A Publication of the Coalition on Homelessness
Names: Taylor Michael, 42, and Joanne Fong, 48
Time without a home: Michael: Just under a year; Joanne: Since June 2015
What does homeless mean to you?
Michael: Well San Francisco’s my home. I maybe houseless, displaced, it just means displacement.
What does home mean to you?
Michael: Home means a place I can have my doors secured, kick by after work,
One stands as the financial and cultural hub of the world. The other is the center of the global tech universe. In the battle between New York and San Francisco, residents of these two iconic cities are quick to list reasons why their city is superior.
But historically, the two are more similar than they are different. Often dubbed the “New York of the West Coast,” San Francisco has long stood as the shining capital of liberalism for the western United States.
In the wake of the North Bay fires, adequate services for chronic homeless, undocumented, and incarcerated people have been few and far between.
Harper Bishop (L) points to a section of his home as wife Cristy surveys their home destroyed by the Tubbs Fire in Santa Rosa, California, U.S., October 10, 2017. REUTERS/Stephen Lam.
In the aftermath of the North Bay fires neighbors and community members have come together to offer their spaces,
I came to San Francisco about twenty years ago ‘cause jobs were kind of scarce for me. I came to California to change myself and find more opportunity and cause I didn’t like the snow too much in Toledo, Ohio, which is where I’m from. I mean its nice to look at from the window but I don’t like to be in it. When I was a kid I didn’t really have a lot of time to myself cause I came from a family of ten.
The route to the Snakepit homeless encampment is as circuitous as the name suggests. Taking Muni in any direction involves a stop requiring a 10-minute walk to Seventh and King streets in what’s now called the Mission Bay neighborhood. That trip concludes with a dead end that’s fenced off by the Caltrain line and shadowed by the Interstate 280 overpass.
This is — or was — the terrain that made the Snakepit one of the longest surviving camps while the City disbanded several other encampments throughout San Francisco.
As San Francisco considers arming its police force with Tasers for the fifth time, we explore the history of the electronic control weapon and how it’s worked out for other cities.
On September 28, a person in Oakland was shocked with a Taser after allegedly trying to flee a car crash scene, but died in police custody after the weapon was used and then taken to the hospital. There are a lot of questions surrounding the incident,
Hurricanes Irma and Harvey delivered a devastating one-two punch to Texas and Florida, forcing millions to evacuate and leaving thousands displaced. Now, as emergency responders try to help hurricane victims cope with the aftermath of the storm, previously homeless residents are taking a particularly hard hit.
In Florida, as officials rushed to open emergency shelters for those forced from their homes by Irma, some residents who had been homeless before the hurricane were forced to wear bright yellow bracelets to mark their status.
The City continues to expand parking restrictions that have a detrimental impact on people who reside in their vehicles.
On Tuesday September 19, 2017 the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) Board of Directors and Parking Authority Commission’s had yet another parking restriction on the agenda that would displace more people who live in their vehicles. The board told MTA representatives that they are no longer willing to take requests for more “Oversize Vehicle” restrictions until the City develops alternatives,
It is difficult enough as it is to find stable housing as a single person experiencing homelessness in San Francisco; to be a family in a housing crisis can mean facing a different set of challenges on top of everything else. According to the San Francisco Department of Human Services only six short-term shelters and three extended housing programs exist as a resource for the over 1,000 homeless families with more than 3,000 children within the city.
Mikey: The point of this mini-comic is to spread awareness about Harm Reduction, to explain what it is, and to tell people about some of the kinds of programs related to it that are(or could be)in S.F. Things have regressed in the U.S. in terms of drug policy and attitudes(back to the dark ages) since Trump has become president. In this mini-comic, we compare and contrast harm reduction to the war on drugs.
