Continuous Downward Spiral for Homeless Man Living in Local Parking Lot

By Michael Gold

A man is living in a local supermarket parking lot in his car.

He’s been there about six months. His name is Steve Cassanelli. He wears a New York Giants sweatshirt, sweatpants and a thin coat.

He graduated magna cum laude from Pace University and has a master’s degree from there, too.

I met Steve as I was putting groceries in my car. He walked up and said something about the Mets cap I was wearing. He’s a Yankees fan.

I got Steve’s cell phone number and texted him phone numbers for Catholic Charities and Westchester County Social Services. I gave him the numbers for A-Home, a non-profit organization that acquires, rehabilitates and manages affordable housing in Westchester, and a local church, thinking they might be able to help.

I didn’t know if Steve called any of the phone numbers I got for him. Then I didn’t hear from him for months. I made calls to a few organizations to see if they would send someone to go talk with Steve. They told me they didn’t do that. I texted him in late January, asking if he called Catholic Charities, and offering other ideas for housing, such as Lifting Up Westchester.

I didn’t get a response to that, but a week later Steve texted me to tell me he was working with the Westchester Independent Living Center (WILC).

I thought he would find housing, but then I saw him in the supermarket lot again. I asked him about what had happened with WILC. He told me that they referred him to Westchester County Social Services. To his knowledge, Westchester Social Services’ only option was a shelter, which he didn’t want.

I sat down with him a couple of weeks ago, at a local pizzeria, to try to figure out his story and see if there were other ways to help.

Steve graduated from Valhalla High School, then went to Westchester Community College (WCC) in the 1980s. He worked a number of jobs, from busboy to bartender.

He got into Pace University, earning a partial scholarship because of his WCC grades. He earned his MBA and got steady work in financial analysis for 20 years. After he was fired from one job, Steve’s mother developed Alzheimer’s in 2001, and he cared for her in her Valhalla home.

When his mom died, he and his brother and stepsister had a legal disagreement about reimbursing Steve for the $180,000 he spent caring for his mother. He didn’t have the money to hire his own attorney and lost the case for reimbursement in court.

After 2008, he couldn’t get any more finance jobs. In 2010, his house was foreclosed on. He then lived in a series of apartments.

Steve became a taxi, limo and shuttle van driver, but was let go in 2018. Then he got a job as a deli clerk at a local market. The president of Boar’s Head, the meat and cheese supplier, sent a letter of commendation about his work to the market, stating, “We are pleased to recognize the performance and outstanding level of customer service” provided by Steve.

Then COVID hit. Steve contracted the virus and was sent into quarantine.

“I was a high-risk COVID patient. I was over 55 years old. I had diabetes,” he said.

After he recovered, the market where he worked wanted a doctor’s note every month to verify his COVID status.

“It was like pulling teeth to get the doctor’s note,” Steve said.

On Jan. 3, 2022, he was late getting the doctor’s note and got fired. He was renting a room in Pleasantville and fell behind on the rent. He got evicted in September 2022. Since then, he’s been living in his car.

I called his brother to talk about Steve’s situation, and he wouldn’t speak with me. Steve said, “He (the brother) doesn’t like me.”

In addition to diabetes, Steve has neuropathy, high blood pressure and cardiac atrial fibrillation.

“It’s hard for me to work because I’m not presentable. I wake up and my heart’s fluttering,” Steve said. “What kind of job am I gonna get? I’m limited.”

He’s on Medicaid and food stamps and is applying for disability.

When he mentioned to me that he was worried about sleeping in his car in the cold, I talked about trying a shelter. He grew angry.

“How am I going to sleep on a cot?” he said.

He has a GoFundMe page. He’s trying to raise $500 to pay monthly bills. People have posted nasty comments on his page. He said, “I’m so frustrated with people and life.”

I am out of ideas about how to help him.

Most of us go about our lives and we don’t see the Steves of the world. We have our own worries, about our families, our jobs and paying the bills.

But the Steves are still there.

Pleasantville-based writer Michael Gold has had articles published in the New York Daily News, the Albany Times Union, The Virginian-Pilot, The Palm Beach Post and other newspapers, and The Hardy Society Journal, a British literary journal.