STRIKE! Incarcerated Workers Demand End to Prison Slavery

by Prison Strike Media Team

This is a growing movement and the Nationwide Prison Strike of 2018 is an unparalleled success for prisoner organizing in the modern era. However, it is important that in recognizing that success that we not lose sight of the demands that prisoners have laid out. Each of them is crucial. As the continued prisoner-on-prisoner violence within prisons over the past week suggests, the people who run the US prison system have not yet made the necessary changes to stop the violence they produce behind the walls.

… READ MORE

Share this:

What It Really Is About

by Vivian Imperiale

I couldn’t take it anymore

Walking by sad, homeless people,

barely looking at them

as I passed them by.

I wanted to be better than that

so I decided on a simple outreach plan:

I would give them granola bars.

Using my instincts,

I chose the people to approach.

I thought my gift to them was the granola bar,

… READ MORE

Share this:

No Help Here: Homeless Seniors in Sonoma County

by Brie Franta

The oldest homeless person I’ve known was in her early to mid 80s.  Netta lost her house to foreclosure and had no family. She had nowhere to go so she continued living in her foreclosed home until the sheriff sent an ambulance to take her away. She was frail but not particularly sick or disabled.  The hospital admitted her but she didn’t need hospital care and, without a disabling illness, the hospital couldn’t send her to a skilled nursing home.

… READ MORE

Share this:

Human Rights Abuses in Wake of Sonoma County Fires

by Ben Sheiner

When I first arrived in Sonoma County as a new student at Sonoma State University I was greeted with a few lovely towns with nice people who are overly friendly. Coming from San Francisco this was a shock. But I noticed something strange… The homeless community is constantly pushed around and hidden from the greater population to preserve this fantasy world of a lovely nice perfect place to live.

In October 2017 a multitude of fires hit Sonoma County hard.

… READ MORE

Share this:

The Emperor of San Francisco

by Ian Bertrando

San Francisco has a long illustrious list of quirky residents who have called this city home throughout the years. Reigning at the top of this list of peculiarity would be none other than the late and great Emperor Norton, whose bicentennial birthday was recently celebrated this year. Norton was an eccentric fellow who may be credited with giving this city its characteristic embrace of the unconventional, always looking towards the horizon for progress and providing a place to call home for those that would be shunned elsewhere.

… READ MORE

Share this:

Facts about Business Improvement Districts

by Quiver Watts

What is a BID?

Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) are areas of cities where property owners have voted to take over the roles of security, marketing, and management usually performed by local governments. Once created the city itself is responsible for collecting property assessments from the business in the district, and then turning that money back over to a BID board composed of property/business owners voted in by other property owners in the district.

… READ MORE

Share this:

Do You Remember Me?

by Carrie McCollum

Lindsay McCollum and Tennessee (Eddie Tate) were murdered Dec 18, 2016, at 8:45 p.m. on 16th and Shotwell streets in the Mission District. Do you remember them? Tennessee was a kind man and could fix anything (I’m told) and actually had a generator in his tent. Tennessee has a family who loves him.

Do you remember my daughter Lindsay? Lindsay has a family who loves her and always prayed for her recovery from drug addiction.

… READ MORE

Share this:

Hollie Homeless Advice Column

by Hollie Homeless

Hi Hollie,

When someone on the street asks me for change, I often give them $5-$20.

There are rumors on the internet of how giving cash to folks on the street can be anywhere from unhelpful to dangerous, but it’s hard for me to not see the person I’m talking to as a responsible adult who genuinely needs money for essential services. Is that just fear- mongering, or is it really not helpful for me to give people cash?

… READ MORE

Share this:

It’s a NO BRAINER

by Jennifer Friedenbach

Our City Our Home

It’s a NO BRAINER

Many of our local policy makers, if they are not on board already, are considering support for Our City, Our Home.

This measure is fantastic and is being put forward at a magical moment.  After decades of going further down the rabbit hole of human suffering caused by the federal divestment from housing its poorest citizens, we have wasted billions on the ripple effects of mass homelessness.

… READ MORE

Share this:

Our City Our Home: Fact and Fiction

by Finn Collom and Camila Vergara

Earlier this month, Our City Our Home qualified for the November ballot in San Francisco. If passed, the measure would develop 4,000 new permanent housing units for homeless and marginally housed people, expand homelessness prevention services, and develop new public mental health resources. Before turning in 28,000 petition signatures—roughly four times the amount required to make the ballot—the campaign hosted a rally on the steps of City Hall. At the rally, a crowd of homeless and formerly homeless people,

… READ MORE

Share this: