A Publication of the Coalition on Homelessness
By Lisa Aragon
Sometimes you don’t know what to do
If you look, there will be help, that is true
Things you need are long overdue
Life does not always give us the best view
Homelessness will never be new
People that get over it are very few
Everyone is locked in some kind of zoo
Whenever you pray,
by Jennifer Friedenbach
Look around
Open eyes look back
Back back back to slavery time
Black bodies bent
Stolen bodies working stolen land
Brown First Nation bodies strewn
Stolen lives losing Stolen futures
Look around
Open eyes look forward
Forward forward forward to Reagan Trump times
Black bodies lying askew
Stolen belongings sleeping without on stolen ground
Brown bodies kidnapped and detained
Stolen futures killing stolen dreams
Look around
Open eyes see resistance
Resist resist resist to a new time
Black bodies reclaim their homes
Brown bodies reclaim their dreams
Black and brown and white unite
In a city with a homeless crisis declared “cruel and unusual” by the UN, crueler efforts to displace them — alongside politicians and real estate developers pushing for increased surveillance and policing — are putting LGBTQ+ lives at risk.
reprinted from them.us
June 18, 2019
A photo of Vanguard activists documenting their “Sweeps” action, from an October 1966 issue of the group’s publication, … READ MORE
Since 2017, homelessness has increased by 30 percent and a significant part of the increase in that population is due to an increase in the vehicularly housed population. Since 2015, the population of people living in their vehicles increased 22%. In response, what does the Department of Homelessness want to do?
Increase parking restrictions.
“The Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing has requested overnight parking restrictions to support their work to resolve vehicular encampments and discourage re-encampment on these streets.
by Tee Hoatson
Compton’s Cafeteria Riot has come a long way from hiding in a newspaper clipping in the Gay and Lesbian Historical Archives, waiting to be discovered by trans historian Susan Stryker. Now that this monumental piece of trans history is out of the closet, it’s no surprise that TLGBQ communities have organized around it. By now, you’ve probably heard of Compton’s Transgender District,
by Roadkill and Tee Hoatson
Every year, thousands of people die from opioid overdoses. Fentanyl, however, seems to have a particularly shocking effect. In 2017, 59% of opioid-related deaths involved fentanyl compared to 14.3% in 2010. And this phenomenon isn’t just national, it’s happening here. In 2018, San Francisco had 57 officially recorded fentanyl-related deaths. This is a staggering number—in perspective, that is more than one death each week.
Pharmaceutical fentanyl was created in a lab by Janssen Pharmaceutica back in 1959.
by Michael Brown
I came to the city in 2007 because I have two boys. I was driving trucks countrywide for work. So I came to the city to be around the kids, they needed someone stable around. I took a job at Fort Miley VA hospital, I met a young lady who worked there and we ended up having a child. Once she had a child she went back to college,
I met M.y.N.d. on a trip to Los Angeles. She was facing housing instability and a difficult situation at the time, and her struggle and resilience was apparent to me. In just a couple of hours we talked about everything from intersectional feminism to her intensely emotional poetry and her past. M.y.N.d. has written poetry since she was 12. When I read her poetry I knew her voice had to be heard. – Anisha Tammana
Poisonous wolf
The day I met u I jumped through hurdles of conclusions
not noticing I was braiding the rope u would use to strangle my emotions
navigate mindless eyes through a raging sea
do u even want what’s mine to give
nodding
choking
on the vapors coming from your pores
intoxicated by poisonous silence
I find comfort in my violence
the violinist in this symphonic masterpiece
the naked wolf….
by Quiver Watts
Two hundred people gathered outside the Federal Building in San Francisco at 8 a.m. on Friday, blockading the main entrance in protest of the abhorrent concentration camps set up all across the country that are currently warehousing more than 53,000 immigrants, including 15,000 children. Conditions in the camps are appalling, with overcrowding forcing people to spend nights in standing room only cells, children being denied such basic provisions and toothbrushes and diapers,
by Zach K
Under federal law, people with disabilities are supposed to
have the same access to government-funded services and public transportation as
everyone else. Many disabled people suffered and fought for the passage of the
ADA, or the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990, which recognized for the
first time many basic rights of disabled people. It was the closest thing we’ve had to a civil
rights movement.
However, just because something is law doesn’t mean that
people are following all the rules.
