Over the past decade, the massive homeless shelter at Peachtree and Pine streets has been a target of business leaders, who complain it merely warehouses the destitute and creates an unsafe environment in its Midtown neighborhood.
But Anita Beaty, who heads the Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless that runs the shelter, has kept it operating in the face of unrelenting criticism, a previous water shutdown by the city and, most recently, financial ruin.
However, the business community may soon get its wish in having the Task Force evicted and the shelter closed. In recent weeks, Beaty lost a court ruling that allows the city to shut off the shelter’s water again because it is so far behind in paying its bills. Beaty, who allowed Occupy Atlanta to take up residence in the shelter over the weekend, also appears to be on the verge of losing another ruling that would require her and the Task Force to leave.
At a recent federal court hearing, Task Force lawyer Steven Hall said hundreds of homeless men, including some who are fragile and have compromised immune systems, will be put out in the cold if the shelter closes down. “These people are going to die,” he said. He noted the Task Force was founded 30 years ago after 17 homeless men died during a bitter freeze.
Laura Sauriol Burton of the city’s law department said that won't happen because the city will not cut off the shelter’s water until it is assured those inside will be cared for. “We do not want to see chaos,” she said at the same hearing. “We do not want to see life-threatening situations.”
Last Thursday, the United Way of Metropolitan Atlanta said it would help the men at Peachtree and Pine. Its president, Milton J. Little Jr., said the group will provide social services and housing to those who need it, whether they are displaced or continue to reside at the shelter for a few months.
Beaty, who has headed the Task Force for a quarter century, won't give up her fight to keep control of the shelter, even though the Task Force has defaulted on loans to buy the property and owes more than $200,000 in overdue water bills. She recently said she would occupy the shelter if told to leave it.
Beaty contended last week that the business community, led by Central Atlanta Progress, wants to shut down the shelter to clear a prosperous area of the blight of homeless men and because the Midtown property is so valuable.
“What we do is a good thing,” she said. “Those attacks are efforts to demonize us [because] we stand in the way.”
Beaty said the shelter, which provides beds to about 575 men a night, does not warehouse anyone. “We offer support services, from IDs to jobs to resumé assistance to health clinics ... to mental health care to recovery living and 12-step programs,” she said.
Beaty and the Task Force have filed a number of lawsuits, including one against the city that was recently dismissed. They are also suing Central Atlanta Progress, the new owner of their property and others, saying they unlawfully conspired to cut off the Task Force’s public and philanthropic funding.
The litigation says Central Atlanta Progress president A.J. Robinson helped orchestrate the plan. Last week, Robinson said, “We deny all allegations the Task Force has made against us and others in the filings. We look forward to defending ourselves in court.”
In late 2006, Robinson asked the business group to convene a brainstorming session to figure out what to do about the Task Force, court filings show. One topic on the agenda was a discussion on going after the group's funding and political support.
Robinson and other business leaders met with Chick-fil-A president Dan Cathy to express concern there was inadequate remedial care for those at the shelter, court filings say. Cathy had volunteered, spent nights at the shelter and pledged $750,000, but he suddenly stopped all donations, Beaty said in an affidavit.
The Task Force had also defaulted on almost $900,000 in loans that two nonprofits gave it to buy the shelter. Aware of that in late 2008, members attending a Central Atlanta Progress and Atlanta Downtown Improvement District committee meeting initiated plans to try and purchase those loans, court filings show.
Central Atlanta Progress then approached the nonprofits, saying it had lined up an investment team to buy the notes. But the nonprofits decided not to consummate the deal, court filings say.
In pre-trial testimony, Robinson said he told developer Manny Fialkow that he might have a better chance buying the notes on his own.
Last year, the nonprofits sold the notes to Ichthus Community Trust. In a July 2010 op-ed in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Fialkow said he was a business consultant to Ichthus and pledged to help the homeless inside the shelter. Ichthus borrowed money to buy the shelter’s notes from Premium Funding Solutions, a limited liability corporation whose members include a company in which Fialkow's wife has an interest.
In May 2010, Ichthus foreclosed on Peachtree and Pine and filed a dispossessory suit against the Task Force and Beaty. When the Task Force did not pay off the notes to Ichthus, Ichthus transferred title of the property to its lender, Premium Funding Solutions.
Beaty and the Task Force contend Fialkow, Ichthus and Premium Funding Solutions were part of the alleged conspiracy that illegally interfered with the Task Force’s financing.
Fialkow’s lawyer, Matt Moffett, said the suit against his client is frivolous. “This is no evidence to support any of their allegations against him,” he said.
That litigation is now pending before Fulton County Superior Court Judge Craig Schwall. On Oct. 17, Schwall signed a stinging dispossessory order to evict the Task Force and Beaty from Peachtree and Pine.
The record “is replete with evidence that the property is in deplorable physical condition and cannot offer adequate benefit to the less fortunate members of society,” Schwall wrote. “The court is not assured that [the Task Force and Beaty] have the best interests of these community members in mind.”
Given the allegations filed in the case, Schwall said, “One could determine that [the Task Force and Beaty] are less concerned about the plight of their community and more concerned with embarrassing defendants and tarnishing reputations.” Schwall also added that “the handling of this crisis” by business interests and the city “has been an embarrassment.”
Schwall, however, recently vacated that order when he discovered he had yet to rule on a motion to recuse him from the case. If Schwall determines he can continue, he may issue that same dispossessory order.
Steven Kushner, a lawyer for Premium Funding Solutions, said he thinks it is inevitable the company will get possession of the Peachtree and Pine property. When that happens, he said, the shelter will stay open for six months so the United Way and the Regional Commission on Homelessness," can determine the needs of the men inside and where would be the best place to house them.
“These men are going to be taken care of,” Kushner said. “The homeless shelter is not going away, not immediately.”
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