An Ohio pastor was punished for opening his church to the homeless. He deserves it. (Livestream)
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- čas přidán 10. 07. 2024
- Was Reverend Chris Avell merely acting like Jesus, letting homeless people into his church, only to become the victim of overzealous local authorities?
Or was he making a very real problem even worse?
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Thank you to Yanely Del Rosario for providing captioning help!
If only American Christians paid their taxes we could have solved homelessness problem.
As much as I agree that churches should pay taxes, I am under no illusion that those dollars would go to housing the homeless. Not in this country.
And billionaires... and Corporations...
Could you give a percentage you think they should be taxed?
Even based on PPP the US is on of the highest ranked nations. If the US wanted to solve the homelessness problem, they already could. However as with many problems in the US. The issue is not having enough money. It is the political will to make those changes. So taxing churches (and I agree with that) ain't going to do anything as the political will would still not be there.
@@MarcillaSmith100%
Lovely how anything that sounds righteous on Fox disintegrates into a rotten mess upon closer inspection.
So very true!!💙💙💙🥰✌
see: maga
@@ThatOpalGuySee: trump suit
Has completely ruined Bridge Night for me. 🙃
Then trump supports foxs fake news just like trump supported covid shots and bands. Wars etc. Trump is deepstate aswell
Speaking of Fox. Why doesn't Rupert Murdoch donate to that "church" to fix the code violations? Surely it'd be a fraction of what he already has...
Consider all the legal firepower that the right wing is bringing to fight this issue. Those legal fees could easily have gone towards getting this makeshift homeless shelter up to code.
The Tax Exemot Freedom From religion Foundation Brings Millions of Dllars to Frivolous Lawsuits over if Someone is Allowed to Pray Outside of a Public Building, Why don;t'THey use That Money to Help the Homeless Instead?
As the wife of a bureaucrat who worked in the Social Services department, I would like to draw attention to all the hard working bureaucrats who are having to deal with this joker on top of their usual overflowing inboxes.
Social workers and the bureaucrats who support them are unsung and occasionally even vilified. If you ever have to deal with a social worker (and I hope you never do) please be patient and kind. They have probably seen more everyday horrors than you can even imagine.
Solidarity from the spouse of a planning-office bureaucrat who is explicitly disempowered from defending himself AT ALL against either a much-inflamed and ill-informed public or a dismayingly ill-informed county board of supervisors. All he can do is suck up the abuse. I've watched it eat away at him for over 20 years.
Yeah, there are legit issues that should be brought to the attention of local government. But a) do your homework before you pop off at someone just trying to do their job and b) remember that person you're complaining to IS a person, and quite possibly a person who cares deeply about what they do, especially in offices like social services.
I feel a need to point out what many people easily forget, or just never know:
Most safety laws are not made in a vacuum. They don't come out of thin air. Most, if not ALL result from deaths. Literally people died, and then someone said "Hey, that wasn't safe. We should make a law, so this doesn't happen again."
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire
Iroquois Theater Fire
Cocoanut Grove Nightclub Fire
Our Lady of the Angels School Fire
MGM Grand Hotel Fire
Those are just the fires. There are regulations because of trains colliding. Ships sinking. Planes exploding. Women being lied to about how deadly radioactive paint is. A golfer being sold radioactive pills. Buildings, bridges, & dams collapsing!
Regulations are built upon corpses. Don't let these people die in vain, because we have forgotten the lessons their deaths tried to teach us! Please!
There's a wonderful channel I watch called Fascinating Horror. The presenter does a wonderful job telling about the disaster that occurred and the results from it.
“A golfer who was sold radioactive pills”
You mean the guy whose jaw fell off? That was radioactive water: Radithor.
Love Fascinating Horror!
@@Leofwine You're right. I just remembered the little brown bottle. 🙂 But the point stands.
This is so important to remember. Yeah, regulations seem tedious at times, but they're there because people died without them. Violating them puts lives in danger. "Regulations are built upon corpses" is an apt quote to drive the point home. This pastor, although trying to do a good thing, was putting lives in danger.
Is there a database where I could find regulations, and ones that are unanimously received as good by all of us (not just the controversial ones like libertarians like to talk crap about) and where these regulations came about, etc etc.
I know if I were to study I could find info on specifc regulations, just wondering if there are resources that go over this topic or websites that keep track of them.
Would love some help on this if anybody has it.
I wasn't praising him but I was being more critical of the city failing to house the homeless.
As a society, we should not have to rely on churches for basic necessities.
I agree. One of the primary justifications for tax exempt status for churches is so they can use that money to meet the needs of the community. I agree that we need to not rely on churches for basic needs. So, we could discontinue the tax exemption and support more and better services.
When I was a reporter in So. California I researched homlesness and found that often cities, as much as they try, have an uphill battle when it comes to sheltering the homless. A shelter must abide by a stricter code than your home or business. There are women with little children who had to escape abuse, there are victims of violence, sick people without insurance, jobless immigrants, etc. The shelter has to reject people with a history of violent crimes and sex offenders. They can't allow drugs, alcohol, or weapons. Since residents are provided shelter, food, clothing, and basic medical care, they're not supposed to beg claiming to be homeless to make money. In short, many will rather be in the streets than abide by those rules. Some will break the rules and have to be expelled, since there are others waiting who are willing to abide by them. Some are even paranoid about having a permanent residence. Homlessness is extremely complicated and very hard to solve by simply throwing money at it.
@@DoctorZisIN What if we housed the homeless and not just sheltered them?
@@DoctorZisIN I agree. It seems it would have been better if the pastor and the community leaders sat down and COOPERATED about what to do (even for the s-x offender). We want solutions, not accusations NOR unnecessary risk-taking!
You soon enough find out if the church in question is out to benefit on the backs of the poor, or truly want to help (but are looking for ways to do it).
And EVERYBODY should work to HOUSE people rather than fight about how to "shelter" them when all else fails! (like polarbear says).
Why not?
The system is obviously overrun.
If they aren't to be taxed then they need to do their part in dealing with the issues they help perpetuate.
This isn't rocket science.
I was one of those people defending the pastor. Without the proper context, the story sounds absurdly unfair. Thank you for bringing the context and changing my mind ❤️
Like he said, when you see right wing news sites covering it and or defending it. It should auto throw up red flags to most people, this can be true for left wing things too.
Me too.
Same I thought he was running it out of a stand alone church. I had no idea he was running it out of a tiny arcade business. That changes perspective.
Yep. Me too.
@@kiraward1125 I really don't see what difference that makes. If he had code violations at a building that looked like a church, would that have been any more acceptable? What matters is that he was preventing people from freezing to death, not the kind of building he was doing it in. Yes, he should've been doing it by code, but freezing to death is an emergency.
You need to hear the whole story before turning someone into a martyr - hero.
What's really funny to me as a Bible scholar is that according to the new testament, even the religious elite at the time knew to follow government regulations. Heck, "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's" is an explicit statement telling people to pay their taxes, which for some reason is ignored by modern theologians when it comes to religious institutions.
They ignore it because it has a deliberate loophole. Jesus was asked if it was right to pay taxes to the Roman Emperor. This was a trick question as paying tribute to the Caesar (a divine figure in Roman society) could be portrayed as disobeying the command to worship no other gods before yhwh whilst advocating against paying taxes would place Jesus in conflict with the law of the empire and potentially lead to his imprisonment.
Jesus first asks for a coin and points out the Caesar's face on it. He then says to give to Caesar what is Caesar's and give to God what is God's.
The response is deliberately framed so as to imply an endorsement of paying taxes, but keen readers will note that he never actually said as much while also recognizing that, in Christianity, everything is God's.
It is one of several verses in the Bible meant to serve as "Oh so clever" mic drop moments for Jesus that only really work because the Gospel authors could just choose to end the conversation there.
Another example of one such passage is the, "Let he who is without sin among you cast the first stone," story. In context, Jesus is intervening in the punishment of a breach of the law. This means that Jesus's statement is an advocation against the enforcement of the law except by wholly sinless individuals which would make it impossible to enforce any law. Nobody brings this issue up to Jesus in response, of course, because the author ends the conversation there.
Also
_Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves._
Quite a bit of the christian "persecution" that actually existed in the first hundred centuries C.E. was about not paying taxes. (As opposed to the imagined persecution today. Some of which is also about not paying taxes.) Funny how much fuss christians will make in order to not contribute to society. ("Taxes" in Roman times were often animal sacrifices that were killed on altars for the gods and the best cuts were given to the clergy, but the rest was given to the poor or sold at a subsidized price. People couldn't afford beef without subsidies then just as today, so the gov propped up the industry.)
@@kateherr2893 quote the source to back up that statement thanks.
Not to mention helping people who are poor for the sake of it.
You know, there's a bit of irony in a church that has a bunch of arcade claw machines in the front. Especially since the machines seem to promise a reward that you can never attain.
"Work all day, live on hay; you'll have pie in the sky when you die (that's a lie)." ~Joe HIll, "The Preacher And The Slave"
As the saying go: 'the devil is in the details'
I'M BEING PERSECUTED FOR HELPING THE HOMELESS! Now excuse me, WHILE I ENCOURAGE MY CONGREGATION TO VOTE FOR POLICIES THAT KEEP THEM THAT WAY.
This right here.
The article didn't actually say anything about what kind of congregation he has. Not all Christians are Republican. Many are very progressive and vote for progressive policies.
@@dragongirl7978 Maybe, but nearly all the times I've come across Christians, they have all been republican.
@@dragongirl7978yeah no, as nice as that sounds it just doesn’t track for the most part.
@@dragongirl7978 Fox news would have researched enough to see if they were Republican to have that heading
Funny how there's always a backstory to Christian "persecution."
And there's always a shady Christian law firm slinking about to attack the public. Ironic how easily one can spot the lawyer in any picture.
This is Christian prosecution! They always seem to confuse those two words.
Its Funny that You Sociopaths Attacked Churches for Not Opening their Doors to the Homeless, and did no Further Digging, just called them Hypocrites and Monsters, then Attack a man Who did Open His Church to the Homeless to Save Them from the Cold. And its Hilarious since You are Pretending to Punch Up at Christian Privledge when Listening to a man Hemant Mehta Who is a Millionate because He is a Proffessional Atheist Who is Paid Handsomely for His Hate Peddling and is president of the Well Funded Secular Student Alliance, and it is in turn a Subsidiary of The American Humanist Association, Both of which are Tax Exempt, and None of them Help The Homeless at all.
The idea is that suffering for God is the highest praise so Christians often invent it for that praise.
@@NoahMoorman - No Actual Christian says "Suffering for God is The Highest Praise". Face Facts, Millionate Hemet Mehta is Bullying This Guy Because He doesn't want Anyone to see Christians as Heroes.
In other words, this guy isn't being cited for sheltering the homeless. He's being cited for unsafe conditions. If his facility was up to code, I bet nobody would bother him.
Honestly before seeing the google street view of "dads place", I thought that this "Dad's place" was an actual, stereotypical church building, not the back room of an arcade.
I cooked professionally for 20 years, and dealt with several state health dept.s, and I found the vast majority were very easy to work with; they were mostly concerned with the health and safety of the public, not being hard-asses. It looks to me like that is the case here. Another Christian going out of his way to force the issue, so he can show everyone how persecuted he is. Who cares if a few homeless people get hurt in the process.
It is funny to see a grown man go around crying publicly about how the city literally told him to fix his violations that can lead to people's deaths, or stop being a homeless shelter because he can literally kill people with his neglectful property management practices.
As a fellow food worker, I agree. My bosses would introduce me for the walk around. These folks understood and treated me with respect. They educated me rather than complain.
"Get hurt?" It was literally in sub-zero temperatures and nobody got hurt. Do you think they might have "been hurt" outside in sub-zero temps? 🤨 They dude should fix his huckster shack, but arresting him for code violations for letting homeless people inside in sub-zero temps is pretty fucking petty.
@@FakingANerve For months, and warned about them with a long time to fix it if you saw the video.
Our oldest church burned down 2 weeks ago, when the temperature was 10 degrees. Two fire departments responded, and the water was freezing as it left the hoses.
The church was “abandoned”, in that no one attended anymore. The grounds were kept up by former members.
It had occasionally been opened as a shelter. Officials think someone entered to keep warm, started a fire, which got out of control.
In Worcester, MA 4 firefighters lost their lives in an abandoned warehouse fire. It was started by a homeless pair who accidentally knocked over a candle as they left the building. I watched it smolder for over a week. It was horrific.
I appreciate your dive into this. It's such an easy story to twist into "He was arrested for giving shelter to homeless people".
I do potentially take issue with your characterization of harboring a "sex offender". Without knowing what the person's offense was, we don't know if their presence makes the home unsafe or not.
Tier 1 sex offenders (the lowest risk group) are slightly less likely to commit another sex offense than the general public and much less likely to commit another sex offense than the population of all felons. And if they are on supervised release (which is extremely common for towns with the resources) they are under a lot of additional scrutiny where one wrong move can send them back to prison.
Despite this, courts have held that homeless shelters can ban sex offenders, that residential bans on sex offenders can essentially banish them from cities, and that landlords and home owners associations can make blanket rules banning them, without regard to what their actual conviction is. And this housing issue has other complications because if someone can't secure housing in a reasonable time since leaving, they will likely be found in violation of their parole/probation/supervised release and be sent back to prison.
And this is all coming at a time where courts are more and more likely to prosecute "sex offenses" and give much stricter charges for them than in previous years, which means we have at least a sizeable chunk of people on the sex offender registry who do not belong there and would not have been placed on the registry if their charge was prosecuted when the registries were created.
This overlaps other systemic issues such as how LGBTQ+ people and racial minorities are more likely to be placed on the sex offender registry for crimes that don't require it, the overall ongoing housing crisis leaving so many people housing insecure, the plague of mass incarceration, and the social ills of putting someone in a prison environment that grooms them into gang-like behavior (unless they have people on the outside sending them resources) and then denying them resources and housing once they're out.
If the "sex offender" in question was a Tier 1 offender, especially a non-violent Tier 1 offender, then providing them housing when nobody else would was likely a very kind and generous thing to do for them and statistically does not endanger the other people living there.
I can't say i'm surprised, now thst i know more details. I thought the only reason he would have been sued would have been abuse or trying to profit off the people in desperate times.
I was already rethinking the moment i heard it wasn't a church but a business. Hearing the violations was also just scary.
Just because people in desperate need are desperate, it doesn't mean you can cut corners in trying to help them. No moldy food. No donated clothes that are mostly holes. No gas leaks introduced by you.
He probably thought he was doing the best he could for them, but good intentions can still be harmful
The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.
I was surprised that the problem wasn't predatory practices while they'd be better off next door.
It sounds like he _tried_ to help them but wasn't willing to put the work into doing it properly.
Except for the fact that he insists on keeping the church in his business' building. That sounds a lot like a tax dodge.
He probably figured that once he got these people back on their feet they would join his church and give him a lot more money in the long run than he spent housing them in his unsafe church/arcade.
*Sometimes you can only find out who a person really is, by learning who sides with them.*
And let's just say: if a RW organisation sides with someone - that someone is probably not a good person.
Another version of the old saying, which my father liked, “Tell me your friends and I’ll tell you who you are.”
Useful, but not universal.
There's also a chance this is just some dufass trying to do a decent thing, that right wing evangelical politicians randomly came across and decided to milk
@@mbburry4759
So, you didn't watch the video. Ok.
Wait a minute., this guy is running a Church out of an arcade? Can we see if he's paying taxes on his business or does his business now count as a Church asset and is tax exempt?
Very interesting point for a possible angle as something they may or may not have considered. What an angle if it proves to be that.
Maybe he will start selling Pet Rocks that have been baptized to justify the 20 dollars.
@@truetech4158 All my pet rocks are atheists.
@@DoctorZisIN So am I, but they still waterboarded me and tossed me to the moil, who hacked off the tip and shipped it fresh to roman for their vatican picnics as a disgusting little vatican onion ring.
@@truetech4158 Oy ve!
@@truetech4158 I have no idea what you're trying to say here my dude.
16 million unoccupied houses in America and as of 2023 there was 653,104 homeless ppl.
a mc mansion just sold it was newly built in 98 but the owner NEVER moved in... he got hotels bc it didn't even have any furniture.. some ppl are just greedy af, smh.
Which is why I say there isn't a housing crisis. There's a greed crisis
Most of those rules (such as fire codes etc) were paid for in human life. Many were a created as a reaction to tragedy.
Ugh. The $ used by the city to defend this law suit could be used for safer emergency shelter. Outrage machines are expensive to maintain.
probably a red-run community.
Excellent point.
Did you watch the same video? There are ongoing safety violations being raised by the city. The lawsuit is being raised by the right wing legal group.
@@andrewharrison8436 yes...the city needs to pay lawyers for the defense. That's how lawsuits work. The right wing likes to use government to "starve the beast." No $ left over for social good.
@@andrewharrison8436
Did “you” watch the video?
The city was *OUT of shelter space* in the middle of a very dangerous cold wave. If you had to choose between likely freezing to death or taking your chances in a not-up-to-code WARM shelter, I doubt very much that you would take the first option.
I do not care one bit about the politics of any of the people involved. I only care about what is right. As another poster in this column pointed out, the city should be spending money on expanding its shelter space, rather than prosecuting this pastor.
Seems to me perhaps he did this church thing to avoid taxes on his failure arcade.
THis is because You are a Bigot WHo decided to Hate Christians First and never Bother with Facts. The Arcade was Opened After the Church was. Now YiU Wil chnge the Hate Talk to He began the Arcade to give it Tax Exemoption even Though hthat is Not Really True Either.
If I were homeless, I would rather choose to stay in an unsafe house than freezing to death on the street.
Yeah, same. I was expecting the twist to be like, it was actually a sex trafficking ring or something. I mean what if he'd just opened up his house and his house had safety violations? Still think the city is more wrong than the pastor. If they wanted to help they should have helped fix the violations, not prosecute the guy who was helping the homeless people they weren't helping.
@@dragongirl7978 They actually did go in and fix some of the violations. No one was out on the street freezing. I live near there.
That's how I felt when I was homeless
@@QueenoftheBlackCoastthat's comforting
Hypothetical claims of what you’d do in a situation you’ve never been in is just egomaniac bollocks. You have no idea what you’d do, and your ignorance is immense. Many homeless people are fleeing abuse and coercive control. 🤦♀️
Being raised Catholic and attending other churches through the years I have a pre-disposed idea of what a church looks like. So when I first heard this story I was like " so isn't this guy acting on his faith what's the big deal". Now I understand the city's stance. After looking at the photo you showed of the "church" building I'm not sure I'd even go in to play the claw machines. I understand his motives but he has a responsibility to insure their safety while on his property.
I remember back in the 80's or 90's, one of the shelters here would lock the doors at 10pm. It took the city and fire department, coming after them so these people didn't end up locked into a burning building.
Perspective, context, and facts ... something those right-wing articles clearly ignored
The LP Tank noted is Liquid Propane Tank. The stuff Hank Hill sells for BBQs. It's heavier than air. So if it leaks, it'll settle on the floor, displace the air and suffocate people sleeping there. Also, if the stove has a pilot light, once the propane hits that... Pop goes the weasel! And everyone goes to heaven.
If gasoline gets exposed to air it will evaporate and float away. If the plastic container was repurchased to carry diesel or kerosene and a little was left in. It will bond with the gasoline and form a vapor heavy enough to linger
It can go boom
Thank you for finding out the rest of the story. 👏👏
Guaranteed the pastor was given a warning, if not several, prior to charging the violations. I'm in a small town in Texas. The last thing we want is a long and expensive court case.
I run a business. When there have been any questions from the city, I have always been given a chance to rectify it before I could be given a charged violation. Never been charged with any official violations.
According to Hemant's reporting he was issued 18 code violations, was given a month to correct them before fines began, and in that time he corrected 13 of them. This guy runs a quirky arcade in a small town, and then he decided to run a little church out of it too. I don't think turning a profit was his driving motive for this project. I doubt he has the drive, business acumen, or capital to be handling the kind of pressure these violations put on his business, but it seems to me a good faith effort was made. And I say kudos to this guy for refusing to close his doors to people in need.
Thanks for this video. As a former zoning administrator my skepticism was raised when I first heard the story. It’s actually very much everyday business in a city but when the media gets involved you get selective amplification of the issues.
Yeah, I was wondering the same. City managers aren’t usually trying to be nasty- they’re balancing safety and community needs.
Thank you for looking at this more carefully. I used to work for the Red Cross, and people did stuff like this all the time. When you run a shelter, you MUST maintain standards for health and safety. People can be preyed upon in these vulnerable situations. If Rando offers to cook burgers for hungry people, he could kill people. *Bad things* can happen to children (and others) if certain protocols aren't followed.
Once you accept responsibility for these people, you accept ALL the responsibility.
IDK but I think the fire chief (and city) would ignore the misuse of the building if the code violations were taken care of.
If there had been fire and people were hurt, everyone would've condemned the city council and fire department for not upholding housing regulations... Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Well mother Teresa never had to worry about this stuff. 😤
(Sacasm, i know a bunch of vulnerable people died under her 'care')
Mother Terea ran a Hospice, not a Hospital, most People DIed Under Her Care, but She was Not the Monster that Hitchens Depicted Her as and You Atheist Scyumbagts Need to Really just Attack Christians for No Reason Out of Hate. Telling Me No Hate like Christian Love is Meaningless given All you do is Hate Christians.
Good work Hemant,the city is doing its job and people better realize cowboy chtistainty is dangerous.If this pastor has a burden for people he should join forces with the homeless shelter next door and the city and do everything by the book and they could have a very good ministry going using both buildings and resources as a unit.Theres hope there if all parties WORKED together.
Hadn't heard the term "cowboy Christianity" before but I am definitely going to use it now. Great image.
@@lynkissa Your very encouraging Lyn,keep the faith.
A church in the back of a mini-claw arcade? Hmmm...that's not suspicious at all.
This story illustrates almost perfectly the frustrating mismatch that always exists between the ease and speed at which a lie can be disseminated and the laborious effort and time that's required to set the record straight with a full presentation of the facts.
Hold parasitic cooperations accountable for their exploitation of their employees.
Agreed, but this isn't that kind of channel, at least, not until Zuck turns Meta into the Golden Calf.
Just like that Fox Noose "loves" the homeless. 🙄
You mean Faux Noise
Fox Spews
So basically, to sum it up as clearly and quickly as possible, the problem isn’t housing the homeless, but housing people in a business area in unsafe conditions? It might have been good to put that thesis somewhere closer to the start.
Death vs being in a fire hazard. I chose being in a fire hazard to being dead.
Could end up dead either way 🤷♀️
A Christian feels worthless unless he can claim he is being persecuted.
You know what would truly help the city help the Homeless = Make the churches PAY TAXES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But... that makes too much sense.
Why don't Atheists Lead by Example and have Atheist Groups Pay Taxes? They are all Tax Exempt. Like Millionare Hemet Mehta's Very own American Humanist Association and its Tax Exempt Secular Student Alliance He is President of. Why doesn't Mehta Pay His Taxed?
Im sorry but city officials are anti homeless people. They do not set up rules to help the homeless, but rather to harm them. I’m not saying i agree or disagree with this pastor, but to say that rules are there to protect the homeless is just not true.
I remember someone saying that our local sheriff said that helping homeless people kept them from seeking services. I was like are you serious? There are hundreds of homeless people in our streets and nowhere near enough beds for all of them. Giving them lunch for a day helps keep them alive it's not what " keeps them living in squalor".
I don't approve that this gambling establishment is allowed anywhere near a homeless shelter let alone be one...
I think that jesus feller would have had something to say about having that as part of a church too lol
Guess he felt bad, that taking away easily maliable gambling addicted people's money that might want to find a place to live, while becoming addicted to a fiction book that tries to convince people that homelessness frostbite and starvation and being marched into battlefields overseas by delusional smiley liars makes the victims float off to a fancy better place in the sky made of gingerbread like the monolith.
Hemant, nice arrangement of laying out the story in your video, well done. I'm an architect in the Chicago area who often gets brought in after the fact to help correct these problems. Its always fun explaining to an owner why they have to spend far more money than they anticipated. I worked with a community theater group in Indiana where they renovated an old paint store into their theater and they wouldn't accept my telling them that the one toilet room would not be sufficient because they were changing occupancy type from retail to assembly. Sure enough they had to hear it from the state review and I got to change my drawings to rip out the old toilet room and put in two new ones. And of course the sucker I was I did all this pro bono for a friend who worked with the group. But hey they put my company name in the program no leads yet from it but anytime I'm sure. 😂
I'm glad that you provided that very important context 🙏 It really did changed the entire narrative, however I don't necessarily agree that housing a sex offender would be a danger to others staying there.
Considering just how easy it is for one to get placed on the sex offenders registry, and the different levels on the registry, it would depend on what that individual actually did that landed them on it. Most people hear that someone is on the S.O. Registry and they immediately think the worst but that is often times not the case.
I've heard public urination is one such offense that can earn you an entry. Ambiguous as it is, it's understandable to reactively latch onto it because it's true that the opposition would eat that up if it wasn't a church. Speaking of things to get hung up on, the police report was pretty focused on getting the guy to live in his car someplace people can't see.
@@gausscone There are a number of innocent things that most people have done at least once in their lives that could have landed them on the registry under the right circumstances, and because of the stigma surrounding the S.O. registry, getting placed on it can be extremely detrimental to ones everyday life.
Rarely when someone finds out that someone is on the registry, do they attempt to learn what that individual did to land them there. They just assume and immediately judge them harshly while trying to get them out of their community.
Like the homeless, states and communities generally make an effort to place and keep those on the registry out of public view. A sort of out of site out of mind position while also trying to make their lives harder 😔
I feel badly for this situation. When I was a kid, my family was homeless for a time, and the misery is everything it's cracked up to be. It can happen in the blink of an eye, and people you thought loved you can abandon you and blame you. We eventually clawed our way out, but I learned a great deal about people and am not very judgemental in my life. We were "helped" by supposedly good Christian people, one of whom shouted and screamed at us for supposedly leaving a paper towel in her van. We hadn't, but there wasn't a reason to scream about it anyway. When my mother responded with "Oh, did they? I'll speak to them. I'm sorry if they did." , she screamed, "Just take that correction and shut up!" I'm still in therapy because of this woman. Another pastor called my father a professional con man because he had called asking for any help he could get and keep working to get his family in a better place. That's kind of amusing; my father would be a horrible con man. We also met lovely people who wanted only to help. I know I may get crap for saying it, but the most non strings attached help we got was from the Catholic Church. I'm still friendly with the priest at that parish; he knows I'm an atheist but loves me anyway. He, my rabbi, ( my family culturally celebrate Jewish holidays and secularly celebrate Christmas, and we attend any event for people we love) and my husband's uncle the judge all officiated our wedding as friends at a beautiful secular setting. Just three friends who loved us. A great time was had by all. In terms of Chris Avell, I have no idea where he falls, but I do think at least part of him wants to do the right thing. He may have taken the help of a far-right legal group because they offered their services. He may have gone on Fox News because he like too many decent conservatives don't realize that it's not really a news station and don't have Ground News . He may have needed more time to complete correcting the violations. I have no idea . The complaints seem to echo those of homeowners who complain about not being able to make major renovations without permits or inspections. "They just want money! Why can't I do what I want to my house without this crap?" To avoid disaster than could harm your whole family. We had an incident here in NYC where someone had put a very large pool from Walmart on the roof of a building. It held thousands of gallons of water, which weighed thousands of pounds. They were livid when the fire department and the zoning board made them take it down because the roof was not made for a pool. Kind of like having to fix a gas leak to avoid an explosion. And I think you're correct; the lawyers care about publicity, not homeless people. If any of them did, they'd help Chris take care of the problems and make it safe to give a place for the homeless to sleep. Just my two cents from someone who has been there. Love your work. Keep it up!
You know where people are allowed to sleep and it's safe? In the pastors home.
3 People died from hypothermia due to the cold...I'm willing to bet those homeless people would rather take sleeping in a shady business than sleeping outside where it's guaranteed they'd die, I know I would.
He’s been housing people there since last May. This wasn’t some emergency measure just for the cold.
@@karenneill9109 the owner was given 18 code violations to address one month before he started getting fines. He addressed 13 of those. He probably didn't expect anyone to have issues with him housing people in need. When he first opened his doors that's all he did. He had the good will to make room for these people, but not the bureaucratic expertise or resources to make it happen above board. This one guy in a small town running a quirky arcade didn't happen to know how to appease the city in setting up an official homeless shelter, but didn't want to stand idly by while people had no roof over their heads. Not every christian is a bigot, just like not every atheist is compassionate. We're all humans and we come in lots of different flavors. The guy who makes room to shelter the unhoused is alright in my book.
@@jeremymorris6000 The city told him exactly how to make it happen above board and up to code, he chose not to follow through.
@@swimmingmide you mean like how they suggested he buy or rent another property? You got that kind of money? Or 18 repairs in a month kind of money? Because I sure as hell don't. I doubt the guy who runs the claw machine arcade in a tiny town that lets homeless people sleep in the back room does either.
@@jeremymorris6000 It depends on the repairs, but I would make sure my building was up to code before I opened it to the public. If you can not afford to run a homeless shelter with safe living conditions don't run one illegally. If I had found out the repairs I needed to make to safely house people were too time consuming or costly to do in 30 days I would shut the location down until the repairs were done. Fire and safety codes exist because people had died from them not being in place. We have fire escape doors because people kept getting killed in fires they could not escape from. We have CO alarms because people kept dieing from leaks. We add chemicals to natural gas so that we can smell it because people were being killed by gas leaks. The pastor was told what the rules were and was given options to follow them. He chose not to follow the rules and is now upset that his actions had consequences he was informed of ahead of time.
He might still be collecting offerings and tithes from them
People without housing deserve a safe place to shelter. I’m glad the city is committed to this accountability. I’ve heard people defend similar “efforts” to provide space for unhoused people without ensuring the safety factors - defending their actions by saying “it’s better than nothing.” This is faulty logic & faulty thinking. If they want to do something helpful, they need to do it right.
Thank you Hemant! I love your work!
So true! I think there’s also a clear difference when it’s an emergency situation with a deep cold. The stories implied that he took some people in for a few nights due to the cold, not that he’s had these issues since last May!
So are those conservatives going to call for the defunding of the police next? It makes my head spin
Doubt it
Governments are suppose to care and act in the best interests of their constituents. Whether they are housed or not. Not offering shelter, gov should be held accountable.
Sounds like violation that needed to be fix just being run as an arcade
On the person who is a sex offender. Is he/she a real sex offender or just someone who was pissing outside because he / she is homeless and stinks.
I don't have an answer, but it seems to be the regulation violations, while dangerous, might be the lesser of two evils: Freezing to death outside (if there's not enough room at the shelter) versus risking a dangerous situation. What it comes down to is the city (or local government) protecting themselves where clear regulations are being violated versus what makes logical sense but hasn't been put in writing.
It's a homeless problem all over, nothing specific to this case.
I wonder how many children were on the property using the arcade machines while he was housing a SO there?
Some rabbit holes reveal a 'cancer' that is not of value!
Thanks, Hemant!
Great post!
As usual, Hemant, your comments are right on the mark. Thank you for your efforts snd thoughtful commentary!
I've been homeless, and I've lived in homeless shelters. There are 2 things about this you did not raise, but is the biggest danger. 1 is the improper ventilation with a gas stove. He is literally gassing the homeless. 2 is if his place on the first floor of this building were to burn down not only would it be his 1st floor but the whole building, and possibly the whole block that could burndown, including the legally operating homeless shelter.
Thanx for the “deep dive.”
You prove you gotta go beyond the headlines more than most of us do.
Leave it to the religious to cut corners and just pray about it.
Dad Avell taking a page from Mother Teresa, huh?
@Deridus lmao... without all the private jet and rulers of country associations. Boy, is he doing it wrong.
@@Mwilson8581 Well, it's not like he has the big CC on his side to artificially inflate his income...
Guaranteed there is a bunch of gray haired parishioners who through a fit
Dude, your segments are really informative. Keep up the great work.
Thanks for the update
You say that the city should be doing more. Maybe the city is trying to do more, but when you have "Christian republican politicians" who are preventing change from happening, there's little the city can do.
Exactly
I understand why the city has to enforce code, they can't just decide that the law doesn't apply, but I think it's a stretch to say that he deserves it. I don't know about Ohio but here in Oregon we just had 15 people die in Portland alone from hypothermia during a storm last week, ranging in age from 15 to 82. If the city isn't going to help, I say f- their code. It's a good example of the difference between legal/illegal and right/wrong.
That place could blow up at any minute with these violations. All that gas and no ventilation. It’s egregious. He could have collaborated with the homeless shelter next door to arrange for temporary housing. Could have paid for motel rooms, or housed them in his own residency, or asked his congregation to help take people in, even if it’s just a cot in their garage with a space heater nearby, it would have kept those people alive in the cold without putting them into a furnace bomb.
@@jazzpear8877 "Could" seems like a reasonable gamble if you're freezing to death. It's the same reason that shanty towns exist in a lot of places, and yeah it's not good by any means, but it's realistic and as a country we're not providing alternatives. We want to legislate like a developed country but not treat our citizens like a developed country does, if that makes sense.
Thank you for digging into this and giving this clarification!
Nice to see you doing a deeper dive into the story.
The zoning rules (no residential in business district) are not about safety and contribute to the homeless crisis, but the safety hazards are more realistic as a reason to charge him.
If we wanted to solve homelessness we would have by now, there are billions spent on political campaigns with politicians running on fixing homelessness as part of their platforms.
There's also a ton of money spent by special interest groups to keep/worsen the status quo, especially when it comes to housing.
Exactly they don't WANT to fix the problem
I live in a small town with no homeless services. Last month we had a little over a week of freezing temperatures. The high one day was 3°. A local church set up a temporary shelter.. without that Church these people would have been sleeping in negative 10° weather outside.
It was temporary and follows all the codes. Apparently they do it every year!
Following the codes is a key phrase here, I think. I would have no problem giving money specifically for a shelter project (money to update the arcade setting to follow the codes). The fire risk is hard to brush off. But it is better to keep people from freezing than to let them freeze, sure. Tragedy can be preventable.
Thankyou for telling the whole story.
To open a church or place of worship. All you have to do is fill out one side of a form and a small fee and have a small area for people to gather. It isn't a church. it is a claw archaid that wants tax exemption. It is too easy to take advantage of loopholes in the tax code. I have joked I will start a church to worship the One Eye Purple People Eater. Nothing in Ohio law prevents me from doing so. Where I live there is over 20 small buildings that say church. In about a square mile. all to avoid %10's of thousands in taxes... It is a way to own property with no taxes until you can sell for major profit. Property values have double in recent years and development is in a major upswing with the new interchange.
I love how the plaque for "Dad's Place" is roughly the same size as the Pokemon Minecraft sign. At least it's at eye level, with the other sign a little lower for children. Quite a hustle.
Homeless people eat out of dumpsters. Are we to believe that the city cares about the safety of their food?? The building MIGHT be unsafe, but freezing cold weather is not?? If the city is so concerned, why is nothing being done to help them??
Agree. Pastor might not be doing his full due diligence but I still think the city is the one in the wrong here, not him.
So you're arguing that homeless people deserve unsafe food?
@@adamcosper3308 No. I'm saying that the city's excuse was that the food might not be safe. Neither is dumpster food. At least they would be in a warm place. If I had my way, ALL people would be housed, fed and have a thriving wage / income.
@marciwilliams8654 Sure, and those basic necessities should meet safety standards. Maybe you shouldn't make assumptions about homeless people.
@@adamcosper3308 My point is that the city was using safety as an excuse... a very poor excuse. Homeless people don't get many choices.
Brilliant work good sir! Thanks for this.
Thank you for clarifying this story!
This is like if a church that meets in a school cafeteria on Sundays tried to allow people to “live in their church”.
It’s why you can’t just open a hotdog cart and sell or even give free food (if you make people sick without the proper food handling permits and TB check the city can then be liable for people hurt).
Even our school PTA had to have insurance in case someone was hurt at an event or from food we served.
I know some small towns use schools as emergency shelters but usually it is because they are already equipped with restrooms and cooking facilities and they allow people to roll out sleeping bags in the multi purpose room AND in those situations the school is closed to students because you can’t have random strangers living there and bring the children in, you can’t be sure that the students will be safe, that’s why it is only in big emergency situations where school is less of a worry than the public displacement.
He could have sought injunction for temporary accommodation of these people WITHOUT laundry facilities and other stuff, but then they could work on expanding the actual shelter.
Wow a video game place housing a sex offender….wow.
Churches were originally supposed to help the homeless.
Legally, and safely.
Great research, thx
Any time you see a story that is this outrageous, you've got to check to see whether it's actually true. Sometimes there's something absurd going on, but far more often there's more to the story than it seems.
Umm 🤔 it’s good that he’s pointing out how unsafe that place is.. BUT.. When it’s below 0* and the Shelter is full.. Where Do these people go?? I’m saying RIGHT NOW!! We are still in winter.. The city isn’t going to do Anything!! So.. the choice for these people are.. Freezing to death OR a fire trap with a sex offender?? What do you think the Families are going to Choose?? 🤦♀️🤦♀️🤦♀️ Thanks for Pointing THAT out!!!
To literally any of the other shelters in Bryan within 30 miles of dads day church close is less than 1/5 of a mile away from dads day church without health and safety violations that the city of Bryan is literally proving to be open, had open beds, and didn't have to turn anyone away to use against Chris and dads day church to why he didn't have to keep people in a building that one wrong bump against the stove will lead to carbon monoxide poisoning, or you know something extremely dangerous to homeless people mold for the fact they have to struggle to pay for basic antibodies to fight against pores that will slowly eat away their immune system. Sorry your talking points is sht when state funded homeless shelter in Bryan is literally letting out the fact they had open beds and full willingness to help more people then one dangerous unsafe and unhealthy, mold infested building that it's owner prioritized his arcade more than fixing violations that don't even take a week to fix. all of which was known to Chris months apon months before he was even given a notice of possible fines long before he was literally any punishment charged against him.
Call me crazy, but aren't claw machines basically just gambling? It seems really exploitative to gather a bunch of homeless people in the back room of some DIY casino. Isn't the assumption that they're going to spend a significant portion of whatever money they're able to pan handle on the machines for entertainment? Plus the fact that he got his mini casino to be a registered church just sounds like tax evasion. Sounds like a real sleaze ball.
In Reality it was a Church before The Arcade Opened, and a Claw Arcade is Not a Casino and Only Exists because The City Demanded he Open some sort of Business to Stay and Operate there. But as He is a Christian You Have to Make Him Sound as Bad as Possible. Now just Repeat that Lame Joke where You say He doens't Need You to Make Him Sound Bad, He does that All by Himself. It won't Change the Fact that You are a Scumbag.
I was homeless for three years with my husband we lived in a tent in Seattle during the Snowpocalypse of 2019. Before this my husband had no experience with falling snow. Having lived in those conditions you tend to realize just how precious, human life is. I understand the city’s point of view, but I still think that it’s better to offer shelter to the homeless than to leave them outside in -20° weather, which would kill them for sure. I still remember the freezing cold of the Snowpocalypse, when the temperature dropped to the 20s. I believe the only reason we survived was because we had each other and our body heat. We were lucky in that way, but I often wondered how the single homeless people made it. I can’t even imagine what -20° would feel like. That being said if given the option of staying in a warm, place that may not be the safest &may have an increased risk of death or disaster as a result of those18 zoning violations or facing an almost certain death sentence in -20° weather conditions , I would pick the warm place every time, and so would any homeless person!!!
I was homeless that year too but I live in California so the weather wasn't as severe. I made it because I finally sought shelter but I had to wait about 6 months for a bed to open up my husband was with me then too but he passed away this June ( he was hit by a car) I think it's ridiculous that so many of my friends try to convince me of Republican talking points. I know part of the reason I survived was because I am disabled and I had that " social safety net" but you can't tell people who think that the federal government is the ' enemy of the people " any of that.
Just because that person is a sex offender doesn't necessarily put everyone else at Dad's Place in danger. It would depend on exactly what that person did to end up on the sex offender registry and what they were convicted with. Unfortunately, there's a lot of ppl that have ended up on the sex offender registry for "urinating in public" - which includes doing so in ways to make sure no one sees any genitals.
Is that the case for this person? We don't know. We don't know who they are, how they ended up on the sex offender registry, or if they were even charged/convicted of anything. So I would be a little careful with that assumption.
I would also add that even sex offenders need a place to live and it can be damn hard for them to find a place to live.
Cruelty is the point
2 groups i have zero trust for as groups. Religous leaders, government officials...im guessing everybody involved is doing something corrupt.
I trusted the handshake of a smiley priest 1000 miles away in new brunswick as I was about to load up a uhaul truck with 2 rooms worth of very good condition vintage record collections inherited from my atheist stepfather. He either probably wanted me to have those records, or be able to sell them to help with cost of living increases. It's been 10 years, havnt seen a thin dime and no attempts from that priest to ever contact me ever since trusting his disingenuous professionalized scam-based handshake. Keeping in mind that many of those titles were so rare and selling for over a $100 a piece.
We even let that priest have a 2 month old highest end apple desktop workstation for way under even a used price would be for it, because he smilingly said its going to help him run the ebay store, to sell the many many records that I paid extra out of my own wallet to buy proper more expensive plastic bins for him to nicely keep the inventory in.
Please feel free to share victim impact statements in public venues that wont engage in theft of freedom of speech rights, and do mention of the otherwise public venues that engage in theft of freedom of speech rights involving victim impact statements, such as CBC, CTV, Roger Media Inc, even the politicians in Canada and elsewhere have proven to be no exception to such forms of theft.
Encourage atheists to start running to take the wheel of the political arena.
I dont even care about anyone getting fined or punished for gas leaks, they need to be inspected often and fixed ASAP. In Mass we saw an entire town turned into an inferno, don't want to see that happen ever again, especially not under the guise of good intentions.
Also, a new landlord bought the rental house I'm in, basically because old landlord was too old to fix. Somehow, we hadn't had a fire inspection in 10 years. 1 month after purchase Fire Marshall came personally, laundry list of fixes needed, and has been back a few times inspecting the fixes, and keeping track of dates the new landlord has appointments with contractors to fix, even though they are outside the normal 30 day fix window, because there's a plan and cooperative, the fire marshall is not penalizing or unduly enforcing a tough time table. The real story all checks out, any property/business owner needs to be responsible, and held responsible.
Thank you for digging into this! I live about 20 minutes from Bryan and felt like something had to be up here. Especially when I saw some pictures and thought that really doesn't look like a church... They have a go fund me that has raised over $33,000 but it's really vague what they're actually planning on using the money for.
You have to know when to follow the exact letter of the Law and when not to, this is definitely the time not to.
The city should have, prior to the code violations fines, had an on-site presser to give light to the violations, not the punishment/fines.
They should have anticipated the thumper reactions, by the way.
So then the city would have press releases for every building code violation of every business in the city, and people would complain of public harassment and ask, "why didn't you just give me a ticket and time to fix the violation rather than scaring off my customers?"
thank you for sharing the deeper details in this story.
A lot of zoning laws are BS. The separation of residential and commercial activity just means everybody needs a car and has to waste a lot of time getting anywhere. Some of the issues are valid, like a dryer that could catch on fire, but is there no laundromat nearby? This all seems so avoidable in a way that would work for everybody.
God is also criticized for housing non Christians in His kingdom.
I can see where you're coming from, Hemant, and normally agree with you, but freezing to death outside is an _actual_ emergency situation. The potential emergencies that could happen as a result of the violations are indeed possible, but doing something about an actually-occuring emergency takes precedence. It gives the appearance of a not-so-friendly atheist on your part.
However, the conservative media's framing of the story as religious persecution rather than the need to come together and do something to help the conditions at the facility shows where their true priorities are, and was a wasted opportunity. They could've spent all that time and energy raising money and volunteering to make it a safer place for those people, and at the same time would've boosted their own abysmal image slightly.
And yes, you have a point that the pastor didn't seem that interested in following the city's rules. But I'd argue that separation of church and state is supposed to go both ways.
Most of these violations were noticed months ago, and he was given time to fix them. He didn't. So he was knowingly risking people's lives.
They had other shelters to go to then the one that literally neglected to fix literal safety and health violations for well over a year. Literally not once was a person there forced to be there or freeze because other shelters were full they chose to stay there because they weren't told about the dangers of being there were. Saying go huddle in this building that a single wrong bump against the stove can lead to literally everyone dying by carbon monoxide poisoning is massively stupid to say. Nobody was forced to stay or die literally not even one they don't get to research and pick where they're going to pick they seen it and pick it not this was the only place so I had to.
Thank you.
Sorry, but with the state providing a defining lack of options, I couldn't give a rat's behind about zoning laws. Potential problems being in this guy's place vs the actual danger of being on the streets in sub-zero conditions with no shelter isn't a contest. An imperfect solution is better than no solution at all. There are way more religious people and groups I have a problem with over this guy. If the violations bug you that much, use a tiny fraction of the money you're spending in code enforcement and defending the lawsuit and just fix up the violations.
Yeah? A few years ago a fire started in a 2 bedroom apartment in sydney. Except the owner had illegally divided it into a 6 bedroom unit and rented it to 6 chinese university students. The same argument you make could apply to this apartment. Two young chinese girls died when they fell from the building while trying to escape the fire. They couldnt get out because of the way the owner had built new rooms in the apartment.
So youre basically saying lets risk killing innocent people just…well, for no reason really, because there’s ALWAYS safer alternatives.
Laws and regulations are there for a reason. You might not like that but thats because you dont know much about these things.
Wrong not once was any of the homeless people there was forced. Not a single was forced to go there they all picked it because it was the closest. Every state funded shelter within 30 miles of dads place church was open in Bryan not a single one told anyone they had to tell people to leave. public information used as literal evidence being used against Chris's and dads day church bryan's lawsuit. Next time don't come ranting and raging over something that literally wasn't a problem at all when even with it closed not a single person was left without a place to go.