FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 29, 2009
Contact: Jacob Horwitz – 5044529159
Low-Income Residents Sue Housing Authority of New Orleans
Residents Haul HANO To Court for “Corruption and Neglect,” Demand Meeting With HUD Secretary
September 29, 2009 – Low income residents sued the Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) today in a major blow against HANO Commissioner Diane Johnson. Residents claimed the agency operates with “mis-management, corruption, and neglect,” and simultaneously demanded a meeting with Obama appointed HUD Secretary Shawn Donovan.
The lawsuit, brought by the organization STAND and its members, uses HANO’s violation of the Louisiana Public Records Law to expose the harm HANO has done to low-income and displaced residents who are locked out of affordable housing in New Orleans.
“The community has suffered serious harm, and wants to be made whole,” said Tamar McFarlane, lead organizer of STAND. “The mothers and children on the streets and the seniors without housing are tired of suffering the consequences of HANO’s mis-management, corruption, and neglect. Starting today, HANO will face consequences for the harm they have done.”
The petition for writ of mandamus, submitted by STAND and its members to the Civil District Court today, asserts that HANO’s shameful failures of public service “harm the most vulnerable residents of this community-low-income renters, low-wage workers, struggling families, seniors, and homeowners who want to rent to low-income families as a means of supporting the right to return.”
The court action comes after HANO’s long refusal to be monitored by, or accountable to, community members in need of affordable housing. The Louisiana Public Records Law requires that government agencies allow the public to examine public records, usually within five days of when the request was made. STAND requested basic information from HANO chief Diane Johnson on July 15, 2009 – information as basic as Johnson’s job description – in an attempt to monitor and participate in the process to open up Section 8 and affordable housing units in the city. Despite numerous attempts to obtain it, HANO never provided the information as required by law.
“We weren’t asking Diane Johnson for anything we couldn’t have,” said Talbert Haywood, plaintiff in the case. “Our questions for Diane Johnson were simple: what’s your job description? How many affordable units are available? What is the plan to introduce new affordable units?” Haywood and others followed up on requests, going as far as to protest, but they got no answers. Haywood is a resident of the lower Ninth Ward and is now homeless and in need of a Section 8 voucher to afford stable and decent housing. “HANO has no answers for the community, and as a result I’m going from shelter to shelter, and sleeping in the streets,” said Haywood.
Many speculate that HANO’s failure to respond to simple requests for documents is an indication that they have even more to hide. “They’re covering up,” said Ali Shabaz, a member of STAND.
“The information STAND asked for, any honest person in office would give it to us. It’s the responsibility of a public official to share public information when the public asks for it. The only reason not to give it to us is that they have something to hide–even more to hide than we thought.”
“There’s more Section 8 theft, sweetheart deals, Miami mansions and Mercedez Benzes than we are even aware off. Diane Johnson has been sitting on the tip of the iceberg – and she knows what’s underneath. The people of New Orleans have no faith in her or HANO,” said Shabaz.
Hundreds gathered in front of the courthouse to celebrate the legal action against HANO, even as the housing crisis continued to be excruciating for residents of New Orleans. “When HANO fails low-income residents, we all suffer,” said Merline Kimble, a plaintiff in the lawsuit. Ms. Kimble, a community worker and homeowner in the Treme area, rents to low-income residents. She has not been able to have a steady income because of HANO’s refusal to reopen Section 8. Without steady income from low-income renters, she is on the verge of losing her house.
Residents gathered outside the courthouse and demanded a meeting with Obama-appointed HUD (Housing and Urban Development) secretary Shaun Donovan. “We were promised real investment by the Obama Administration,” said McFarlane. “In appointing Donovan, President Obama promised that he would invest in affordable housing, but residents of New Orleans have not seen that investment. Instead, low-income residents are still suffering from neglect and abandonment. Donovan must meet with us to demonstrate that he is committed to New Orleanians having a home.”
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: SAKET SONI
504 881 6610
AS U.S. SENATORS INTRODUCE FEDERAL LEGISLATION ON DETENTION STANDARDS, DETAINEE REPORT REVEALS GROSS VIOLATIONS IN LOUISIANA ICE JAIL
New report contradicts Obama Administration on detention standards, as hunger strikers and human rights monitors in ICE jail face aggressive retaliation.
July 30, 2009 – Just as U.S. Senators set out introduce new federal legislation governing minimum standards in immigration detention today, detainees and their advocates released a damning report on real-time detention conditions in Basile, Louisiana.
“Detention and Human Rights Under the Obama Administration” features the most contemporary account available on current detention conditions in any Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facility. The report was compiled from the first-hand accounts of over 100 of detainees who have acted as human rights monitors in the last one month, recording and reporting violations in the facility.
The report reveals that the isolated, privately run ICE detention center is failing ICE’s own minimum standards for detention. It is being released the same day as Senators Robert Menendez (D-NY) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) introduce the Strong STANDARDS Act (Safe Treatment, Avoiding Needless Deaths, and Abuse Reduction in the Detention System).
“We applaud Senators Menendez and Gillbrant on their leadership. While they introduce this bill on detention standards, detainees in Louisiana are facing solitary confinement in Louisiana for monitoring detention conditions and speaking out,” said Saket Soni, Director of the New Orleans Workers’ Center for Racial Justice. “The detainees’ accounts in this report make it clear that the present detention system is a human rights disaster.”
The report comes just three days after the Obama Administration rejected a federal court petition calling for legally enforceable detention standards. On Monday, the Department of Homeland Security refused to acknowledge the need for change in the detention system. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claimed that the Bush-era inspections and monitoring systems, run by private contractors, “provide adequately for both quality control and accountability.”
Detainees themselves disagreed. “Anyone who says there is quality and accountability in ICE jails should spend a week in Basile, Louisiana,” said Joaquin Ruiz, a detainee who acted as a human rights monitor in the ICE facility.
The report compiles the accounts of Ruiz and over a hundred other detainees. The data demonstrates that ICE failed its own detention standards governing medical care, religious practice, and access to legal information.
Copies of the report are available upon request. To request a copy of the report please email saketsoni@hotmail.com.
A detainee is available to speak to press.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Saket Soni
504 881 6610
DETAINEES CONTINUE HUNGER STRIKE IN LOUISIANA ICE JAIL AS US REJECTS CALL FOR DETENTION STANDARDS
New report on most current conditions in Louisiana facility to contradict Homeland Security’s position on detention standards.
Basile, LA – Even as the Obama Administration refused to acknowledge the need for legally enforceable standards for immigration detention this week, over 60 detainees in a Louisiana Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facility entered their second day of a hunger strike to protest inhuman conditions.
The hunger strike was launched a day after the Department of Homeland Security rejected a federal court petition by former detainees and their families, deciding instead to continue a Bush-era system that reports have found insufficient. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claims that the current inspections and monitoring systems run by private contractors “provide adequately for both quality control and accountability.”
“The detainees’ hunger strike flies in the face of the Administration’s assertion that no change is necessary in the immigration detention system,” said Saket Soni, Director of the New Orleans Workers’ Center for Racial Justice.
The detainees are on hunger strike in the isolated South Louisiana Corrections Facility in Basile, Louisiana. This is the fifth hunger strike in four weeks at this privately- run detention center. Detainees launched their hunger strike to protest humiliating treatment and indecent conditions at the facility. Reports generated from the facility clearly demonstrate the facility falls below ICE’s own standards for detention.
Tomorrow detainees and their advocates will release a damning report on conditions in the Louisiana ICE jail. The report reveals that the ICE facility does not meet ICE’s own detention standards, and puts detainees’ health and well-being in serious risk. The report was compiled by over a hundred detainees who have been acting as human rights monitors inside the jail over the last month and features the newest eyewitness information available on detention conditions.
The report also details the risks detainees take when they decide to complain about human rights conditions and detention standards. Detainee human rights monitors recorded complaints, attempted to lodge grievances, and communicated with advocates about jail conditions. Jail staff and ICE responded to the monitoring with hostility, often refusing to accept written complaints. “They said, we can’t read complaints in Spanish,” said one detainee. “They said, ‘don’t waste our time with this.’”
When ICE refused to consider complaints,the detainees launched hunger strikes. They then faced aggressive disciplinary retaliation, including solitary confinement. “I have been complaining about the unjust conditions in detention,” said one detainee, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of further retaliation.. “I am now in [solitary confinement] for planning a hunger strike. I believe that they are going to keep me here, so that we do not have a hunger strike to expose and the bad conditions in this jail.”
As the hunger strike gained momentum, national advocates on the issue of detention wrote to Janet Napolitano, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security today, demanding that she immediately allow a national leadership delegation of civil, human, and labor rights advocates to visit detainees who have monitored human rights conditions and conducted hunger strikes. Co-signers included the Center for Constitution Rights and the National Immigration Law Center.
“The detainees in Basile, Louisiana confirm what advocates are saying nationwide,” said Karen Tumlin, attorney and detention standards expert with the National Immigration Law Center. “ICE is failing all standards of human decency and its own standards in its detention centers.”
Detainees and their friends and families continued to press Napolitano to shut down the Basile, Louisiana detention facility. “We demand that Napolitano stop doing business with private jails profit from our extended detention in inhuman conditions,” said Joaquin Ruiz, who served as a human rights monitor in the ICE detention facility.
“Napolitano says there is quality and accountability in ICE jails. She should spend a week in Basile, Louisiana,” said Ruiz.
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A detainee and human rights monitor is available for interviews.
