A Publication of the Coalition on Homelessness
by Darnell Boyd
Why did S.F. officials intentionally leave 45 beds meant for people with mental health issues empty? How dare they leave our most vulnerable population on the streets? They had 45 beds, yet they complained about homeless people screaming in Union Square, Market Street and Sixth Street. These officials went home to their comfortable beds every night for months knowing that there are 45 warm beds that is sitting empty and staff lied about those beds.
By TJ Johnston
July 25, 2019
As this paper goes to print the president of BART’s Board of Directors, Bevan Dufty, wrote on Twitter that BART will be removing the anti-panhandling signs and that the campaign “happened w/out considering broader messaging”.
Here we go again: another anti-panhandling campaign.
To be specific, another plea for housed people to avoid giving money to usually unhoused or unsheltered people.
The homeless property yard at the San Francisco Department of Public Works saw an unusually busy Saturday afternoon on June 22, more activity than the workers anticipated.
Eleven unhoused City residents — joined by about 100 supporters of unhoused people — attempted to reclaim property that Public Works crews seized during sweeps of outdoor encampments earlier this year to where it was supposedly stored.
Alton Perdew lost four backpacks containing such personal possessions as phones,
San Francisco has the illusion of social services. Like some jesting phantom, they taunt us with a never-ending promise of relief.
A light post image of a blonde woman looking up to the sky on Bryant street in the South of Market district reads: “SF Marin Food Bank – The face of Hope“; the web page of the Glide church has an orange heart around their name next to a montage of smiling faces with bold letters that read: “I Am GLIDE: a radically inclusive,
Cities across the United States have tested the housing first model and found that it works very well, presenting a compelling case that housing first should be expanded where it is already used on a small scale and implemented where it is not public policy.
Despite the immediate costs and political resistance with building housing for chronically homeless people, the shift to putting homeless people in permanent, personalized shelter is justified on a range of grounds.
It would be easy to miss, with Prop C in full swing, with political candidates talking about their “solutions to the biggest challenges facing the city today”, with successive mayors intensifying the criminalizing sweeps of our friends and family on the streets… But San Francisco is making radical steps – leading the country, in fact – with the first ever demonstration model of a safe injection site in the United States.
“Safer Inside: A Community Demonstration” took place in the last week of August,
It’s Friday afternoon at the drop-in center known as Mother Brown’s on the corner of Jennings Street and Van Dyke Avenue. Despite the iron-gated door fronting the entrance, people drop in freely to check their mail, take a shower, do laundry, or chill out in the reception area. For a nominal fee, Mother Brown’s rents out lockers.
Gwendolyn Westbrook, the director of the United Council of Human Services — the official name of Mother Brown’s — as well as staff describe the place as a community center.
Just like the ones before, the latest class of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors will have to tangle with the city’s homelessness crisis. And the four newest supervisors could play a key role.
The board welcomed them to City Hall on January 9. Three of the them—Sandra Lee Fewer, Hillary Ronen and Ahsha Safai—were elected last November to replace termed-out supervisors. The fourth, Jeff Sheehy, was appointed to fill a vacant seat after its previous occupant was elected to the State Senate.
Homelessness continues to be a pervasive social contemporary problem within the San Francisco Bay Area. Advocacy organizations and service providers of homeless people seek to implement policies that minimize barriers that homeless families, youth, and adults are facing. In fact, focus groups consisting of members of the homeless population and/or front line service providers in 12 different homeless service providers and advocacy organization took place.. The survey outcomes revealed interesting findings of barriers within the homeless system.
Mayor Lee recently cut funding for two new Board-funded housing subsidies, affecting 175 households across the city. The funding would have provided critical rental assistance for seniors, families, and people with disabilities.
These funds were backed by the Board of Supervisors and totaled $2.5 million—125 subsidies worth $1.5 million for seniors and the disabled, and another 50 subsidies worth $1 million for families with children.
“We have to invest the resources to keep people in San Francisco,” says Brian Basinger,
