4/3/2022
####################################################
Spokesman-Review
New approach exists for us to do more for homeless veterans
KXLY
####################################################
Spokesman-Review
By Emma Epperly
THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
Blue clouds cover the wall of Sharon Murfin’s basement.
“Serenity” sweeps through the clouds in large black letters just above a photo of Murfin’s 1-year-old granddaughter, who died late last year from a likely fentanyl overdose.
First responders rushed 17-month-old Serenity Murfin-Marusic to the hospital Dec. 4 after callers reported the toddler wasn’t breathing at a home in northeast Spokane. She was declared brain dead three days later and taken off life support.
A drug screening done by the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office revealed fentanyl in the girl’s system, court documents show.
Police had been investigating her father, Frank R. Marusic, 31, conducting
See FENTANYL, 11
Sharon Murfin wipes away a tear while talking about the overdose death of her 1-year-old granddaughter last year. She started a new nonprofit, Serenity: Family over Fentanyl, in honor of her granddaughter. She is interviewed in her home office Wednesday in Spokane.
PHOTOS BY KATHY PLONKA/ THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
The Serenity: Family over Fentanyl banner is on display at Sharon Murfin’s home in Spokane on Wednesday.
Continued from 1
multiple drug buys with a confidential informant since early September.
Marusic was arrested Dec. 16 on suspicion of six drug charges. Seven new charges were added less than a month later, including second-degree murder, stemming from his daughter’s death.
When questioned by police, Marusic gave differing statements, according to court documents.
Marusic – along with his girlfriend, Teila Murfin; his daughter; and 4-year-old son – was living with friends after being homeless, Murfin said. The roommate told police that Marusic and his girlfriend dabbled with mexi-blues, a pill made to look like prescription narcotics that often contains large amounts of fentanyl.
Walking through grief
Murfin had been heavily involved in her grandchildren’s lives, hoping to provide stability while her daughter was in recovery from substance-abuse issues. The toddlers lived with her part time, but also spent time with their parents. Murfin said her daughter was trying to stay sober through a methadone clinic when Serenity died.
It had been a difficult few years, with Sharon Murfin fighting breast cancer and the COVID-19 pandemic making visits risky, she said. When Marusic and her daughter would come over, they wore masks to protect Murfin, something she now fears obscured their drug use. She had tried to encourage the couple to leave the grandchildren with her for their safety, but Marusic was controlling, she said.
When Serenity was taken to the hospital, Murfin stayed by her side until the end. After her death, she was given custody of her 4-year-old grandson.
The Murfin family’s adjustment has been difficult, with Serenity’s brother going to therapy to help him through the loss of not only his sister, but also his parents.
“It’s been trying,” Murfin said. “He lost his whole family.”
At first, Murfin was angry at Marusic and her daughter, she said.
“I blame everybody that was in that house, because they shouldn’t have been doing drugs,” she said.
She also blames police for not arresting Marusic after the series of drug buys.
“I believe that this could have been prevented had the police done their jobs,” Murfin said. “Then I would have known what was going on and I could have protected my grandkids.”
Spokane Police Cpl. Nick Briggs said shortly after Serenity’s death he could not offer more details about Marusic’s case, but noted it is “not abnormal” for undercover drug investigations to span several weeks or months before an arrest.
Drug investigations “are a lengthy, lengthy process,” Briggs said, and take resources the department sometimes has to stretch in order to cover the other ongoing investigations in the city.
Now, Murfin is supervising visits between her grandson and daughter, while she gets treatment and counseling. Finding a counselor for her young grandson was difficult. Finding a support group was nearly impossible.
It felt like people didn’t want to talk about fentanyl overdoses, she said.
‘All I have is memories’
Murfin, along with friend Kara Birge, recently founded a nonprofit, “Serenity: Family over Fentanyl, Let Our Voices Be Heard.”
They hope to raise awareness of the dangers of fentanyl and how easy it is to overdose.
Murfin, who has been in recovery for the last 15 years after dealing with substance abuse herself, said it’s terrifying how little fentanyl it takes to overdose.
“I mean, it’s very little,” Murfin said. “You’re playing Russian roulette anytime you even try it.”
The drug is 50 to 100 times more potent that morphine, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Through the nonprofit, Murfin hopes to encourage families to get lock boxes for their medications and talk to their children about drugs, especially fentanyl.
Many drugs, including nonregulated marijuana, have been found to be laced with fentanyl in recent months, making even experimenting with other drugs dangerous, Murfin said.
The Drug Enforcement Administration announced Tuesday the Spokane area is one of 11 areas they plan to emphasize for drug crime prevention in light of skyrocketing fentanyl cases.
Seizures of the drug have increased 1,100% after federal drug enforcement officials seized 15,000 pounds of pure fentanyl in 2021, according to the DEA. Last month, a man was arrested with more than 20,000 pills of illicit opioids, largely fentanyl, according to court documents.
Drug deals commonly take place on social media applications like Snapchat and TikTok, the DEA said, something Murfin hopes one day to talk to students about. Having been addicted to drugs and also losing a loved one to an overdose, Murfin hopes children might listen to her lived experience more closely than just an informational presentation.
“We’ve been in the drug world, and we know that kids aren’t just going to listen to you,” Murfin said.
Despite his parents discussing drugs with him, a Coeur d’Alene teen overdosed in May on what he thought were prescription pills but turned out to be fentanyl.
Birge hopes to remind kids that “trying drugs, it’s not the time to try anything right now; nothing is safe.”
The nonprofit is just getting started, but the goal of making a difference has been a huge help to Murfin as she grieves.
“Going through this has changed my life,” Murfin said. “This is something I wouldn’t wish on anybody. All I have is memories.” Emma Epperly can be reached at (509) 459-5122 or at emmae@spokesman.com.
New approach exists for us to do more for homeless veterans
By Tiffany Smiley and Keith Kellogg
Our nation’s military and supporting our veterans have defined each of us. For me, Tiffany Smiley, it was working to enact caregiver reform following my husband’s wounding at the hands of a suicide bomber in Iraq. For me, General Keith Kellogg, it was the dramatic increase of suicides among our homeless veterans.
We’re not alone. Washington is the proud home of several large military instillations and veterans comprise 9% of our population. But sadly, Washington also has more than 1,600 homeless veterans – one of the highest rates of veteran homelessness in the country.
For more than a decade, homelessness among our veterans was on the decline. At the beginning of 2020, however, that number started to go up again – a situation that was further exacerbated by the pandemic and economic shutdownthat ensued.
The factors leading to this problem are as numerous and varied as the solutions trying to address it. One thing that isn’t a factor, however, is funding. Federal funding to assist our homeless and at-risk veterans population surpasses $2 billion annually, with various programs across Washington – from the Corps of Recovery Discovery (CORD) in Walla Walla to the Continuum of Care Leadership Team in Spokane – seeking to assist veterans achieve long-term, stable housing.
These are all well-intentioned programs run by committed people who care about supporting our returning veterans, but a growing problem requires a thoughtful new solution.
The approach we propose is modeled off an innovative initiative in Boise and draws on the best elements of the programs mentioned already, bringing them together in a single facility: the creation of Veteran Home Centers.
This approach focuses on five core components: providing a respectful place to live that is run by veterans; an emphasis on family reunification; access to VA benefits – including medical and mental health care, drug and alcohol rehab, and job training; a transition to permanent housing; and engaging community action teams.
Research indicates that a housing-first approach is the critical step toward a long-term solution when dealing with veteran homelessness. Getting our veterans off the streets and allowing them to live independently in a facility with fellow veterans provides stability and an avenue to addressing root causes.
Very often, homelessness can be traced to a disconnection with family. The love and support of a family is invaluable to successfully overcoming homelessness. Family reunification is a crucial step to stability, and this program will prioritize reuniting veterans with their families and people who love them.
Scheduling and traveling to appointments often proves to be an impediment to receiving care for many veterans. The Veteran Home Center approach addresses this with in-house access to VA personnel who can cut through the bureaucratic process and help residents use available treatments and programs.
As we have seen with the “series of broken promises” at the VA hospital in Spokane, we simply cannot singularly rely on the VA system to resolve the challenges facing our returning heroes. The Veteran Home Center would tap the federal funds available and join them with state and local assets for a true public-private partnership.
Addressing homelessness cannot happen in a vacuum – it requires the cooperation of communities and veterans associations. The federal funds available through programs like HUD-VASH (Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing) are the key to attracting the state, local and private investments necessary to make these Centers a reality.
Finally, these centers would provide more than just shelter and care for their residents. At the heart of each facility would be respect, understanding and an acknowledgment of the experiences and sacrifices made by each person living there.
Our veterans need to know there is hope and that with work and the right approach they have the ability to achieve the ultimate goal of independence again. Tiffany Smiley, of Pasco, is a national veterans advocate and the 2022 Washington State Republican Party’s endorsed candidate for the United States Senate. Retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, a 35-year highly decorated veteran of the Army, is the former national security adviser to President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence and is active in the plight of our military veterans. He lives in Arlington, Virginia.
####################################################
KXLY
Anna Helhoski, NerdWallet Posted: April 2, 2022 9:45 AM Updated: April 3, 2022 7:43 AM
Getty Images
Two years after the chaos of the pandemic prompted Congress to pause federal student loan payments, new data show many borrowers have used that extra room in the budget to shore up their overall finances. Some have inched closer to eligibility for student loan forgiveness.
Economists and lending experts say it’s unclear how long that stability will last when the payment pause ends, currently scheduled for May 1. Among the 26.6 million people expected to enter repayment at once, some will inevitably struggle, including unemployed borrowers and those whose wages have not kept up with rising inflation.
Evan White, executive director of the California Policy Lab at the University of California, Berkeley, says to expect an increase in delinquencies and eventually defaults when student loan repayment resumes. That echoes recent projections from a March 2022 New York Federal Reserve report and a January 2022 report from the Government Accountability Office.
Pandemic-related supports like stimulus checks and the payment pause could have been propping people up in a way that makes them look like they’re doing much better than they are, White says. “Or it may be that all of those supports build people up to a better place in a way that will have some sustainability.”
All borrowers can make a plan to manage upcoming payments by reaching out to their servicers, the companies contracted to manage federal loans. If you are at all uncertain of your ability to resume payment, an income-driven repayment plan is your best option.
Here’s how the federal student loan payment pause has affected borrowers.
Overall finances improved
A lot can happen to your finances in two years, but the pause was objectively good for federal direct student loan borrowers in several ways:
Borrowers, on average, experienced $210 of monthly breathing room. Since the start of the payment pause, 37 million borrowers have collectively saved an estimated $195 billion in waived payments, according to the March report from the New York Federal Reserve. Each month, borrowers saved around $210 on average, according to California Policy Lab.
Balances didn’t grow. No interest accrued during the pause, which means borrowers’ balances did not increase.
Borrowers reduced other debt. About 44% of borrowers reduced the amount of debt on their credit cards and 6% of borrowers increased payments on other loans, like an auto or mortgage loan, California Policy Lab found. White says, however, that it’s more difficult to draw a direct line to the pause being the cause of these changes.
Credit scores increased. “The people that saw the biggest boost to their credit are not the doctors and lawyers, it is the people who are struggling that are now the beneficiaries of this extraordinary public policy,” says Mike Pierce, executive director of the Student Borrower Protection Center, a nonprofit advocacy group. Borrowers across the board saw credit score increases, with the most gains among those with the lowest scores and those with a recent delinquency, according to California Policy Lab.
Some borrowers are closer to forgiveness
Every month of the pause could count toward the total borrowers need to become eligible for loan discharge through existing programs.
For public service workers, each nonpayment month has counted toward the 120 payments needed for forgiveness through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. To qualify, borrowers had to be working full time for a public service employer during the pause.
Borrowers on income-driven repayment plans — aimed at keeping monthly payments manageable — also can count each nonpayment month toward the 240 or 300 months needed for loan discharge.
A borrower enrolled in these forgiveness programs since the pause began in March 2020 has been credited with at least 24 payments toward their goal. The same is not true for borrowers in more traditional repayment plans.
Borrowers who kept repaying took advantage of 0% rates
Zero percent interest meant borrowers who could afford to make payments could potentially lower their debt faster, but they had to do so by voluntarily contacting their servicers. The New York Federal Reserve report says over 18% of borrowers with direct loans continued making payments.
Among those who made payments were borrowers with a history of actively paying down their balances before the pandemic, as opposed to those whose balances were increasing due to accruing interest.
A fraction of borrowers in default grabbed opportunity
The payment pause offered defaulted student loan borrowers a rare opportunity to get their loans back in good standing — removing the default from credit reports — without having to make a single payment to do so.
Student loan rehabilitation stipulates borrowers must make nine payments at an agreed-upon amount out of 10 possible months. Months spent in forbearance count.
Data from the Education Department show some borrowers did take advantage of that: A total of 602,000 borrowers rehabilitated their loans in 2020 and 2021. But this is likely a drop in the bucket. Department data show that at the end of the first quarter of 2020, 5.7 million borrowers were in default; by the end of 2021, it was 5.1 million.
Even more disheartening, 25% of borrowers in default do not have an email on record with the Education Department, the Government Accountability Office report found. It remains unclear how those borrowers would be reached before collections resume six months after the pause lifts.
Borrowers with private loans missed out
Not all student loan borrowers saw their finances improve as a result of the pause, including private loan borrowers and Family Federal Education Loan program borrowers with commercially held loans.
Most FFEL borrowers whose loans are privately held were not placed in any forbearance and struggled with payments, according to the March New York Federal Reserve report. Some FFEL borrowers whose loans were placed in forbearance saw delinquency rates increase after the end of those periods. And FFEL borrowers also experienced 33% higher delinquency on other non-loan-related debts after forbearance ended.
Betsy Mayotte, president and founder of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors, says most FFEL borrowers didn’t realize the payment pause didn’t apply to them until delinquencies hit their credit report. “I still, today, get people saying, ‘Why am I getting a bill?’” Mayotte says.
Private loan borrowers did not see their loans paused, but they also didn’t experience significant delinquency increases since the start of the pandemic, according to data from Measure One, a data and analytics firm.
___