Homeless

Policing And Punishment In Minneapolis’ ‘SafeZone’

January 31, 2021 Marjaan Sirdar, Unicorn Riot. Educate! Defund the police, Homeless, Minneapolis, Police violence

The criminal “justice” apparatus faces increasing criticism for emphasizing punishment, violent abuse and incarceration of criminals rather than rehabilitation. However, few observers recognize the active role community “justice” programs and businesses play in this displacement. The public/private SafeZone initiative launched in downtown Minneapolis in 2004 serves as an instructive example of how programs lauded as reforms can still impose punitive “law and order” tactics onto targeted populations. “A month ago I was driving down Nicollet going to pick up my girl, somebody shot at me, twice!” Demetri (whose real name is being protected) said in an electrified voice.

Court Orders Quebec Government To Exempt Homeless People From Curfew

January 29, 2021 Christopher Curtis, Ricochet. Educate! Canada, Curfew, Homeless, Police

Police in Quebec can no longer fine people for being homeless after eight o’clock. In a cutting decision delivered late Tuesday, Superior Court judge Chantal Masse ordered the provincial government to exempt people without housing from a curfew that subjected them to fines of up to $6,000 for being outside after 8 p.m. Masse said the curfew put the lives of homeless people at risk and that the province’s network of shelters doesn’t have the capacity to provide a warm bed for all its unhoused people. She also rejected the government’s argument that police were only ticketing those who refused help, citing evidence from the plaintiffs that showed a lack of discretion from officers.

Emergency Urbanism

November 27, 2020 Ananya Roy, Public Books. Strategize! Cities, Homeless, Land Reform, Tenant Rights

Los Angeles is on the brink of one of the largest mass displacements in the history of the region. As eviction courts reopen, nearly half a million renter households, concentrated in Black and Latinx neighborhoods, are at risk of expulsion through unlawful detainers, or eviction filings—UD Day is here. In a deal struck with the landlord and banker lobbies, the California legislature has put forward tenant protections that postpone some evictions, keeping tenants in a state of permanent displaceability. In a cruel hoax, such protections convert unpaid rent into debt, turning the small-claims court into yet another arena of violence against working-class communities of color.

Chris Hedges: This Is Kabir’s America

July 22, 2020 Chris Hedges, ScheerPost.com. Educate! Homeless, Prison, Prisoner rights, Racism

Robert “Kabir” Luma was 18 when he found himself in the wrong car with the wrong people. He would pay for that misjudgment with 16 years and 54 days of his life, locked away for a crime he did not participate in and did not know was going to take place. Released from prison, he was tossed onto the street, without financial resources and, because of fines and fees imposed on him by the court system, $7,000 of debt. He ended up broke in a homeless shelter in Newark, populated with others who could not afford a place to live, addicts and the mentally ill. The shelter was filthy, infested with lice and bedbugs. “You have to chain your food up in the refrigerator,” he said, wearing a worn, ripped sweatshirt, when I met him at the Newark train station. “There’s a chain on the door. There’s no stove. There’s one microwave that is on its way out. It stinks. I’m trying to stay positive.”

Seattle: Get Police Out Of Handling Homeless

July 12, 2020 Joaqlin Estus, Indian Country Today. Create! Homeless, Indigenous Peoples, Police, Seattle

The National Coalition to End Urban Indigenous Homelessness wrote to the mayor of Seattle this week demanding the removal of the Seattle police department from a team handling homelessness. It recommended that the $2.6 million that goes to police to address the issue instead go to organizations that specialize in serving Indigenous people experiencing homelessness. Coalition partners Chief Seattle Club, Mother Nation, Seattle Indian Health Board and United Indians of All Tribes Foundations signed the Wednesday letter. “Police officers are not the best-suited to respond to our homeless community’s needs,” Mike Tulee, Yakama, executive director of United Indians of All Tribes Foundation, said in a statement.

Homeless Philadelphians Moving Into Vacant City-Owned Homes

June 25, 2020 Unicorn Riot. Create! Homeless, Housing, Philadelphia, Squat

Philadelphia, PA – Housing advocates plan to reveal today that they’ve facilitated moving previously-unhoused city residents into “vacant, viable” homes in North Philly owned by the Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA). According to those who are helping families move in, a large number of usable residences are being intentionally left vacant by the PHA so that they can be sold to developers. The process of finding empty PHA-owned homes, fixing them up, and helping to move people in is a collaboration between ‘Occupy PHA’ and the Revolutionary Workers Collective. The ‘move-in’ process began during the coronavirus pandemic earlier this year, but now has a sense of added urgency against the backdrop of nationwide unrest and struggles for justice during uprisings after the police murder of George Floyd in May.

In Absence Of State Action, Organizers Help Homeless People During Pandemic

April 27, 2020 Ella Fassler, Truthout. Create! COVID-19, Food and Agriculture, Homeless, Mutual Aid, Social safety net

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, collectives sharing free food with the hungry were facing a sharp uptick in state repression. In Arizona, Tucson Police Park Safety warned the public that sharing food in public parks is illegal in a statement posted to Twitter on February 7. In response, the People’s Defense Initiative in Tucson started a petition and organized a rally at the City Hall on February 19 to “remind Tucson leadership that feeding the hungry is never a crime!” Free Hot Soup, a group that serves food to over a hundred people in a Portland, Oregon, park five nights a week, sued the city in November 2019 after it introduced a new “social service” law. The law creates new bureaucratic hurdles for solidarity services including food handling permits, insurance coverage, dumpsters, security, and restricts the services to once per week per park.

The Homeless Can’t Shelter-in-Place

April 12, 2020 LibRainey, The Indypendent. Resist! COVID-19, Homeless, New York City (NYC), Physical distancing

Chris was given a test for COVID-19 in the middle of the night. It was just past 1 a.m., and he entered Lenox Hill Hospital’s emergency room on the Upper East Side with a headache and runny nose. He had been living unsheltered on and off since 2018, passing many nights sleeping in hospital waiting rooms or 24/7 FedEx stores throughout Manhattan. But then early March hit. The city began to close down as the coronavirus spread. His usual resting spots — including Starbucks and Pret a Manger — were closed. In need of a place to rest and use the bathroom, he entered the Lenox Hill emergency room where he’d taken refuge many nights before. This time, Chris, whose name has been changed to protect his identity, was tested for the coronavirus.

Judge Rules LA Must Stop Taking & Destroying Homeless People’s Property

April 15, 2016 Elijah Chilang, www.la.curbed.com Resist! Homeless, Los Angeles, Property

By Elijah Chilang for Curbed - The city of Los Angeles has run into another setback in its ongoing quest to confiscate the property of homeless residents. A US Circuit Court judge ruled Wednesday that local law enforcement has gone too far in seizing the property of homeless individuals without sufficient reason. As the LA Times reports, the judge issued an injunction that stops the city from taking belongings without sufficient notice and—in the event that property is confiscated—makes the city sort through it and store items of value.

New LA Law: Homeless Can Only Own Trashcan’s Worth Of Belongings

April 11, 2016 Brianna Acuesta, www.trueactivist.com Educate! Homeless, Legislation, Los Angeles

By Brianna Acuesta for True Activist - The city of LA just passed a law limiting the possessions of homeless people to one trashcan's worth of things. As though homeless people don’t already own so little possessions, the city of Los Angeles just passed a law saying that the amount of things a homeless person can own must fit inside of a trashcan. They even have size dimensions for the trashcan, noting that the items must fit in a 60-gallon trashcan and the lid must close over it.

NYC Shut It Down: Weekly Shut Down & Clothes For The Poor

February 15, 2016 Keegan Stephan, www.keegan.nyc Resist! Clothing, Homeless, Mutual Aid, NYC

By Keegan Stephan for Keegan NYC - On Wednesday, November 4th, before temperatures in NYC dropped to 4 degrees, and the mayor warned people to stay inside unless absolutely necessary, NYC Shut It Down, the group who has been shutting down NYC for victims of police violence every week for over a year, distributed clothes to those who have no option to stay inside, even in arctic weather – the homeless. Over the previous weeks, NYC Shut It Down had accepted clothing donations and stored them at the offices of Global Revolution TV, a media collected made famous during Occupy Wall Street.

San Francisco Herding Homeless Out Of Sight For Superbowl Parties

February 1, 2016 Evelyn Nieves, www.alternet.org Resist! Homeless, San Francisco

By Evelyn Nieves for AlterNet - The first official signs of Super Bowl 50—six-foot-tall, 1,600-pound, solar-powered number 50s, each with its own Super Bowl-themed design—started popping up at photogenic landmarks around San Francisco two weeks ago. The first unofficial signs—rows of tents and tarps lining a major thoroughfare under the I-80 freeway to the Bay Bridge—started popping up two months ago. That’s when Oscar McKinney, a 49-year-old hearse driver, pitched a tent on the sidewalk across from a Best Buy parking lot.

Great Potential Of Poor Americans

January 26, 2016 Paul Buchheit, www.nationofchange.org Organize! Classism, Homeless, Poverty, Unemployment

By Paul Buchheit for Nation of Change - The homeless are feared by the upper classes, and they’re often arrested for nonexistent or non-violent infractions, in good part because they are simply considered “offensive” to people of means. They usually have personal problems that society has failed to address. A study of nearly 50,000 cases revealed that most deal with alcohol or drug abuse, and mental health issues. Legislating against impoverished people is expensive: shelters, emergency rooms, jail cells.

Black Homes Matter: San Francisco’s Vanishing Black Population

January 21, 2016 Carl Finamore, www.beyondchron.org Educate! #BlackLivesMatter, Black Lives Matter (BLM), Homeless, San Francisco

By Carl Finamore for BeyondChron - This story is prompted by a picket sign I saw at a recent anti-police brutality protest sponsored by two San Francisco families, one Latino and one Black, whose sons were shot dead in separate incidents following a barrage of police bullets. Among the crowd of 150 activists standing in the pouring rain in front of the police-barricaded Bayview police station, were four young people holding a sign that simply read, "The Last 3 Percent." I thought their message was both powerful and poignant.

Berkeley City Hall Occupation Update

November 22, 2015 Mike Zint, www.occupysf.net Resist! Affordable Housing, Homeless, Homelessness, Human Rights

By Mike Zint for Occupy SF. Berkeley, CA - November 20, Day 5: It has been a busy day. The occupation is growing. We have had a lot of food support. Tents are still needed. Blankets are still needed. We have had channel 2, channel 7, the Dailycal, and KGO come by. We thank them for paying attention. And finally, many old friends are showing up. People I have not seen protesting for awhile. My hope is on 12/1, all our old Occupy friends reunite here to hang out, and stand in solidarity with the occupiers. 1 day, 1 Bay Area convergence here at city hall. Spread the word on our “peasant uprising.”

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