Story Archives 2002

by Leroy Moore/Illin and Chillin

"The Warden is not here, no one is in charge today!", the security guard barked at the protesters who gathered at the gate of the Skilled Nursing Facility of Central California Women Facility in Chowchilla (CCWF) CA. armed with a list of demands as follows:

*Stop the lockdown of women in the Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF)

*Compassionate release for dying prisoners

*Independent investigation of the Skilled Nursing Facility at CCWF

On April 27th, 2002 over seventy-five former prisoners, family members and advocates from around the state gathered at the gates of Central California WomenÌs Facility in the town of Chowchilla to protest the health care crisis and deaths of women prisoners. The town of Chowchilla is part of Merdera County in central California, north of Fresno. Chowchilla current population is 5,930 according to the 1990 US Census and the land is 10.3 sq. mile. The origin of Chowchilla comes from the nearby Chowchilla River named for the Chauciles Indian tribe that once lived on its banks.

However the quiet rural desert with its calm river has became home for one of the biggest correctional nursing facility for women in the nation. One of the activists told the crowd that CCWF was built in 1990 and is known to be the place where that state routinely sends seriously ill women inmates because it operates a hospice and skilled nursing facility. If CCWF is known for its skilled nursing expertise, then why over fifty prison activists, family members, grassroots organizations and media carpooled to this facility? The reasons are well known to prison activists, inmateÌs families, California Prison Focus, California Women Prisoners and Families with a Future who with others organized the rally at the gates of CCFW.

Karen Shain of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children Organization in collaboration with prison activists and family members of inmates helped put the spotlight on the physical and sexual assaults against women at CCWF plus the denial of medical care that have lead to 17 deaths in the last year. Matter-of-fact two years ago the high death rate at Chowchilla reached the attention of Los Angeles Times.

According to A December 20th 2000 article in the LA Times, there have been 15 death in the year 2000, 9 in 1999 and 10 in 1998. Almost two years after the state corrections official investigation of repeated deaths at Chowchilla and a federal class-action lawsuit over shoddy health care, the death toll keeps on rising.

Ida McCray-Robinson, a formerly incarcerated poet, mother and organizer also Founder of Families with a Future shared with the crowd that17 women died in CCWF last year alone. Ida pumped up the rally as she told how she used to feel hearing protesters outside when she was incarcerated. ÏMake them hear you! We love you, we love you! we shout under IdaÌs commands. Speakers who represented a coalition of organizations, i.e. Critical Resistance, Out of Control, Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, California Coalition for Women Prisoners, California Prison Focus, Queers United to Fight Israeli Terrorism, Prison Moratorium Project, Death Penalty Focus Amnesty International and Disability Advocates of Minorities Organization and community activists
took the mike to talk about what was going on inside.

As I marched with 50 to 75 other protesters young and my elders, my blood was boiling from the stories that were spoken about the way my disabled and terminally ill sisters are treated inside CCWF. For example one organizer talked about the death of a quadriplegic inmate because nobody responded to her medical emergency but the guards rescued a burning microwave in record time. After an hour or so marching and listening to speakers, a handful of activists decided to take our list of demands to the Warden. As we approached the gate, three security guards, one of them was a women, communicated to us through their body language which read clearly as Total Confusion.

After we asked for the second in command because the Warden wasnÌt in, the guards looked at each other and replied that nobody was in charge today! At that moment a common thought breezed into our heads and flew out of our mouths in a chorus, Ïwell if nobody is in charged the women prisoners should come home with us. We realized that we were talking to a wall with human like features so we decided to continue our rally outside the gate. The beloved activist,Yuri Kochiyama rolled her walker up to the mike and gave herstory about the racist, sexist and classiest prison industrial complex that is becoming homes for our diverse society. As cars started to pull off, I received some more history of Chowchilla. Come to find out the town of Chowchilla is mainly comprised of low-income Latinos and the push for CCWF in this area was a political move to one separate families from their love ones and to provide jobs in Chowchilla.

As the car turned onto the highway to the Bay area, I saw three more prisons all for women. Our mothers, sisters, mothers and grandmothers are joining forces with spirits of our ancestors, goddess, Mother Earth and Mother Nature to give birth to JUSTICE in the desert. I wonder would our Native American ancestors would agree on how the land and women are being treated? I don't think so!

For more information call California Coalition for Women Prisoners at (415) 255-7036 x4 or visit their website; www.womenprissoners.org
The Coalition meets on the first Wednesday of every month at 7pm at 100 McAllister St., 3rd Floor in San Francisco.

You can also order their quarterly newsletter, The Fire Inside: Caring
Collectively for Women Prisoners. The Future issue of Fire Inside will look at the Americans with Disabilities Act & work regulation with a special focus on disabled prisoners.

Birth at Chowchilla

(For my sisters in the Skilled Nursing Facility at Central California Women Facility)

She gave birth

he is sleeping

while she struggles in his world

She gives him everything

he serves her a pink slip & an eviction

greed breaks up kinship

Men in Black & Blue

takes her away

a man in a Black rob

takes the verdict from the juror

who resembles her son, ex-boyfriend & father

the muscle-bound bailiff handcuffs her

I gave birth to all of you!

Without me thereÌs no you!

She finds sisterhood in prison

but his hands continues the abuse

from the GovernorÌs mansion

to skilled nursing facilities

men with no compassion

forgot who gave birth to them

He takes advantage of his authority

she used to breast feed him

now he force his seed in her

her blood is on his hands

can’t understand

why he canÌt make love to his wife or kiss his daughter

Umbilical cord tightens around the world

tossing & turning in his sleep

waking in a pool of sweet

screams echoing in his head

body covered with black buries, behind a black veil & black cell bars

Riding in a black Hurst to be buried in a black hole

Voices ring out

from Chowchilla

to Palestine

Grandmothers, mothers,

Sisters and daughters

join forces with

spirits of her Ancestors,

Goddess, Mother Earth & Mother Nature

to give birth to JUSTICE in the desert

By Leroy F. Moore Jr.

by Lisa Gray-Garcia and Connie Lu

"What will the very low-income participants do without their wages?"

"They'll be ok - they're still on welfare...?"

I didn't respond...I just looked up.. too tired to fight..to tired to resist this newest barage of accusations, assumptions, and requirements, "NO, I wanted to say "they " will not be ok, "they", like "us", are in fact trying to get off of welfare through POOR Magazine's innovative job creation program which pays folks a living wage to learn how to be journalists and multi-media artists, and due to the wages "they" have gotten so far "They" are no longer eligible for their cash grants and "we" are unable to pay "them" any more wages. But I said nothing. I just looked up and sighed, a new kind of weary entering my bones, a new kind of loss and confusion about our non-profit organizations' dilemma of recieving funding from the very system which continues to de-value everything we and our participants are attempting to do.

Today's meeting heretofore known as The Inquisition #2 began earlier that day with me and Scott, zen-admin volunteer at POOR, compiling and collating a massive set of documents which followed a memo from the Private Industry Council. Most of these documents were things we had already reviewed and submitted to PIC/DHS in The inquisition #1, a four hour meeting after which PIC/DHS reneged on their agreement to reimburse wages already paid by POOR for folks in the JOBS in the Media welfare to work internship and training program at POOR, we were aware that this whole process was probably futile and PIC would manage to find another excuse not to reimburse us or the interns, but nonethless we complied and collated.

At 2:20 a small crew of POOR staffers transported a one foot pile of paper to the offices of PIC and DHS, we were accompanied by Osha Neuman, civil rights attorney from Community Defense INC on behalf of POOR Magazine.

The meeting room was small, bursting at its stucco seams with the human overload of 7 people- San Francisco Deputy City Attorney, two representatives from The Private Industry Council (PIC) and one from the Department of Human Services (DHS) . We began right away after a cursory attempt at polite introductions. This Inquisition wasn't nearly as long as #1 and there were a few less redundant moments. We went over the "pile" and tried to re-explain a few of the same issues. We presented all of the proper documents, and then the perennial "outside of the box" question was brought up by PIC, "So what exactly do your interns do, we are questioning whether they were really working?"

I began to explain for the 20th time that the interns all did a creative variation of journalism, multi-media and creative writing production, but that wasn't enough, "if they don't come in to an office, sign in, and sit at a desk - how do we know if they are they really working?" They pressed on.

Dee Gray from POOR began to explain the different nature of the internships themselves, how POOR tried to tailor the internships and their work duties to the specific abilities and interests of the interns. Osha added that the duties are in fact "outside of the box" I continued that in the case of the journalism interns, the whole nature of journalism itself is not about sitting at a desk but in fact is done mostly out on the field, at the event, or at a computer finishing a story, ending with my statement, "let's define Staff Writer,(the job that is listed on PICS contract with POOR)

This kind of futile re-explaining continued for another hour until it was 5:00. After the blase' statement by PIC/DHS about how the very low-income participants were "all ok" cause they were on welfare, we asked them the same question we have been asking for the last three weeks, " This is an extreme hardship for our small organization and the participants in the program, " When will you reimburse us for the wages we already paid?"

"I can't say for sure.."

As of this publishing POOR
Magazine has still not received reimbursement from DHS and PIC for the
wages paid to the students in POOR's JOBS in the Media Welfare to Work
program, and yet, they will continue to speak, write and educate about
issues of poverty and racism as long as there is breath left in their
collective lungs...If you want to urge PIC/DHS to reimburse POOR's wages please call Pamela Calloway at PIC (415) 431-8700

Youth Commission Supports POOR

By Connie Lu/PoorNewsNetwork Media Intern

I am a few blocks from the San Francisco Youth
Commission at City Hall, but its colossal dome shaped
roof adorned with gold trim can already be seen from a
distance, as it sparkles against the fresh blue sky.
As I enter the commission hearing room I notice that
there are several lights hanging from the ceiling's outer edge that look
like delicately illuminated white tulips. The
ethnically diverse representatives of the Youth
Commission are seated in the front of the room in a
semi-circle, as they address the various issues of todays
agenda.

After several topics are discussed, the resolution
urging the Department of Human Services (DHS) and the
Private Industry Council (PIC) to maintain and
continue the funding of the JOBS in the Media Program
at POOR Magazine is introduced. The Youth Commission
is given information about the situation that POOR is
facing. The JOBS Program is a paid internship that
gives houseless and low-income people the opportunity
to gain writing and multi-media skills. DHS and PIC
are currently withholding desperately needed funding
from POOR due to trivial discrepancies in the
difference between class time and work hours completed
by the interns in the JOBS Program.

The Youth Commission then opens this topic to public
comment. The members of POOR Magazine approach the
microphone. As I rise out of my seat, I take a deep
breath in an attempt to somehow release the fluttering
anxiety in my beating heart. I had not planned on
speaking before the Youth Commission, but Isabel
Estrada, a Youth in the Media Intern at POOR, was
there to encourage me to represent POOR Magazine,
despite my fear of public speaking.

I move up to a seat in the front row and wait for my
turn at the podium. As I look over my notes, I am
unable to sit still. Suddenly, I realize that I am
next. Before I begin, I swallow the tight knot in my
throat. I feel like a nervous bottle of shaken
champagne with a cork that was inhibiting the use of
my vocal chords. As my mouth opens to speak, I could
hear and feel my voice wavering with the first few
sentences that were rushed through. However, I remind
myself to slow down. I force my eyes to look up from
my notes to the faces that were no longer intimidating
to me, as I finished speaking.

After the last public comment is made, several of the
representatives of the Youth Commission raise their
hands in favor of the resolution to urge DHS and PIC
to fund POOR Magazine, which will result in DHS and
PIC receiving a copy of the resolution. This matter
will also be brought to the attention of the Mayor of
San Francisco and the Board of Supervisors because the
Youth Commission are their advisors.

As I leave City Hall, I take another deep breath, only
this time it was a breath of relief. But at the same
time, I was also relieved that I was able to defeat
and break the tenacious grip of fear upon voicing my
support for POOR. I know that my brief comment to the
Youth Commission will not solve this entire difficult
matter, but I feel that through this experience I am
learning to strengthen voice.

Connie is a student in the New Journalism/Media Studies Program at POOR where she is learning how to speak her voice.

by Staff Writer

Each Po' Poet, "Resistors" in their own right, began the process of "writing" the award tributes in OUR weekly workshops at POOR. Each Poet chose an adult, elder, youth or ancestor that WE believed deserved OUR honor through WORDS and visual art.

As poor folks who have barely managed to Make it through OUR lives, the Po' Poets believe that the "Word" is healing and that one of the ways for all of us to survive is to use words and images to honor our collective struggle through life itself.

To get a copy of the Book Resistance published by POOR Press - $10.00 you can call poor at (415) 863-6306 or email;tiny@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

Recently I read in
The Independent, a free newspaper about the Newsom "Care Not Cash" initiative soon be submitted to the Department of Elections.

He has the petition sighed by 20,000 citizen’s seeing houseless folks all over the Castro, Noe Valley, West of Twin Peaks, and West Portal.

All they see is homeless people on the streets. Funny with all the financial upheaval from Enron, World Com, or other business related turmoil they believe houseless folk are the problem.

I guess that stuff is too big but homeless people is something they can deal with.

These people use to live in those same neighborhoods but once evicted, rent hiked skyward.

Those voting for the charming, fair-haired, fresh faced, glittery, glint eyed Gavin will themselves be next as speculation and property value soar.

See how he frames houseless people, notice they are first people of color, its not a new face of homeless folk but a widening chasm of the poor.

Whether we're white, red, brown, black, or yellow its economic disregard for those not making enough bucks to be care for or about.

Like Newsom, the signee’s don’t see working poor with families struggling, elderly being removed from their living spaces, women with families with sub or minimum wage jobs falling behind.

Instead they are blinded by a quick negative photo conveying contempt masking the real problems like better choices in jobs, up graded training, higher education, and most importantly housing.

Its has always been housing and jobs not drugs, housing and careers not sleeping in public, housing not panhandling.

Taking people’s checks because you believe most of the homeless spend it on drugs is the arrogance of ignorance and blindly thinking all poor folks are the same.

If they were you wouldn’t see ‘em reading, carrying books from libraries or because they’re in school, or have work in other professions other than what can be seen.

We’re not monolithic people in thoughts, deeds, ideas, or ideologies.

You know what I use to spend my General Assistance checks on?

Sometimes it was books on fiction, history, biography, movies, and regular feminine companionship (monogamous) safe sex if you want to know.

Besides looking for jobs too and I’m not the only one but does Newsome and others care or know that – No, they want to control what houseless do with their own money.

When you control someone’s personal economics you can dictate whatever terms you want.
"First take their money then place them in SRO’s (Single Room Occupancy) now Newsom doesn’t think SRO’s are appropriate either.

Dangling someone else’s money to do your bidding is.

Is this guys smiling face is only a mask is he really that serious that he’s willing to cause more "accidental" deaths by turning homeless folk into pariah’s so even if they do find ways out of their mess they’ll still have to fight a negative stigma.

This guy is so Oily wet slick that he makes Willie Brown seem fair and honest by comparison.

I think of Dan White, another squeeky clean up standing though working class guy and when he didn’t get his way after quitting his supervisor job; we all know the tragic end to that
Mayor Moscone and Sup. Harvey Milk Assassinated in City Hall.

Just as Tom Ammiano San Francisco Supervisor is American as anyone else with tons more of experience in life and politics knows that the hidden agenda can help or hinder pol’s and its best to lay the cards on the table and be done with games.

Are all of Newsom’s cards on the table or is he hiding more slight of hand tricks with extra cards to play?

I get an ominous feeling that blood will flow again only it won’t be seen in City Hall but all over from working poor and houseless people.

I could be wrong but just in case Mr. G. and his handler’s or backers backgrounds should be check on thoroughly.

Lets find this candidates skeletons, and inform the public if he won’t … Bye.

HouseCare-Pro Price range:
$25 per day or 100 a week for
1 bdrm. Apt, small House.
4 to 3 bedrooms, $50 to $100 a week,
$5,000 a week for 20 to 40 rm. Homes.
$25,000 by the week or $100,000 for
50 to 100 rm Mansions
Prices are negotiable.
Non drinker, smoker, drugs (unless its aspirin & vitamins)
Not a party animal, Boredom, works me.

For Joe only my snail mail:
PO Box 1230 #645
Market St. San Francisco, CA 94102
Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

George McDonald

Founder and President

The Doe Fund
232 East 84th

Street, NY, NY 10028

(212) 628-5207

Dear Joe:

It seems that you have misunderstood the information you read on The Doe Fund's web site.

Please allow me to clarify what our Ready,
Willing & Able program has done to find permanent solutions to homelessness.

Since the program's inception in 1990, over 1,200 homeless
men and women have transformed their lives through paid work.

Today they are
drug and alcohol free, living in their own apartments and working in
full-time private sector jobs.

Not one of them has gone on to become a
sanitation worker.

I invite you to re-visit our site and read the section
entitled "Success Stories."

I am sure that these program graduates' personal
accounts of transformation would challenge your demeaning characterization
of them as "wage slaves."

I would invite you to speak personally with Mr.
Doug Smith or Mr. Nazerine Griffin, both of whom can be reached at (718) 622-0634.

Since you suggest that our program does not provide our participants with the chance to "improve and grow," I invite you to also
read about the education component of Ready, Willing & Able.

You will learn that participants are provided with the opportunity to develop their literacy skills, obtain their GED certificates and acquire the computer skills necessary to succeed in today's workforce.

On March 21st, 2002, The Doe Fund celebrated its annual graduation ceremony.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker
Gifford Miller addressed the 180 graduates and praised them for their hard
work and determination to re-enter mainstream society.

Graduates' parents,
spouses and children were also there to support their loved-ones and welcome
them back to their communities as positive role models.

Graduates all obtained private sector employment, sobriety and their own market rate apartments.

Their average hourly wage was $10.

Again, I encourage you to contact Mr. Doug Smith or Mr. Nazerine Griffin and any other Ready, Willing & Able program participant you
wish. Our contact information is on our web site. I am certain that talking with them will clarify whether The Doe Fund is "real or hype."

Sincerely,
George McDonald
Founder and President
The Doe Fund

ASKJoe Responds;

To: Mr. George McDonald,
Doe Fund Founder and President.

Sir, I
received the letter from you urging me to look up your website, read it thoroughly for errors I could have made in describing it to others in my Ask Joe Column.

To be fair, I will browse the site after lunch at Saint Anthony’s.

Word to the wise, don’t ever go to St Anthony's free meals on the 1st or 15th of each month to lunch if you have pressing appointments afterwards. After eating four servings of a type of curie over rice, lettuce, donuts, with apple juice, and water.

The curry is working through both ends of me, making me dash to my SRO. (Single Room Occupancy) to sleep or be at work funny how this frequently happens and be constantly in the restroom. So discretion at home is the better part of bladder-uh, valor today.

First of all, it’s both surprising, gratifying, and a little disturbing to get responses to my article [Doe Fund Real or Hype 1/25/02] which I wrote way back in January.

As I look at the DOE web-site, I see the "WORK" works logo with long push broom and large garbage can. Then I browsed to the Events section of your site and I find The 3rd Annual "Sweep The Green" Golf Outing At Quake Ridge Golf Course in Scarsdale, NY. I find a listing for "Sweep The Green For The Men In Blue"

I hope its the Ready, Willing, And Able employees/people that are being honored.

The list of Employer’s are from small, mid sized and mega- corporations.Employee’s are working, some even have careers starting at $5.50, $6.50 even $10.00 an hour. My feeling; maybe it isn’t slave labor but its not much better.

I knock DOE Fund Inc's.-Ready, Willing and Able program because this dignity-in-toil works when companies did pay workers fair wages that matched cost-of-living.

These days most don’t, the same hard-working men, women, get less and less-the fair bosses, companies are distant memories, those that stay true to fair wage ethic are like secrets passed from worker to worker precious as gem stones to be guarded.

I got to say it, do you have ads with PC’s, programming schematics, architecture blueprints, test tubes, laptops, cell phones, or palms, (compact internet-machines) showing alternative ways of working in these high tech fields-along with custodial sweep-mop jobs?

Nothing wrong with street sweeping but many people with a second chance would like a chance in those fields too and if that’s part of the skills program then I stand corrected.

Program participants, Mr. Robert Wright, William Williamson, Vincent Moore, Al Johnson are sterling examples of Ready, Willing and Able (RWA) program.

What I’d like to know about is after RWA graduation, lets say weeks or months (I know you have a follow-up program too) still I’d like to know from them independent of DOE and RWA of what were the rough patches.

Are graduates taught some of the basic, midlevel, and advanced computer skills?

One more thing, Mr. Gavin Newsom visited New York a few months back, toured the
DOE program deeming it worthy. Problem: if your model works cloning it to San Francisco the way he wanted it won’t work unless modifications are worked out.

This centralized theme works only if people can get to without taking hours, taking into account "the human factor" of economic, family, and being in areas that do become danger zones for folks at certain hours of the day and night.

Another thing, the Past Alumni of the programs from 1999, 2001, if they are out there doing well or not so well, I’d like to know what they did or how the programs after graduation helped them.

This is a chance for New Yorker’s to tell me and Mr.George McDonald what’s up in old Gotham.

But mostly its for ‘Yorker’s from all over who may have left the city because of economic reasons.

I will not apologize for some of my remarks, though I may have been in error on some points, but this debate, it is no longer up to either of us not even ‘Cali’s and ‘Yorker’s but nation wide as house-less, joblessness continue.

Its not drugs and alcohol, our economy and technology has slowed but still changes so fast that no job or career is safe.

So folks as I said before email me at askjoe@poormagazine.org - but remember, I only answer ask questions.

by Joe B.

It’s Monday, May, 6, 2002, I just got back from a two day brake away from the City.

What do I do when I’m not at work?

Loaf, sit back, watch the ‘tellie, listen to music, visit a fem friend and loaf some more.

Reading about news-rack law is way under my radar.

That’s what I was doing reading the Guardian.

20 year contract that Clear Channel can back out of anytime but the city is on the hook [Liable] for 3.4 million.

What kind of half jacked-up deal is that, what happened to mutual exit plans for both partners?

[The mega corps wanting to censor all kinds of songs in the aftermath of 9-11-2001 then said “It was only a trial balloon, oops our bad].

Lets see, Clear Channel after President B. Clinton signed the Tele-communications Act of 1996 made possible for C.C. to gobble up Radio, TV, and billboards.

C.C. is now into owning new racks which means what they deem not worthy they omit guess who has less choice if most of the news racks are owned by ‘duba-C?

I don’t know much but a 20 year deal with one company that bought out by ‘duba-C. [They fired Davy D because he and others spoke their minds about flag waving and what it still means in black ‘n brown-profiled while walking, talking, or driving in America].

Am I making sense people? This Corporate Entity not only wants to make profits but influence slightly or change your ways of thinking by controlling the newspaper(s) and by doing so the content of what is read.

Of course there are ways around this if the Supervisor’s are locked in for financial reason to make it difficult for Duba-C to lose revenue thereby making it more attractive to back out of they’re sweetheart deal.

Boycott, not a noisy one but an insidious quiet one where we leave the rack full of paper, anyone can total the racks or take papers an dump them in the trash - C.C. will replace them charging the City, but leaving them to yellow is more telling, ignoring C.C. will cost them much more that attacking them.

Freebies, this ghetto style is a slight redesign where no money is needed to buy a paper because the coin or locking mechanism’s been on the vending machine is now - lets say turned non profit.

This way the newsprint are read by those wanting to read it but C.C.’s has gained no profit and is constantly bleeding money because of their generous though unknown give-a-way.

A third way is a sarcastic parody of Clear Channel.

Your not harming them much because it is protective speech but one must be careful of slander.

Like in the TRUTH Anti-Cigarette ads on television where folks are telling the truth in funny yet factual ways all Clear can do is use humor too on the other side or bellow out angry which adds more fire to their already burning log butt.

Lastly but as important former Clear Channel employee’s who may have been fired or left on their own.

All employee’s should be treated with respect no matter their station, economic situation, because one can never know when an angry, bitter, former working employee(s) with nothing to lose can economically hurt former employer’s bottom line to the point of bankruptcy if said worker’s knew too much.

I don’t know which will work best but all three should be tried because a triple whammy is better than a single.

All I know is if Clear Channel wants to own multi media outlets to spew their slanted views let them but they should also know many people want other sides of the questions affecting their lives.

Oh, I forgot a 5th thing: That's stocking up and buying CD’s, DVD’s,
[Compact Disks, Digital Video Disks].
and rapidly out-of-date video tapes.

We can look at movies, tv, serials, cartoons and adult entertainment for years before paying or listening to Clear Channel’s drivel.

The very technology and laws that allows a Clear Channel multi media giant to rise also allows regular folks to also chose their own medium.

Clear needs our money but we don’t their one-way, one -point driven views.

Its up to each individual to chose their own content and not to have Clear decide for us.

Or maybe I got this whole News-rack law all wrong, what do I don’t know, I just want as many alternatives as I can even if I don’t like certain publications doesn’t mean I have any right to rid everybody else of the same choices.

Now I'll check out Cheney’s business deals.
...Bye

by Connie Lu, PNN Media Intern, Facilitator, Dee Gray/Courtwatch

I am sitting face to face with Rebecca
Barraza-Aanestad in the common room of POOR Magazine.
The spicy aroma of empty jalapeno pizza boxes lingers
throughout the room, along with the resonating and
echoing sound waves of Rebecca's powerful voice
reflecting quickly off the high ceilings. My eyes are
focused upon her deep brown eyes filled with
frustration, strength, and anxiety, as they dart ever
so slightly back and forth in search of the painful
memories in her mind when she begins to share the
account of her children being taken away by the Child
Protective Services (CPS).

R-A: My name is Rebecca Barraza-Aanestad with Parents against the
Child Abuse Industry."

C: "Can you describe the situation you're facing right
now with your son?"

R-B: "My son recently filed a lawsuit in federal court
in the United States District Court for the Northern District. He doesn't
want to have his name printed in the paper; but I
wanted to talk a little about the lawsuit and how I
came to file the lawsuit, when my kids were taken
away. My son was taken away when he was 3 years old
in May 1987. And I got him back January 17, 2001 -
You look at all that time between those dates and
that's many years. He was in Foster Care for almost 14
years. I started going to college right after he was
taken away, and I studied law and came to know what my
rights are and my children's rights. I started a group
several years after my son was taken away and his
sister and his brother. But I don't want his name
printed in the article. You can just say Rebecca's
son."

C: "OK."

R-B: " Leave my 3 children's names out too. I started
a group called, "Parents Against The Child Abuse
Industry" after listening to KGO Radio. KGO Radio did
a talk show with Mary Pride who wrote a book called,
"The Child Abuse Industry". Right after my kids were
taken away in May 1987, I think it was July of 1987, I
heard this interview on KGO Radio with Mary Pride and
one of the KGO news casters or news people, the people
that do talk shows-a talk show host."

C: "Right."
R-B: "When I heard her talking about the child welfare
system I ran to the radio and turned the volume up
because I knew that I had just gotten back involved
with The Child Welfare System. Basically The Child
Welfare System is the Juvenile Dependency Court System
in the United States of America. It's a new court that
has been only developed in the last 20 years. Prior
to that, they did not have a Juvenile Dependency
Court. They've always had Juvenile Criminal Court but
this new court called The Juvenile Dependency Court is
about 20 years old, somewhere in there I would say. I
listened to the radio show and I was so excited. I
wanted to get a hold of her book, so I called KGO
Radio. They set me up with South West Radio Church and
I ordered a dozen of Mary Pride's books. This was many
years ago but today I still have her book called "The
Child Abuse Industry". And that's how I came to start
my group and name it "Parents Against Child Abuse".
That was in December of 1989. In 1994, I renamed my
group, "Parents Against The Child Abuse Industry"
because I was inspired by Mary Pride's book. I've been
to a thousand Juvenile Dependency Court Hearings - I
was not able to get reunited with my children."

C: "Let's go back to the lawsuit itself, can you tell
me what the lawsuit specifically entails."

R-B: "The lawsuit is based on the taking away of my
son and his brother and sister. The facts relate to
how and when my children were taken away..."

C: "How many children total?"

R-B: "3."

C: "3?"

R-B: "3-two son's and one daughter. So my son filed
the lawsuit. He filed it based on the C.P.S. (Child
Protective Services) Social Worker's-I need that copy
of that lawsuit back right now I don't why they're
keeping it?"

R-B: "Anyway the C.P.S. Social Worker - I need to back
up here, I'm totally disorganized now, this interview
is not going well now, I don't think."

C: "Can I maybe ask you about ?..."

R-B: "Don't - Don't -Don't do that to me because now
I'm focused and now you're going to throw me way off.
(Pause) When my children were taken away from me, it
wasn't all 3 of the children. There was only my
daughter. My daughter was taken away and placed with
her... Ok, let's start from the beginning. When my
husband died March the 3rd, 1985.
This C.P.S. Social Worker came out to the place where
I was living. All she did was knock on my front door
and ask me a bunch of questions. First of all she
wouldn't go away - see it's all on this document that
I have for you. She wouldn't go away and she kept
hounding me, interrogating me to come into the house
and I wouldn't let her in initially. She would not
leave. Then I let her in just so she could hurry up,
ask her questions and get out."

C: "Right, right"

R-B: "The mistake I made was telling her - Well, I
don't feel like living-my husband's dead, I'm really
depressed." I never should have told her that. With
that one damn statement she went back to her office
and typed up this report that made me look like such
an unfit mother. It was ridiculous."

C: "Did she have it recorded?"

R-B: "They go back to their office and they type up
their reports. They're like news reporters - that's
how they do their work. The end of March she served me
with a petition to go into court. I went into to court
on April the 1st, on April Fools Day. Whoa, what a big
fool I was right? I went into court April 1st and
Judge Gargano, of the Juvenile Dependency Court let my
daughter stay with her grandmother because initially I
let my daughter go and stay with her grandmother until
I could find an apartment to rent."

C: "Right."

R-B: "We were staying in a hotel at the time my
husband died. It was demoralizing, degrading. The
welfare system back in 1985, had a lot of families
staying in what they
called these "WELFARE HOTELS." There were rooms that
families actually rented.
It was very degrading to live like that. I had no
choice because my husband wasn't working. I was on
AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) back
then. That was 15 years ago-Man! I went to court. They
took my daughter. They let her stay with her
grandmother and then I moved to Sonoma County. Do you
know that the C.P.S. followed me?"

C: "They tracked you?"

R-B: "They do what they call a transfer - they
transfer your case to another county where we live so
they followed me. I felt like they were following me.
You know I was starting to feel paranoid. They
contacted the Welfare Department and they ended up
handling the case. They 'kinda like monitored me and
the boys to make sure we were all right."

C: "Yeah."

R-B: "OK, then I left because I got this letter in the
mail one day. I lived up there like ten months and I
was happy up there with my sons. And then all of the
sudden I get this letter in the mail telling me that I
had to appear in court. And my girlfriend, I showed
her the letter and she goes "Oh, Rebecca you better
move because it looks like they're gonna take you to
court on Monday and they're gonna take your boys
away." " I said "What?"
And I looked at this letter and I go "You know what,
you're right. This is another petition."

I rented a truck on a Saturday. I moved all my
property, loaded the truck up with all our furniture,
everything and we left on a Saturday. On Monday
morning I woke up at my destination. I went down to
live with my sister. Monday morning I left my sons
with my sister because my daughter was already staying
with her grandmother. I went to court. When I walked
into that courtroom and told the judge that I was no
longer living in Sonoma County- he said, "case
dismissed." He just threw the case out of court. I
looked over at the District Attorney and he was so
mad. You could tell he was just fuming. His facial
expression was kinda like "Oh, I'm gonna get you yet"
- like I had done something very wrong.

These people
are sick. The whole system is corrupt and sick. I left
the court house and moved to Santa Clara County. I
said thank God, they didn't get their hands on my poor
sons. They wanted to put my sons in Foster Care up
there - that would've fragmented all the children. I
don't want you to use their names when you write up
this article. My case remained in Santa Clara County
because I have not moved away. I've been living down
here all my life. What happened was I worked with the
system to get my kids back. I could've illegally
kidnapped my kids and moved to Mexico or France or
Italy and they would've never found me but I didn't do
that. I wanted to get my children back the right way,
the legal way. So what happened was, I've been to a
1,000 Juvenile Dependency Court Hearings and I was
never reunited with my sons or my daughter. My kids
were taken away when they were 4, 8, and 9. I didn't
get my daughter back until she was 14. I didn't get my
oldest son back until he was 15, and I didn't get my
youngest son until he was 17, and that was January 17,
2001.

Then what happened was I was living with a fiance of
mine, this man that I was gonna marry. We were
friends, companions. I was his friend then I was his
companion and then he asked me to marry him. And I
accepted his hand in marriage in February 2001.
Then on Friday, March 2, 2001, the District Attorney,
The Office of the Public Guardian and Conservators,
two sheriffs, three women from the Public Guardians
Office, a woman and a man from The Child Protective
Services, and two locksmiths came to my house. There
were 12 people. They raided my house where I lived
with my sons and my fiancÈe. Now mind you, I had just
gotten my youngest son back out of the Child Welfare
System on January 17, 2001. On Friday, March the 2nd,
my house was raided by all these government employees,
public employees, and the locksmith people changed our
front door, our back door locks, and they took away my
fiance. They flew him out to stay with his daughter
-I mean with his sister. My two sons and me became
homeless because my daughter's been living on her own
for a couple of years now.

I ended up sleeping in my car as a homeless person
last year. My youngest son who recently filed the 25
million dollar lawsuit, went back to where he
became homeless and my oldest son ended up renting a
room in somebody's apartment.

I recently got a house. God was very good to me last
year. He did not let me down because my heavenly
Father never lets me down; I'm very spiritual and very
close to my heavenly Father. With my footwork between
my Lord and me I was able to get my housing. My son
and I rented a two-bedroom house. We're in a house
now. I'm back on my feet. I'm trying to get well. I
ended up with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, A
Panic-Anxiety Disorder, and a Manic Depressive
Disorder because our house was raided.

That's the last time I'm gonna be traumatized by any
'fuckin county officials - excuse my language, by any
damn county official. That's the last damn time I'm
gonna be traumatized in my whole life. This is what
happened - I talked to my youngest son who's living
with me and I advised him about his rights. I told him
what some of his rights were. As a Paralegal I cannot
give legal advice. I cannot practice before the bar,
and I can't charge outrageous sums if I help people
with their legal work. I cannot do legal work per se.
But I can handle my own cases and I do as a
Paralegal."

C: "Good for you."

R-B: "As a professional Paralegal I can handle my own
cases. I recently took a police officer to Federal
Court and they settled out of court, and I more or
less won that case through settling out of court. I
advised my son to file a lawsuit based on the fact
that he, that he's 18. These people violated his
rights in all three counties. They violated my
children's First Amendment Rights, free speech, the
Fourth Amendment Rights, their Fifth Amendment Rights,
their Ninth Amendment Rights, and their 14th Amendment
Rights. You have this book - by the way, one of my
distant relatives is a California State Assemblymen that's right, that's right, I've power behind my
family.

My son found the lawsuit based on the
Constitution of The United States of America and the
Constitution of the State of California.

He filed his lawsuit based on the fact that these
people The state of California Constitution which
states: Article 1, Section 1 which reads ["All people
by nature free and independent and have inalienable
rights. Among these are enjoying and defending life
and liberty; acquiring, possessing and protecting
property and pursuing and obtaining safety, happiness,
and privacy. So my son, this right of his was
violated, his life, his right to enjoy and defend life
and liberty, protecting property, and pursuing and
obtaining safety and happiness and privacy. My son is
suing on that Constitutional Amendment - The
Constitutional of the State of California.
Article 1 - Section 1. And then he's suing under the
grounds of his First Amendment Right which is
[Congress shall make no law respecting an
establishment of religion or prohibiting the free
exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech.]

Now let me stop right there and tell you something. My
son never had a chance. None of my children ever had a
chance. My son never had a chance to go into Juvenile
Dependency Court and tell these people what he wanted,
how he felt. "No, I don't want to be in this system, I
want to go home with my mother." "He told the Juvenile
Dependency District Attorney for the Juvenile
Dependency Court, he told that woman; I'll say her
name too cause I don't care if she sues me and she
can't sue because this is a fact. Her name is Penelope
Blake. Penny Blake. My son kept telling her always
kept telling Penny Blake "I want to go home. I want to
go home. I want to be with my mother. I want to be
with my mother." And the last thing I remember of my
son every time I went to visit my son and when the
visit was over he would scream and cry and shout and
say "Mommy, Mommy, I want you back. Mommy, Mommy, I
want you back. I don't want to go with these people."

That was traumatizing for my son to have gone through
that. He's suing on that ground, he's suing on his
Fourth Amendment right, which is seizures, searches,
and warrants. The right of the people to be secure in
their persons, houses, papers, and affects against
unreasonable searches, and seizures shall not be
violated and no warrants shall issue but on probable
cause supported by oath or affirmation and
particularly describing the place to be searched and
the persons or things to be seized. Now let me stop
right there and explain something. When these people
came into our house in March 2001 they illegally went
into my son's bedroom. This was his private bedroom.
They stole my holographic will that my fiancÈe had
hand wrote for me plus they stole They didn't get
their hands on the grant deed because I still have the
original copy to the grant deed of his house. When my
fiance was diagnosed with lung cancer in the right
lung we knew he didn't have much time to live but I
was almost sure that he was going to live at least 3
to 5 years longer than what the doctor had diagnosed
him as living. They only gave him one year. I didn't
believe it because we were praying over him. I had him
on a good diet. He was eating fresh vegetables,
fruits. I didn't have him eating a whole lot of meat.
We were eating salads. I tried to get him to quit
smoking but he wouldn't quit smoking. When they did
this to us, when they raided our house, on top of it
all that they never had a search warrant signed by a
judge, and dated by a judge. They never showed me a
search warrant. So my son sued them on his Fourth
Amendment violations."

C: "Exactly."

R-B: "He sued them under his Fifth Amendment Violation
which states: [Criminal proceedings, and condemnation
of property. The Fifth Amendment is no person shall be
held to answer for a capital or otherwise infamous
crime. Unless on a presentment or indictment of a
grand jury except in cases arising in the land or
Naval Forces between the militia. We need an actual
service in time of war, a public danger. Nor shall any
person be subject for the same offense to be twice put
in jeopardy of life or limb. This is where the catch
is:

"Nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a
witness against himself. Nor be deprived of life,
liberty, or property without due process of law." Let
me stop right there. He sued on the ground that says
"Nor be deprived of live, liberty, or property without
due process of law." One fault that the Juvenile
Dependency Court has is that they always violate
people's Fifth Amendment Right by not allowing them
proper due process of law and they deprive the
children of their life, liberty, and being with their
families. So my son sued under his Fifth Amendment
right and the Ninth Amendment and the 14th Amendment.

The 14th Amendment reads:
[All persons born in the United States are subject to
the jurisdiction of the United States where they
reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which
shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens
of The United States. Nor shall any State deprive any
person of life, liberty, or property without due
process of law. Nor deny to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.] And
that's exactly what these counties have done to all
three of my children; was deprive them of their rights
- constitutional rights. Therefore my son found his
lawsuit based on Constitutional rights and State of
California Constitution, Article 1 Section 1."

C: "Now with this lawsuit what are you hoping to
achieve then?"

R-B: "My son hopes to get into a trial level. He wants
a trial where we can explain to the jury. All three of
my children are going to get up on the stand and
explain to the jury how they were treated in foster
care, how they went from satellite homes, then to
foster care and they ran away. All three of my kids
ended up running away. Do you know that, this is a
fact. My public defender that I had for over ten
years, same public Defender and I'm going to say his
name. Howard Siegel S-I-E-G-E-L. He told me "Rebecca,
your children are gonna eventually gonna run away" and
I didn't believe him, I said "Oh no, no, they're not.
I'm gonna get them back, before they even do that
Howard." I couldn't believe it. I never got my
children back the right way. They ended up running
away. As a direct result, all three of my children
never graduated from high school, and they all have
felonies on their records. That's right before the age
of 18, they all had felonies when they were minors.

So I have had it with this system. I advised my
children, that when they turned 18 they could file
their lawsuit. My daughter was all mentally deranged,
emotionally a wreck. So was my older son, he was
emotionally, mentally, and spiritually a wreck; both
him and her. The youngest son was my last hope to file
this lawsuit and by the grace of God we filed it on
April 4, 2002. In Federal Court, in the United States,
District Court for the Northern District of
California. I'm eager to find out this week about the
Judge's decision on whether or not he will accept the
lawsuit. If he accepts the lawsuit, then my son will
not have to pay filing fees for the lawsuit. Jesus
its 4 o'clock. They're gonna tow my car, why don't
you keep these"

After the interview with Rebecca, I realized that her
love for her children is simply relentless and
unconditional. The determination in her heart to be
reunited with them is the driving force and hope
behind her powerful spirit. The celebration of the
bond between a mother and her children will soon be
honored on Mother's Day, as it approaches. However, I
am encouraged by Rebecca to not only show my love for
my mother on a designated day of the year, but
everyday.

Email Contact :
Rebecca Barraza-Aanestad:
paca54@yahoo.com

by TJ Johnston/PNN

Starting Michael Steinberg’s latest novel, my first impression of Homes Not Jails! was that it’s a thinly disguised manifesto. The homeless advocacy and squatter organization’s logo, bolt-cutters and a crowbar superimposed on a broken circular chain, adorns the cover. The opening chapters lay out the political landscape of San Francisco, circa 1992:

"Over a decade’s worth of Right Guard Republicanism’s wicked waves appeared to be surging hard onto the battered shores of California’s bankrupted liberalism, knocking the last duplicitous demagogic Democrat into the foaming fulmination emanating from every ass crack and crotch crevice of the Groping Ogre Party.

"With Pistolwhippin’ Pete in the Governor’s Mansion and the other Jordan’s rules insinuating their way into San Francisco’s tarnished-topped City Hall, there was no reasonable doubt that they were in complete control from sea to oil slick sea."

Steinberg, a longtime Homes Not Jails(HNJ) member and author of I Work the Tenderloin and The End of Tobacco Road, then introduces us to protagonist and narrator, Joe Singleton. Joe contents himself with a low-wage job at a produce market (where he smokes weed each morning with his coworker, Jerry, a fiery Food Not Bombs activist) and a tenuous relationship with his live-in lover, Corrina. On a whim (as well as with a sense of fatalism), Joe agrees to occupy an abandoned building with Jerry and his new, homeless comrades.

Thus begins an early fictional history of Homes Not Jails, the group known for taking over vacant and neglected buildings and claiming it for the city’s roofless occupants. Initial legal victories and burgeoning public support charge this crew. Mayor Frank Jordan, a former police chief, enacts a campaign of harassment where cops ticket the residentially challenged for "quality of life" violations. Jail cells swell with spare-changers unable to pay their $76 fines on Matrix charges.

These factual incidents inform Steinberg's book, but he has a specific intention in employing a fictional narrative. "I wanted to tell the story of my experiences working with HNJ," mused Steinberg, "but in a way that also allowed me to express the emotional parts of that experience, which I think journalism isn't as good for."

Evoking the early 20th century pulps, Steinberg also briefly takes us to the newsroom of a large metro paper. The editor strong-arms a reporter into championing the repressive policies. The reporter, himself a victim of the system, meekly complies.

Amidst such grimness, some momentary comic relief is provided. In the middle of a clandestine HNJ meeting, a woman interrupts and comments on the lack of gender balance in the proceedings. Also, an anarchic band of squatters calling themselves Damage Incorporated meets the HNJ’ers while scoping out a squat. The contrast between Damage Inc. and the almost parliamentary HNJ couldn’t be starker. Another episode illustrates the absurdity of the real estate enforcers: immediately after the squatters comply with orders to leave the premises, they’re detained.

Concurrently, Joe’s newfound activism takes its toll on his personal life: as he loses his job and his relationship ends, Joe joins the numbers of the homeless. He is jailed on an inflated trespassing charge. Upon his release, he’s intermittently housed in squats, his former workplace and on the beach. To top things off, his bicycle and other possessions get stolen.

More people are displaced by the pogrom on the poor. China Basin occupants need to make way for the Giants’ new ballpark.

A reunion between Joe and Corrina proves itself bittersweet. "You’re not like the rest of us who can blithely pretend it’s not getting worse," Corrina admits. "Nothing can ever make you forget or ignore them, not love, not money, not nothing. And whoever loves you, whoever pays you, whoever engages you in any other kind of significant human relationship is gonna learn sooner or later that they’re gonna lose out to that, and there’s not a damn thing they or you can do about it." Later, she begs for change on Sixth Street because she could no longer make rent.

The novel ends with Joe entering one more squat, but doesn’t resolve, much like the continuing plight of the backpack/shopping cart brigade or the officials lacking the political will to create more affordable living space.

To get a copy of the book you can email Michael at blackrainpress@hotmail.com, or by sending $10 to Michael Steinberg, 31 Grand St., Niantic, CT 06357. or through AK press at www.akpress.org

by Leroy Moore/PoorNewsNetwork and DAMO

One thing I have learned as an advocate is that you might think you won a battle in the political arena, but what happens in the political arena and what happens in our communities is two different stories. This fact struck me last week when I interviewed Patricia Webb at POOR Magazine's Newsroom. Ms. Webb, a disabled mother and resident of the Filmore district of San Francisco, contacted POOR as a call for help as she didn't know who else to turn to as she faced her own kind of housing hell.

Her son is her live-in personal caretaker but because she received a monthly disability benefit and her son has an income from being an in-home-support caretaker which he recieves from In Home Support Services (IHSS) HUD has raised her rent from $281. per month to $833. Although she lives in section-eight housing and has proved that she needs her son to be a live-in caretaker, HUD did not back down on the issue of her increase of rent because of her son's income. HUD passed her to San Francisco Housing Authority where she met with a counselor who told her the only solution was to have her son move out so the household income will be only hers. Ms. Webb's choice is to eliminate her live-in caretaker that she desperately needs especially at night not to mention to separate her from her loving son. However the housing authority made Ms. Webb produce three pieces of Ids to prove that her son has moved out. And as of now she still doesn't know if her rent will be lowered because it has to approved by a Housing authority caseworker who has still not met with Ms. Webb. I wonder if Ms. Webbs' difficulty with HUD has anything to do with Governor Gray Davis attempts to change the existant In Home Support Services (IHSS) laws so that IHSS workers will no longer be able to be family members.

From the jazz capital of the West, the Filmore district of San Francisco, to the home of the Black Panthers, West Oakland, residents are becoming tennis balls in a tennis match between city bureaucrats, local politicians, and federal policies. Although many Bay area cities have recently held many summits on homelessness, and advocates for the homeless and housing advocates i.e. The Coalition on Homelessness, Right to A Roof and Mission Anti-displacement Coalition of San Francisco, and Just Cause of Oakland etc have try to advocate for more low-income accessible housing but the city mixes with policies local and federal have been making people homeless.

In the case of Oakland, under Mayor Jerry Brown 10 K Plan which is a redevelopment of Oakland especially West Oakland that supposedly have brought and will bring economic growth and eliminate the drugs, crime, other urban realities that some times makes urban living not pleasing to many who have climb that class ladder to the middle\upper class. However like a scale, the city of Oakland, didn't balance the cost of Brown's 10K plan and because of this lack of insight many have been tinkering on the edge of homelessness. Ground zero of Brown 10K Plan is West Oakland. The Smith family of West Oakland has many things in common with a recent case of Vernolia McCullough of East Oakland that recently appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle. Both are Black families living in poverty, both homes were places of drugs and both were demolished by the out-of-control city crane that has brought their homes to the ground and left many disappearing in the huge Bay Area homeless population. After years of homelessness the young disabled David Smith have landed in a transitional housing in Berkeley and fortunately the elderly Vernolia has family where she is staying.

In this housing market it doesn't make sense why we are demolishing homes. Yes, both Smith and McCullough were supposedly a place of drug traffic but there are many proactive ways the city, Oakland, could have solved this situation without making people homeless. How about conforming the property into a group home for drug users or housing complex with built-in counseling services. However the City of Oakland has entered into a five-year contract with the feeds in which properties are seized by the federal government can be returned to the communities. However the City of Oakland answer is to have a mobile police command center at a time when the Oakland police department in court for allege abuse and brutality against residents in the same neighborhood raised questions who is benefiting in this contract between the feds and Oakland city government. This contract would make any true Black Panther flip out of their skin Uncle Sam in our neighborhoods!

Even the Oakland School Board wants a piece of land to build three new school campuses but to do this they must evict over a dozen residents who most of them own their homes in 104 Ave. of East Oakland. We all know the problems of the Oakland schools i.e. aging buildings, over crowded classrooms and a lack of community control but why is the city putting the Black community in a no win situation. Although many in this community own their homes, the city is actually saying the have right to that land. The City agree to pay each homeowner what their homes are worth. Many residents have their forty acres and a mule but the city wants it back. Can we come up a way to have our cake and eat it to? Yes Oakland needs new schools but we also need to live in our communities. Another example where the county of Alameda have sized a home and left a family on the edge of homelessness is the Sloan family of West Oakland. The County came in the Sloan home and became the legal guardianship of the elder and put her in a nursing home. To pay for her medical bills the county sold of one of Sloan houses and is threatening to raise the rent in the led poisoning house they live in now.

Some times I wonder why we, as advocates waste our time with the political arena and city bureaucrats because we know what happens in our communities doesn't look like the laws, summits and promises that blankets the reality we live in daily, that Ms. Webb and her son live and are struggling with today.

IF YOU HAVE ANY IDEAS FOR MS. WEBB OR HER FAMILY - PLEASE CALL POOR Magazine at ( 415) 863-6306