Why is the Coalition on Homelessness Suing the City of San Francisco?

by Contributing Author
In the foreground we see a figure holding a sign that reads "Housekeys not Handcuffs", and a crowd is gathered. In the background San Francisco City Hall seems to loom.

This article has been adapted from an episode of Street Speak, our podcast answering your burning questions about poverty and homelessness. To listen to the full episode, find us wherever you get your podcasts or on our website, streetsheet.org/street-speak-podcast

Right now, attorneys from the Lawyer’s Committee on Civil Rights (LCCR)—alongside the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Coalition on Homelessness—are suing the City and County of San Francisco for their main response to homelessness: criminalization.

… READ MORE

Share this:

Do the Rich See Inequality as a Zero-sum Game?

by Jeanne Kuang

Originally published in CalMatters.org

California has one of the highest levels of income inequality in the nation, and nearly six out of 10 California adults polled said they believe the government should do more to reduce the gaps between rich and poor. 

But when presented with proposed policies to boost resources for disadvantaged groups, even liberals show reluctance to reduce inequality after all, according to a new study co-authored by researchers from UC Berkeley and released last week. 

… READ MORE

Share this:

Where’s the Care in the Proposed “CARE Courts?”

by Jade Arellano

In early March, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced the Community Assistance, Recovery and Empowerment (CARE) Court program, which would create yet another separate court for poor and unhoused people with mental health conditions and substance use disorders. Governor Newsom has explicitly discussed CARE Court as a tool to address street homelessness, and the proposal is consistent with a string of bills nationwide that seek to increase the power of the state to institutionalize unhoused people under the pretense of “compassion.” The devil is in the details,

… READ MORE

Share this:

California Has a New Law on Eviction Protections

by Manuela Tobias

What does it mean for tenants?

Reprinted from CalMatters

When California legislators voted last June to again extend eviction protections, they promised the third time would be the charm.

But the state’s rent relief program, which has struggled to reach the neediest tenants and landlords from the start, continues to lag. As of last week, the state has paid $2.4 billion to about 214,000 households — fewer than half of all who have applied for aid.

… READ MORE

Share this:

A Palace to Us: Unhoused 37MLK Residents Demand Hotel Rooms, Occupy Palms Motel in Oakland 

by Quiver Watts

On Friday afternoon several dozen people gathered outside the unassuming Palms Motel in Oakland, CA with signs reading “Housing is a Human Right” and “Hotels Not Graves.” Inside, Stefani Echeverría-Fenn, an adjunct classics lecturer who herself was formerly homeless and has lived in the neighborhood for 11 years, has chained herself in the bathroom of a small room. She has been demanding that the City of Oakland offer hotel rooms where she has helped set up for her unhoused neighbors at the intentional encampment at 37th Street and Martin Luther King,

… READ MORE

Share this:

No State Execution by COVID-19

by Press release

Press release: SAN QUENTIN PRISON PROTEST West Gate, Saturday May 9 @ 11AM

A car caravan demonstration to demand protection from the deadly COVID-19 virus for prisoners is set for Saturday, May 9th. Cars will assemble at the Larkspur Ferry Terminal parking lot at 10AM. The caravan will begin at 11AM driving up Sir Francis Drake Blvd. to the West Gate of San Quentin State Prison. They will be protesting prison authorities who are leaving the most vulnerable people—prison inmates in overcrowded conditions—in danger without basic protections and unable to enact physical distancing.

… READ MORE

Share this:

California’s largest shelter outbreak: A case of government malfeasance

by Jennifer Friedenbach and Chris Herring

Doctors, public health experts call for testing and housing all shelter residents in hotels 

Yesterday, California experienced its most widespread outbreak of COVID-19 in any homeless shelter to date where nearly half of 144 shelter residents tested positive. For some perspective, the outbreak in this single shelter of 70 shelter guests comprises 8.5% of all positive cases in San Francisco, which total 857 as of Saturday. 

When looking back on the lead-up to this catastrophe we see a series of policy missteps that got us here. 

… READ MORE

Share this:

Cities Are Moving Unhoused People into Hotel Rooms, San Francisco Isn’t

by Jennifer Friedenbach

In the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, San Francisco Mayor London Breed has refused to use executive powers to house San Francisco’s 9,000 homeless residents living in the City’s streets and shelters. Under the Mayor’s emergency powers in the Charter and Administrative Code, Breed has the authority to commandeer a portion of the 33,000 vacant hotel rooms to house homeless residents, but has yet to utilize those powers in spite of the dire situation at hand. 

… READ MORE

Share this:

CALTRANS SETTLEMENT TO HOMELESS PEOPLE: $2 MILLION – REPLACING LOST MEMENTOS: PRICELESS

by TJ Johnston

Unhoused people in the East Bay will be compensated by Caltrans for property that the state agency damaged or destroyed in encampment sweeps, thanks to a newly reached legal settlement.

A class-action lawsuit that began in 2016 is nearing its conclusion after the California Department of Transportation agreed to pay $2 million to reimburse homeless people for lost possessions and employ someone to recover their items and connect them to services.

… READ MORE

Share this:

All Bark and No Bite

by Quiver Watts

The flaws and failures of Sen. Scott Wiener’s Senate Bill 50

by Didi Miller

The U.S. Senate wasn’t the only legislature suffering from an inability to compromise — California had also felt the brunt of unyielding adversaries in the heat of its housing crisis. California State Senator Scott Wiener, San Francisco’s district representative, brought his wildly disputed transit rezoning Senate Bill 50 (SB 50) to the floor on January 6,

… READ MORE

Share this: