The lives of the scores of homeless people living in the Palisade Hills in Union City are a paradox. Their existence is animalistic, but many of the ramshackle homes they’ve constructed there have pictures and little figurines adorning the walls and interiors.
Some of the residents smell of smoke and alcohol. Some mumble, some speak a variety of languages. Some have grown children – and some never got the chance.
Due to mental illness, job loss, addiction, or a string of tragedies, they have been left to scrounge and beg.
“The Hill People” all have stories, just as they have makeshift shelters – attempts at aestheticism within a hellish existence.
When asked about how they came to be homeless, many of the residents tell of having once had a career, almost as if it was a different person they were speaking about. One mentioned breaking her collarbone and then losing her job. Another mentioned being fired from his job. Left out of most of these conversations were incidences of abuse, physical or otherwise, alcohol abuse, and stints in various mental institutions.
Even within their horrifying existence, they still have their pride.
What to do?
There are estimated to be thirty to fifty people living on the hill, according to various sources, including Palisades Emergency Residents Corporation (PERC) Director Tom Harrigan and resident Lawrence Gilbert. No definitive census has been taken as of yet.
The homeless have settled on both sides of the 14th Street Viaduct, which reaches from western Hoboken up to Union City and Jersey City. There are distinct communities on both sides.
With freezing temperatures two weeks ago, Union City decided to try to nudge the residents into shelters by padlocking their homes.
Union City Mayor Brian Stack convened a meeting last week in the offices of city spokesperson Gale Kaufman at City Hall. Members of the “in-house committee” that had been convened to tackle the homeless problem were present, such as police captains Charles Everett, Brian Barrett and Joseph Blaettler; Tom Harrigan and Lourdes Rebollo from the PERC homeless shelter in Union City; and three of the residents of the hill community: Brothers William and Henry Sanford, who have been living on the hill for six years, and Lawrence Gilbert, a 10-year veteran of living on the hill. Gilbert is the de facto spokesman for the residents, as he is relatively well spoken and lucid.
The discussion covered many issues, but perhaps the one that captured Stack’s attention was the fact that the morning before the meeting, PERC’s FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) funding had been cut by five percent.
According to Susan Wagner-Glasser, who is PERC’s funding director, “Funding in general is difficult to come by. It’s a competitive process. Any decrease, or even if it stays stagnant, it’s that much less that we can give to the clients. A reduction in services can be the result.”
The PERC shelter sleeps 40 people a night but according to Harrigan, “With the cold weather lately, we’ve been 15 people over our capacity.”
Stack mentioned using his position as a freeholder to try to bump up aid from the county for the shelter from $15,000 annually to $20,000.
“I want to get these people out of this cold weather,” Stack said. “It just isn’t safe.”
One thing that many of the homeless residents were concerned about was the rumored destruction of their homes by city officials. Stack alleviated their worries by stating, “Until we come up with a solution, there won’t be any movement on the hill.”
After the meeting, Gilbert expressed hope for the future. “I feel like we really accomplished something here,” he said.
A tour of the communities
Harrigan and Rebollo toured the hill community last week, along with the Reporter.
The gateway to this world was the Yardley Steps, a litter-strewn, graffiti-covered corridor of broken concrete and glasses shards that leads up the hill.
Ed Waleck, a Palisade Avenue resident who lives directly in front of the steps, described his street as “The Low-Life National Highway.” Said Waleck, “They drink, they urinate. There’s so many of them.”
However, Waleck was generous enough to give two gallons of spring water to neighbor Gilbert. “Lawrence is okay,” said Waleck.
A potentially ankle-busting five-minute walk down the steps and a traffic-dodging jaunt across Manhattan Avenue brought us into the main living area.
There are two communities: One on the north side of the Viaduct, and one on the south side. These, according to Gilbert, are like “uptown” and “downtown.”
“You have no idea what this is like,” said Gilbert.
During the tour, the stench of urine was unmistakable. There were remnants of a fire pit and blue jeans spread over a log to dry.
Down the hill, within sight, was a symbol of technological progress – the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail construction project. The train will run from Bayonne to Bergen County.
But hill resident Eugenio Brito, a Cuban immigrant, said simply, “I want to work. I don’t care where.”
Inside Brito’s three-room shack was a raging fire used for warmth. The smoke induced coughing. A dog barked from somewhere deep inside.
Scruffy cats milled about, mimics of their human neighbors.
One-room shacks constructed out of scavenged planks stood in silent defiance of the elements. Many of the structures appeared to be well built by someone who, in another life, might have been a successful carpenter.
Inside some of them are beds, end tables, hot plates, shaving cream, and empty bottles of high-test alcohol. “All you do is drink,” said Gilbert, who said he has been drinking since the age of 11. “They get some scrap metal, sell it, get their buck, get their bottle, get drunk, fight,” said Gilbert. “It’s no f—— picnic.”
To be continued…