Feeling forgotten, a group speaks out

By Lynda Gorov, Globe Staff, 10/18/2000

OS ANGELES - They had expected to be ignored during last night's debate, and for the most part they were.

No one from their ranks appeared to be in the audience in St. Louis. No one asked the questions that concern them most. No candidate spent precious minutes on their pressing issues, or looked into the camera and asked for their votes.

The homeless and marginally housed men and women gathered around a borrowed television, screen snowy with interference, then said the conversation between the two presidential candidates had made them feel as invisible as ever.

The talk of tax breaks didn't apply. Repeated mentions of the middle class drew sighs. Promises to provide decent health care to all Americans were met with skepticism. The absence of affordable housing from the discussion underscored the group's cynicism about the political system and the men seeking to lead the country.

Darrell Moore, 47, and in a single room occupancy hotel on Los Angeles's Skid Row, said: ''This just has nothing to do with us.''

Rickey Mantley, 47, also unemployed and now living in government-subsidized housing, added: ''They might be talking about health care, but we're just peripheral to the issues. We're probably not even on their radar screens.''

As the 90-minute debate wound down, and the group began a heated debate over everything from the black separatist movement to the importance of full-time employment, no one felt compelled to focus on any of the evening's remarks.

None of the questions the group (which was put together by the Community Action Network, a nonprofit homeless advocacy organization) wanted answers to were asked. With several Democrats, an undecided independent, a Green Party member and one registered Republican among them, the small gathering agreed the tenor would have been different had they been in the audience.

Luis Lopez Vasquez, 51, said he would have asked, ''Why are we sending so much money to foreign lands when we can't even take care of our own citizens?'' He also wanted to hear the candidates' positions on illegal immigration. David Busch, 45, who distributes a homeless-produced newspaper called ''Making Change,'' wondered, ''Why is poverty increasing around the world with multinational trade pacts that benefit no one but the greedy?''

Jennafer Waggoner, editor and publisher of the publication, has been living on the streets since she had surgery she could not afford four years ago and subsequently lost her job as an administrative assistant. She said she would have questioned the lack of emphasis on helping communities solve their own problems. ''And, of course,'' she added, ''where was poverty on their agenda? It wasn't even on their screen.''

Seated around four desks crammed into the organization's office, eating pizza and drinking soda, none of the group blamed the president or the presidential candidates' for their economic plight. No one made excuses.

One's family business failed, and sooner than he could imagine he was on the street. Another, disabled and unable to work, found himself unable to pay rent. They said they understood what it means to be one paycheck away from homelessness and then lose that paycheck. They said they also understood why the candidates barely pretend to care about the poor, and why the rest of the country has not pressed them to do so in the months leading up to the November elections.

''Homeless people don't donate to political campaigns,'' said Mantley, a lukewarm Gore supporter who said he is particularly concerned about future appointments to the US Supreme Court and the rest of the federal judiciary. ''We're not out there getting out the vote. They're beholden to corporate interests. They don't have to care about us.''

For his part, Busch said he saw more nefarious forces at work. Calling all three presidential debates a staged sham, he said the two major political parties and the corporate-controlled media have incentives to ignore the poor.

''This debate is not open to people like me, and it's not about having a real debate,'' said Busch, who prides himself on being self-sufficient. ''If we got a real debate, it would be over corporations sucking our human values dry.''

Taking the debate for what it was, the group gave Al Gore higher marks than George W. Bush, saying the vice president at least offered the appearance of being somewhat progressive while the Texas governor seemed to represent the status quo. Still, no one was overly impressed with either's performance, even on the issues that they hope to be worrying about one day.

''The most common statement people make to people like me is, `Why don't you get a job?''' said Moore, who once took out a loan to attend a computer institute but was forced to leave when he became homeless. ''I'd like them to talk about something that has to do with that. I'd like to have asked, `How can you create visas for all these foreigners to work in the computer industry instead of creating programs to train those of us who are ready, willing and able to work?' It's not like we want to stay homeless.''