COVID-19: Homelessness & Faith Communities in San Francisco

Unfortunately we will not be publishing a print version of our April 1st edition because of the risk to our vendors and readers. In the midst of this pandemic, our Street Sheet vendors need your support more than ever. Please consider making a donation to our EMERGENCY VENDOR SUPPORT FUND to help vendors cover essential costs while they are unable to sell the newspaper.

Today we spent time figuring out how to organize collecting and distributing tents across the City for folks who have no place to ‘shelter in place’ during the pandemic.

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Moms 4 Housing

An armored vehicle was parked outside the house on Magnolia Street in Oakland when a SWAT team dressed in what looked like military fatigues broke down the door. Deputies from the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department swarmed in to carry away their targets. So what threat was the police force sent in to pacify? What danger warranted all the police, the guns, the fatigues, the vehicle meant to respond to terrorism threats?

Mothers. 

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One Day Hunger Strike at Notorious Santa Rita Jail

by Ella Rose-Kessler

On October 30, over 400 individuals locked up in Santa Rita Jail staged a one-day hunger and work stopage strike to fight back against the inhumane conditions they’re subjected to. The group had a list of 26 demands relating to their inhumane treatment, such the jail providing more cleaning supplies to maintain sanitary conditions, access to lawyers, better and more nutritious food, daily exercise and recreation time, and an end to price gouging for commissary items and phone calls.

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Our Wheels, Our Homes

By Mirjam Washuus

As of April 2019, over 1,800 San Franciscans  were living in their vehicles. This is an increase of almost 600 people (49 %) since 2017 and simultaneously an undercount according to the point-in-time count itself. That is nearly 2,000 people sleeping, eating, fighting illnesses, helping neighbors, raising children, going to work and school from inside a tin box with very limited, if any, access to water and electricity. So, they are dependent on its community (both City and neighbors) to provide support as in any other community.

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TRANSIT SYSTEM’S DETERRENT TO PANHANDLERS A BAD SIGN

BART advertisement reads “Say no to panhandling. There’s a better way to give.” with a hand forming a heart around words reading “Have a HEART but GIVE SMART”

By TJ Johnston

July 25, 2019

As this paper goes to print the president of BART’s Board of Directors, Bevan Dufty, wrote on Twitter that BART will be removing the anti-panhandling signs and that the campaign “happened w/out considering broader messaging”. 

Here we go again: another anti-panhandling campaign.

To be specific, another plea for housed people to avoid giving money to usually unhoused or unsheltered people.

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BELONGING(S) STOLEN IN SAN FRANCISCO SWEEPS

By TJ Johnston

June 25, 2019

The homeless property yard at the San Francisco Department of Public Works saw an unusually busy Saturday afternoon on June 22, more activity than the workers anticipated.

Eleven unhoused City residents — joined by about 100 supporters of unhoused people — attempted to reclaim property that Public Works crews seized during sweeps of outdoor encampments earlier this year to where it was supposedly stored. 

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Mirage of Relief: the Sobering Truth about San Francisco’s Social Services

San Francisco has the illusion of social services.  Like some jesting phantom, they taunt us with a never-ending promise of relief.

A light post image of a blonde woman looking up to the sky on Bryant street in the South of Market district reads: “SF Marin Food Bank – The face of Hope“; the web page of the Glide church has an orange heart around their name next to a montage of smiling faces with bold letters that read: “I Am GLIDE: a radically inclusive,

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SEIZURE OF HOMELESS ARTIST’S PRINTS AN EXHIBIT OF INJUSTICE BY CITY

Ronnie Goodman, a 58-year-old homeless artist, was arrested near the Redstone Building on 16th and Mission streets when he jumped on a Department of Public Works truck to retrieve 50 linocut pieces he created — and the rugs and boards he shelters himself with — that City workers seized.

Initially, he was charged with felony vandalism and illegal lodging for the September 15 incident, but those charges were later dropped for a lack of evidence.

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I’M BIG……I’M BAD……..I’M A BID!!

Patrolling and controlling our public spaces— sidewalks, streets and parks— Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) are privatizing our downtowns and main thoroughfares. Our public spaces are becoming corridors and shopping centers that are welcoming consumers with open arms and excluding everyone else. Most particularly impacted by this emerging trend are the houseless communities, who are seeing these areas to rest and sleep, free from harassment and criminalization, shrink.  

BIDs have been growing significantly across the United States.

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Safer Inside: A Community Demonstration

It would be easy to miss, with Prop C in full swing, with political candidates talking about their “solutions to the biggest challenges facing the city today”, with successive mayors intensifying the criminalizing sweeps of our friends and family on the streets… But San Francisco is making radical steps – leading the country, in fact – with the first ever demonstration model of a safe injection site in the United States.

“Safer Inside: A Community Demonstration” took place in the last week of August,

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