adelaide. But it does look a little strange when so many millions are being spent by the Social Inclusion Commission, “helping the Adelaide CBD homeless”, and the primary homeless housing group closes its waiting list because it has grown too big. Gregory Calder, the “short fuse” at the psychiatric agency, Street-to-home, won’t be too unhappy with this news because Street-to-home has been trying to set up its own section within HousingSA – a sort of psychiatric section where all homeless people will be treated similarly to psychiatric patients. Any problems with MACHA can only help Street-to-home. The negative side of all this is that these fighting bureaucrats will scoop off most of the money for their salaries and perks leaving little to those living outside. 7 May 2007 Sugar Thief John Green from Barmera was caught stealing sugar from the London Tavern in the Myer Centre. He is worried about germs from other people at the Hutt Street HomelessCentre and was stuffing into his pocket the little sachets from the London Tavern. Staff at the Tavern haven’t bothered saying anything to him but they’re on guard if he ever returns there again. 7 May 2007 Social Inclusion Commission Wasting More Resources? Have you ever come across writers who spend decades researching their subject in an attempt to avoid beginning “their book”. They prefer research to actual writing. “The next Pope” displays similar prevarication. He and the Social Inclusion Commission are forever starting new studies on poverty, like that announced yesterday for The Parks area. It is a study about poverty, housing, crime, etc. More money wasted on another study instead of using it to improve the lives of the poorest people. It’s bureaucrats wasting resources doing more studies; recommending more changes that don’t happen. What is the point of beginning new studies when the old studies haven’t been acted on. Nothing has improved for those living outside in the Adelaide CBD? 8 May 2007 The Most Dangerous Part of Adelaide A woman threw a cup of coffee into the face of an older man at Fred’s Van. The older man was telling someone else that the fruit was being distributed and she thought she was insulting her when he held up a banana. Her “husband” got involved but after a shouting match everything settled down. A ploy of thugs at Fred’s Van is to threaten someone till they leave then follow that person until there aren’t many witnesses and then attack and rob the person. The police are totally useless and deliberately avoid protecting people in the homeless scene; they consider that being around a place like Fred’s Van is the same as “asking for it”. Many people avoid Fred’s Van from fear of violence. Just like the man being “stomped on” outside the Wakefield Street Police Station yesterday while police inside wouldn’t come outside to that man’s rescue. Police Commissioner, Malcolm Hyde muttered something about the police being willing to rescue the man being stomped on but thought the patrol could do better. A lot can happen in that few seconds when you’re being beaten up and even a one-minute delay can result in extra injuries that may take months, evenyears to heal. What is that dope Hyde on? He’s better suited to working for an advertising agency than as a police commissioner. Gawler Courtyard, where Fred’s Van operates, is the most dangerous single spot in Adelaide yet is just 85 paces from the front of the Wakefield Street Police Station. It could just as well me on the moon. And what is that moron, Cappo, “the next Pope” doing about it? He’s grabbed all that power and money yet apart from grandstanding in the media does nothing about getting the police to actually protect people from violence at Fred’s Van and in the parks generally. 10 May 2007 Angry Red-haired police officer A red-haired police officer forced a formerly homeless man into his car and drove him home. Why? The man was sitting under a tree in the parklands and the officer claimed he might be "looking at children". The man said he wasn't, doesn't have any criminal record and says that some police officers are "bad". The man is a Disability Support Pensioner. Police would never dare do this with anyone with social standing. Is this "Social Inclusion"? 14 May 2007 Delayed medical treatment A 47 year old man had to rest on the way to the Friday lunch at WestCare, (fish and chips, $2), because of stones in his left kidney. He's had them for two and a half years and they are causing damage to his kidney. He's on the Royal Adelaide Hospital waiting list for ultrasound treatment then, if necessary, surgery. He says the stones are causing damage to his kidney according to doctors. RAH won’t say when he might expect treatment. Is this social inclusion? 14 May 2007 Eight-dollar haircuts Hercules, the hairdresser at the Greek club next to the Stag Hotel on the corner of Whitmore Square and Morphett Street charges $8 for pensioners. 14 May 2007 The Naked Chef "Jamie Oliver owes me sixty-dollars," said a man at the Otherway Centre. He was referring to the celebrity Chef and Author. 14 May 2007 Fantasy and Depression as Protection "I lived in the same house with Fleetwood Mac in the seventies on the Gold Coast," said a formerly homeless man at the Senior's Information Service. "I emailed Stevie Nicks when she visited Melbourne and asked why she didn't send me some money for clothes and air tickets so we could meet?" Living on the streets can destroy a person's sanity so many resort to fantasy for protection. It works. It saves their sanity, but not everyone in the homeless industry appreciates this self-protective technique. Those idiot bureaucrats want to break down protective fantasies and leave the homeless person vulnerable to injury. 14 May 2007 "I don't like Rice Religion," said a man at Fred's Van last Thursday. He was commenting about the religious talk at the Teen Challenge meal on Thursdays in Hindmarsh Square. 14 May 2007 The former Editor of this column reports: Saw John Green on Friday in the Grote Street Library. He seemed disinclined to bring up the subject of that one-week loan he made from me last October, 2006 for $1400. He claimed at the time he was buying a car for his "boy" and couldn’t access his term account in time. It turned out the term account and the car never existed. There is also some doubt about “his boy”. It is in the public record that John Andrew Green has been convicted in Australian courts 26 times for fraud and forgery. Green's targets anyone but has recently obtained never-to-be-repaid-loans from people working in Adelaide's homeless scene. He uses library computers to contact people in homeless forums then meets them in person. Kevin Naughton, a journalist and Chief of Staff of Adelaide's Sunday Mail newspaper, (circulation about 250,000) can confirm Green's fraud convictions. 14 May 2007 Something fishy about MACHA closing its books. MACHA (Multi-Agency Community Housing Association) recently closed its waiting list because, so they claim, over one-hundred people are on this list. They say it has become too big. Yet when I signed up with MACHA four years ago it had 79 on its list. So one-hundred isn't much more especially when one considers that many are evictees from Afton house, currently undergoing renovation. MACHA's other rooming housing, East Park Lodge, should have absorbed a number of the Afton evictees, having laid mostly empty for over a year. But MACHA closing their books seems a little like a political action. MACHA, formed by various church based homeless agencies, is at war with the Social Inclusion Commission and Street-to-home. These latter groups want to exert more control over formerly homeless tenants and force them into "treatment" and send them to outer suburbia. The real problem is that MACHA has just two-hundred properties. They are the rubbish properties dumped by HousingSA, according to one church person. And they can't get any more because the Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, Jay Weatherill, is selling 16 HousingSA properties a week. Is this Social Inclusion? 14 may 2007 Long live the Revolution “Corporate communists; creatures of monopoly; filthy, filthy animals.” Man at Westcare’s $2 lunch talking about corporate managers. 16 May 2007 Is MACHA’s category 2 waiting list dead; is it merely a decoration using human mannequins? 16 May 2007 Insurance Companies Fred's Van is held outside because then they aren't liable for injuries if someone gets beaten up. If held in a building then an innocent client beaten up could claim damages on public liability insurance. 21 May 2007 "Like he's on medication." A description of the "short fuse", Greg Calder, in the presence of his little boss, John Forward. 21 May 2007 A precursor of "homelessness" “Alienation at its most essential level is not poverty or unemployment. It is the inability to imagine your society and therefore to imagine yourself in it.” John Ralston Saul, On Equilibrium Dominick gets a nasty letter Dominick, who used to be the man in the little office in the now demolished toilet block in Hindmarsh Square, showed me a letter HousingSA sent him saying they’d kick him out if he didn’t stop shouting at a “female visitor”. The visitor is a long-time friend suffering from depression. The interesting part of the letter is the term, “female visitor”. It reminds one of “gents only” rooming houses where you could get kicked out for having a “female visitor”. Is HousingSA going back to the “good old days”. It should be noted that 90% of public housing tenants are “single”. 22 May 2007 Social Inclusion? One of those fantastic self-cleaning toilets in Victoria Square has had water in it for weeks, according to a city resident. Humiliating, dirty toilets are part of government plans to exclude people from parks. Not exactly social inclusion, rather more like “Social Inclusion”. 22 May 2007 Afton House Workers were dragging stained mattresses and filthy furniture from Afton House this afternoon in the rain. Perhaps they should continue their work at Hutt Street Centre and drag out some of their old furniture. You need to wash your clothing just after sitting on some of it. Rumour has it that most of those who have recently been evicted from Afton House, due to the renovations, won’t be allowed back in when the improvements are finished. One reason put forward is that many won’t submit to new “control orders”, aka “rehabilitation”. Another is that the lengthy renovation will be used as a trick to force ex-residents into outer suburbia. They haven't been told, of course. 22 May 2007 Downer's Clone? Andrew Grant of Street-to-home was seen on the corner of Bentham and Pirie Streets waving his ID badge. The only words that formed in my mind upon seeing him were, “Alexander Downer” and “cosmetic surgery gone wrong”. 24 May 2007 "Domestic" on flight Remember the homeless woman, Donna, who was having a terrible time living outside. She recently went to Sydney with her “boyfriend” but they had a ferocious “domestic” on the plane and he was arrested. She has stopped drinking and her weight is down to 48kg because she got much of her kilojoule intake from alcohol. I hope she emerges alive. 24 May 2007 Bureau of Statistics The Australian Bureau of Statistics still won’t explain how they compiled the Adelaide CBD primary homeless statistics for Census 2006. One source suggests Street-to-home played a part, which might compromise the data because they’re a psychiatric agency that needs to show that homelessness is decreasing due to their efforts. Also, people living outside are wary of an agency that often sends them to psychiatric hospitals and might have avoided the census because of that. One veteran in the homeless scene said the stats for Census2006 were collected differently from Census2001 so the results can't be compared. He said it will take the Census2011 stats compared to the Census 2006 stats to show whether the number living outside has decreased or not. Won't "the next Pope" and the "short fuse" just love this. They won't be accountable until 2012 when the results of Census2011 are collated and published. 24 May 2007 Dot Casey Dot Casey of HousingSA is said to be on sick leave. She is valued by those living outside. 24 May 2007 Two sources report John Green back at Byron Place Community Centre, Byron Place, Adelaide.. This is surprising considering that one of his creditors, Ian, is a long-term volunteer there on Friday mornings. Ian delivers the top quality day-old bread and buns, and toasts and butters them. Maybe John will make his visits Mondays to Thursdays to avoid Ian. One source says John has borrowed money there from another person named Matt. 28 May 2007 Rumour has it that some in the homeless industry are unhappy that Jo Wickes is getting all the publicity in the City Messenger, especially Jo's flattering head-only photos. 28 May 2007 Fast Finish The clients disappeared from Fed's Van before the volunteers packed up. The reason was that Clem was in town and in an exictable mood and calling other men, "Prissy". Even Gary shot through early. 28 May 2007 "Cock," Gary Rankine, to a well-wisher at Fred's Van. 28 May 2007 Casey at the Bat? Dot Casey of HousingSA in Flinders Street is off on extended sick leave until 14 June. One staff member says she takes on too big a work load. Dot specialises in finding housing for people living outside. Let’s hope she recovers quickly or takes on a lighter work load. Some of those sods in the Port Adelaide HousingSA office are just the opposite of Dot Casey. Juanita at Flinder's Street is taking Dot’s case load, well, trying to, anyway. 29 May 2007 Diabetes is a killer, Warren. Start eating better food, drink more water, and exercise Warren, who used to do the Teen Challenge meal at Hindmarsh Square, is down with diabetes and rumour has it that he is not treating it as seriously as he should. He doesn’t realise it is deadly. 29 May 2007 Anatomy of a Scam Attack Here is a link to John Green’s emails as he tries to get more money from someone who lent him $1400. Other emails show how he avoided repaying the “one-week loan”. 29 May 2007 Mechanics Beware Rangi, of Teen Challenge, is working at St Lukes in Whitmore Square. Be careful you don’t tell him if you’re a mechanic: He’ll want you to fix his car. Pretend to be toally incompetent. 29 May 2007 Cheap Razors “Hey, Buddy, want to buy some razors?” said that blue-eyed, fat man who chain smokes and begs money outside the Central Markets. 29 May 2007 Executive Material Gary Wilson, of ShelterSA, has had a haircut and beard trim. He looks like a real executive, now. 29 May 2007 Some guy tried to steal another man’s backpack at Fred’s Van last night. He was confronted but claimed it was his then backed down and handed it back. One must never forget that Gawler Court is full of desperadoes. 29 May 2007 Centrelink Darren Matson of Centrelink in Currie Street, Adelaide needs to do a refresher course in income declaration and deeming. He got it all wrong with me. What a stuff-up. 29 May 2007 Psychological Damage One might consider whether those social workers/housing advocates suffer inner damage by spending their days trying to establish rapport with the clients then when the client discloses sensitive history the social worker gets him or her to sign a privacy release form and spreads these personal details to other agencies, other strangers. There must be some inner guilt built up by this behaviour that resembles betrayal. 30 May 2007 Incident at Chat’n’Chew A twelve-year-old boy arrived with a male neighbour at the UnitingCare Wesley Port Adelaide free meal back of the Family Centre situated on Dale Street, Port Adelaide. It was 5pm on Wednesday, 16 May 2007 and the food was being served. The customers were mostly those suffering “mental illness” and/or epilepsy, and some diners were carers and friends of the above. The female social workers became very worried and demanded the boy go home with them because he might be in a dangerous environment. They called the police and, after a few threats, the boy went home with the police who dropped him off at his front door and said he could do whatever he wanted. The social workers took the names of some people sitting at the same table as the boy and put them in their child molester files and might even have given them to the police. At the next Chat’n’Chew meal two weeks later the boss social worker, in charge at the previous meal, was absent. There had been some argument with management about the behaviour of the female social workers because the clients, mostly psychiatric patients, had been treated as a threat to a twelve-year-old boy, especially the neighbour who said the boy had followed him there. One social worker implied the neighbour was guilty because she smelled alcohol on his breath. Thus the clients had all been stigmatised as being unfit to be around a twelve-year-old boy because of their psychiatric condition or, because they were friends of people suffering mental illness. This contradicts UnitingCare Wesley Port Adelaide policy that says psychiatric patients aren’t dangerous people and should be treated with respect. No formal or informal apology has been offered to the diners at the meal and probably won’t be. 31 May 2007 Kidney Stones The man with kidney stones was feeding the pigeons with old bread in Victoria Square this morning. He got rained on and vomited his pain medication. By the time he got to WestCare he was in too much pain to stay for the meal. We suggested he catch an ambulance to the hospital but he said they just told him to leave. He’s on a waiting list for treatment but there is no estimation of the time he’ll have to wait. “If you have money you go to a private hospital and they operate right away,” he told us. Is this social inclusion or is it “Social Inclusion”? 1 June 2007 Homeless Politics A thirty-two-year-old-man got two used quilts from Fred’s Van last night. He didn’t know where he was going to sleep but was amazed that so many diners weren’t homeless. I told him that services for the homeless generally go to people who aren’t homeless rather than those who are. An example is MACHA’s East Park Lodge being kept nearly empty for a year while many lived outside. Then when the Afton House people were told to leave they moved to East Park. The primary homeless living under the stars (and clouds) were sleeping on the ground then and are still doing so. 1 June 2007 The curry with rice wasn’t heated up enough at Fred’s Van last night. “Steve”, the guy who wears shorts in winter was the first to observe this though he said the sweet flavour was interesting. 1 June 2007 A Prancin and a Dancin I wonder if "the next Pope", David Cappo, ever wonders if he's simply being used by Media Mike Rann, for political and publicity reasons, to cover up the fact that the government is continually reducing cheap public housing for those at risk of "homelessness". The Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, Jay Weatherill, looks sicker every day, maybe from having to maintain the big lie. Everything good in him must be screaming out that this deceit must stop. 1 June 2007 Jill and Dominick strike again Jill and Dominick from Fred's Van were pleased with themselves on Friday after spending five hours eating at the Pullman smorgasbord in the Adelaide Casino. "I eat very slowly," a smiling Dominick tells me somewhat unconvincingly as he heads to the bar for the one-dollar beer. Later they sit together on those new leather chairs watching Friday night football and wait for the free pies at half-time. On a sadder note, Barmera's Biggest Loser, John Green was seen at the Roulette-on-computer table at the Casino last Wednesday, 30 May from 8-11pm. He was, as usual, pouring his fortnight's Centrelink money down the drain before retreating to his outdoor squat. He'll spend the rest of the fortnight crying poverty and trying to obtain large amounts of cash from people saying it is to support his "sons". Maybe a true story, if he has "sons" and they're named roulette, pokie and baccarat. 5 June 2007 A acute shamanist observer of the weather stopped me on North Terrace and said that the drought had been caused by the Minister for Destroying the Housing Trust, Jay Weather-ill. 5 June 2007 Has he got a deal for you An elderly gentleman told us at the Hare Krishna meal in Hurtle Square that someone was using his name to register cars and he wanted me to grab one of the cars, worth about $20k. Then he would sell it for parts and share the profit with me. 5 June 2007 Gambling Addict Spotted at Fred's Van John Green was seen at Fred’s Van in Gawler Place on Sunday evening, 3 June 2007. Those living outside are wise to his scam tricks to obtain their welfare money. Of some concern are the Fred’s Van volunteers who are often elderly, with some assets and with a sentiment of wanting to help other people. They may be vulnerable to Green’s scam talk of wanting money to visit a “family re-union” or “to bring my kids down from Darwin” (when they already live in Adelaide), or to buy a car for an estranged “son”. Green is from a Catholic family in Barmera and knows what “buttons” to push with elderly Catholic volunteers at Fred’s Van though he isn’t fussy – anyone with money is okay. 7 June 2007 Sandra Kanck speaks in Parliament "... I have had drawn to my attention a number of recent examples, but one in particular is of a grandmother who was caring for her three grandchildren in the Housing SA home of her daughter and partner. The daughter and partner both had drug dependence. The daughter's partner, who was the leaseholder, was in prison, came out, took drugs and died apparently of an overdose. As a result, the grandmother was removed from the house by six police officers and thrown on to the street. She had kept up all the rent payments during the time the leaseholder was imprisoned. So, a family dealing with the issues of drug abuse and death are now also dealing with issues of homelessness. Unfortunately, this case is far from unusual..." Is this "social inclusion?" posted 7 June 2007 “Never got a reply,” Sandra Kanck, Upper House Democrat MP responding to my question whether the government answered her questions asked in parliament one year ago about the expenses of the Social Inclusion Commission. The former Editor of this column wanted to know how much of the $4million annual budget of the homeless section of the Social Inclusion Commission went to salaries, air travel, hotels, hosting experts here, office expenses, etc. For example, how much was spent for the various homeless and social inclusion experts to visit Australia and what was the practical result for those living outside in the Adelaide CBD; how much was spent on "the next Pope's" trips abroad; who pays for David Waterford's Listerine; how much was spent on regional members of the board of the Social Inclusion Commission to visit Adelaide for meetings (what hotels were used and how much was their food and entertainment expenses); how much are Board Member's paid; how many employment positions are dedicated to the "homeless component" of the Social Inclusion Board and how much do they cost; how much for operating the office; how much was spent on photographers to capture shots of "the next Pope" for promotional material, how much was spent on printing; how much on car expenses; were any bodyguards hired when "the next Pope" did his Christmas routine at homeless centres (and if bodyguards were present then who paid for them); how much was spent on the Social Inclusion website; what other expenses were there? Of all the above expenses precisely what precise benefit did those living outside in the Adelaide CBD and surrounding parklands receive. And has "homelessness" in the Adelaide city area gone down since this money was spent? 7 June 2007 Social Inclusion and Kidney Stones The man at Westcare was complaining; he's got kidney stones and matter-of-factly said he woke up last night at midnight vomiting and couldn’t sleep until 5am from pain. He’s on the RAH waiting list for treatment but hasn’t a clue when he’ll be “called up”. Two years ago he developed the problem but was misdiagnosed with nerves and then muscle pain and finally kidney stones. “If I had $10,000 I’d get treatment right away,” he said without a hint of cynicism. A church worker at WestCare said he didn't know the man very well but he'd been paying for lunch for six years and was always polite and doesn't use drugs. 12 June 2007 Organ Donation Another man at WestCare said that the Royal Adelaide Hospital gives him the creeps because it’s, “organ donation, organ donation, organ donation propaganda”. 12 June 2007 Dirty Jokes Dominick and Jill were at the free comedy performance at the Casino last night. Dominick complained to the Action Desk that there were too many dirty jokes being told. The Action Desk woman said people liked dirty jokes and that they were going to make them even dirtier. 12 June 2007 Someone Shot Through A heap of old clothes arrived at WestCare for their free clothing room. Some good stuff. So much they had to put some boxes out in the main hall. I got a good summer hat. The old guy from Bohemia got a good winter jacket. The guy with kidney stones was in too much pain to be interested. He even gave away his bread for the pigeons because he was too sick. He gave it to the guy who just took a doctor’s pill and his stomach was burning and he had to eat some bread right away to kill the pain. 12 June 2007 Down the Drain with John Green Barmera fraudster, John Green, was seen at the Metropolitan Hotel near the Central Markets on Tuesday, 5 June. He was playing the Geisha pokies machine. He was losing, of course, as always though it isn't known whose money he was losing. 12 June 2007 Thanks to everyone who provides these updates. I’m stuck in a small room and don’t get out much these days. 13 June 2007 Iron Fence for Hutt Street Centre Rumour has it that Hutt Street Centre is putting up a high iron fence to stop patrons from sitting on the verandah because richer people walking by are offended by their presence. There isn’t any word if those expensive cafes in Hutt Street will be asked to push their fat clients back inside the cafe buildings in case hungry homeless people might be offended by the luxury experienced by the café customers compared to their own material existence. 13 June 2007 Royalties for Media Stars I wonder if the two men whose images appear on the wall of the HousingSA office in Flinders' Street get royalties. 14 June 2007 “I wonder who will be next.” “J” asked our table at the WestCare Fish and Chips lunch today. We were talking about his friend with leukaemia who has moved in the Mary Potter Hospice. Also, Brett Grant, the unpaid worker in Hutt Street who died of apparent hypothermia while sleeping near Pulteney Grammar school. 15 June 2007 Foreign Material? “What’s all this black crap in the custard,” asked a patron at the same meal. I picked one without black crap in it, I laughed. “Look, again, said Gideon at the next table. He was right. My custard had black crap in it, too. 15 June 2007 Our former Editor reports “Rose”, an employee in Centrelink in Currrie Street wouldn’t accept some stuff from me because it was written in pencil and would give me a stamped copy as a receipt. I said, “Well, I’m leaving it here. You can toss it in the rubbish if you want.” She raised the pitch of her voice and replied, “Fine,” and made a gesture towards the floor as I walked out. She passed it on to another person in the office though I still phoned the Centrelink Complaints Hotline and told them they are too petty. 15 June 2007 Unwelcome well-intentioned Guests Seven police stormed the Teen Challenge meal at Hindmarsh Square: four men, one with arthritis, and three women, one with a charged camera and pants that pushed her buttocks upwards and outwards. The arthritis man said it was a PR exercise though it cast a gloom over the meal. To be fair there was already some gloom from people who were going to be sleeping out that night. One guy was sick. The police were at Fred’s Van, too. Someone said it was because someone got beaten up at 5pm that day at Gawler Court. One police detective, (the woman who looks like she’s on a mission for the Jehovah’s Witnesses), said they wanted to know if there we knew of any standover merchants threatening people living outside. She asked if I minded telling her my name. I said I did mind it and didn’t tell her. Heidi told the police her life story about her family losing their home in Germany after the war and also about her no-good ex-husband. It was a real gloomy meal, also, because even though the police were trying to help, almost everyone is suspicious of them especially after that person was beaten up in front of the Flinders Street Police Station and the police wouldn't come out of the station. 15 June 2007 Thanks, Norm, for the above. “I call him John Greed. I respect the word “Green” too much.” A former friend talking about the Barmera Scam Artist. 15 June 2007 Show Case Housing "A high-level support group has come together to raise $5 million in private support to match the State's $5 million pledge." Does this quote from "Smart Moves" by Rosanne Haggerty sound beautiful? The support group raised $5 million. Wow, what generosity. What isn't clear is whether the $5 million in private support was a donation or an investment. And was the government's $5 million a donation to the land developers like Theo Maras? Those sleazy politicians, like "the next Pope", at the Social Inclusion Commission, won't answer questions like the above. 15 June 2007 “Oh, God, no, that would be criminal.” An employee at the Bureau of Statistics on whether Street-to-home (Manager: Greg Calder), got access to the completed homeless Census2006 forms filled in by people living outside then used this information to build the Street-to-home dossier list on “homeless” people. 15 June 2007 The New Game "…identifying the chronically homeless and requiring that all placements into government-assisted housing be drawn from this prioritised list until all are housed…" From "Smart Moves" by Rosanne Haggerty and published by the South Australian Government. This is what "the next Pope" has been talking about for years. "Smart Moves" was published in January 2007. In June 2007 this still hasn't been implemented. A few people who are classed as "primary homeless" and others "at risk of homelessness" have still not got rental housing because it is still going to Category 2 and 3 people on the HousingSA waiting list. There is resistance to the "the next Pope's" desires because the number of "homeless" in South Australia could absorb the total allocation of government housing to people on Category 2 and 3. The government could no longer maintain the lie that those waiting on Category 2 and 3 had any chance of obtaining government housing. Therefore, don't expect "homelessness" numbers to change very much. 15 June 2007 "37" "A total of 37 rough sleepers were found." From "Smart Moves" by Rosanne Haggerty, a New York real estate agent hired for a reputed $250,000 as "Thinker in Residence". Haggerty said she, Street-to-home, and some university students went around counting people sleeping outside last winter and found 37. So if there were just 37 people sleeping outside in the Adelaide CBD in 2006 then Census 2006 results published this year should show a similar number. But everyone I've spoken to who is employed in the homeless scene says there are many more than this. One source said rough sleepers counted in 2006 for the Census were 135 so to keep the official numbers lower the Bureau of Statistics will need to either doctor-up or, rather, doctor-down the numbers to make the Social Inclusion Commission look good. 15 June 2007 New York Real Estate Agent Threatens Homeless Centres? "They must now face the possibility that their jobs, and the future of the organizations in which they work, are at stake." From "Smart Moves" by Rosanne Haggerty, and published by the South Australian Government. P 26 Ian Cox of Hutt Street Centre feels the heat of this little threat from the Social Inclusion Commission. His church boss, "the next Pope", David Cappo, won't help retain Hutt Street Centre's independence and the nuns have been shipped out and are mostly retired. There is also that pesky rumour of the Hutt Street Centre being bulldozed, and replaced with a block of units for homeless people and with government welfare offices and a checkpoint at the front door. Ian might be retained if he switches sides, so to speak. Let's hope the rumour has no foundation. The fact that the Social Inclusion Commission's favourite psychiatric agency, Street-to-home has open access to client files is an ominous sign. 18 June 2007 Don't Unpack Your Bags? "…transitional residences such as Afton House…" From "Smart Moves" by Rosanne Haggerty, and published by the South Australian Government. So much for the housing security of those people who were living in Afton House. Many are under the impression they will be moving back to live there permanently once the renovations are completed. They're now in various temporary housing and may move back to Afton, but only temporarily then they'll be shipped off to somewhere else where they will be "assertively managed" or, if they don't play the game, back on the streets. 18 June 2007 Thanks to the young woman who snuck up on me in Hindley Street last Thursday night and gave me a copy of "Smart Moves" witten, perhaps, by David "Listerine" Waterford in the State Administration Centre, under the name of Rosanne Haggerty. 19 June 2007 Artists to the Rescue? The government of South Australia continuously suggests that large renovated apartment blocks will house artists and homeless people. This doesn't sound realistic. Most artists I've come across hate homeless people, mental patients, ex-crims. Most artists are middle and upper class people. Spectrum, an off-shoot of the old Housing Trust, put African refugees and foreign students into housing developments with ex-psychiatric patients. It didn't work well at all. The Writers' Centre in Adelaide has for decades actively discouraged underclass writers from using the place. It is true that crims, psychiatric patients and homeless people are the most interesting people in the world, and that artists use these people as models. But living near them? Hardly, the upper-crust artists use them as fodder then shoot back to their more comfortable abodes. "The next Pope" may get around this problem by reclassifying some underclass and "homeless" people as artists then claim, yes, artists are happy to live in the same building with "homeless style" people. 19 June 2007 All you can Eat “Sir, would you like to view our menu: barbecue meals, all you can eat for $28.00.” A spruiker on Gouger Street, Adelaide speaking to a man going to Hurtle Square for Moore Street Day Centre soup van. 20 June 2007 Rainy Night Blues They forgot the sausages and went back for them: it took thirty minutes. The spaghetti soup was burnt on the bottom giving the whole lot a burnt taste. 22 June 2007 That thin fellow who was charged with encouraging his pit bull terriers to attack someone on the parklands is back with another dog. First he replaced the two adults with a puppy pit bull terrier but someone stole it. Last night he was at Fred’s Van with a Queensland Blue Healer puppy. “What sort of person would steal someone’s dog,” he asked us. 22 June 2007 Who is the Social Inclusion Board? Three academics and four public servants and “the next Pope”. No one from the church-based agencies that actually have everyday experience with people living outside. The Board consists of Bettina Cass; Kerry Colbung; Bill Cossey; Graeme Hugo; Alwyn McKenzie; Mary Patetsos; Tanya Smith and “the next Pope”. 22 June 2007 The Great Stake-Out The police staked out Gawler Court on the weekend especially during the Fred’s Van hours. One officer was hiding in his unmarked car but when the Coastlands food van arrived it smashed into the police car. 27 June 2007 Recipe Section Coming Soon…Cappo’s Crazy Recipe of the Week. 27 June 2007 Community Groups Losing Funding The Disability and Information Resource Centre has lost $100,000 in funding from the State Government, according to one source. This is said to be “50% of the budget”. The Aquatic Centre has lost funding for much of its youth swimming training. A whole range of other organisations have lost funding. Meanwhile, millions will be spent on “showcase” projects for homeless people, like that Light Square thing. “The next Pope” is saying he will be visiting homeless centres to help them “”rejig” their services. In Social Inclusion NewSpeak this usually means replacing people who provide basic services to those living outside with bureaucrats who withdraw these services unless a person complies with “rehabilitation”, which usually means sacrificing privacy rights (allowing bureaucrats to get information from anyone at all about you), agreeing to use psychiatric drugs, and “counseling.” It’s a bit like the “starve them out” tactic in which those who don’t conform will find life living outside even harder than it is presently. Of course, “the next Pope” could explain precisely what he means but such frank speech is beyond this type of snake. 29 June 2007 Teen Challenge Hindmarsh Square Meal Moves to old RAA building in Grenfell Street. Teen Challenge was kicked out of the area in Hindmarsh Square, outside the building where Eric Gassy did his work. Either the bureaucrats or landlord pressured the Council to pressure the Jasmin Restaurant who gave Teen Challenge the hard word who told us that food would now be served outside the old RAA building in the dark. It is at 5:30pm on Thursdays. 29 June 2007 Two Black Eyes The man who got two black eyes and busted facial bones at Fred’s Van last week says two men jumped him. One later came back to nail him further but ***** says he got him back good. The other guy is still “walking around”, but not for long, another source says. ***** will undergo surgery, he says, next week, for facial re-alignment. 29 June 2007 King Canute “How dare you insult your betters and elders,” shouted a man looking skyward outside WestCare on Friday, just before lunch, to the cloudburst sky. 29 June 2007 Green hiding John Green has either been kicked off the dole or suffered reduced payments for not meeting Centrelink’s Activity Agreement. This usually means not doing work for the dole or looking for work. His Personal Support Program Case Manager has advised him to plead insanity and go on a Pension. Green is also avoiding the Central Markets when Kevin Norton, Chief of Staff at the Sunday Mail, is there drinking coffee. Kevin says Green cheated him of lots of money some years back when they met in Darwin. 29 June 2007 Million Dollar Writers Centre woman Barbara Mcfadyen, aka Barbara Wiesner, is celebrating receiving over a million dollars while being a non-writing employee of the South Australian Writers Centre in Rundle Street. She has earned more than most famous published Australian novelists during the same period. There must be a lesson here. 29 June 2007 |
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