In the winter of 2013, I started working at a small Italian restaurant. It was close to where I lived in the Upstate NY town that I had moved to in 2012. My husband and I had left NYC after Hurricane Sandy destroyed our home and everything in it. I was lucky to escape with just the clothes on my back and my little blind cat, Grumbles. Grumbles was a ginger cat that I had rescued when I found him on a Brooklyn street,
After SIP hotels get an extension, will unhoused residents get a new lease on life?
As public health and homeless advocates urge San Francisco to keep the shelter-in-place (SIP) hotels open, the City announced that its plans to close two of the remaining 25 SIP hotels are put on hold through at least the end of the year, Street Sheet has learned.
The City’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) sent a memo to the hotels’ service providers announcing a pause in relocating COVID-vulnerable residents to congregate shelters as of August 19,
Kids Speak Their Minds
On Returning to School, Navigating Housing Insecurity, and Surviving a Pandemic
August is the time when parents get to have a break from their kids, and kids get to spend time with their friends. These were the normal circumstances before COVID-19 entered our lives. However, the pandemic has dramatically changed people’s lives, some for the better and some for the worse. Now that the vaccine is being distributed, the School Board is planning on reopening schools once more.
In Memoriam: Janice Mirikitani
February 4, 1941 – July 29, 2021
Originally published at Glide.org
Janice Mirikitani, the beloved GLIDE Co-Founder and Japanese American Sansei poet, whose activism helped define the social justice culture of San Francisco, and whose verse illuminated her struggles with ethnic identity and personal adversity, died on Thursday, July 29, 2021. She was 80.
Mirikitani was a teacher, artist, and activist whose work and commitment to empower and give voice to the most marginalized has transformed tens of thousands of lives in San Francisco and beyond.
When Tents are Removed, There’s No Way Home
A Look At HSOC and Why It Should Be Dismantled
The Healthy Streets Operations Center (HSOC) grew out of the Mission Police Station in January 2018, with the goal of clearing all the tents from the Mission District. It almost succeeded in that endeavor. But rather than reducing homelessness, the number of folks on the streets actually increased in the district, as did the misery of those who had their flimsy shelter and the bit of dignity that tents provided ripped away.
