by Jordan Wasilewski
I want to share something I learned in high school, a parable from South Asia about the blind men and the elephant. Several blind men touched the elephant in different parts of their body and came back with various different descriptions of the animal, which, although accurate, was incomplete. Together, the blind men could have painted a picture of the elephant and all its multitudes. I am also reminded of a quote by deaf-blind disability advocate and socialist Helen Keller, “Alone we can do so little, together, we can do so much”, but sometimes, “together” may not include those who have experienced the other multitudes.
Similarly, I believe that there is a need for a Permanent Supportive Housing Tenant Convention, so we can all come together and shape policy for the future in a way that is authentic, honest, and fosters participation.
When I went to the Tenant Empowerment Week in June, I discovered that there were pre-approved talking points by the Supportive Housing Provider Network’s Resident Advisory Board. Though I had no disagreements with any of the talking points, which were extremely important, several issues were still left out. While these talking points were not devised by one individual, it was a closed process involving a select number of tenants, and I had the feeling that is why we did not see as much participation because other tenants may not have felt invested in the process.
The closest that permanent supportive housing tenants have felt in having a convention was an SRO tenant convention in 2006, which predates my time in San Francisco, and which was run by the Central City SRO Collaborative, which was, and is, still run by troubled permanent supportive housing landlord, the Tenderloin Housing Clinic. I only know about it because in the SRO mailbox legislation introduced and passed by former Supervisor Chris Daly, the findings stated that “At the Central City SRO Collaborative tenant convention, attended by 300 tenants from more than 100 San Francisco residential hotels, problems with mail distribution in the hotels ranked as one of the most pressing issues for the tenants surveyed”. I have not been able to find much information on these conventions; the Central City SRO Collaborative mentioned these conventions on their website, but offered no specifics.
In my decade of PSH residency and advocacy, there haven’t been any SRO tenant conventions, so I believe that it is high time for a gathering open to all permanent supportive housing tenants. With that said, to protect the integrity of the event and to encourage unfettered advocacy, supportive housing providers should not be senior partners in this convention. There are plenty of organizations, such as Senior & Disability Action, Causa Justa, Housing Rights Committee, and even the Coalition on Homelessness (which prints Street Sheet) that could help organize such a meeting.
So, what would a tenant convention look like? Think of it like the national political party conventions held before a presidential election; one of the understated functions of a convention is to create a platform, which is a set of issues (sometimes known as planks)which the party agrees upon in the coming years. A PSH tenant convention would have breakout sessions in various different subject areas: infrastructure, evictions, policies and procedures, case management, wraparound services, workforce development, as well as responses to city-driven proposals. Like the blind men in the parable, each breakout group could provide its unique perspective and add to a vision of the whole.
And, true to Helen Keller’s words, we could accomplish much together.
Jordan Wasilewski (she/her) is a long-term permanent supportive housing and SRO tenant advocate, former commissioner, affordability activist, and good government girlie. You may follow her at @sfpshsro on Instagram. This piece is her 50th for Street Sheet.
