A Publication of the Coalition on Homelessness
By Matt Levin, CALmatters
No wonder Gov. Gavin Newsom dropped those hints earlier this week about an upcoming “Marshall Plan” for affordable housing.
Sure, he’d made ambitious campaign promises to combat California’s housing crisis: leading the effort to build 3.5 million units over the next seven years (an unprecedented rate), jacking up state subsidies for housing reserved for lower-income Californians, and easing regulations so it would be easier to build all types of new housing.
An alliance of tenant organizations is demanding a “full repeal of the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act, nothing less.”
That could happen if enough Californians approve Proposition 10, the Affordable Housing Act. It would empower the city of San Francisco to pass its own rent-stabilization ordinances. It could also give residents a fighting chance to stay in their homes.
The San Francisco Anti-Displacement Coalition issued its findings in a report, “The Cost of Costa-Hawkins,” published in July.
I just love the language used to describe homeless people: Drunk, crazy, helpless, ad nauseum. It’s also shrouded in industry-specific terms like “experiencing substance abuse issues.”
Alphabet soup of acronyms that only a handful of insiders know. My all-time favorite though is “service resistant.” Google the term. There is no definition for it except when applied to the homeless. Common sense leads one to conclude that there is a whole army who resist services.
Despite the fact that transgender and gender non-conforming people have recently become more visible in the media and popular culture, the realities for street-based, poor, black and brown and disabled trans women remain the same. Trans people continue to face discrimination from traditional housing, employment and healthcare forcing many trans people into alternative street economies like sex work, drug sales and whatever other work people can find. As a result of being pushed out of these traditional systems,
