Thirty two people died “without fixed abode” in Orange County in December. Their names are:
Liviu MURESAN who died on December 5th in Santa Ana
Stanley WARHOL who died on December 7th in Anaheim
Rachel SEBASTIAN who died on December 7th in Anaheim
Andre SWAIN who died on December 9th in Orange
Todd UTT who died on December 10th in Anaheim
Daniel PRALL who died on December 11th in Fullerton
Abdalla THROWER who died on December 11th in Seal Beach
George SCHILTZ who died on December 11th in Fullerton
Julie JOHNSON who died on December 12th in Huntington Beach
David EHLERS II who died on December 14th in La Habra
Mark PRICE who died on December 15th in Garden Grove
Rosa CASTRO who died on December 16th in Fountain Valley
Mark LEWIS who died on December 16th in Santa Ana
Felix CEDENO who died on December 16th in Fullerton
Philip WRIGHT who died on December 17th in Anaheim
Charles SCHOONOVER III who died on December 18th in Stanton
Jorge GONZALEZ NORIEGA who died on December 18th in Santa Ana
David FLORES who died on December 21st in Garden Grove
Anton KIRKPATRICK who died on December 21st in Santa Ana
Ron SWOVERLAND who died on December 22nd in Costa Mesa
Joseph SAENZ who died on December 22nd in Fullerton
James LEE who died on December 23rd in La Habra
Terra WILSON who died on December 23rd in Orange
Stanley BRAVO CANALES who died on December 24th in Santa Ana
Burton BELL who died on December 26th in Huntington Beach
Dung LE who died on December 27th in Fountain Valley
Jason POSTIER who died on December 27th in Westminster
Dane ZACHARY who died on December 27th in Westminster
Robert PICKENS who died on December 28th in Anaheim
Rex PETROSKI who died on December 30th in Fountain Valley
Javier BRENIZ who died on December 31st in Santa Ana
Andria BOTELHO who died on December 31st in Orange
Additionally, we remember
Loren HALL who died on November 30th in Costa Mesa
Raymont JONES who died on November 30th in Anaheim
David SCHOONMAKER who died on November 30th in Costa Mesa
who died in November and whose deaths were registered only in the past month.
All told, as of now, 499 people died “without fixed” in Orange County in 2023, with one or two others to be added in the next month or two to the list. In 2022 the number of deaths for the year was 490, so about a 2% increase from last year. The increase, however, proved significantly lower than projected six months ago. Indeed, the number of homeless deaths over the last three months of 2023, fell from 119 in 2022 to 99 in 2023, or an 17% decrease from the previous year. That could be good news.
Still, the number of homeless deaths for 2023 almost certainly reach 500 for the first time since these records have been tracked, and the number of homeless deaths in OC has increased by 238% (from 209 to 499) since 2019.
Okay, those are the numbers. How are things otherwise playing out on the homeless front in OC?
Well, with sadness I report here that among the people on the list of those people who died “without fixed abode” who we remember here was Joseph Saenz.
He became quite well known to us at St. Philip Benizi Parish as one of the more difficult people who we met among those “without fixed abode” who’ve come to our doors. Yes, he scared our parishioners at times and disrupted a couple of our meetings. Most famously he threw a fair number of big plastic jars of mayonnaise around the inside of our Parish Hall one time (they were there stacked on a Pallet for eventual distribution by our St. Vincent de Paul Society). And most irritatingly to me, he broke one of the windows, a big one, right there at the entrance to our Church on the Friday night at the beginning of Labor Day Weekend – St. Peregrine Mass in the morning, Quinces and Weddings in the afternoon. It was a true Pastor’s joy to try to get that fixed or at least in order at that time.
Was he arrested for any number of these things? Of course he was, but the infractions were always small, and the underlying problem that there was no place for him to stay was hopelessly unaddressed or perhaps better stated hopelessly under-addressed.
Well, Joseph Saenz died on December 22, hit by a train on the railroad line running a few blocks north of our parish. If you remember, it was cold and times raining in the days before.
His mother and I had spent the last several months trying to get him into Care Court Program. We had the court papers submitted on Nov 9th. Originally, his court date was going to be on Dec 12th but it was postponed to January 9th (for reasons that none of us understood, though to be honest, Dec 12th being the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, I was kinda grateful). His mother predicted that this was going to happen: “He’s going to die before he is able to get help.” And he did.
Another story, ongoing, that one hopes will end better.
These past several weeks have been exceptionally cold and one’s reminded once more of the really quite stunning holes that exist in the County’s thread-bare safety net:
Last Monday night, after a day of many meetings, I found a woman (I’m guessing in her 50s) sleeping under a blanket and tarp right at the backdoor to my office. There’s a partial wall there shielding one somewhat from the wind and something of a roof over the door as well, so one could hide as well be shielded more-or-less from the elements.
It was 9 PM. What to do? I knew for a fact that calling anyone at all at that time, 9 PM, would cost me several hours of time with the almost certain result that nothing besides what I myself could provide her would be available to her.
So I decided to get into my car, drive home, get my generally unused sleeping bag, and bring it back to her. I became more convinced of doing this because the temperature indicator in my car showed that it was 48 degrees outside and it was windy and it was still 9 PM.
When I got back, I talked to her. And even though she didn’t initially want the sleeping bag, I told her: “It’s 9:30 PM, it’s 48 degrees now. It may drop to freezing by the end of the night, and you may want this at 2 AM. Tomorrow, let’s see what we can do.”
The next morning, she was gone, along of course with the sleeping bag. But I was giving it to her anyway. And I was happy that she apparently made it through the night.
But this is where we are. In a County like ours where all the beds for women seem to always be full (see my article from last month) and there’s no place (that will actually give help) to call at night, we’re left trying to keep people not frozen dead for the night.
Can the County do better? Can Southern California do better? Of course we can. But when it comes to homelessness, we clock out at 5 PM, and really at 3:30 – 4 PM, and just hope not to see anyone dead the next day.
Thank God for those outreach workers who work 9-5, you DON’T get the credit you deserve.
But … it should be obvious that we need to staff (and supply with beds) the two other 8 hour shifts in a 24 hour day as well.
Fr. Dennis Kriz, OSM, Pastor St. Philip Benizi Catholic Church, Fullerton.
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