Day one of a week in the life of KWRU. Day two of a week in the life of KWRU. Day four of a week in the life of KWRU. Day five of a week in the life of KWRU.   Read more about the Kensington Welfare Rights Union. Take a Tour of Kensington online. Read more about our organizing model.

A Week in the Life With the Kensington Welfare Rights Union Search for Affordable Housing in Philadelphia Campaign - Day 3: Wednesday, July 23, 1997 Day three for the Search for Affordable Housing begins at 8:00 a.m. in court at the Criminal Justice Center at 13th & Filbert Streets. The "Conrail Seven" represented by Paul Messing were arrested for setting up a tent city on a vacant lot at Kensington & Lehigh in May. The charges were defined as defiant trespassing. All seven cases were withdrawn from the court by the prosecution under the conditions the group does not conduct protests on Conrail property. This was the 7th tent city KWRU set up in their Schmidtsville Campaign in response to the city's cut in shelter beds. The city forced KWRU to move from six abandoned lots in the course of 6 weeks. The final tent city across the street from the arrests was thrown into a trash truck by License & Inspection while members of KWRU were in Harrisburg for a press conference announcing their historic 10-day "March for Our Lives" to the United Nations (protesting the new welfare reform legislation). The tent city where the arrests took place was erected on an abandoned, drug-infested lot owned by Conrail. The lot was used for prostitution and a shooting gallery for heroine addicts and crack addicts The Lehigh neighbors welcomed KWRU and the tent city to their neighborhood but the police found it more important to spend their time dismantling the tents and harassing KWRU rather than dealing with the severe drug problem in the neighborhood. Three dead bodies were brought out of one of the crack houses during their stay. While the tent city was erected, the pimps moved their business and crime was reduced dramatically. No time for celebration with this group, the next stop was the offices of Community Legal Services (CLS) at Broad & Erie Streets for a meeting with attorney Debbie Freedman surrounding welfare reform legislation and the appeal process. Following this meeting, members of KWRU headed to four Philadelphia welfare offices (Ridge and Tioga, Lehigh, North and Unity and Boulevard districts) for a day of human rights violations survey taking and to advocate with people having welfare issues. This day of organizing was extremely stressful. The welfare office is a place of complete demoralization for people receiving "so called services". We heard one horror story after another as we took surveys of every person in each office. Some people had been waiting for three or four hours even though there is a sign in each office that states "if you are not seen within 20 minutes please check-in at the front desk". The plastic seats are lined with men, women and children who are treated like cattle as caseworker's scream out last names to be seen. These caseworkers have so much power in their hands and decide the fate of so many. You would think that the grants come out of their own pockets. As soon as you walk in the door you are greeted with attitude and an immediate "blame the victim" mentality. Many of the folks live in such fear of their caseworkers that some were afraid to talk to us. Others were so angry at their treatment that they welcomed the survey and a chance to tell their stories. Below is a summary of our visits. Lehigh District: Two organizers were unable to get a caseworker to come out about a man's food stamp case (after he'd been waiting 3 hours), they tried to go in the back to meet with her, but were stopped by the security guard. They called the rest of the group back in and we circled the office chanting for Ms. Body (the caseworker) and for dignity. The organizer was pulled aside and the man was taken back to meet with caseworker. North District: One woman was hard of hearing and had bad legs. We tried to make sure she was taken care of and could hear her name being called. Another had been waiting four hours to apply for welfare. An organizer went with her to talk to the front desk. Another was cut off food stamps and welfare for missing a meeting, which she appeared for but waited several hours and never was seen. She received her notice too late to continue getting benefits. An organizer took her to the front desk to get the caseworker out. Several organizers talked to Charles White (Assistant Managing Director) and Helen Little (Office Manager) who said we could be there to talk to people but not to disrupt things and slow the office down by bothering the secretaries and making a fuss about people having to wait. He said that if there's a consistent pattern of people having to wait long or something else, we should go directly to them and arrange a meeting rather than just go into the office. They said "we are new administration and so any arrangement with the previous staff was outdated and we should work with them now". Unity and Boulevard Districts: At Unity, the guards tried to stop us, then brought out the District Director, Dean Morrow. He said we could not hand out "inflammatory" literature. An organizer handed him our flyers and he said OK. None of the 56 people surveyed today could tell us where there was affordable housing available to them, their families or their neighbors. The housing crises of the individuals surveyed demonstrated this lack of affordable housing, and more so, the dangerous and unhealthy conditions of "affordable" housing. A woman and her husband are currently living in an abandoned house after they were evicted for not fulfilling their mortgage payments. The house has no electric or water, and is infested with rats and riddled with holes. No one in the family has medical coverage. A seventeen year old mother with an infant son, is living with her sister. Together, they are having trouble paying rent for the one bedroom row house. Her son has fallen sick from lead poisoning from all of the walls. She and her son do not have medical care. A gentleman lost all of his possessions in an apartment building fire. He and the other tenants were evicted by License and Inspection and have waited four months for Section 8 placements that were to take four to eight weeks. He is currently homeless. A woman moved from her PHA house to escape her abuser and was denied other housing. She was in a shelter until she could get a restraining order. She is on a waiting list for Section 8 and was told it would take 5 years. Her house had leaky pipes, her gas has been shut off, and she was without heat repeatedly this winter. She is currently homeless. A woman has been on the Section 8 waiting list for twelve years; she has been evicted four times since applying because she could not pay her rent. Her floor rotted through and her granddaughter fell and broke her leg in the hole. A mother became homeless and she and her two children moved in with a friend. They spent half of the winter without heat. She is not on the Section 8 list because she refuses to succumb to the conditions of Philadelphia's shelter system. A mother is scared that she will soon be homeless because the landlord has announced that he is going to raise the rent. Her child has lead poisoning from the paint in the house. She has been on the Section 8 housing list for thirteen years, and is also on a waiting list for a Montgomery County townhouse. A woman lives on a block with eight abandoned houses. She is currently living without electricity and having problems paying her rent. She was cut off welfare after taking a job at a sweatshop where the floor was about to cave in. A 43 year old gentleman became homeless five years ago and moved in with his grandmother. He was recently cut off medical. These individual cases are representative of the 56 cases that we documented in the North District, Boulevard and Unity, Lehigh, Tioga and Ridge District Welfare Offices today. One very interesting survey questions to note is that most of the 56 people surveyed said there were abandoned houses on their block. day four