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NEEDHAM, MA - The Needham Housing Authority (NHA) has devised a new innovative solution to the problem of the need for more affordable housing. This is so easy, it is brilliant.
If you are a landlord or a housing authority in a wealthy town, and you want to create more units of housing for the homeless and the needy, what you can do to make room for more tenants, is simply evict the current tenants.
Of course it doesn't make sense, but eviction as a form of housing management doesn't make much sense either, unless you are a bully Town and you are a Housing Authority that would kick an old man out onto the street rather than try to solve the problem.
The problem for Joseph Amrhine, 70s, and a tenant of public housing in Needham, is that on 10:00 AM Monday July 14, 2025 he is scheduled to be evicted from his Chambers Street apartment, after three years of bungling indifference in the courts and with the landlord. Its been a cavalcade of incompetence.
In Joseph's case, he was on the waiting list for two and a half years, during the pandemic, before moving into public housing. For his three years, as a tenant, he has never been financially stable and he admits to disabilities in his physical and mental health, for which he is getting treatment and counseling. Unfortunately, his 18 unit apartment building has been rife with what the cops call "neighbor trouble." This situation is one that Joseph is attempting to survive.
The Housing Authority cannot seem to own up to its part in creating and sustaining the unhealthy social environment at Needham's public housing. And it does not help Joseph is not always shy and quiet about expressing his anger and frustration at the hand fate has dealt him and his fellow occupants.
The NHA tends to take an unfortunate situation and make it worse. When Joseph's friend went to the NHA offices to talk with the Executive Director on Joseph's behalf, somehow, somewhere between the NHA, Joseph's friend and Joseph, his legal papers got lost.
Similarly, at Housing Court in Canton, a set of photographs regarding the condition of the apartment were not seen by the judge, which, when this was pointed out, the case was, in effect, reopened for further review.
Joseph's capacity to handle the criminal charges, the eviction, and his personal emotions were brought into consideration, in Court, but almost informally and by chance, when proper legal counsel should have been provided.
Basically, throughout multiple processes, he has not been fully appraised of what he was agreeing to.
The most egregious instance of another example of poor defense for a tenant was with Trecina Burnett, who was a trans woman or at least a cross dressing man, who, without benefit of counsel admitted to charges of lewd behavior against her, which then impacted her status, as an acceptable applicant for a place in public housing. She was told in an informal and clearly threatening way that she was going to be evicted. She was concerned, and the stress may contributed to the cardiac arrest that killed her.
Regarding the prejudice against men who are angry, I am, personally, not afraid of an angry man, unless, of course, he's coming at me with a weapon and I cannot get away. I am more afraid of women who talk about a man behind their back in ways that will ruin his reputation and get him evicted.
Specifically what scares me is the woman in Joseph's building, who is a functioning alcoholic, who knows how the criminal justice system works, and who, if you believe it, has falsely accused him of a supposedly violent attack against an elderly grandmother, who has since died. The incident never went to court and there's no apparent police report, but the character assassination persists at the Housing Authority and with the Health Department. And this prejudice has colored the processes and procedures used against him.
