A Publication of the Coalition on Homelessness
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual individuals, alive or dead, is coincidental.
Case counts were down; I told the folks delivering vaccinations that I could help. We set up Mobile Outreach Vaccine Events to find homeless people to vaccinate. We gave people twenty bucks worth of gift cards for vaccinating, and offered flu vaccines, booster shots, Johnson and Johnson one-shot-gets-you-done vaccines, and completion doses for Moderna and Pfizer.
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.
After fifteen years of planning, strategizing, connecting, and building, Western Regional Advocacy Project (WRAP) is proud to announce a huge step in our work: the official launch of the Legal Defense Clinic (LDC) Project! With the support of the National Homelessness Law Center, WRAP’s local member groups are developing a national network of legal defense clinics that promote access to justice by bringing dedicated legal services to the neighborhoods where unhoused people live. These are the neighborhoods where WRAP’s local member groups have built deep relationships with unhoused community members,
In 2018, the Coalition on Homelessness worked hard to craft and then pass Proposition C, “Our City Our Home,” to make significant systemic changes to address homelessness. The measure, which taxes the most profitable San Francisco corporations with annual incomes over $50 million an average of one-half percent, garners around $300 million for homelessness every year. At least half of the funding must go to housing, and at least a quarter must go to mental health and substance use treatment.
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.
The Eviction Defense Collaborative (EDC) has been putting Prop C dollars to work keeping people in their homes as more and more households are swept up in the wave of evictions that has followed the roll-back of the moratorium imposed at the beginning of COVID. The money is being used to supplement federal and state money that is helping tenants catch up on rental debt, and is currently being disbursed to cover three months of back rent and three months of future rent for tenants impacted by the pandemic.
Make a left from Harrison onto Merlin Street in San Francisco’s South of Market neighborhood and you enter another world. Past two low-slung, industrial buildings and under a noisy freeway is a scene that has come to define San Francisco: Tents line the sidewalks, and a collection of household items tumble out onto the street. There are cardboard boxes, coolers, overflowing garbage bags, containers of food, grills, chairs, and a pile of bicycles. A huge clock is attached to a chain-link fence and on top of it sits a red toy truck.
SoMa RISE is an innovative program that will provide low barrier services to people who use drugs in and around the SoMa and Tenderloin areas, with a particular focus on individuals who are marginally housed or are experiencing homelessness, starting this winter. The SoMa RISE Center at 1076 Howard St. will welcome people under the influence of drugs into a safe, indoor setting. We will provide a space for people in crisis to stabilize and get connected to care,
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,
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,
