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by Matt Dodt/PNN Community Journalist and Poverty Scholar
It was obviously one of those things that was meant to happen, me and my
new photo/video camcorder being at the His-Willieness (S.F. mayor Willie Brown)-Ordered raid on the homeless camp by the pumping station at 7th and Berry Sts. (by the Caltran station, within sight of
Pac-Bell Park) early the morning of Saturday, July 27, 2002. After all, I was
going to an all-nite rave party at the same venue where the cops tried to shut
down another event just the weekend before, so I figured I better bring my
camera along just in case. Then, before I left to go Friday nite rave-ing, I
tuned in the 10-o'clock news report on KTVU (broadcast channel 2), when what
to my wondering eyes should appear, but a news story announcing the impending
raid on the camp, a story that featured, among others, my old cohort and
sister rabble-rouser Mara Raider, from the Streetwatch* project of the
Coalition on Homelessness. Also featured in this report were residents of the
camp, including Jasin, a 47-year old woman who refused to stay at the
shelters because they wouldn't allow her and her husband to stay together.
Included in this report were statements from Jasin and other residents
saying that they preferred this site because not only was it out of the public
eye and generally not on the tourist repertoire of places to visit, but, in
the words of one resident, "There aren't the problems here that you find at
other camps or in the shelters. There isn't the fighting and the dope-dealing
that goes on in other places. People here respect each other."
The report also included statements from the mayor's office, such as,
"Because it's near a water pumping station, this encampment is a threat to
security." Ridiculous, because in this writer's opinion, it's MORE secure to
have a group of long-time residents there, many of whom are quite patriotic,
judging from the number of American flags being flown around the camp, as
that many more pairs of eyes to keep watch. Another quote from the mayor's
office was, "The conditions at this encampment are dirty and unsanitary and
therefore a risk to the residents here." Yet another statement rendered
ludicrous by the wide-angle shot displayed on the TV screen, showing that
this camp was quite clean and orderly, given the circumstances.
Other questions come to my mind: This camp had been here for years.
It's also been a number of months and many 'terrorist threats' since the
World Trade Center attacks. Why, all of a sudden, did Brown decide that
this camp now had to be terminated, without delay?
After a night of rave-ing, which included a quick catnap on a couch,
I rolled up 7th St. from Indiana St. toward the camp. Even though dawn was
just breaking, the camp was as busy as a nest of ants that had just been
stirred with a stick. Hastily-gathered possessions were being lashed onto
anything with wheels; these were being pushed toward the street with all
haste. After bicycling my way around some fenced-in areas and over some
railroad tracks, I arrived on the Berry St. side of the camp to find the
aforementioned Ms. Raider talking with one of the camp's residents.
"Hello," says she to me, "do you have your camera?" "Yes," I replied,
"that's why I'm here." A few minutes later, L.S. Wilson, another longtime
Streetwatch volunteer, walked up with a video camera in his hand, and I
had already noticed a KTVU cameraman at the scene. After some chit-chat, I
was tired of straddling my bike and decided it was time to get off and lock
it up. At that moment (about 6:20 A.M.), a large group of police cars and
another large group of motorcycle officers drove up Berry St. and descended
on the scene.
One officer, presumably the site commander, started giving orders
to, "start at this side of the camp and work back." Along with the KTVU news
crew, I wound up following the police, documenting them as they went from tent
to tent and structure to structure as a sort of UnWelcome Wagon, gently
advising the residents to, "wake up, it's time to go." The genteel nature of
the police's behavior and the whole anti-climatic feel (no resistance was
offered) of the events belied the cold, cruel, heartless nature of what was
transpiring.
The heavy presence of police officers (about 25-30) motivated the
camp residents to hasten the evacuation process. Even us non-homeless
homeless advocates - myself, Mara, L.S., and another Streetwatch volunteer
named Ken - were pressed into service, cutting down and rolling up tarps,
pushing carts and other mobile apparati laden with belongings out toward the
street, in keeping with the sacred credo of POOR magazine's journalism
department, "We don't just RE-port, we SUP-port."
After a couple of hours, things had rather settled into a routine
when who should show a face but George Smith of the Mayor's Office on
Homelessness, and P.J. Johnston, the mayor's spokesperson. A flare-up occured
between Mara Raider and Mr. Johnston while the latter was being interviewed
by KTVU and Ms. Raider, loudly and in no uncertain terms, voiced her
disagreements with Mr. Johnston's statements. I even added my spoke, which was
that many of the new evictees would inevitably be going into the
neighborhoods, which was not going to please many of the neighborhoods'
residents. And in the one-picture-speaks-a-thousand-words category, as the
camp residents were toiling away getting their shelters and possessions moved,
George Smith was seen (by me) capering and dancing while chatting with a
police officer.
The exchange between Mara and P.J. Johnston added comic relief to
the KTVU 10 o'clock news broadcast that evening. As P.J. was making a
statement, I believe it was that there were enough shelter beds to accomodate
all the new evictees, Mara, who was off-camera, could be very plainly heard
saying, "But that's bullshit."
Funny stuff, that. But in this writer's humble opinion, there's a
serious question to be raised about this action by the mayor, which at best
makes it appear extremely short-sighted and harebrained. Starting with the
issue of available shelter space: Even if there is enough for all the
evictees, as the mayor's office contends, SHELTERS ARE ONLY OPEN AT NIGHT.
Shelter clients are not allowed in until late afternoon/early evening, and
are turfed out early (5-7 A.M.) each morning. Which leaves about 12 hours
each day with no guaranteed safe, suitable place to go. So where to, then?
The neighborhoods? We've been over that already. The newly gussied-up,
extremely homeless-unfriendly Union Square Plaza, with its 24-7 police patrol
and gentrification-obsessed area merchants? Your guess is as good as mine.
Keep in mind also, that there were, to my estimation, about 100 or so people
living in this camp. No small amount of people to keep out of sight and out
of mind.
I'll finish my rant with this: Remember the word coming from the
mayor's office a few months back, wringing his hands while swinging the
budget axe? How heartbreaking it was to lay off so many laundry workers?
"It's like laying off my own mother," lamented Slick Willie. Well, this was
all a visit to Reptile World, because the tears were crocodile and the oil was
snake. How so, you ask? Because at the same time he was making these cuts,
such as laying off 'his own mother,' i.e., the laundry workers, and cutting
the funding for the POOR magazine media internship program, which moved
several other POOR magazine interns, myself included, from paid work back to
welfare, the budget was INCREASED for some of his cronies, including the
aforementioned Mssrs. Smith and Johnston, each of whom was given a significant
salary increase. I guess Da Mayor cares more about his (wrecking) crew than
about his mum.
Now back to our story. The eviction continued to proceed without
significant incident. DPW and SWAP crews, a front-end loader(bulldozer),
and dump trucks were brought in to haul away what the evictees couldn't or
wouldn't haul away themselves. Huge, thick clouds of dust, equalling those I
used to see when I would hitchhike across the desert, were raised by the DPW
doing their thing with the bulldozer, scraping the bucket across the already
parched ground. This came at a most inconvenient time, just when we homeless
advocates and houseless folx were trying to get some breakfast, a surprisingly
opulent one, hosted by Jasin and her significant other and featuring Cheerios
and milk, orange juice, granola bars, tea, and much-needed and appreciated
coffee, both standard drip and Turkish.
There's not much more to tell.The evictees and city workers all
finishing the horrible task at hand, the police slowly dispersing and the
houseless sitting along the Berry St. curb, waiting for rides, pondering
their fate and their next move. In our already-exhausted state and our energy
continuing to drain, the other homeless advocates and I discussed what the
next move should be. A few ideas were tossed out, no consensus was reached,
except that we agreed that this outrage by 'our' image and wealth-obsessed
mayor cannot be allowed to pass as water over the damned. This having been
agreed upon, we decided to call it a day. This hours-long reminder of my
former homelessness and current at-risk state, plus the growing heat of the
day and my having gotten a total of about 3 hours of sleep the previous 2
nights made the prospect of hot shower and bed seem especially sweet.
Final note This and just about everything else this mayor has done
has only convinced me that the only reason that the same political
homeless-hating, king-making machine that put Frank Jordan in office in 1991
abandoned him for Willie Brown in 1995 and beyond is that Frank Jordan was not
a good enough politician; his attempts to rid San Francisco of the poor and
homeless, i.e., the Matrix program and the crackdown on Food Not Bombs were
too clumsy, stupid, and obvious and brought The City a lot of bad publicity.
Willie Brown, on the other hand, is a much better politician, meaning a much
better snake-oil salesman. He can, and has, made anti-poor/homeless programs
that are much harsher than Frank Jordan's seem genuinely compassionate.
*The COH's Streetwatch project's mission is to address the injustices
perpetrated on San Francisco's poor and homeless population by the police and
city government, such as unlawfully-issued citations for so-called 'quality
of life' offenses, such as blocking the sidewalk, camping/sleeping/
panhandling/loitering in public, lodging in vehicles, open alcoholic beverage
containers, and unlawful detentions/searches/warrant checks. This is
accomplished by community outreach, i.e., teams of Streetwatch staffers going
out on the streets on a regular basis with notepads, OCC complaint forms,
video cameras, and literature containing information on exactly what the above
laws are, what one's rights as a homeless/at-risk individual are, as well as
tutorials on what one's rights and responsibilities are when observing and
documenting police behavior. The notepads and video cameras are for
documenting any police interactions with the poor and homeless that the
Streetwatchers encounter while on the job. Streetwatch also conducts community
forums to educate the public about the above issues, as well as what really
goes on in city government re poor/homeless issues, behind the corporate media
spin of Willie's World. Streetwatch also offers pro-bono legal representation
for tickets issued for the above-mentioned 'quality of life' offenses. This
usually results in summary dismissals for all tickets so represented,
thwarting The City's plan to harass the poor and homeless out of town via the
legal process.
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