My Mother’s San Francisco

I was born in 1969 in the San Fernando Valley, and grew up in Pasadena, so what the hell do I know about San Francisco? I moved here last September, it’s the most beautiful city in the world! But the ugliness of inequality and poverty can be seen everywhere, and it’s heartbreaking! Just this morning, one homeless person died, and three were injured in an encampment fire. It was freezing last night! I was in my safe,

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A Life I Never Dreamt of Living

From Gender-Based Violence to Homelessness

San Francisco, The Bay Area, my home. My well-furnished house that I felt I would never leave, not even in my worst thoughts. Little did I know this comfort of having a nice home, family and even cars would be short-lived. In October of 2013, I got married to my sweetheart—let’s call him Michael for privacy reasons. I was filled with happiness and expectations of a long-term marriage. Months later,

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SOMBRAS DE LA CIUDAD

San Francisco las personas desamparadas aún tienen fe y esperanza en la organizaciones que le hagan  brillar sus vidas de nuevo

El reto del como y cuando,
sigue siendo
el dilema
de una sociedad
que se insensibiliza,
frente a la crisis de las personas desamparadas

This article has been translated from Spanish to English. Read the translation HERE!

Las personas en crisis de desamparo, tienen una gran tensión física, sicológica,

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The Tenderloin Needs Help, Not Harm

An abridged Statement from Coalition on Homelessness in Response to Mayor Breed’s State of Emergency December

Mayor London Breed is exploiting the concerns of a vulnerable community in order to promote a “law and order” agenda meant to benefit political and financial interests. This unjustified, and in some cases, illegal maneuver is cause for alarm. On Tuesday, December 14, after a misleading flood of media hysteria around crime in San Francisco and just days after meeting with a group of residents brought together by the business group Tenderloin Community Benefits District,

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Prop C Money Funds Hotel Acquisitions

The most direct way to permanently solve homelessness is to provide homes for people to live in. Every San Franciscan deserves to live in safe and permanent housing, including those who don’t currently have a home.

One of the promises of Proposition C was to find permanent solutions for people experiencing homelessness. This past October, the City purchased three hotels using Prop. C funding for just this purpose. The first was the Mission Inn in the Outer Mission neighborhood.

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Prop C funds San Francisco’s first Community-Led Sanctioned Encampment

In the midst of COVID-19, a community-led encampment in the Haight Ashbury offered an oasis for formerly homeless community members. Thanks to funding for emergency shelter made available by Proposition C, campers had a safe place to stay, daily meals and important services—and most importantly, a say in how the operation was run. 

When the pandemic struck in March 2020, Mayor London Breed issued a shelter-in-place order. But that order didn’t apply to those who had no shelter.

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Why We Need Safer Consumption Sites

Safer Consumption Sites (also referred to as Safer Injection Facilities, Overdose Prevention Programs, Supervised Consumption Services) have been a hot topic nationwide, but especially here in San Francisco. There are over 25,000 people who inject drugs in San Francisco alone and the overdose crisis has only worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Many see the rising overdose statistics as a result of fentanyl, despite it being prevalent on the West Coast since around 2014. Those working in drug policy,

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I Narrowly Escaped Foster Care When I Was 15

I owe an incredible debt to Huckleberry House.

I’ve always considered myself an open person, but this is not a part of my life I am comfortable talking about. It’s taken me several tries to get my thoughts out, but I believe that if my story can shed light on the need for our government to invest in social services, and soften the heart of even just one of our legislators,

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As Hotels Close, Advocates Say “Keep SIPs Open”

On October 20, the Tilden Hotel in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood saw more people outside its doors on a damp, dreary afternoon than were inside. About two dozen activists from the Coalition on Homelessness, Senior & Disability Action and other allies and members of the city’s unhoused community rallied outside the nine-story hotel that, until that week, was used as a shelter-in-place (SIP) hotel to protect homeless people from COVID-19. 

The advocates demanded that SIP hotels funded and operated by the City stay open,

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Gimme Shelter

Ooh, a storm is threatening
My very life today
If I don’t get some shelter
Oh yeah, I’m gonna fade away

“Gimme Shelter” -Jagger/Richards

Last weekend, San Francisco endured record rainfall during its first major rainstorm of the year, receiving over 4 inches of rain within the roughly 48 hours that it lasted. The storm had been forecast for over a week and was all over television, internet and radio. For most locals,

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