2001

by Leroy Moore

"Working 9 to 5S" Dolly Parton sang But I’m busting
my butt 24/7 "I bring home the baconS" Remember
that song I’m busting my butt keating leftovers.

People say what goes around comes around I1m
bustin1 my butt But no money is circling around me
Others say give and it will come back to you My closet
and heart are emptied But bills are all I have received.

Revolutionaries will die for the cause But what is the
real cause They are busin1 their butts for And striving
to death.

"Just give it time!" Tell that to my pocket and stomach
Tick tick tick tick Time is ticking and I am wasting
away physically and mentally

Bustin1 my butt for what Somebody ate my piece of
the pie The American Dream is a lie My life is like
Good Times

Busted my butt for that white paper so I get some
green paper But I was told I need more white paper So
I took out a loan

Now Uncle Sam wants some green paper for the white
I received

I1m bustin1 my butt But I1m still broke Stress out and
beat down Need to calm down before I have a stroke

DAMO1s 1st Annual Celebrating Ourselves

It was a beautiful day, not drop dead gorgeous. The
sun raised up on August 30th 2000 and DAMO1s staff
got busy. It was our first ever Celebrating Ourselves
Blasting Stereotypes on Visible & Invisible Disabilities
event at McLaren Park Amphitheater in San Francisco.

Walking like zombies, with sleep in our eyes, the
DAMO staff crowed into the kitchen to make one
hundred lunches, hang up posters and blow up
balloons.. All the obstacles we had run into for the last
three months of organizing this event , didn1t matter
on this sunny morning. Like they say in Hollywood
"the show must go on!". We descended on McLaren
Park Amphitheater at 9:00am. And oh my God did the
show ever go on!

ALike busy ants we covered the Amphitheater and turned
it into a rainbow of colors. Time was ticking away while
the sun beamed down on us helping us relax. The feet of
children and adults scrambled around the Amphitheater
decorating the stage and the seats. The show was
scheduled for 11:00-2:00 and we were doing good on
time. For entertainment we had a raffle and prizes, a live
DJ and dancers, a dance contest a poet, and yours truly
was the first disabled black clown. For refreshments we
had the lunches we packed plus 7UP and Frito Lays
donated three cases of soda and chips.

The gates opened and we waited for our audience. The
show stared at 12:00pm. (better late than never!). Idell
Wilson and I welcomed the crowd. The sun spilled over
the park and because of the heat I had to take off my blue,
red and yellow clown wig. The DJ did not waste any time
pumping up the crowd with our theme song. The whole
show was like climbing a ladder: the poets, artists and the
energy of the hosts with the hot licks of the DJ took
everybody higher and higher.

At lunchtime everybody mingled and got to know the
artists and the vision of DAMO. We raffled off toys,
Tupperware and we even had a disabled Barbie! The most
amazing element of the whole day was the children. Half
the audience was teens and children. They made the show
come together by dancing on stage and winning our
raffles. They danced with disabled poets and artists
without hesitation.

The show ended with a call for people to get involved in
Disability Advocates of Minorities Organization (DAMO).
We spoke of the emergency that disabled minorities are in
today and expressed our need for help.

One last note: this event could not have happened without
support from the Women1s Foundation, Bay Area
Homeless Program, LA FAMILIA, 7-up Bottling
Company, Frito Lays Company and all the artists and
poets who participated. A big special thanks goes out to
the staff of DAMO - especially Idell Wilson and her
children.

DAMO plans to make Blasting Stereotypes on Invisible &
Visible Disability an annual event! We1ll see you next
year!

By Leroy F. Moore Founder and Executive Director of
Disability Advocates of Minorities Org., DAMO

by Kaponda

Golden-clad rays from the fiery-rimmed, celestial globe ringed the city of Indianapolis, Indiana, as the moonlight had retired from another night of labor. The sunrise brought into full view the logo embroidered on the shirt of the man who culled me and one other man, Sam, from among the many men who were standing in the street waiting for work. It was the logo of the Ringling Brothers & Barnum & Bailey circus.

By the time the train cannonballed into the depot at Detroit, Michigan, Sam and I had become the spectacle on that dreary night in 1979. A band of circus cads had converged upon us for baneful sport. While I watched a sledgehammer quickly move toward the head of Sam, I split a 2”x4” object, that had been guided towards my temple, with my forearm. After the clowns, lion tamers, strongmen and other circus performers had retreated to their sleeping compartments, Sam and I collected our pay for our six days of labor and walked off into the Detroit moon.

Most day laborers will never experience the kind of hire-wire act that Sam and I had encountered when we were hired by the Ringling Brothers & Barnum & Bailey as laborers, while standing and waiting for work on the street in Indianapolis, Indiana. Most employers who hire people off the streets understand that we seek a clean and honest living through expenditure of physical efforts. However, there are those callous employers who exploit the labor of benign people standing on the streets of America.

If the registry of day laborers who have perished or contracted job-related illnesses at some back of beyond work site were opened for inspection, then the magnitude of danger would probably astound members of regulatory agencies like the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Short of walking off the job, there is very little, if anything at all, a laborer can do to avoid exposure to hazardous chemicals or accidents caused by unsafe working conditions and code violations.

Jose Escheddarillo has seen many of the schemes engineered by oppressive employers to extract the maximum efforts from day laborers without providing compensation equivalent to the labor. According to Escheddarillo, who, as a retired day laborer, has earned the recognizition as a living monument to the day labor industry, “a lot of employers have committed flagrant civil and human rights violations of health and safety work codes.” One of the founders of the San Francisco Day Labor Program, located at Franklin Square Park on 17th and Hampshire streets, Escheddarillo arrived in America in 1989, and, like the many other immigrants who have come before him, he wanted an opportunity to improve his life.

“I immediately realized as workers on the streets waiting to be hired,” continued the relic and current advocate of fair wages and working conditions for day laborers, “we were experiencing abuse from employers and people who were getting work from us. Back during the formation of the Day Labor Program, there were a lot of problems.”

The San Francisco Day Labor Program was created in 1990 by a collaboration of day laborers, neighbors and community service organizations. The program has provided a place where workers can find temporary and permanent work in a safe and supportive environment, without having to chase cars on the street. The San Francisco Day Labor Program also has provided free medical clinics, referral assistance, English classes and legal services to many of its clients in the Mission District. The San Francisco Day Labor Program offers these services to its clients and has developed a mechanism that allows a match between laborers who need work with employers who need laborers. However, like the offices of a circus, the Day Labor Program also currently operates out of two portable trailers that sit on a lot at Franklin Square Park.

Because Franklin Square Park is located a good distance from the original stretch on Cesar Chavez Street, where day laborers have been at the mercy of prospective drive-by employers for over 30 years, the San Francisco Day Labor Program has neither been able to prevent the continued exploitation of cheap laborers, nor provide laborers the protection from arbitrary abuses. However, the building which formerly housed Sears & Roebuck Company and more recently, the Employment Development Department, located right at Cesar Chavez Street, has invited bids from any employment-related, nonprofit who has expressed interest in relocating its business to that site. So, when I interviewed the Executive Director of La Raza Centro Legal, Anamaria Loya, I was surprised to discover that the proposal of the San Francisco Day Labor Program had been rejected by the master tenant of the building, the Department of Human Services.

“They were very hesitant and are basically saying that even though we are an employment-related nonprofit, they would not let us move in because the day laborers would not fit in with the other tenants,” stated Loya. But I was under the impression that day laborers have been at the Cesar Chavez Street corridor for over 30 years doing just that -- loitering! So I asked Loya to clarify her answer for this article? “The reason for not considering the day laborers for the hiring hall on Cesar Chavez Street,” continued Loya with a gracious tone, “is that they were afraid that the laborers would loiter around the building and were worried that the day laborers would not fit in with the other nonprofits....Who is so afraid of loitering? Men already gather along the street of Cesar Chavez. If we had a program there, then we would at least be able to help meet their needs. Our belief is that it is not that they [DHS] have a genuine concern, rather, we think they [DHS] have a disrespect for poor people because day laborers tend to be poor and homeless immigrants. I think it is just fear and disrespect of poor people.”

While everyone has been educated concerning the San Francisco Day Labor Program, employers continue to shop at the meat market where fiddle-footed laborers offer bargain-basement rates for their labor.

According to a letter publsihed in August of 2001, by the Director of the San Francisco Day Labor Program, Renee Saucedo, the new site on Cesar Chavez Street could address the concerns of loitering. “A location away from Cesar Chavez would be ineffective....,” states the letter and continues with “The relocation of the Day Labor Program is supported by many neighbors and organizations, including the Precita Valley Neighbors Association, the Southwest Mission Neighbors Association, St. Anthony’s Church, the SF Archdiocese, the SF Labor Council, the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Congress and other organizations.”

Since all the above-referenced community- and faith-based organizations have recommended the building at Cesar Chavez as the ideal site for the San Francisco Day Labor Program, I asked Anamaria Loya who at DHS actually rejected their proposal?

“The original person who rejected our proposal to use a portion of the building as a hiring hall was the Assistant to the Director of DHS....There was kind of a second rejection as well in that after we were initially rejected, we asked the mayor if he would lobby on our behalf and discuss with DHS our concerns, since DHS is one of the city departments under his watch. The office of the Mayor told us that ‘they did not have authority over their city departments.’”

The San Francisco Day Labor Program, after the rejections by DHS and the mayor put on a show of their own. It was the kind of feat that the master showman himself, P.T. Barnum would have applauded. Under the behest of La Raza Centro Legal, men and women, accompanied by the San Francisco media, marched into City Hall and demanded to know why the mayor had not provided support for the San Francisco Labor Program to move into the building where all day laborers could finally be centalized under one roof? But the lobbying efforts by La Raza Centro Legal did not stop with one action. Members of the Board of Supervisors were also contacted and responded with overwhelming support for the mission of the San Francisco Labor Program.

According to Loya, “the Department of Human Services has agreed to meet with us on Monday, February 12, 2001, concerning the possibility of moving into that site. Visits from Supervisors Chris Daly, Matt Gonzales and Tom Ammiano as well as phone calls from the office of the Mayor were instrumental in the decision to meet.”

On Monday, February 12th at 4:00 p.m., the Interim Director of the Department of Human Services on behalf of his department, expressed support of the San Francisco Day Labor Program in moving into the building on Cesar Chavez Street. Anamaria Loya, Renee Saucedo, two members of DHS and the director, Trent Rohr, discussed the concerns of the current owner of the building and how the San Francisco Day Labor Program would address those concerns. After the La Raza Centro Legal presents its proposal to allay those concerns the approval process will start.

by Leroy Moore

There are always two sides of every story but many
the public only gets to hear or see only one side.
On July 26th the Bay Area and the rest of this country
will be celebrating the tenth birthday of the Americans
with Disabilities Act, ADA, of 1990, what disabled
Americans call Independence Day. But we have to
realize that there are two sides of this celebration and
of the disability rights movement.

Many times poor, homeless, youth, people of color
and immigrants with disabilities aren't given the
opportunity to express themselves during the ADA
birthday or any other time for that matter. This is why
Disability Rights Advocates of Minorities
Organization, DAMO in collaboration with many Bay
Area grassroots organizations, will be sponsoring: The
Other Side Rally at City Hall Plaza in San Francisco on
July 26th at 12pm. The goal is to present the other side
of the tenth birthday of the ADA and the disabled
rights movement.

As a Black disabled man, Independence Day is still far
away and I see no reason to celebrate! On July 26, 1990
President Bush turned to the four White, upper class
activists with disabilities near him and proclaimed, let the
shameful wall of exclusion finally come tumbling down!
However for people of color, homeless, poor and
immigrants with disabilities the wall of exclusion is still
up in our communities, disabled leadership positions and
in the history behind the ADA. Lately this wall of
exclusion has turn deadly. For example, the San
Francisco Coaltion on Homelessness said that they have
witnessed more disabled people living on the streets
lately. From Margaret L. Mitchell to Ya Fang Li, disabled
people of color are victims of police brutality. Now
people with mental illness will experience more negative
force if Assembly Bill 1800, (i.e.,forced treatment)
passes in California.

Even the latest report from the National Council on
Disability, NCOD, reads that disabled people of color still
have the highest unemployment rate, this is why
traditional Black organizations are now working with the
NCOD. We individuals with disabilities are suppose to
leave our harsh reality that surrounds us everyday to
celebrate a piece of paper, the ADA, that hasn't touched
many in our community! I say lets come together and
voice our side of the story and find our own solutions.
We can't wait another ten years!

EMERGENCY!
EMERGENCY!

There is an emergency in our society that has been
ignored for too long. It certainly affects one of the
fastest growing sectors in this country and probably
worldwide. The lack of attention to disabled women of
color presents a dire emergency. In addition, disabled
women of color are the latest victims of institutional
racism. They have been under attack from law
enforcement throughout the country, as well as the
Immigration and Naturalization Service. Furthermore,
the status of disabled women of color is not included
in conferences on women and the disabled when
framing issues for media consumption.

Last year, I wrote an article on the brutality against
disabled people of color. During my research, I had
noticed that many of the cases involving brutality were
perpetrated on disabled women of color. In 1999, a
disabled elderly Asian woman filed a complaint against
an officer of the San Francisco Police Department. The
complaint stated that the policeman had hurt her while
she was collecting bottles for recycling near 3COM
Park. She reported that she suffered bruises on her
knees and hands.

We can’t forget the horrible death of Margaret L.
Mitchell, a black, homeless woman with mental
illness. Ms. Mitchell had been shot to death by a
LAPD officer because she had a foot-long
screwdriver.

Although violence and disabled women of color have
been highlighted in the news lately, conferences on
women have not included disabled women.

A friend of mine attended the San Francisco Women’s
Summit at City Hall this year. Idell Wilson, an
African-American woman and advocate for people
with invisible disabilities, told me that no one talked
about women with disabilities. Idell Wilson offered to
work with the organizers of the summit by doing
outreach to the disabled community. She also offered
to make their language disability-friendly. The
coordinator of the summit refused her help.

According to a statistical report drawn from the Census
Bureau data on black and Hispanic adults with
disabilities, "Women face higher unemployment rates
and lower educational attainment than non-disabled
women of color and their white disabled peers." An
example of this can be extracted from the 1998
Conference on Minorities with Disabilities. It was
reported that disabled African-American women had a
98% unemployment rate. Although statistics on
disabled people are becoming easier to receive,
statistics on disabled Asians and Pacific Islanders do
not exist. The 1996 data from the United States
Census Bureau reported about 79% of the 14.2 million
Asians-Americans and Pacific Islanders with severe
disabilities were jobless. Furthermore, the United
States has a long and well-documented history of
discouraging immigration and an equally documented
history of failure to grant citizenship to people with
disabilities. Women and those from certain racial and
ethnic communities have been particularly burdened by
these past practices. The historical pattern of
discouraging and actively restricting the immigration
and citizenship of people with disabilities has
continued on into the 1990s and today through a more
indirect, yet equally exclusionary practice of denying
immigrants with disabilities their right to reasonable
accommodations in the naturalization process.

I bring this up because lately disabled immigrate
women have lived this reality. For example in July of
1997 the San Francisco Independent had an article
entitled WAITING GAME. It reported on how a
disabled young lady’s sister try to get her sister
citizenship but the INS said that because of her
disability it was difficult to get a satisfactory
fingerprint sample. And recently the Asian Week had
an article entitled Disabled Women Sues for
Citizenship. Officials said Vijai Rajan was denied
citizenship because her inability to comprehend the
oath of allegiance due to medical certified condition,
according to INS documents. The INS bypassed that
Rajan lived in the United States since she was four
moths old. She is now 18 years old. She has brought a
lawsuit against the INS.

The above cases are only scratching the surface when
it comes to the lives and struggles of disabled women
of color. What is sad and shocking is that conference
leader; summit coordinators, feminists, authors etc.
nine times out of ten have no clue what’s happening to
their disabled sisters of color. Did the Million Women
March in ’99 include issues and leaders that represent
disabled women of color? Do you understand we have
an emergency on our hands! My disabled sisters of
color its time to take a stand!

by By The Associated Press (courtesy of The Homeless People's Network)

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) _ Homeless living in cars and campers may be
getting help from the Board of Supervisors: Special sleeping zones in
parking lots.

With rents at an all-time high and more people taking refuge in cars, the
board will consider a proposal Feb. 27 that establishes sleeping zones in
the parking lots of designated churches and public lots.

Supervisor Gail Marshall proposed the law at the request of homeless
advocates. One plan allows three cars per night to park legally and
rent-free in the parking lots of public and private facilities.

A similar program in Eugene, Ore., is serving as a model for county officials.

``It's an issue that needs to be addressed and we agreed to initiate the
discussion,'' said John Buttny, aide to Marshall.

Hundreds of people live in their vehicles on the South Coast, many of them
living on $700-per-month disability checks, officials said. Public sleeping
and camping is against city and county laws.

by The Associated Press

PATERSON, N.J. Last year Felicia Hernandez gave birth to
New Jersey's first baby of the new millennium, bringing herself and
son Yordy media attention and local fame.

Gov. Christie Whitman sent a letter of congratulations,
neighbors cheered when Hernandez walked by, and the doctor who
delivered Yordy said in a television interview that the boy
embodied hope for the future.

Hernandez told the media that Yordy would one day become
president.

But the mother's hopes diminished in 2000 as she lost her
factory job and received an eviction notice. On Tuesday, she must
begin working for welfare benefits.

``I'm a little desperate,'' Hernandez told The Herald News of
West Paterson for Monday's editions. ``But I'm not crazy because I
pray to God.''

The 33-year-old native of the Dominican Republic was laid off
from her job at a bookbinder in Ringwood, where she had been
employed for five years.

State law gives welfare recipients two years to get a job or
begin a work program. Hernandez must attend a work experience
program Tuesday, and worries about how she will find someone to
take care of her four kids, the oldest of whom is 8.

She said finding a new job is difficult because she must pay
someone to watch her children. She also can't speak English --
which is why she now faces eviction.

Hernandez did not understand a letter First Preston sent to
residents of her building, notifying them that the owner of the
building foreclosed on a federal loan. First Preston is contracted
by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Hernandez was given 20 days to secure a place in the building.
HUD spokeswoman Sandi Abadinsky said the agency assumed Hernandez
found a new place when she didn't reply.

Prompted by press inquiries, HUD gave Hernandez a six-month
extension and plans to assign her a Spanish-speaking case manager.
But Hernandez struggles from month-to-month in the apartment she
has currently.

The family gets by on $300 in food stamps and $424 in cash.
Hernandez pays $450 in rent.

The bedroom window doesn't close, the shower is boarded up and
the front door is secured with a ribbon.

None of the fathers of the children provide any support.

Meanwhile, many people in her neighborhood still cheer for
Hernandez and her millennium baby when they're out. Some mistakenly
think she won prize money from a Spanish-language television
station for having one of the first births in 2000, but Hernandez
said she can't even afford to throw a party for her son's first
birthday.

``I feel bad,'' she said. ``Everyone keeps asking if I'm going
to have a party because he was a millennium baby, but I tell people
I can't.''

by Staff Writer

Hi folks, I thought of cloning and framing it as a pro/con discussion but for many people including myself its full of moral and ethical quicksand and I wish not to sink in either direction.

The Basics of Cloning: making an exact copy of a living organism.
Twins are split embryo egg cells that gestate and in nine months or less are born together, seconds, or minutes apart. The infant twins are from a females split egg and male sperm naturally born, some people would call these siblings clones. Applied Science is speeding towards the cloning of human’s whether it has been accomplished already or in the process is speculation but knowing our species we will keep trying in secret as private government/public industry projects.

The Bad News:The technology is here, cloning human’s can be banned, slowed, but cannot be stopped. We are economically, scientifically connected globally. Do we really think other countries especially ones with a dictator and a population ready to leave or worse overthrow said dictator(s) will not use this new ‘tech to make ready made “clone soldiers” under a dictators control and what if one their researchers found ways to “serial clone” parts or place the original neural electrochemical imprint [personality] of the dictator into his clone skull overlaid on a new brain and body! You not only have replaceable, non reject internal and external body parts but the potential for a near immortal dictator(s) renewing themselves when possible. And unlike Xerox copies as the technology improves cloning gets cheaper, better, and those cloned bodies last longer.

The Good News: This breakthrough can enable adults, children, the elderly to replace defective organs, blood with healthy ones. See how genes can be improved, make better synthetic genes that are better than our original ones. We’ll be able to control our evolution not for the next generation but in our own. Prevention and cures for many human ills.
We have time to slow the pace, place guidelines, speed is deadly on this and other sciences coming together we must take the time an safeguard our selves.

Here are a few Questions I’ve answered for myself

Are clones human? Though created asexually [without two parents]
if they gestate and grow normally they become normal looking humans, being a copy is the original human’s problem not the clone’s he/she see themselves as normal.

Do they have souls? If a clone is made from skin cells, develops in a female’s womb or artificial one, normally ages the same way most infant do, becomes a toddler, child and hopefully grows up. If they have religious lessons and are taught right from wrong they’ll believe they have souls if not like some normal birthed children they may become psychopathic.

As we all know even the best parents with all the love and protection given their child he or she might end up psychopathic killers... There is no way to know.

My View: If I wants spare parts then my clone should be separate from its brainstem so as not to have a living being suffer. With brainstem, nervous system, and other internal/external organs on-call I’ll have replacement parts ready including replacements for neurons and synapses.

Having a child grow, learn who and what purpose they were created is a cruelty that makes the original human souless not the innocent unknowing clone.

As for “Serial Immortality” [replacing old cloned bodies with new ones].This could be possible for wealthy people or lotto second life winners which can win only once! The problem is everytime this is done it must be perfect each time. I’m thinking A.I. [Artificial Intelligence] medical surgical techniques on the molecular level for gene, cell, and hormone copy and improvements.

I may trust human surgeons but for possible ongoing near immortality by serial cloning give a high tech ‘molecular mechanic to work on me from my first gene sequence to last neuron human hands and brains have to many flaws for me to trust them to. Anyone have positive or negative views on your own personal view on cloning, its challenges and pitfalls just sound off.

by Joseph Bolden, staff writer,

It’s not only a brand new year but the true end of 20th century, start of the 21st century or real millennium.

People have celebrated many ways, some killed, a few died near, on, or after New Years day.

What I did was visit Reno along with my mother, brother and his friends.
I lost money, won a bit, slept in a hotel, gambled more and before the stroke of twelve went into Navada's crisp frigid air to see brilliant, sparkling fireworks then quickly returned inside the warm of our hotel have I mentioned [its freezing in Reno.]

By 2:41 I'm asleep. There is a new President elect transitioning into the White House. I do not know what will happen this 2001 but I know it won’t be boring.

My New Years Resolutions are:
1.

Be and stay aware of what’s happening.
2.

Get healthy and stay that way if possible.
3.

Be independent both financially and mentally.
4.

Don’t sweat big or small stuff, let'em go.
5.

Don’t think about women, concentrate on health of self.

There are others which are private. I’ll try to read my back up e-mails
and send replies as time permits. To everyone. HAVE A, SAFE NEW YEAR-CENTURY, AND MILLENNIUM.

P.S.
So I’m a little late, I was never good at this e-mail or uploading stuff on my own site. I'm starting to loath both the 21st. century; thanks a lot.
A.J. Bye.

by By LAURA MECKLER, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) _ Conservatives who successfully argued that the
nation's welfare system must aggressively push poor people into
jobs are preparing to push something more personal: marriage.

They argue that the breakdown of the two-parent family is the
root cause of welfare dependence, and that millions of Americans
will remain trapped in poverty unless the nation fosters a culture
of marriage in poor communities.

``All the data we have says that kids do best when they grow up
in two-parent families,'' said Rep. Wally Herger, R-Calif.,
chairman of the House Ways and Means welfare subcommittee, who
plans hearings on the issue. ``We'd like to see a return to the
family unit and to family values.''

Nationally, one in three babies is born to unmarried parents.
And among women with less than a high school education, 60 percent
were unmarried when they gave birth.

One of the 1996 welfare law's central purposes was to encourage
formation of two-parent families, but so far states have spent
little time, energy or money to this end. That is partly because it
raises sensitive questions about the role of government and partly
because there is little evidence about what works.

Now debate is beginning over what changes are needed to that
law, which must be renewed by next year, and conservatives are
laying the groundwork for a stronger focus on marriage. Liberals
have concerns, but are not rejecting their ideas out of hand.

Among them:

_requiring states to spend part of their welfare money on
pro-marriage activities.

_encouraging caseworkers to talk to pregnant women about
marrying the fathers of their unborn babies.

_judging state success based on reductions in out-of-wedlock
births.

_teaching about the value of marriage in high school.

_sponsoring experiments to see what programs might produce more
marriages.

The role of marriage in social policy has been a contentious,
painful debate since 1965, when a future senator, Daniel Patrick
Moynihan, prompted charges of racism with his report on the
breakdown of black family. Pointing to the rising number of black
babies born to unmarried parents, he suggested that the absence of
fathers and male role models _ along with the income they provide _
explained myriad social problems.

At the time, about one in four black babies was born to
unmarried parents. By 1999, it was 69 percent.

Still, 35 years later, there is little agreement on how to put
families together.

``Until we get more evidence, I'm not so sure we should be
spending huge sums of money here,'' said Wendell Primus, a welfare
authority at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, who left
a top welfare job in the Clinton administration to protest the
president's decision to sign the 1996 overhaul.

``There are clearly some marriages that aren't going to work,''
Primus added. ``Government can't force two people to love each
other when their relationship has broken apart.''

Sandra Robertson, an advocate for the poor in Georgia, suggests
that poor women are perfectly capable of deciding when marriage is
right for them.

``I'm especially surprised that the party that talks about
wanting government out of our lives, of wanting government to stay
away from social engineering, seems to have a desire to do that for
poor people,'' Robertson said.

Others worry that women may wind up pressured to stay in
unhealthy _ even abusive _ relationships.

Robert Rector, a leading conservative welfare expert, argues
that government should not coerce anyone into marriage but should
suggest and encourage it. With a push, he says, some couples are
bound to succeed.

``You could say, `Here's a mentoring group. You don't have to do
this. But it's a free group to try and improve a relationship that
can lead you to a lifetime of love and commitment,''' he said. ``I
think it's absolutely tragic that we don't do anything like that
now.''

Talking about marriage would be a giant departure for welfare
caseworkers, who used to simply calculate whether an applicant was
eligible for benefits, said Susan Golonka, welfare expert at the
National Governors Association. Caseworkers have already expanded
their duties to include job counseling, and adding marriage
counseling would be another big step.

``There would be a lot of people who would be uncomfortable,''
she said.

There is little pro-marriage activity in social policy today.
Some fatherhood programs work to help fathers find jobs _ partly so
they can pay child support _ and to participate in their children's
lives. But co-parenting, not marriage, is the focus.

Primus, Robertson and other liberals are not rejecting the
marriage push wholesale, suggesting Rector may be right when he
predicts a growing consensus for a stronger focus on marriage.

``I don't think progressives should be scared of this issue,''
Primus said. ``We also believe in marriage and two-parent
families.''

And Robertson, who directs the Georgia Citizens' Coalition on
Hunger, says: ``It's clear when a child is wanted, and when a child
has two parents ... that child has a better chance.''

by Ken Moshesh

“YOU PEOPLE SHOULD SLEEP OVER AT THE CHURCH.” THIS WAS ONE OF THE UNSOLICITED COMMENTS MADE BY THE ARRESTING UC BERKELEY OFFICER DURING THE CONTESTED OCTOBER 27 LODGING WARRANT INCIDENT COVERED IN “ARRESTED ARTISTRY”.

by Kaponda and Tom McKay

The Danzates moved about like visible spirits as their blessings
poured upon the four infants whom they shielded within the fringes of
their ceremonial dance. Dressed in motley costumes that symbolized the
vivacious culture of the Latino community, the Danzates exhibited an emotional
performance which forebode the dawning of a new vanguard in the Mission
District.

The focus of the movement is aimed at the prevention of rapid displacement
of artists, workers, residents and merchants in the Mission by unscrupulous
real estate developers. The Mission District is the latest staging area
for highly technical venture capitalists and fledgling business enterprises
whose start-ups neither guarantee a long-term marriage with the Mission,
nor bring the kind of stability necessary for their continued survival
in the Mission.

"If you look at the NASDAQ, they [high-tech industries] are not even
that economically viable anymore. So, are we going to lay waste neighborhoods
for dot.com space and in five years the neighborhoods will be empty and
rotten and the damage will have been done and very hard to reclaim?" asked
Board of Supervisor President Tom Ammiano during an interview with my
editor, Lisa Gray-Garcia and I, as we participated in what was dubbed,
"Caminata," on Saturday, August 12, 2000.

Mi Rancho Market represented the kind of economic viability that Supervisor
Ammiano talked about. Located on 20th and Shotwell streets for over 40
years, it embodied the spirit of the Mission. It was one of the sites
designated by the Mission Anti-Displacement Coalition as an illustration
of the kinds of atrocities that are being perpetrated by developers in
the Mission. Ten condominiums will be constructed at the former site of
Mi Rancho Market to provide housing for the future employees of the brick
building on the corner -- the brick building which consists of fifty percent
of high-tech office space!

"I just want all of this to translate in November to a passage of Proposition
L, which will start to put the brakes on the displacement that has been
happening, particularly in the Mission District, Potreo Hill, South of
Market and Bayview. The Mayor did a really sneaky thing. Two minutes before
the deadline, he put something on the ballot that had a lot of loopholes
in it, particularly around live-work. He also tried a divide-and-conquer
strategy, and we are too smart for that. He left out a lot of neighborhoods
that we want to protect as well," Supervisor Ammiano continued to speak
as he walked under the warmth of the buttery sphere in the brilliance
of the sapphire upper atmosphere.

Proposition L is the instrument that all of the people who participated
in the Caminata on Saturday, and most of the residents and merchants of
the Mission District hope will be the slayer of the huge dot.com dragons
that are devouring huge chunks of real estate in their neighborhoods.
This preliminary law would, among other things, amend the Planning Code's
Priority Policies to link commercial development to transit capacity and
traffic improvements, and discourage displacement of community services
and arts activities. In addition, it would redefine "office space" to
include multimedia and computer-based services such as software development,
web design, and electronic commerce. The redefinition of "office space"
is an essential element of Proposition L, since most developers take advantage
of the code's current broad and ambiguous description to construct high-tech
industries in the Mission.

The event was organized by members of the Mission Anti-Displacement Coalition
(MAC), the political, economic and social watchdog formed to curb the
flight from the Mission and the Hispanic diaspora throughout the Bay Area.
The rate of occurrence of gentrification in the Mission is astounding.
Within the past three years, there have been over 1,000 evictions. The
severity of this rate of eviction was summarized by Bill Sorro of Mission
SRO Collaborative, a component of MAC. According to Bill, "The people
who have been here for a long time are tired of being pushed out. Not
one Latino person has even come down the steps on which I am currently
sitting while you interview me. The only people who have come out of this
building, down these steps, have been young, white, hip people. I'll bet
you a dollar to a doughnut that these people have displaced our Latino
people."

His mustache sprinkled with gray, the middle-aged activist sat on the
stairs of an adjoining apartment complex with one eye on the rhythmic
performance of the Danzates as he resumed his expressions of fervor. This
event today is a culmination of years of frustration in this community.
This is the barrio. This is the barrio of the Mission District.
It has a soul that is unlike any other part of the city that is still
in tact....The barrio here is a very special working-class neighborhood."

A Mission resident of six years, a troublemaker and former member of
the Coalition on Homelessness, Stefan Goldstone became hot under the collar
as he expounded his first-person account of the consequences that the
greed of developers have had on his place of birth. According to Stefan,
"The interests of the people are not being served by the policies of the
city. The culture of the neighborhood and ability for low-income people
to stay here are being erased by the invasion of yuppies....I know a few
people who have directly been evicted from their houses as a result of
the dot.com invasion. There is also an indirect affect of this phenomenon.
My parents and best friend do not live here anymore. They were not necessarily
evicted directly, but the influx of the dot.coms and business interests
over the interests of people [like them] have made it so that their rents
had become so high and the quality of life so low that they were forced
to move to Oakland, Antioch and Pacifica -- all over the Bay Area. This
is neither fair nor right. People should have a right to live in
their communities with their friends where they were born...."

As the walk to defend the right to live in the Mission and to prevent
greed-driven speculators from shattering neighborhoods was about to began,
I asked Christian Parenti, also a resident of the Mission District, to
give tell me what he thinks of the Caminita. "This is a much needed public
protest against the evisceration of our home -- the Mission. It will send
a message to the Planning Department and the City that they can no longer
discard the law by working hand-in-glove with what is really totally illegal
development. Calling the development R&D to circumvent restriction
on office space, and the use of eviction of all the nonprofit tenants
out of the Bayview Bank, are examples of illegal development that the
City is facilitating. The City is not passively standing, but is working
hand-in-glove with dot.com industries and developers. It feels like a
sought of slow, subtle rape of a community."

by KACEE

You shoved poverty down my throat, like she did

when I was six.

sitting at the breakfast table, I said no !

She slapped me in the face, hit me up side my head!

and forced oatmeal down my throat.

It’s good for you! eat it,you little ungrateul BITCH!

I saw her bodybeing lowered into the ground,

dead and rotting,

flesh dropping,

I knew they would come..........and...eat her up.

the maggots, they were there to get full,

and then they grow up and fly away.

He stuck his stick into ny black hole,

and...he did his dirty task......

He said it was making love...

it was rape.

by Luz Diamonte

It was a day of Many Tears….. I looked up to see a flying plastic bottle of bleach that was on fire. At first I couldn’t move because I was so afraid. Then I heard the screams of all the people I love……Suddenly the mountain had covered the house I have lived in with my mother, my aunt and my four sisters for the last 15 years.

"Kahit mahirap Ra Hindika namen walang bahay o nagugutom"

( "We may be poor but we’re not homeless or hungry")

Pilipino’s have a saying, "We may be poor but we’re not homeless or hungry"

Our house was made of all things we have found over the years. You see, I work and live at the garbage site in Rizal. Some people in the US must think we are very sad because we live in garbage, but we aren’t.. This was the way we survived. Yes we are very poor. But now we are very poor with no job and no house.

POOR Magazine attempts to cover issues affecting communities of poverty globally as well as locally, rather than the mainstream coverage of this event which was from an "outsider" perspective, i.e., from journalists who reported on the tragic, yet faceless deaths of over 71 very poor people who lived in a garbage dump in Manila. The people died and several more were injured when a Mountain of garbage at the dump site collapsed and caught on fire due to the erosion caused by heavy rains from a typhoon.

POOR attempted to cover this event from the "inside", i.e., one of the survivors, Luz Diamonte’s first-hand account and her very different emphasis on the tragedy.

by Leroy and Melissa Moore

It’s a New Year but nothing is new for homeless entrepreneurs, low income, middle class folks, artists and other people trying to live, survive and thrive in the Bay Area.

We are all in a boxing match with the Bay Area’s muscle bound housing market. This endless match has caught many young entrepreneurs with a one two in the gut and an upper cut to the chin but we duck and dive the blows and hang on to the ropes for support. The San Francisco housing market could whip Muhammed Ali and Mike Tyson’s butts.

What’s so sad is that many entrepreneurs and artists have been knocked out of the ring and given up on their careers in order to take on more than one job, just to live in this city. This situation has hit the Moore family in more ways than one.

Melissa and Leroy Moore are young African American entrepreneurs trying to make a difference in the most expensive city in this country, but they find themselves consistently on the borderline of being homeless and having to close their businesses.

For more than ten years, Melissa has provided day-care in the Potrero Hill district of San Francisco. She has raised many babies and has hired one or two employees to help her with the kids. However, during these ten plus years as a day-care provider she has experienced wrongful evictions, at times living with friends across the Bay or sleeping in her car with her dogs.

The boxing match began when Melissa was living on DE Haro Street. After two years of renting out and fixing up a gorgeous though run-down house, she read that the house in which she lived was being sold, and the open house was about to happen that afternoon. She found out about the open house in the local newspaper, not from her landlord. This started the cycle of living on a boot string.

Melissa’s next door neighbor, a 90-year old lady, saw Melissa’s big heart at work with the kids at her day-care and her consistent helping hand in the neighborhood community. So this elderly lady and her daughter invited Melissa to move her business- and herself- into this kind lady's basement. It was a great opportunity for both parties. Melissa watched over the elderly lady, and Melissa could set up shop in her basement.

One evening, Melissa went upstairs as she used to do every night to check on the eldely lady and found her face down on the floor. Melissa called her daughter, and that’s when everything changed. Once again, Melissa was hit with a low blow. The elderly lady’s daughter changed her mind about Melissa living there, wanting the house to herself after her mom passed away. After a month of verbal abuse Melissa got a lawyer. When it was all over, Melissa found herself out in the cold again, scrambling for a place to live.

Now, almost two years later, Melissa is still providing top notch day-care five days a week, but is living in her car with her three dogs. She is down to garbage bags full of her clothes, dog food and other basic needs. At 6:00pm she cleans her day-care, packs her stuff, feeds her dogs and looks for a quiet place where she can park her car and go to sleep.

Police and people in many neighborhoods have told her that she could not park and sleep in their neighborhoods. Many people complain about her dogs barking or being left in a car all day. The complaints got so bad that one day after work she discovered that her car was towed away and the dogs were taken to a shelter. Although times are rough for Melissa, one thing keeps her going, her baby, her own job which means seeing the smiles on the kids faces every morning.

Melissa’s brother, Leroy, has followed in her footsteps of being his own boss and also has faced the endless boxing match of being on the edge of homelessness. It all started in 1997 when Leroy decided to quit his job and start Disability Advocates of Minorities Organization, DAMO, the only organization in California that is run by and for disabled minorities. For almost three years Leroy and others have build this organization with no financial backing causing Leroy to do consulting work just to pay bills and keep DAMO going. Although Leroy is a home care provider to a young disabled teen and gets room and board in exchange for his duties, he is consistently walking a thin line between his government benefits, lecturer fees, consultant work and his small salary from the first grant that DAMO received this year.

With the reality of his sister being homeless, Leroy decided that he and his sister should put their resources together to find a place where Melissa can live and keep providing day-care and where Leroy could continue working on DAMO, his consulting, lectures and writing, the only problem is the prohibitive cost of housing . On top of everything else, Leroy, a college graduate never wanted to relay on government cash benefits. He is in danger of making too much in a month for disability benefits and his goals has out reach the confine rules of government disability benefits. The common advice Leroy always receives is to get a real job but if he does that it would eat into his organization, lectures and writing.

So what’s going to happen to the Moores? Like many young entrepreneurs, they will find another avenue to balance their careers with the brutal reality of living in a boxing ring called San Francisco. If you can help keep them from being homeless and keep their doors to their businesses open, please give us a call.

by Gio Willis-Barela

I'm an average person just like you. I have four wheels that's very
important to me too.

Yeah, I have a job that I have to work at to survive, but I have to go from
place to place in order to get by. My pay? Well, let's just say it's lower
than minimum wage.

My family and I we're uncomfortable at this stage. I'll take anything though
in order to feed my child. Some days we go without eating, period, I won't be
in denial.

We use our wheels to carry our cans and our bottles because "recycling is the key"that's our motto.

"Your house, Your clothes, how do you wash up? Where do you sleep?"

"Our bodies and our clothes are all washed in the same filthy, dirty
sink.

Nights that we can't get warm resting grounds, the concrete is where we sleep.

By now you probably figured out that our family are one in many who are
homeless, yes, homeless. Holding a sign ummm, people don't care.

One out of 10 cars may give me their change, the other 9 may or may not look at me, but, definitely will never share. Yes, we're homeless, there's no doubt, but all we depend on in this world is Jesus to help us out.

by Joseph Bolden, staff writer,

Because I kept taking off the brown plastic patch so it didn't correct
itself. Other than being in fights, snubbed by girls and women,
and having no depth perception, my psyche is okay. My job history
in brief: Lab Aide, Library Aide, Food Service Assistant in Oakland's
and Berkeley's Unified School District's, also a Custodian, Security
Guard, and Certified Nurse's Aide, (CNA) Dietary Aide, in a Convalescent
Hospital with Holocaust Survivors. The blue/purple numbers etched
into their flesh told me. They were terrified and cringed at my
touch. My CNA license was not renewed: my choice.  

1989, I moved to San Francisco, jobless,
homeless, drifting from shelter to shelter; let's just say I was
living the polar opposite of the 'Go Go 80's. 1991: I was on General
Assistance (G.A.) By 1994, I saved enough money from odd jobs and
G.A. to leave the shelter I was staying in, Pierce Arrow Multi
Service Center North, known on the street as "Broken Arrow,"
I move into a Single Room Occupancy hotel or (S.R.O.)
Yes, there's more, but not now; dear readers, you now know a
little about me. My apologies if you were bored. 

 top of article 

More on Knowing Joe 

I learned photography, darkroom techniques,
lighting, in what was known as Eye Gallery, renamed The
Sixth Street Photo Workshop. One day, I met a slim, red-haired
woman, named 

"Tiny," who asked me to write my true
feelings in the pages of a new magazine called POOR.
At first I balked at doing it, dredging up bad memories. But once
passed the past, I have worked on and off with the struggling magazine
since 1995. During the same time I have relearned data entry, word
processing and worked as a sorter in Goodwill Industries. A sorter's
job is to check donated items for possible resale to the public.
Items like old cameras, photos, and records, are thrown in the garbage.
Old 78's, 1930's-40's records are old and brittle, they're also
rare and valuable Americana, destroy-ing them is more of
our history lost forever.  

After graduating from Goodwill's work/education
program, POOR Magazine got a grant and
I was hired December 15, 1998. At POOR I work as a
Writer-in-training, I learned about reporting, interviewing people,
and working on different news stories. I also learn I do not like
investigative reporting. The art of Investigative Reporting is an
on-going, never ending process. 

This column is a dream, I dreamt, about when
I was homeless, in shelters, and in food lines. I am a latecomer
to the Internet, e-mail etc. Still, I'd like folks to drop by on
stealth visits for one-on-one (PNN) Poor News Network
web cast interviews. Other voices, hidden or shaded for safety reasons,
can help people I may never meet. I worry about column shock, a
version of writer's block, when I feel everything's been said and
I am all written out. Must go, please tell me what you believe and
think... "bye."  

by Kaponda

Like the proverbial hen, my grandmother would always lay an egg in the refrigerator for each of my six sisters and brothers and me to fry before we went to school. After we had consumed our egg with a buttered slice of toast and a healthy episode of the animated television cartoon, Mighty Mouse, each of us would then fly upstairs to the bedside of grandmother to beg for a nickel for candy. Her weary eyes hardly ever opened as she groped for the small purse which she would set on the end table after coming from work at the Mariott Bakery at 5:00 o'oclock every morning.

More than three and one-half decades have past since those childhood days in Washington, D.C.. As I reflect back on her dutiful adherence to the welfare of her seven grandchildren, I sometimes wonder how she kept such a large family together on a minimum-wage income and a monthly government check. Clearly, without the support of that low-income job and welfare check the bottom would have come out from under us during those years. We probably would have become another case for the Child Protective Service.

In fact, government assistance has allayed many anxieties of parents since the federal government responded to a national cry of relief in 1932. Although welfare has always been a subject of taboo outside the partitions of official business, it has kept many poor families together. Welfare has been ridiculed by middle- and upper-class America, and those who have been too young to recognize the sighs of relief by the many fragile vessels whose tears have been kept from spilling over into the streets.

However, the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program was restructured. Instead of its original mandate of January 17, 1935, which provided for the welfare of poor families, in 1996, Congress enacted the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act. This shrewd initiative placed time limits on entitlements and replaced AFDC with a Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program with a proviso that after five years TANF must be reauthorized.

The reauthorization of TANF had seemed unproblematic until a blustery, biting storm out of Madison, Wisconsin blew into Washington, D.C. on Saturday, January 20, 2001. Now, the severe restrictions which were imposed upon low-income and poverty-stricken families by Congress in 1996, have been threatened further by the past policies of the new Health and Human Services Secretary, the former Governor of the state of Wisconsin, Tommy Thompson. Welfare advocates around the country have begun to mobilize support for not only the reauthorization of TANF, but what they view as necessary improvements in the current version. Furthermore, many welfare advocates see Tommy Thompson as an axman selected by President Bush to slice the current time limits and language of TANF even further.

Usually garbed in a stark, clean blouse with a milky backwrap, grandmother would fasten her hair with a headband as she prepared for another around-the-clock day of work. There were no limitations on her determination to provide for the children of her daughter. A time frame on the entitlement which helped achieve this, however, would probably have amounted to a loss from which she could never recover and certainly would have deprived us of both our bread and butter.

"On Tuesday, August 22, 2000, we launched a program to develop ideas that would jump-start the political campaign to institute necessary changes in the reauthorization of the TANF legislation in September of 2002. A follow-up conference is scheduled for February 18, 2001," stated Martina Gillis of the Coalition for Ethical Welfare Reform (CEWR).

A former recipient of welfare and now the director of CEWR, Gillis views welfare as critical aid which "sets up a system that supports families through hard times." Since there is currently one in seven children throughout the country who experiences these hard times, Gillis is especially wary of the sophisticated welfare policy of the Health and Human Services Secretary. It is a policy characterized by complex and highly complicated reforms that are fraught with stringent criteria for eligibility.

A native of Elroy, Wisconsin, Tommy Thompson was elected Governor of Wisconsin in 1986 on a strict reform platform. He has claimed victory over dependence by reducing the rolls of welfare by 74 percent across the state, which includes 73 counties. His policies will not come as a surprise in the city by the Potomac, where the cherries blossom. In fact, his welfare policy guidelines between 1986 and 1996 influenced much of the TANF legislation of 1996. If it is true that form follows function, then privatized welfare delivery, after the form of the Wisconsin welfare reform, will become the federal status quo under the new Health and Human Services Secretary. The nation will see a competitive bidding process whose chief criterion will be to drastically reduce caseloads in a short period of time. Thompson will bring to the seat of government the basic assumption that the size of the caseload of welfare recipients is the principal measure of success.

"The reduction of welfare rolls is not the measure of success," stated Gillis, "Rather, it should be reducing and eliminating poverty."

How has this policy propelled Thompson to his current status if, as many advocates believe, a policy implemented to encourage the wholesale reduction in caseloads is insensitive and expedient? In fact, according to a report by Workfare Watch , there were "numerous complaints" about the performance of for-profit welfare delivery companies. Some of the complaints included cases of recipients being closed without any contact with the families, cases where group rather than individual assessments were conducted, and cases where a failure to respond to telephone calls of recipients created further problems.

The complexities of the Wisconsin reforms were the central reason for their success and the success of Tommy Thompson. Complexities which included the denial of education and training to welfare recipients, while utilizing the "dissuasion" effect of work requirements. By operating their reform initiatives and requiring most new applicants to find private-sector, low-wage jobs, or perform community-service work shortly after enrolling in welfare, Wisconsin drastically reduced the number of recipients on the rolls of welfare.

There never seemed to be a "family hour" in our household because grandmother was either at work or exhausted from her household duties.

A recent study, according to Ruth Todasco, an older mother and new grandmother, was done in Los Angeles county with poor working mothers. The study discovered that poor working mothers only get to spend 30 minutes a day with their children...."

"Welfare reform is insulting...." continued the Texas-born Todasco, in an interview with my editor, Lisa Gray-Garcia. "It is saying that the 24-hour job mothers do of raising all the people of the world is 'nothing.' Government policy says the years of raising children are the zero years." Ruth Todasco is a member of Every Mother is a Working Mother Network, which is coordinated by International Wages for Housework Campaign, organizing and advocacy groups for mothers. "Furthermore," Tadasco continued, "We oppose welfare reform because it denies that every mother is a working mother." Todasco, along with 250 other mothers, presented six demands to the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles during the summer of 2000, to be carried to Tommy Thompson and Congress during the upcoming reauthorization hearings in September of 2002.

My grandmother needed no other reward for her parental excellence except that her grandchildren were properly fed, clothed and educated. But the history of the voracious appetite of the incoming Health and Human Services Secretary of devouring the welfare entitlements of the neediest families in America through reform is an unconscionable punishment.

by Joseph Bolden, staff writer,

About a week ago New York Mayor R. Giuliani's praised
New York's Filthiest (1% to 5% of rotten apples on the police force)
for the fatal shooting of 26-year-old Patrick Dorismond this month
then pulls out the late Mr. Dorismond's "sealed" records in response
to justify shooting an unarmed man. The Dorismond Family is suing
the (police for the wrongful death of Mr. Patrick Dorismond.) To
all hardworking, non racist, fair officer's that abide by "To Serve
And Protect as a real standard, a few of your "Brothers-In-Arms
are turning the populace against that 'Thin Blue Line' making a
mockery of why most of you joined the force in the first place.
These... sleazy, cowardly, (shooting unarmed people in one-on-one
or in an organized gang formation is cowardly.) out of control brutes.
A bunch of Goons in a Rabid, Mad Dog Goon Squad. I'm a transplanted
New Yorker living in ("Lets say it together) Sodom and Gomorra,
or the place with all the fruits and nuts: San Francisco, California.
Police are just as twitchy on the trigger out here, though our Mayor
"His Willi-ness" is dapper, has some finesse' in his "Power Politics.
Cops, like those funny car insurance adds: "We all do dumb things
commercials. These Keystone Cops (my apologies to the Late Hal Roach
and his family.) are not funny. L.A. has its problems too. There
was a time years back when I had just arrived tired, hungry, no
place to stay and no money that I actually went to a police department
to see if they had an empty cell I could sleep in for the night.
"You have to commit a crime."

I didn't, luckily I find a drop-in shelter this
was before lottery beds when all you did is show up early, sign
your name, S. S. (Social Security number.) and someone did not show
or is late you get their spot. If you don't have one, write your
name anyway you'd still get a bed if a guy or woman didn't show
up. (women were treated better then too.) I showered, had a four
heaping helpings of solid and liquid food, and got into clean, used
bed clothes or pajamas. My sleep is restful except for the terrified
screams in the night. Now if I went back and two cops asked me what
I am doing, I better not have hands in pockets hidden from their
view or I could end up as a dead, gallows humor, bloody joke: "I
AM TAKING MY WALLET OUT OF MY POCKET OFFICER, I DON'T WANT THIS
TO BE NO MOTHER 'FUCKIN ACCIDENT." Richard Pryor once said jokingly
even then Black humor by black comedians 'talkin truth to an integrated
audience split two ways: one saw it as simply funny and another
laughing through the pain, anguish of life and death situations
may have really been through this. In Angel City or Los Angeles
a District Attorney, George Rosenstock urging his superiors to file
conspiracy charges against several officers is pulled off a task
force days later.

Explain this to me, the man is a bonafide pass-the-bar
lawyer in good standing as a prosecutor he gathers evidence (true
not fiction or hearsay) and presents his or her case to a judge
and jury for a final verdict. Wacky Angel City D.A. Gil Garcetti
denied the Deputy D.A. sought approval on a radio talk show. Maybe
he did or the case fell on his docket, he goes about his job and
for his troubles is pulled off the case. Is this L.A. thing so scuzzy
'n rank that it really is an open and shut case on L.A.'s Snafu,
Pollute, 'um, Police Fake, 'uh Force?

(Situation Normal Everything All Fucked Up) a Military
term that fits, any other terms you can think of tell 'em to me.
These... Officer's of the law, protectors of peace and freedom (the
fallen stars, no talent bit players, de-evolved, mentally challenged,
knuckle dragging... (sorry, didn't mean to insult our chimp cousins.)
these lousy, underpaid assassins (at least real mercenaries risk
their lives with an enemy with equal access to weaponry and tactics.
Misfits in uniform do it with a badge then cringe behind it just
makes me want to hear those cop killer rap songs 'n video's because
brother's, sister's are on the front line of this manure and see
the raw 'n real. I don't ever want to hear cops bitch about being
betrayed as killers (I'm talking about the rotten, stinking eggs
on the force 'smellin it up for the many good eggs doing their jobs
24-7 year by year. L.A., N.Y.C, S.F, and other places where PIGS
are going ape shit on defenseless folks. Get those Blue Goon A-wipes
off the force before they cause more grief, heartache, and anger.

With that out do you think these yokes read out
of the same rule book? Funny, in the 30's and 40's striking workers
are beaten, jailed and killed. 50's and 60's homosexuals, beatniks,
blacks, radicals are getting the stick across the head, between
the scrotum and breast bone. Between the 70's and 80's blacks, browns,
and Asians are getting bashed and blacks, browns, women, gays, lesbians,
transsexual and gendered are the targets. But by the 1990's mostly
everyone knows of someone be they a relative, friend, or a stranger
by chance set upon the police. One thing remains the same, to some
police anyone out of uniform is the enemy. Being brown, black, Asian,
man or woman on the force. When you take off your uniform do you
feel safe or have you become another target for a goon that doesn't
know you are part of them; a fellow brother, sister, in arms, a
beat cop, chip, or on patrol in squad cars?

You, on the force think of that when and if they
mistake you for some citizen= criminal= enemy then tell me about
the thin blue line. And all young folks, talk, ask your father's,
mother's, aunts, older siblings and elders they may know something
of the so-called dead bygone days when there was strange fruit hanging
from trees, these days most of the trees are in parks or dead so
Goons shoot 'em without thinking of ropes. Be careful youngbloods
invest in education, bullet proof vests and think before reacting
cause the dogs are loose looking for an excuse any excuse to take
our lives and by hiding behind a badge: THEY CAN, HAVE, AND WILL
CONTINUE TO GET AWAY WITH MURDER. THIS IS YOUR FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD
'GOON 'umm, POLICE PORK, oops FORCE, NOW MORE THAN EVER EVERYONE
IS THEIR ENEMY. AVOID ANY CONFLICT WITH 'EM! Bye folks (Not yet)
Source:San Francico Chronicle Mon. 3, 27, 2000.

P.S. I'm available as a housesitter, hours may
vary. Prices: $200 a day, $500 weekly: $2,000 a month. For 3 months
$6,000. You may find someone incorruptible like me to housewatch.
Its possible, they may be less expensive. Your home, your choice.)
I value that borrowed space. To me all homes are sacred spaces;
from living in shelters, bad motels, a real home is priceless.  

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by Lisa Gray-Garcia

I was cold. The February wind whipped up and circled through the invisible holes in my pants. It was dark. I could barely see the phone I was holding. The chill was starting to get to me. I was standing in my house.

It had been 24 days since the PG&E worker had lumbered into the lobby of our apartment building carrying his globe-sized Orwellian time clock and asking everyone in a voice that reached up through six flights of stairs and out through the fire escape, "Where is apartment five? I’m here to turn off the utilities for nonpayment...."

I considered pretending not to be home. Perhaps that would delay the inevitable. But instead I chose a direct, desperate plea. I ran downstairs to the foyer, motioning to him furtively, trying not to look at the crowd of neighbors that had gathered.

"So, Miss Gray-Garcia, are you prepared to pay your bill or should I proceed with the shut-off?"

"But we asked for a five-day extension-my little sister is sick . We can’t be without heat...aren’t you a public utility?" His eyes stared down at me, then closed once before resting at half mast.and proceeded to pronounce very loudly, "We are a business..... Ms. Gray-Garcia, not a social service."

24 days later the suffocating odor of rotting milk products from our shut-down fridge permeated the air of our dark, cold hallway as I stood shivering with the phone receiver in one hand. Thirteen calls later to advocacy agencies had elicited one of two constant refrains, "We have no more funding for utility subsidies" or; You are no longer eligible- you already applied once..."

That experience happened last year, I was working - but still barely able to afford utility bills- now I am scared. As the executive director of POOR magazine, I am still low income- and as I watch an already high utility bill skyrocket to an even higher utility bill, I wonder how I and my fellow low income bay area residents will be able to pay these rates - most of us will not be able to afford the luxury of heat and lights- Most of us will in fact, be forced to decide whether to pay for rent and food versus the luxury of a warm shower or a light to read by-

I have listened extensively to the rhetoric of the corporations, trying to offer rationale after rationale for this situation- and profering the concept of "conserve, conserve, conserve- POOR folks have always conserved - we share bath water and limit our showers to 45 seconds- we turn off the heat and warm our hands over the stove- we buy blanket after shabby blanket- but that is definitely NOT the answer- We all know - even the least informed among us, that so much is so wrong with how this whole thing happened.

Consumer groups like Global exchange and TURN have offered the only light ( no pun intended) at the end of the tunnel, with a group of possible solutions for concerned consumers 1) "reregulate", i.e, to address the very reason the utility companies are proceeding with these actions is because of the "deregulation legislation" and to revisit that with a new form of "regulation" . 2) folks should organize and demand that their city create their own form of municipal power such as the kind that the city of Alameda has.
3)Finally, that consumers should in effect "strike" PG and E and Southern California Edison by paying their utility bills based on the old rates-

I am not sure which one or all of these things myself and all of the poor Bay Area families, elders and children will be able to do. Everything, including daily survival, will be difficult, as we sit shivering in our apartments, scared and confused and dreaming of a home cooked meal or maybe even a cold glass of milk