Episode 71: Housing Is Healthcare

You're listening to Demand and Disrupt, the podcast for information about accessibility, advocacy and all things disability.

Welcome to Demand and Disrupt, a disability podcast. I'm your host, Kimberly Parsley.

And I'm your co host, Sam Moore. Still trying to dig out of 10 inches of snow here in Henderson. It wasn't 10 inches where you are, Kimberly, and Bowling Green, I think, because a lot of it was ice. But you still got like five inches of snow, didn't you?

Five inches of snow, yeah. And then by now there's. I mean, there may be as much as like an inch of ice because of how, you know, it rained and then froze.

That's what makes it so dangerous. I mean, ice is way worse than snow.

Yeah, I haven't, I haven't left the house since it started. Honestly, neither. Neither have my kids.

So you've all been. At least you like each other. That helps.

Well, we did on Monday.

Yeah. Now at least you have separate rooms you can drift into. Can you imagine if you were all crammed in like sardines into a one room apartment?

No, that would. That, that would be tough. That segues into. Let me tell the fine folks.

Drum roll.

I know.

Good segue there, Sam. All right, my interview guests for today were Chelice Lisanby and Eric Evans. And they are from Independence Place in Lexington, part of center for Accessible Living Now. And they are both experts in housing. Ah. And all things housing related. And finance. Well, not finance, but like the affordability crisis and, and things to do about that and accessibility. So, so much knowledge in those two.

People, so much cold weather like this. Kimberly, we all need housing.

We do. And it's so important for, I mean, housing, obviously shelter, you know, one of, one of our main.

That's one of the basic criteria for all of us.

It is.

But I think you're like me, Sam, in that when you're disabled, you tend to be at home more.

Right? Yeah, that does tend to be the case for a lot of, you know, people in our shoes. And so it's important that our houses meet our respective needs regardless of what they are. And you know, also it's important that they're accessible and, you know, we can get in and out of them real easily. Though that's not a problem for, for me particularly at least not when in normal weather when there's not 10 inches of snow on the ground, then I usually get in that real easily. But, you know, people in, in wheelchairs, you know, might need special accommodations or you know, a ramp to offset the steps if there are Any leading up to their houses, sort of things like that that we tend to take for granted.

Right. And. And, you know, you need accessible bathrooms and be able to. Need to. Be able to get to your kitchen appliances and things. So much goes into that. Also, a lot of people who are chronically ill, I mean, they. They need safe housing that's not drafty. And.

Yeah. Yeah, we need. And that's another thing we take for granted. We need safe breathing conditions. And, you know, it's got to be livable.

Bottom line.

It.

It does. And there's just. I think Chalice puts it so well in this. In my interview that there are more people needing housing than there are houses, and that's.

That's where we get the. The demand.

Yes. So so much more demand than. Than there is supply. And it's. I think it passed crisis point a long time ago.

A while back. Yeah.

Yeah. So we. We talk about that.

And so it's perfect timing, Kimberly, for. For a subject like this with the weather being what it is, you know, we can listen to this, and then we can all be a little more thankful if we have, you know, plenty of food, a warm house.

Yep.

Breathable air, we can sort of count our blessings more easily.

Yeah, absolutely. I. And I am grateful, crazy as I am with, you know, all of us being stuck in here all the time, but I am grateful that we have a safe, warm. That's another thing. Warm house. We have electricity. I was able to. Yeah. I had power. I was able to stock up on food. I'm sure you did, too.

You know, Yes. I had plenty to eat.

Didn't.

Didn't go hungry in the. In the least. I know. You know, you mentioned power, and you. You had it the whole time throughout the storm. Knock on wood. I know. Not everybody in Bowling Green did. In fact, I think a little farther south of you, Nashville, I heard about a fair number of power outages with all the ice that they had down there.

So.

Yes, power is one of those things that, you know, it's. You don't consider it a luxury until you go for even a few hours without it.

I know.

Back.

And you're like, I'm never gonna complain again. I promise.

I know, but, you know, we will.

But. Yeah, we always eat our words, but.

Sure. But you know what? I think this is a good time, Sam, for us to say a shout out of thanks to our road crew workers and our electrical workers who keep the. Keep the power on, keep the roads clean. We appreciate you.

We do their paychecks over the past week or so have been well earned. And, you know, we often voice our displeasure about the amount of time it sometimes requires to get our roads clean and in drivable condition again. But the fact is, we don't know how hard it is and how much trouble they have to go through to make that happen. A lot of it kind of varies depending on which county you're in and the amount of equipment they have to work with. But, yes, tip of the cap to our road workers.

Absolutely. So, Sam, did you go out and play in the snow?

I can't say that I did. I would have if I was about 20 years younger. But now, occasionally, I would stick my hand out and, you know, get a literal feel for. For what was going on and what was falling from the sky. And. And it. It did make me definitely more thankful for heat whenever I close that door up again. But anyway, it was, you know, it was definitely a snow that added up real quick. It started out powdery, and then, you know, as the temperature dropped, the. The snow became not powdery, and we actually hired somebody to. Speaking of workers, we hired somebody, Kimberly, to shovel our driveway, which we were very thankful for.

Oh, that.

Yeah, that's. That's a tough job. I've never done it, but I. It seems like a tough job.

Also shoveled our front steps so we could actually get to the mailbox. Although mail has not come all week until today, as we really record this, Kimberly, it is a Thursday, and it is the first day all week that we have received mail.

Ah, okay. Wow. Well, I just would stick my. Stick my head out. I love the. The quiet of snow.

You know, that's one thing I did notice. You know, you are. It's not uncommon for us to hear traffic around our house. And, you know, especially off in the distance at night when it's even quieter. But I would stick my head out to sniff and. And feel the snow, and. And I would hear almost nothing. I mean, it was almost stone silent. Yeah, because nobody could get out.

Nobody's out, and the snow just makes it quiet. So I would stick my head out, listen, and then within seconds, I would hear, shut that r. So because you.

Would be letting in more cold air than you thought you were.

Right. So someone. One of the. Michael was like, shut that arm.

I sent a text to the owner of the restaurant that I host Trivia at in Henderson, Rock House on the River. I sent the day before this junk was coming on Friday. I text her, and I told her that mom and I wanted to reserve a Table for two the following evening at seven o' clock on her outdoor patio.

You would have had that all to yourself, right?

We would have. There wouldn't have been a reservation necessary. We could have picked from any of those tables out there. And she was like, I can't guarantee you we'll be here, but I'll have my manager, Josh, let you in. If nothing else, she did close early that day because the conditions were deteriorating. But. But yeah, that would. We could have taken our pick from any of those tables. Slash seats.

Yeah. I believe Sunday and Monday, pretty much everything in Bowling Green was closed.

Oh, I believe it. And you were telling me that the, the university there years of my alma mater, wku, will end up being closed all week.

I think so, yeah. That. Closed all week. Yeah.

Here it is Thursday as we speak, and they've already called it offered today and tomorrow. So.

Yeah. Yeah.

Maybe I'd have to go back in the history books. I wonder if this is the first time Western has ever closed for a week solid.

It may, you know, it wouldn't surprise me. It wouldn't surprise me. If it is.

It may be a historic week on the hill.

Could be. Could be.

We'll have to. We'll have to look that up. We'll get back to you on that, folks.

Well, I am. I'm excited that we got some snow. I'm ready for it to be over. I'm done. I'm good. Spring can go ahead and come. I like one good snow. I've had it. I'm over it.

It's fun at first, but when you, when it sticks around for a while and, like, nothing melts and it gets kind of old pretty quick, doesn't it?

100%. Yeah. I'm done with it. I'm ready for. Ready for spring.

So you're ready for spring? To spring.

I am. I. I am. January, February. Pretty boring. Well, now, you said you've got super bowl coming up, right? That you enjoy.

Yeah, super bowl is coming up. Not, not this Sunday, but the following Sunday, which would be the eighth, which I know you told me off air that you and your family will probably not even have it on that particular channel. Nope, not a. I was like, kimberly, you've got to at least be excited about the food. Like no special menu or anything. And she was like, no, no, not a thing. It could be Super Bowl Sunday, you know, they could be, you know, doing the halftime festivities and. And I forget who's doing the halftime show, by the way.

I should know. But.

But anyway, it's not me because I did that phone call. But. But anyway, you know, all. All of America could have their eyes glued to the set for the. Either the super bowl game or the commercials. And knowing you, Kimberly, you'll probably be sitting there eating a peanut butter sandwich.

Yeah. Not a bit concerned about it. Not. Not even a little bit. Don't. Don't understand football. Don't like football. I mean, except for, like, high school games, I've never been to a football game.

Yeah. Yeah. And the reason that you enjoy going to high school games is because you were in the band, as your kids are now.

Yeah. Yeah. And my daughter's in the band, so.

And now your daughter's in the band. Now your daughter Sarah has to go to the basketball games, which you don't care to go to yourself.

I don't go to those. She does because she's in the pet band, but I don't because it's loud at a basketball game.

Yeah. And.

And most of those are pretty small, gm, so there's not much room for that noise to travel. And. And yes, it is loud.

Yep.

But anyway.

But you know what I am excited for coming up is I think you might. You and I will be hosting the live podcast of the My Silence Roars book launch, and that is written by Tina Jackson. My Silence Roars. She is an advocate, a disabled and feminist activist from Louisa, Kentucky, way out.

There in Eastern Kentucky, Northeastern Taiwan. Yeah.

Yeah.

So you and I will be doing that. And that's gonna taste.

We'll get a taste of her Roaring Silence.

We will. And it's a good book. I've read her book. I will. You know, I'll have a link to some more where you can learn more about the book if you're interested in that. And there'll be a link to sign up on. It's on February 2nd. That's on a Monday, February 2nd, at 1pm Central, 2pm Eastern. Right.

Eleven Pacific, for all of our California listeners.

Well, now that gets into some math. So I'm gonna. I'm just gonna trust you with.

Numbers are overrated so much.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So this won't be unlike our normal podcast, Kimberly. This. This we can't edit. So I'm gonna have to, you know, refrain from dropping any cuss words or. Or, you know, I've got to do my best to keep this G rated.

I. Well, not too. Not too worried about. About that. But now, y', all, if Sam were to break out in song, it. We're just leaving that in. It's Going to be there. You're gonna know. You're gonna hear it.

So it's there. There ain't no getting rid of it. And she knows. And you probably know too, folks, if you're regular listeners, my just drift off into random lyrics.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Especially when it comes to country songs.

It's country music. Yeah. So if you like that kind of thing. We're not editing that out. We're not leaving that on the cutting room floor. It is going in.

So y' all city.

Yes. Look in the show notes. Join us, Sign up for. For that live book launch. We are looking forward to it. I.

Yes, I am.

We've never done anything like this, so it's exciting.

And there'll be a little history for demand and disrupt.

Yeah.

So there'll be a chat. If y' all want to ask me or Sam anything. We. You can drop it in there and we'll see what answers we have. And. And Tina has already been taking some questions. You know, she. She's already been working up some answers to some questions, so. Just an amazing story. Tina's an amazing person. You will not want to miss hearing more about her book. My silence, Ro.

No, she'll. She'll have way more answers than me. I mean, you can ask me anything, but I won't, you know, I won't have answers to everything. Kimberly, on the other hand, you'll have an answer to anything that anybody could possibly ask. Right.

No, I'm just going to. I'm just going to throw it to you.

I'm going to say, oh, I see how that works.

Right. Yeah.

Any questions you get, you're going to be like, well, let me ask my co host here.

Yeah. No, I. If I don't know the answer to it, I'm going to be like, you know, Sam is our person for handling that particular topic.

Yeah. For that you're honest and I can prepare for it.

Right, Right. No, I had a plan for that all along.

There we go. I like it.

I'm always going to come out of this looking like a genius. You, on the other hand, I, you know, I don't know. I mean, give it your best shot. Right.

I. Look how I look. Whether it's genius or not, it's just going to be. I don't know what kind of ride it'll be Monday, but it's going to be a ride and you'll want to be on it, folks.

It's going to be fun. Y' all don't want to miss it. But right now, you Know what else you don't want to miss is my interview with Chalice Lisenby and Eric Evans. Today we are joined by Shalice Lisemby. She's the manager and direct supervisor at Independence Place in Lexington, and Eric Evans, and he is a housing advocate up there in Lexington. And they are going to tell us about disability services up there in Lexington and the housing situation and all kinds of things. So, Chalice, Eric, thank you for joining me today.

Thank you for having us today.

It's good to be here.

Thank you guys so much on this cold winter day. So, Chalice, why don't we start with you. Tell me a little bit about yourself and how you came to Independence Place.

I have. Chelice. I have worked with people who are disabled and the homeless for the entire length of my career in different capacities. And my passion is working with a group of people we do work with and also have a special place in my heart for the homeless. So taking those two together has been my. My passion for quite a long time. And how I got here. I will let Eric tell you about that.

Okay, Eric.

Am I telling them how you got here? So Chalice and I actually had worked together indirectly. She was with the Lexington Housing Authority, and I was a regular calling her to get housing vouchers. They're called mainstream vouchers for people with disabilities. And we got to know each other and she attended an event that I had put together for our organization and she was in the market for a new job. And I asked our supervisor at the time, our executive director, if they had an opening. They said yes. She was practically hired before the end of the event.

Wow, awesome. Okay, now, so, Eric, you do. Well, I want to talk about your background because you were out there, way out there in California, right?

I was, yes. I was in California as early as 1981 in Los Angeles, and then moved to San Francisco in the winter, actually in December of 82. Yeah. So was there from 83 to 80. Late 84. Okay.

And. And I was reading in your bio that you did a lot of work around AIDS education, AIDS advocacy and things. So can you talk a little bit about that? That sounds like a busy but also sort of terrible time to be in San Francisco.

Terrible time is an understatement. Yes, it was. It was a horrific time to be at ground zero and there was no way around it. And to have people who were basically dying within months of being exposed. It was. And there was absolutely no cure inside. It was kind of like the very earliest days of COVID Quite literally. But there never was and never has been a cure yet per se. I still see that maybe being on the horizon within the next 10 years, foreboding any thing going on with research funding.

Right.

But you know, back in the earliest days, there was absolutely no health care. There was nowhere for anybody to go. They would lose their housing, they went up to the hospital or in a friend's house and they would pass away. And that was, you know, the two years that I was in San Francisco. I ended up being five years in New York City after that because I said my bio. I have been doing HIV AIDS advocacy since 1984 and I just happened to be in a lot of the major hotspots for that for the first 20 years of the nightmare that we live through. So.

So did you go to those places specifically to offer help?

No, actually I just kind of ended up there. I referred to myself sometimes as the Forest Gump of that because it was not with my intention to do that. I went to New York actually because my grandmother wanted me to go to school there. So I went to school there. But then I found a need that was greater than my own, my own education. So I quit my education, start working. I worked with in a television station that was LGBTQIA owned. And so that's how I ended up being there for like the earliest days in the formation of Act up for the Quilt. The very first two viewings of the quilt in Washington D.C. i was there for as a reporter, including the 88 Republican and Democratic conventions. And so I was. I kind of became an accidental or an incidental advocates. And then in my around 2010, 2011, I was actually hired by an organization funded through the John A's foundation, where I did a lot of work directly with finding housing. And that was at the beginning of the Affordable Care act where we were fighting to get people insurance and health coverage when at the time they could be denied for pre existing conditions.

Yeah, those were scary days.

And recording it actually. I was a cameraman and director and did a lot of the behind the scene news stories that help cover the events. There's documentaries that have my footage in it. So.

Okay, so Eric, how did you end up in Lexington?

So that's actually partially responsible due to my husband who works in television as well. We were living in Colorado and he was offered a position out here. We had come out here the year before because his mother, my mother in law, had passed away from COVID in 2020. And when the federal government was paying for funerals and all that we had her interred in my cemetery up in Indianapolis. And we just, we kind of fell back in love with the Midwest. So he went and found a job in Lexington working for a TV station. And I actually found a job once we got out here working for a school for students with special needs or neurodivergence, as I'd ment mention in my bio.

Wow. Okay. So, Eric, you've been everywhere and chalice, it sounds like housing, especially for underserved populations, is close to your heart.

It very much is, yes.

So tell me, and for our listeners, why housing is such a big deal for people with disabilities.

Oh, my goodness. We don't have that long. But let me start with this. So it is incredibly important, I believe, for all people to have roof over their heads, that housing is a human right. Also, for folks who have disabilities, accessible housing is a human right. And so that's where it kind of comes in for me, for the advocacy and activists that I've done, that everybody deserves to be sheltered and have, you know, the basic needs. It's hard to do housing right now. Currently, we're in a housing crisis, not just Lexington, not just Kentucky. This is national. And what I mean by that is there is not enough affordable housing for all the people who need it. There's more people than there is housing, but there comes the income differences as well. Right. So most folks that we work with in the housing piece of all of this have, you know, SSDI or SSI or both. And that income is much, much lower than the income of somebody that you know else that makes a lot more money. And we see that a lot when we help them identify housing, especially if it can be accessible for them. And the landlord or the property management will ask for two or three times income for the rent, meaning if the rent is $850, they want to know that the income is two or three times that much. And that just really knocks out our disabled folks of running to get housing. We also have found this year that HUD has limited funding towards homeless programs. Most, most Certainly the Section 8 vouchers, the mainstream vouchers in which Eric just mentioned. That is for people who are disabled and homeless. HUD has removed the funding for those things. So we're now sitting with. There isn't enough housing to begin with, but we have more barriers. And it is, it is my, my hope that everybody has a roof over their head. And I know that the homeless folks are usually the last to get served or they're looked down upon and they're treated in, in just disrespectful, horrible ways. And these are human beings, these are our brothers and sisters. We should be helping them. That is my personal opinion. So, yeah, it's, it's difficult for, you know, when you can't find affordable housing, but you might find affordable housing but it's not accessible. So that, that changes things for the disabled folks too because we're looking for both for it to be affordable and for it to be accessible. Again, going back to hud, they also have restricted funding to public housing or income based housing. So it is, we're in a time right now where we're not going to give up. We're going to keep advocating, we're going to keep being activists, we're not going to give up on this. It's becoming increasingly more difficult to find housing. There's more people that need housing than there is housing to be had. And I think we're not seeing a lot of new development, we're not seeing a lot of new building. And I also don't see any incentive for potential landlords and potential property managements to actually do the building and, and to make it accessible. They, they're just not incentivized for it and that just makes it much more difficult.

What, what might those incentives look like?

You know, that's a great question. I have seen it before when I worked at the Lexington Housing Authority where they incentivized the landlords for accepting a tenant who had a Section 8 voucher. They got paid an extra thousand dollars for having done that per tenant and that was great. Now that funding to do something like that again is not there. But I, I don't know, I don't know if it could be a tax credit or something, some way that the builders somehow profit off of it, yet we can use, we could have it for, to be affordable and accessible for the homeless folks and our disabled folks.

So incentives have, have those historically come from the federal government? Is that where those come from?

It's been my experience, yes. Okay, go ahead.

But, but the, this like states and local governments, there's to my knowledge there's nothing stopping them from saying, okay, here's a problem, we can solve it. And, and them putting up the incentives, correct?

I, I would think so, yes. No, I think you're very much correct. I also know that in some small part at least, both your state and city governments are federally funded. So again, it gets caught up in that, I think.

Yeah, you know, I'm coming to this conversation. Like, like you will like You. I have the same kind of love of this issue as you. I don't have near the knowledge that you have. I have just my bachelor's degree in political science from so many years ago that it's probably outdated. But what that taught me was that government's job is to do the things in our capitalist system. Government's job is to do the things that our capitalist system won't or can't do. So it.

Yeah.

When people complain as they do that a government spending all its money on housing or too much money on housing, well, that's the job of government.

You know, we're right. Absolutely. I think people fail to see the connection that you've just drawn, that what the government's job, and I would even say responsibility is. But people fail to make that connection. They fail to see that as actually making their communities, their neighborhoods, their state better and more accessible and more equal, if you will. And so people. People like to vote on. On an issue that is going to affect them, not how it might affect other people. And I think that because of that, we're watching this housing crisis happen.

Right. And, you know, so many of us are. We're one paycheck or one lost job away from being there ourselves.

Absolutely. But what I'm seeing now is people are starting to go. As we're losing these resources, as we're losing this funding, people are going, hey, wait a minute. Why are there more homeless people? And they're going, whoa, I didn't know that. And so there's a lot of education that both Eric and I and our staff and the rest of the staff, they go out there and educate as well, because it's like, this is what happens when they cut this. And so I think it's becoming very real to people seeing it. So. Yeah, yeah.

You know, show me a person who does not know someone who has been on food stamps or needed food stamps, and I will show you an imaginary person, because that's right. There's no one out there.

Everyone, 10%.

Yeah.

Even.

Even I. When my husband and I moved from Beaumont to Lexington. I'm sorry, to Shreveport. So we were living in Texas. We moved to Louisiana, and I was on food stamps myself because there was a time where I was unemployed, he was employed, and we qualified because otherwise we could make ends meet with just one paycheck. It's impossible. And, you know, and even though he was making good money and I'm, you know, I'm being the old one here, so, you know, there's. There's Also another term that goes around for housing, that is housing, intelligence, health care. And that's what's kind of the mantra within the AIDS community as well, because somebody with HIV AIDS does better health wise if they have a roof and four walls. And you know, historically speaking, that was one of the secondary crises to the AIDS pandemic was, you know, first it was there being no medication, then it was paying for the $30,000 medication, because if you had to buy medication, you couldn't afford anything else. You would go bankrupt just trying to afford your medication. Hence the Ryan White program, which helps fund that. So, and that's also kind of where the housing crisis first showed itself because, you know, there were people that again had to make decisions, am I going to buy my medication or am I going to stay housed? And a lot of them would rather have stayed housed and take their chance of medication. And it was, there was a no win situation for the longest time. Now I know for a fact that in the early 90s, the stopgap measure was they actually opened hospice centers for people with HIV AIDS to live in and quote, unquote, die in. And until the medication started.

Making it.

Better by having to take fewer pills that were more effective, that did all that. That was the case with anybody that, you know, had any kind of a medical or physical disability. And you know, a lot of people don't realize that when they see somebody sitting in the street, sitting at a median in a wheelchair, 99 of the time, that's real. But you know, there has also been so many stories out there of people who fake it to get food stamps and fake it. And so people want to believe that this small minority, I'm talking half of 1% of people who are taking advantage of the system are destroying it for what is a literal lifeline for 99.9% of the people out there getting food stamps, needing housing assistance and getting all those things, you know, and, and having been on food stamps for myself, once I got a job and once I get afforded to buy my own groceries, I was off food stamps. I quit going to the food banks, you know, because my being says, you know, this is those for really needed and if you don't really need it, don't take advantage of it. But there are people who do that. And this I think has caused a lot of what people are misconstruing as abusing system. Even though if you remember, and I don't know how old you are, when Snap first came out, if you remember, they were doing it in the way of like American Express checks where you got a booklet full of bills, you know, fake bills that you use to buy your groceries. And, you know, a lot of people were working the system by going out and buying a loaf of bread and getting their change in cash and then being able to go and use it for other things. The way this NAT system works now, same thing with housing. There are so many stopgap measures. There are so many protocols that go into, you know, we can't even process somebody for a voucher to get housing unless they can prove their disability. And they're one of two ways of doing that is either getting a doctor's note saying you have a disability, or if they're getting disability through Social Security. And even once they get that, they then have to renew once a year for housing, but they have to renew what, every six months for snap. And I'm like, my God, you know, how much more safety measures do we have to put in place for people to realize this is not just somebody taking advantage or milk in the system?

Now, Eric, you know what you've done is you have just like pulled out the soapbox from under the bed and said, after you, Kimberly. So yes, I, well, yes to everything you said. Basically, I just second all of it. My family was on food stamps. My husband had a job and he lost that job because that is just what happens sometimes. The job moved to China. They started, you know, they just moved overseas, which jobs do. And it's fine. But we were a family of four people, one of whom was, I am disabled. We had two little kids. So food stamps. We were on food stamps. Anyone who thinks that that is just a joy and just so easy, oh my gosh, I would rather go to the grocery store a thousand times than to go to the food stamp office.

1.

I mean, and that is a problem too. It should not be that way. But also, yeah, people don't.

If I can interject there, I often use when I, when I go out to educate people or when people are like acting all a fool about. They don't, they don't know their stuff, right? They're spewing all this stuff. I'll go, do you know what a full time job it is to be poor?

Oh my gosh.

You know what it takes to get food stamps and keep them? Do you have any idea what is put in place just for those people? And they're like, no, like, okay, until you do, need you to sit down.

Right? Amen. Amen. Yeah, it's, it's, it's it's a lot. And yeah, housing and sometimes you have to choose between your health care, your housing, or feeding yourself. And all of those things are extremely expensive.

Extremely expensive. Absolutely it is. And again, I'm going to kind of go back to what I was saying. People are now seeing that at work in their own lives right now. Again, everything has changed with the federal public Administration. So I see people who are never were, but now are having to make those choices and they're like, oh my, how do people do this?

Right, right.

And I had somebody call and say, I don't know how to be poor. Can you help me? And I was like, oh my.

And you know, we always think poor. One thing I want to point out to our listeners, I have such good listeners, I feel like they know this, but I feel like I want to empower them to shout this message. And that is when rich people go to get services or when they go to get loans, they are not shamed for their lifestyle or their behavior.

Not at all.

Most of the time they didn't get what they get because of hard work. They got it because they inherited it. They got it because they or their or their parents got lucky. You know, it's almost never their own hard work. But yet we pour shame so bad. And I'm sure I've been guilty of doing it at some point too. But when you know better, you do better.

And I'm actually, I have a personal story behind that which I think is my financial. So I was one of those that actually was born wealthy. I was actually born into a rather wealthy family from Indiana.

Congratulations. You are the first person I have met so.

Well, think it's better. So I was given a trust fund when my mother died when I was nine, which followed me my entire young adult life. Unlike a lot of wealthy people, though, I was one of those where I would say three quarters of what I got, I was giving away, I was donating, I was using for purposes other than my own betterment. Not to say I didn't live a nice life, but I always made sure that I also gave back to my community in 2008, 2009, if you remember the whole Goldman Sachs debacle where they lost everything. Part of what they lost was my inheritance. I. I went literally from being worth three and a half million dollars being worth nothing within 30 days, because the investments that were made on my behalf were all a part of Goldman Sachs and I had no say so over. I was a beneficiary. I was not a fiduciary So I lost everything. I went from being comfortable and secure to losing my house, losing my car, My husband and I talking about what size box we're going to need to live in on the street with our dogs. And we got lucky enough that his family and his first job he ever had in his life offered him to come back to that for him. He had that. I did not. So I ended up having to literally reinvent myself from being that secure little rich brat to having to swallow a whole lot of pride and a whole lot of humble pieces and to scratch and claw and get myself back to where I was comfortable again. I mean, we lived really so extremely meagerly. And that's why, again, I was on food stamps. Because of that. I was on, well, not even unemployment, but I was on food stamps and going to food banks and working freelancer the table because I owed a lot of money that when that money went away, I couldn't even pay my debts. So it. It literally, I went from being that person that had everything that they had never earned to being the person who had to do everything to earn it.

Which is to say to. To those of those who think it can't happen to them, you're saying it can.

It can. It has. I am living proof of somebody who has experienced both sides of that coin, which is why even today, the work I do humbles me and keeps me in my place as far as I don't deserve to have anything more or anything better than anyone that I'm trying to help who's living in a motel room or living in a shelter or literally living on the streets.

So back to housing then. That's a good segue. Chalice. Tell me about Independence Place Partnership, kind of with the Kentucky Fair Housing Council.

Oh, okay. Yes. So the Kentucky Fair Housing Council is actually housed here in Lexington while they serve the entire state. They are housed here in Lexington. I knew about them and began working with them many, many years ago because again, I worked people who were disabled and I. I begin to see how the people who are in wheelchairs or walk with a walker or cane or struggle with speech, whatever it's going to be, are become a target for exploitation and could also be they don't know their rights as a tenant and they also don't know the landlord laws to know what the landlord's doing is wrong. So I began to see that early. And so I've tried to always make sure that wherever I'm working and working with this population, that. That we're connected. To the Fair Housing Council because they know their stuff in and out. And we, when we come across things in the housing part here, we definitely contact them and go, hey, we're working on a case of this, this and this are happening. And they'll take a look into it and go, yeah, that is discrimination. Can you have that person call us? And they begin working with that, that client too on that end of things with the fair housing laws. And so that is how, you know, how I've been partnered up with them. I, I came into this job here at Independence Place knowing the staff there. I have always worked with Fair Housing Council in that way, so it wasn't something new to me. But we have worked several cases with, with them on the same consumer a lot actually. We, let me give you one I example here recently we had heard that there is a senior living place here in Lexington that is doing a huge rash, huge rash of evictions. And it seems to be people who are in wheelchairs, they're being evicted. And so as soon as we had two or three phone calls about this in one day and then we started getting housing referrals on the same people, I contacted Fair Housing Council and I said, hey, I'm seeing a lot of people getting evicted at this particular place. And it seems to be the disabled folks that are getting evicted. And they were like, oh, let us check that out. And so, you know, we work with them to kind of go, hey, there might be something going on here legally that should not be going on. But also sometimes they get somebody and that person doesn't fit their services but needs assistance and they'll refer over to us and we will help that person out, find housing and get connected to peer support, all of those things. But I know that Eric worked very closely with them on one particular case that it took a whole village and the whole village was a part of it, including Kentucky Fair Housing.

Eric, do you want to talk about that?

So there was a gentleman that we received a call from, very self advocating, but he was wheelchair bound, had one of his bariatric wheelchairs and he had a landlord who was basically giving him notice that they were going to evict him, but they were not making it a court eviction. So. And I don't know how, you know, if you know how the process works, but a property manager or landlord cannot just put a piece of paper on your door saying you have a seven day notice to do this or vacate. That is not a legal eviction by law.

But yeah, that is, that Is illegal. That's what you're saying.

Illegal.

They cannot do that.

You cannot do that. That is a common intimidation method used by landlords in hopes that the tenant will see that and go, damn. And start packing up and just leaving for whatever the reason might be. But Sam was a different case because Sam knew, you know, he had always paid his rent on time, but he also knew that what they were really wanting to do is get him out of his unit so they could remodel it. Because he had been there, like, 10 years, and they just. They wanted him out, but they had no other way to do it, and they couldn't evict him, so they were giving him just a notice of vacation. So he contacted us, told us the story, and we had him contact the staff at Kentucky Fair Housing, and Carrie, who works there, took his case. And, I mean, Sam was one of those people where he was even calling the TV stations, the news stations and. And saying, you know, I'm being improperly and illegally evicted. And, I mean, it really did put a spotlight on some of the. For the nicer word, shenanigans that landlords will do. Because, you know, they can say, well, we think your apartment is infested with bedbugs or cockroaches or, you know, we're just tired of having to put up with you kind of thing. Because they even didn't like having to accommodate him for his wheelchair. So, you know, they will make up reasons if they feel like they can just get you to get out because it costs them money to go to court. But they're. The only legal eviction is one that comes from a judge where you actually go to court and the judge gives you a certain number of days to vacate the property, and you're served an eviction by the court, not by the landlord.

Okay, so you have to be served by the court.

Correct. That is the only legal way to evict somebody in the state.

So I am assuming that when that particular landlord wanted that person out, it was not so that they could remodel it, update it, make it more accessible, and then rent the unit back to him at the same price. Am I correct on that?

Exactly. So they would have to offer him an alternative, what they call an accommodation. But in his case, their accommodation was, well, we can get you a different unit, but your rent would go up 2, 300, $400. And as long as they make that offer and it's considered an accommodation, that's kind of a loophole. So they could say, well, we made him an accommodation, even if it's a fact, was that he could not afford anything more expensive just because they said, well, we made the accommodation, then they're okay. It's kind of a guilty conscience sort of thing. So, you know, it's. It's really very common with a lot of landlords who don't want to make an accommodation because it would cost the money. So they try to find other underhanded ways of getting around the law.

So is that case now still ongoing or has that been resolved?

No, that has been resolved. And we even were able to get him his security deposit back, you know, even though they tried to say, well, he did so much damage to the apartment, really, it was no other wear and tear than a person who had lived in the same place for multiple years in a wheelchair. You know, so it's not like he burned the place down. So. And he didn't want to stay there because he kind of felt like, well, this is the attitude. This is the way you're going to treat me. So we were able to get him rehoused someplace that was much better suited for him anyway. But, and this is one of the things that we have also an issue with is people renting to people with disabilities who maybe it's not accommodating as they say it is. You know, there are newer apartments that are being built that are actually ADA compliant that a lot of the older ones they say they are. But it's like, okay, well, there's one step to get in what they. A problem. So sometimes that one step could. Might as well be, you know, Mount Everest.

So, yeah, we, we see that here in Bowling Green, too. The whole. Well, it's just the one step, you know.

Yeah. Yeah.

So is Kentucky Fair Housing Council that works for the entire state of Kentucky, is that correct?

Yes.

Okay.

And are there similar groups across the United States?

I can't. I. I'll let Chalice take that on. I know that there are, but what they're called, I'm not sure.

I'm unsure of their names. But the Fair Housing act is a federal law as well as. Then you bring to it the state laws. Right. So the. You're going to find other things like Kentucky fair housing in other states. I just don't know what they're named. I don't know if they go by, you know, Kentucky is just Kentucky. We didn't get real creative with that. But.

Well, like I always tell people, if you're in doubt, call your local or your area center for Independent Living and they will find that information out for you.

That's right. Every time.

That's what we're good for.

That's right. We are, aren't we? What we do.

It is. And so another question I have is, do you work primarily at Independence Place with consumers there in Lexington, or is it like that whole area of the state. Is that area called the Bluegrass area? Is that the Bluegrass, or is that something else?

Okay, so, yes, we. We're considered the Bluegrass Area. That's correct. So we work in Fayette County. Correct. However, we serve currently 17 other counties.

That's a lot of people.

And because we have merged almost a year now with cal, the center for Accessible Living.

Yeah.

We will be taking on even more counties now. So, yes, we. We serve more than just Fayette County.

Wow.

For all of our services and how.

Many people are up there in Independence Place?

We. Yeah, there's seven of us.

Seven. That doesn't seem like enough for 17 counties.

It really does not. It. It is not how. However, we do the best we can, and we try. Oh, we try. We try really hard. This team is willing to go above and beyond to help a consumer, and I'm very proud to say that. And very proud to work with them.

Well, and I was going to add to that that. Did you mention the city contract, the city grant? Okay, so we kind of have an interesting duality. So Chalice, our other associate, Erica, and myself are the three that specifically focus on housing, which also encompasses other things, but I won't get into that. But it. I'm supposed to be the one that covers all the outside counties and not just a Fayette County. So if there's somebody in Boone County, Scott county, you name all the other 17 counties and growing. If they call here and are referred here, then I'm the one that takes on the case to try to see how. And 90% of the time, I'd say they want to move to Fayette county from wherever they are, so. Which. Because, you know, as you know, in Kentucky, the larger the metropolitan area, the better chances are you're going to find more affordable housing. I kind of see it as the opposite. Sometimes I see cheaper rents in Frankfurt than I do in Lexington sometimes. But a lot of people don't know that. But they also, again, with their disability, I would say 90% of them have doctors here or whatever sources here. They just feel it would be more accommodating for them to be here than in whatever outside county they're in.

And I'd like to jump in on that. So the years of working in Lexington in the surrounding counties for folks who are disabled and homeless for whatever reason, Lexington is, is this city that everybody's like, you all have the most resources. And I think that that's a false assumption because we, we used to. Goodness knows we used to, but that's not the case anymore. And so we see people in Fayette county, we're like, yeah, I've been at the homeless center in whatever county, name it, Madison or estle or whatever. And they've come here and they're like, yeah, I'm homeless here because you all can help me. And it's amazing how that happens. There's so many people that aren't even residents of Lexington that come in homeless to get help. And in fact, we saw an increase of homelessness when Washington, D.C. decided they were going to take all the homeless people off the streets. Lexington, Kentucky saw a pretty big increase in the population. And I think Lexington's very. Actually, the city itself is very much welcoming and very much wants to help, but at the same time, I think it won't matter what city you're in. The resources are depleting, the funding is gone, and it's just getting tighter and tighter, tighter right now with all of that. And so I, I wish we could do what we used to be able to do, but it's just not going to happen.

So what are some of the challenges to dealing with the homeless homelessness crisis in some of those urban areas and outlying counties as opposed to right there in Lexington?

Well, boy, that's a whole bag of cats right there. So there, there's just so many different things. And one of the. But one of the trends that we see now is that property management companies in particular are the vast renters in this area, and they have created financial barriers to people trying to get out. So if you have a job where you're say, working fast food and you want to rent a place for 875, $900, you have to have three months advance pay to be able to qualify to even apply for an apartment in Lexington.

Wow.

If you don't have that kind of money saved up, you can't, you know, you're wasting your application fee, which we have also found that a lot of these property management companies are more than happy to take your application fee first, have you apply and then find out afterwards that you don't qualify, and then you're right back where you started and the property management company gets to keep that application fee. There's a couple that Are what I refer to as my really big pet peeves. And that's not always the case with landlords, individual landlords. And I think we're all three old enough to remember the good old days when majority of places to rent were rented through a landlord, individual property owner. I miss those days.

So that's like an individual landowner might be someone who has a property, they've turned, let's say a house into four apartments. Is that kind of what you mean? And property, property management, usually property management corporation. Tell me what those are.

So they basically either they will buy properties themselves to then manage or they will be hired on for a fee by an individual landlord to manage multiple properties. So if you have somebody, an individual who's going around and buying and flipping houses and then turning them into rentals, they might go to XYZ Property Management Company and say, you know, I'll pay you 5% for each property that you manage for me. You do the screening, you do the application, you do all that stuff. Which, you know, I, I can see the big advantages of that because a lot of these property management companies, it makes it easier for them to like do background checks in bulk versus if you're an individual landlord that you maybe have three properties and you're going to pay through the nose to get a background check on somebody's criminal record or this or the other thing, unless you know the source. Now one of the things I pride Independence place in is I have at least two landlords who trust anybody that we will refer to them because we try to vet as best we can tenants to know as much as we can for a landlord. But property management companies, they don't care. They have their own standards and we could send them somebody that has absolutely the most minuscule of issues. And, and one of those issues that is another peeve of mine is if you have had an eviction, I'm getting back to that. Within the past five years of your life even. No, no matter what the circumstances were, were they can deny you a.

A.

Place to rent through a property management company. It's the, they basically, it's the same rules. If you've had a felony, depending on what that felony is, if you've had a felony within the past five years, you could be denied place to rent for that felony. So they, they literally categorize an eviction up there with the same degree as they do a felony. And it just absolutely is a peeve of mine.

Yeah, one of the, one of the things I know that we deal with down Here that I have dealt with in Bowling Green is that a property management came in and bought a huge apartment complex that is accessible or was. But then as the apartment ages, they don't, they aren't really managing, they're just collecting rent.

Yeah.

Not, they're not updating, they're not fixing things. So when an elevator goes down there, there's no one, there's no one on site.

No. And there, there's usually just somebody there to make sure that, you know, the rules are being with, are being held. Yeah. Right now, as we were talking, I've been also multitasking because we have an apartment building which is managed by a major property management company who will remain nameless. And we're having issues with some of the tenants not having heat. Yeah. And this is the second time.

Say again what the temperature is there right now, Eric.

We're talking what, 2 degrees, 2, 3 degrees? Maybe it's 5 now. Yeah.

No heat.

And that's, this is where a property management company that really cared about their tenants and cared about their properties, for God's sake, would have had these issues looked at and resolved when the weather was decent out. But, you know, here we are in the middle of December and just now, and one of these properties that I'm, I'm referring to is brand new. I mean, we're talking less than five years old. And they're having issues with heat. And you know, there are some measures in there to protect them, but they're not enough because, you know, these property management companies are supposed to make sure your tenants aren't freezing to death. So what do they do? They might bring them a space heater. You know, for, for a one bedroom apartment, that one space heater is not going to heat your place enough. And, and, and this is where you get tenants that, you know, then turn on their stoves or whatever and then next thing you know, the place is burning down to the ground. Everybody's wondering why. Right. That's why people are literally trying to stay warm. Because the property management company, or in some cases as a landlord are not doing what need to be done with that rent to make sure that their tenants are safe in their environment. So.

Wow.

So sorry, I didn't mean to rant.

I hear you. I feel you. So aside from the, the housing help that you all offer consumers, what else do you offer people in your 17 county area up there in Lexington?

Okay, well, we offer the peer support services, we offer independent living skills training services, the employment ips. Employment services, which is a partnership with OVR and the housing advocacy as well as information and referral. And we have been seeing a huge uptick in just people calling for information or needing a referral to something. And I've noted that that is increasing the longer we're going here. And yeah, so we. But we provide those things to all the counties.

Okay. And if there's someone out there listening and they might could benefit from the services that you all offer, can you tell me how they would reach you?

Well, yeah, sure. We would love to hear from them. So the office phone number is 859-266-2807 and I can talk to them, we can sort it out over the phone, figure out what kind of services are needed and put that into place.

Well, this has been wonderful talking with you all, so thank you. Shalice Lisemby and Eric Evans, thank you so much.

Thank you, Kimberly.

Thank you, Kimberly.

Demand and Disrupt is a production of the Advocado Press with generous support from the center for Accessible Living based in Louisville, Kentucky. Our executive producers are me, Kimberly Parsley and Dave Mathis. Our sound engineer is Michael Parsley. Thanks to Chris Ankin for the use of his song Change. Don't forget to follow or subscribe so you never miss an episode. And please consider listening leaving a review. You can find links to our email and social media in the show notes. Please reach out and let's keep the conversation going. Thanks everyone.

Just for once I think I would.

Agree.

Change we both know there's a difference We've had our curtain calling this time the writing's on the wall.

This.

War of words we can defend. Two damaged hearts refuse to mend.

Judge.

This situation's pointless with each and every day it's not a game we need to play. Each and you try to make things better Repair and rearrange things but each and every letter spells out different time for us to open up our minds and hearts to change. Then what will be will be Disregard for good to set us free. There's just no way of knowing if love lives anymore we'll turn out the light and close the door. We try to make things better Repair and rearrange things but each and every letter spelled out the need for us to open up our minds and put the chain church.