mango4ever and fringe ministry

     I got an apartment at the Stratford after I took the cooking class that CCS offers at the Wiegand Center.  I had a good job, and I was fighting weekly infections at the Gail Miller Resource Center because I have a weakened immune system due to having HIV.  That was the worst apartment I have ever had.  First, they tried to illegally evict me after only living there for 3 weeks because the person who volunteers as a property manager but is really just the on-sight heroin dealer, didn’t want me living there because I actively work to put people like him out of business.  Once I called my landlord after the illegal eviction that they tried to do to me the landlord was apologetic and once I made her aware that I knew exactly how illegal it was what they tried to do to me.  From that point on this drug dealer tried to make my life hell.

     At one point he even had the nerve to tell me that he was just trying to protect all of us from getting in trouble, implying that I like him had something to hide.  Which I did not.  Once, he even threatened me by saying “you can kiss your fancy job good-bye too” this was followed be me getting suspended from my job, where I made $17/hr, for a report of missing packages from one of the offices I worked at.  The investigation into me never went anywhere and I was back at work soon, but I know this was him trying to hurt me by making me lose my job.  I did end up losing that job after they evicted me, I was expecting the eviction though because very soon after he started terrorizing me in my home and the landlord never listening to my complaints about him I told her that I would no longer be paying her rent and I wanted out of my lease.  I would never pay to live under those kinds of circumstances. 

     This doesn’t bother me too much, because I am a very motivated person and this is not going to keep me from working towards my goals.  But what bothers me about this is that they are actively abusing the people who come to them for help in the same way they tried intimidating me.  I was able to fight against them in many ways because as someone who has rented many apartments and even at one point me and my fiancé were property managers ourselves and I know the rights afforded to me.  But the people who they are moving into these apartments are often people with severe mental illness and they are being victimized be the very system that is supposed to be helping them.

     This is a shame, and the fact that Utah Nonprofit Housing is allowing this kind of treatment to the people who get housing through them is abhorrent.  I have made it my life goal to help vulnerable people from this kind of treatment and I am definitely going to do everything I can to make sure that these people who are victimizing people who are already struggling are held accountable for this predatory behavior and that includes every bad actor that is currently using their positions to get away with this.