Do You Remember Me?

Lindsay McCollum and Tennessee (Eddie Tate) were murdered Dec 18, 2016, at 8:45 p.m. on 16th and Shotwell streets in the Mission District. Do you remember them? Tennessee was a kind man and could fix anything (I’m told) and actually had a generator in his tent. Tennessee has a family who loves him.

Do you remember my daughter Lindsay? Lindsay has a family who loves her and always prayed for her recovery from drug addiction.

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Hollie Homeless Advice Column

Hi Hollie,

When someone on the street asks me for change, I often give them $5-$20.

There are rumors on the internet of how giving cash to folks on the street can be anywhere from unhelpful to dangerous, but it’s hard for me to not see the person I’m talking to as a responsible adult who genuinely needs money for essential services. Is that just fear- mongering, or is it really not helpful for me to give people cash?

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It’s a NO BRAINER

Our City Our Home

It’s a NO BRAINER

Many of our local policy makers, if they are not on board already, are considering support for Our City, Our Home.

This measure is fantastic and is being put forward at a magical moment.  After decades of going further down the rabbit hole of human suffering caused by the federal divestment from housing its poorest citizens, we have wasted billions on the ripple effects of mass homelessness.

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Our City Our Home: Fact and Fiction

Earlier this month, Our City Our Home qualified for the November ballot in San Francisco. If passed, the measure would develop 4,000 new permanent housing units for homeless and marginally housed people, expand homelessness prevention services, and develop new public mental health resources. Before turning in 28,000 petition signatures—roughly four times the amount required to make the ballot—the campaign hosted a rally on the steps of City Hall. At the rally, a crowd of homeless and formerly homeless people,

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Safety and Dignity by the Water

By publication time, the votes in last month’s special mayoral election will show that London Breed has prevailed.

As San Francisco’s mayor, she will own the City’s response to homelessness, just as her immediate predecessors, Mark Farrell and the late Ed Lee, did.

That response in the last two years included sweeping sidewalk encampments. These operations, headed by the Police Department, with assistance from the Departments of Public Works and Homelessness and Supportive Housing,

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Budget Justice in City Hall

On June 18th the Budget Justice Coalition, a collaboration of more than 40 community-based and labor organizations serving impoverished and poor communities in San Francisco, rallied on the steps of City Hall to to demonstrate that the city’s budget should increase resources to address the unmet needs of the city’s most disenfranchised populations. The Board of Supervisors hosted a public hearing to hear from the people of San Francisco before voting on the final budget on June 27th.

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Prisoner Strike Planned

The United States incarcerates the highest number of people in the world, both in absolute and relative  terms. But prisoners and abolitionists are challenging the foundations of incarceration. Over the past decade, a prisoners’ movement has arisen within facilities. Prison actions have been increasing in intensity and frequency.

What follows is a press release form April 2018 by Jailhouse Lawyers Speak, calling for a two-week national strike beginning Aug. 21, the anniversary of George Jackson’s assassination,

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“Abolish ICE”: Families Belong Together Rally

More than 300 people gathered at Embarcadero Plaza on Saturday, June 23 to protest the Trump Administration’s inhumane “Zero Tolerance” child separation policy at the U.S.-Mexico border.  The “Families Belong Together Rally” was just one of hundreds of associated events held across the country protesting the separation of children from their parents, and their indefinite imprisonment in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers (read: concentration camps).  

 

Supporters began streaming into the plaza at 9:30 a.m.

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You Can Fight It, Don’t Let It Beat You

The following is a first-person account from Jesus Perez, a longtime member of the Coalition on Homelessness, on a recent health episode and its ensuing hospitalization. It is also a story of resilience. To donate to Jesus’s recovery fund, go to https://www.gofundme.com/helptxutxo.

At first, when I went to the Coalition on Homelessness Board of Director’s meeting, I was okay, but then when I came to the office I started having this pain,

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“Contempt for the Poor in US Drives Cruel Policies,” says UN expert

GENEVA (4 June 2018) – The United States’ principal strategy for dealing with extreme poverty is to criminalise and stigmatise those in need of assistance, a report by a UN independent expert has found.

“For one of the world’s wealthiest countries to have 40 million people living in poverty and over five million living in ‘Third World’ conditions is cruel and inhuman,” the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Philip Alston,

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