A Family Destroyed by Un-Just Eviction

“BANG BANG BANG… Sheriffs here,open the door, you have to vacate the premises” On Wednesday, April 8^th, at 9am after weeks of last minute legal maneuvers, unanswered  calls to the mayor and multiple pleas for a pro-bono lawyer to save the single mama Sabrina Carter and her three suns from one of the most unjust evictions I have ever  witnessed were exhausted, the San Francisco sheriffs, standing shoulder to shoulder with the souled-out housing managers were outside her door in the Plaza East apartments to change the locks and throw her and her suns into the street.

They were outside Sabrina’s no longer public- now privatized housing door in the Fill-no-Mo, like they were outside me and my mama’s door and so many other peoples doors who were devil-oped, rent-raised, gentriFUKed, negro-removed and destroyed by this capitalist system that encourages, supports and demands moves inspired by greed.

In these deadly, sci-fi-like moments, when entire families’ lives are destroyed by colonizers papers and politricksters lies, with names like unlawful detainers, notices to evict, and right to possession, time itself moves so strangely slow and so terrifyingly fast all at the same time. Suddenly before any of us could catch our breath Sabrina and her youngest sun were standing there in the early morning sun, holding back the tears as they watched large plywood boards nail shut what used to be their home.

Sabrina’s families tragedy of injustice has everything to do with the dismantling, destroying and privatizing of the public housing system in the US which is rooted in the misleading HUD acronym known as RAD (Rental Assistance Demonstration) and the ways that racism and policing and the criminalization of young black and brown men are used to implement that privatization.

Sabrina’s crisis began when her oldest, then 17 yr old sun, like so many like him began to be staulked and profiled by a local po’lice officer who obsessively over-polices the one block of majority African descendent residents (when I was sitting with the family on their front stoop, circled Sabrina’s one tiny block over 45 times within one hour). Multiple profiling of her sun eventually led to false changes against the young man which then led to the building management forcing the mother to file stay away orders against her own young adult sun and eventually stipulated agreements she could never keep and ultimately eviction to make way for richer, witer, gentrified tenants which make this building more desireable in the privatization pool.

“Plaza East is not part of RAD,” one of the managers who presided smugly over Sabrina’s eviction said at a tenants meeting POOR Magazine family was invited to a week prior. After his assertion that their apartments were not part of the filthy RAD pool where everyone from non-profit organizations to for-profit corporations like Goldman and Sachs were making bank , he went on to contradict himself in one paragraph,”Well, actually the SFPHA housing subsidies are now going to come from RAD and we are going to start moving people out who are not fully inhabiting their apartments”, he concluded, thoroughly confusing everyone in the meeting. He went on to cite the three projects that are slated for demolition, like the demolition of thousands of peoples housing was nothing more than having a cup of coffee and a donut.

Standing on the street holding this mama and her sun, dreams, memories, altars, momentos, toys and herstories were permanently lost in a series of hefty bags and clutched blankets.  These moments can’t be described and yet I have tried for years, the tears they cause could fill an ocean and no matter how conscious, how revolutionary, and how much I know them far too intimately, I am still destroyed by them.

We stood there, POOR Magazine co-madres and reporters Queennandi, Jewnbug and me, along with Sabrina’s neighbors and extended family, holding onto 13 year old young warrior sun, and her, a lost and overwhelmed mama.

My mind raced with the moves of the last few weeks. The desperate legal saves comrade Leo Stegman and I did for the family at POOR Magazine’s Revolutionary Legal Advocacy Project. The media justice campaign and the countless stories written with POOR/PNN, the San Francisco Bayview and Manilatown Heritage Foundation. The thousands of caring people who made phone calls to the sold-out mayor Ed Lee to try to get him to intervene in this illegal and unjust eviction but who never did because of course it was Lee that invited the private devil-opers MacCormack & Barron who bought this public housing and their lying lawyers, Bornstein and Bornstein into this town, and who not coincidentally are the same lawyers who have been evicting Ellis acted elders and families from their long-time homes by the thousands, while teaching landlords how to be better kkkapitalists and “not care” .

We are still looking for a lawyer to challenge this case. The un-justness of this story has no words.

If you are a lawyer who can help file a state challenge of Sabrina’s case please contact us. POOR Magazine will also be holding an organizing/info meeting in the Bayview branch of the SF Public Library in May entitled RAD=ERADICATION. Please stay tuned   

Poem for privatized, displaced mamaz..

“Been fighting for 30 years and i keep losing, why keep fighting when im never gonna win..?: said by one young privatized, gentriFUKEd mama in so much pain to me on the phone as I screamed out to touch her and Love her No Matter What…

“..Noooooooooooooooooo…,” I shouted to her and.to all the mamaz, the elders, the gentriFUKed and the Stepped on.

To the mamaz who hold their head up- even when their aint no more strength in their necks- whose eyes look foreward filled wit tears, who hands hold so much- whose souls were never built to be killed over and over again.

These stolen lands weren’t created by the gentriFUKators and all the haters- who make these laws and live on all this paper.

Dear Mama Sabrina, Mama Dee, Mama Mimi & to all the mamaz who never did nothing but care for their children in racist Amerikkka- im raising Superbabymama from the ashes of 1999 Dot com Evictions- Im calling upon Harriet Tubman, Fannie Lou Hamer and Quetzalcoatl – im calling upon Mama Earth and Mama Creator.

The brutality of eviction and gentriFUKation is so deep and wrong and filled wit so much wite-supremacist monetary lies and deep hatred- THIS is our Freedom Ride family and all of us mamaz and ancestor mamaz are needed.

Hold out your hearts in the wind- Call to your ancestor mamaz to hold these children and these women.

This lie of civilization and corporate crafted institutional state-hood. Hold out your hearts Mamas – cuz you kno wut im saying. Hold out your hearts young mamaz, older mamaz, grandmothers and babies,

Cause the river of pain is to great to be sedated and the women and children are about to Completely go CRAZY.

The sounds will b loud and the vibe will b amzing –

cause We all KNOW Superbabymama Doesn’t play

No Justicia en las cortes para los inmigrantes (scroll down for english)

No Justice in the kkkourts for Immigrants

The year started off and everything was going well with our family. However, on October 30, 2012 a tragedy occurred. Jose Antonio Matias Aguilion my nephew was murdered. He died from a gunshot wound that perforated his heart. It was horrible but what kept us going was our faith that justice would be served and that the criminals were jailed. Jose’s body was not returned to us, but we were given some peace of mind knowing that “justice would be served”. We believed that they would be on trail and serve time in prison for homicide. It was also very frustrating having to attend court and have to see the killer knowing that his hands had taken Jose’s life. I had so much anger in me. I wanted to tell him how wrong he was andthat god would punish him. He just sat there with an evil look on his face. On many occasions, my family and I would leave crying. I would cry out to God and pray.

I said to myself, if Jose had to die so that there would no longer be any more victims of homicide the sacrifice was worth it for the cause. We assumed our community would be safe without those killers running around in the streets. We really believed that they would spend there whole life in jail.

Unfortunately, Jose’s killer only spent one year in jail and was released. That is why his whole family today is devastated and angry. We believe the verdict was unfair. We are from Guatemala. We experienced a lot of corruption there, starting with the government and also with law enforcement. I never imagined that in America this would happen. I am so disappointed in this country, its judicial system and of course the racism that exists toward immigrants, people of color and other oppressed people! I thought our family would be safer in the US. Today, I am not sure what to believe. I am speechless! It angers me to know that Jose’s killer was set free because the jury declared him free! I’m heartbroken to know that the man confessed to the crime. Innocent? For taking a life? So Jose’s life is worthless? Hewas a human not an animal. He did no harm. Was it because he was undocumented that his life was not taken serious? I believe it was pure racism. The 12 people on the jury let the killer go free! Jose is gone and cannot defend himself. To them, killing a Latino young man illegal immigrants like killing an animal. was not a member of their family they did not care for his life. They had no facts.

I tell the citizens of this country because I know that the people in the government of those who have studied assist them like the jury. I don’t understand why this happened. The judicial system must change. They need more professional people. What happened then with the police’s work and the investigative work??? I am trying to figure out why it’s that we have police or detective systems in this country? In the end of the day normal common people have the last word in the case and discards the work and laws and later complain that the city and the country has so much violence if they are the ones setting the killers free and innocent folks are in prison. I ask for people especially those who are citizens that support crime because there is violence and that is the way they like to live. They judge the undocumented and they judge us and torment us to the point that we are deported and the killers, they are set free and inclusively give them an applause; I became very sad because of these unfair actions. I am heartbroken because of this news and that there is no justice because humanity has decided but I do know one thing-that the man is going to continue killing more people and I hope that its not one of their family members of those who decided to let him free that were on the jury. If it were the case, they would then cry and ask that there would be justice of which they will not find any.

Sadly, it’s the law of life and they get judged by the same system and at the time the system will not fail anyone. I do not know who were the 12 people on the jury and I would have loved to have looked them in the eyes and told them that there are no words that can console a heart who has lost a loved one in the up most violent way. But I will tell them that I forgive them for what they have done; give the killer the liberty even if he deserved to have paid with jail time for killing someone so violently. But I will say I forgive them for what they have done by giving them the liberty that man deserved to pay in jail for killing Jose. You were all not just by being racist and its fine. Remember that one pays for everything they do in life. You reap what you sow.

One thing I will say that man will pay! In my belief, God is a just God therefore he takes justice in his divine hand. He judges everyone for their deeds right or wrong. He also knows that there’s no justice in this country or in the world! I am in solidarity with the activists and organizers that work against police brutality and injustice!! We do not believe in the system that this country promotes and that is why we do not believe that we are being protected by their policies and corrupt system! I do believe in god and in this case that he his divine judge and he will judge according to his divine judgments!

Pena de Muerte Tejana Injusta

[Scroll below for English version]

En Texas, fue ejecutado el ciudadano Mexicano Edgar Tamayo por asesinar a un agente del orden publico.  Le dieron sentencia de muerte porque en Texas, el homicidio de un policía es considerado igual de grave que el homicidio de unniño menor de seis años.

Edgar fue arrestado por robar un reloj. El policía Gaddis, lo reviso y no se diocuenta que Edgar estaba armado y lo llevo en patrulla y dentro de la patrullaTamayo mato al  policía con varios balazos. Quedo inconciente el oficial, seestrello contra una casa. Lamentablemente el policía murió cuando eratrasladado a un hospital en helicóptero.

Zarco Mendoza, amigo de Tamayo, declaró a la policía como habían ocurridolos hechos y sirvió de testigo de la fiscalía en el juicio contra del ciudadanoMexicano. Luego fue sentenciado a un año de cárcel por su participación en elrobo.

Tamayo no habla Ingles y nunca supo que podría y tenia el derecho de recibir laasistencia legal de las autoridades del consulado de su País.Pues no pudo tenerun juicio justo. Se que para la familia del policía se hizo justicia pero para lafamilia de

Tamayo todo esto fue injusto. Yo no entiendo como en los Estados Unidostrabaja el sistema porque yo se que Edgar actúo mal al quitarle la vida al policíaque no pudo conocer a su primer hijo pues su esposa estaba embarazada peroel proceso legal le debía haber dado un juicio justo.

Yo entiendo esto pero lo que no comprendo es que si un Latino mata a alguiencomo fue el caso de Tamayo, hay justicia pero si un policía mata a un Latino no hay justicia. Dejan libre al asesino como si se tratara de un  animal o una cosa, solo se lavan las manos diciendo que fue un accidente y tranquilos siguenviviendo.  

Pero me da pesar por las familias de ambos como el que muere y el que mataporque las dos familias pierden y sufren por eso. Yo les pido, a las personas queleen esto, que piensen bien en sus actos. Piensen en sus familiares y enustedes mismos no le roben a nadie. No maten a nadie. También no hagansufrir a nadie pues por una tontería de material porque pueden perder suslibertad. Esta historia que sea un ejemplo para nosotros. Bendiciones a las dosfamilias.

Death Penalty in Texas Unfair

In Texas, the Mexican citizen, Edgar Tamayo was given a death sentence for killing a police officer. According to Texas law, anyone who commits homicide against a police officer is considered in the same category as someone who murders a 6-year-old child.

Tamayo was arrested for stealing a watch. Officer Gaddis stopped him and didn’t realize Edgar was armed when he arrested him. When he was in the cop car, Edgar shot Gaddis in the head, left him unconscious and the cop car crashed into a house. The officer died in a helicopter on his way to the hospital.

Meanwhile, Zarco Mendoza a friend of Tamayo declared as a witness on what happened. He was given a one-year sentence for the crime. Tamayo, who does not speak Spanish and didn’t know he, had the right to legal advice from the Mexican consulate. He did not have a fair hearing. The officers’ family thinks the trial was just. Tamayo’s family also thinks his sentence was unjust. I cannot believe this happened in the United States. I know what Edgar did was wrong, but he deserved fair trial. It is also sad that Gaddis’ wife was pregnant so he did not know his son at all.

I understand the fact that he committed murder but I don’t know why when a Latino commits a crime he is prosecuted to the full extent, and when a white person or a Latino they can go free! It’s like we are animals with no value or human rights! They wash their hands, say they are innocent that it was an accident and walk free. The truth is that they deserve to be prosecuted equally.

This is why I ask everyone who read this to please think before they act. Think about themselves and their family. Please don’t steal from anyone! Don’t take anything that’s not yours. Please don’t kill! Please do not make others suffer because no priced object is worth a crime. You can lose your freedom and your very life this way. I hope this story can be an example for all. Blessings to all families who have lost a loved one. 

April 14, 2014

At POOR Magazine's indigenous news-making circle we call Community Newsroom this April there was a storming result of women and organizations coming together with holiness to lead the circle. We got visitors from other parts of the country, and what they said confirmed that for some reason, gentrification and mistreatment is going on all over the United States. Our visitors came from Detroit to screen their film, “We Are Not Ghosts.”

I went to their movie screening at the First Congregational Church of Oakland. “We Are Not Ghosts” is about the problems in Detroit and the wonderful outcomes there, which grew from people’s work regardless of class, creed, color, or religion. A lot of people think gentrification is because of race and class privilege but I sincerely believe gentrification and mistreatment work against both the poor and the rich. No class, less class: it doesn’t matter, private corporations tear down family stores and indigenous-led gardens.Evidently Detroit was known to be the worst place in the United States and there are miles and miles of nothing, like the desert. The screening showed live footage of grassroots solutions like what they call the D-town Farm, a literacy school, and even a biking system. I wonder if the Detroit which they refer to as “ghost town” will spread amongst all the people and then everyone will collaborate against displacement and gentrification like Detroit has been doing.

The garden in the movie is led by all races, and it is unique, because white people are always criticized for building nonprofits in the low-income communities, and do not teach people how to establish their own nonprofits. But here white people’s role is different and they collaborate with people of color leadership. They grow beans, rice, wheat, vegetables, and they raise their own animals that are not pumped with hormones but cared for with love. The gardeners have another project that bakes fresh pies and a whole line of fresh desserts. They interviewed the youth at the end of the screening and they said they like the green life and not the deserted place they were. They are not owned by corporate entities, because it is people-led, and I was amazed how they turned this deserted place into a living joy with peaceful practices and healthy environment.

The thing that most stuck out to me was the literacy program that was led by mothers and volunteers who teach the kids leadership skills as well as regular reading curriculum. One of the teachers stated, “We have to love these children like they came from our own womb, and connect them with elders.”

Lastly they made transportation by riding bikes and traveling from neighborhood to neighborhood. Less pollution is a great idea as is teaching exercise as a meaningful thing to practice in life.

At the end of the screening we had group discussions on how the Bay Area is being targeted the same way Detroit was. I just recall this one lady saying white people need to teach other white people how to treat blacks. I brought up a suggestion stating all people have to learn from each other and respect each other because of the differences of culture. There does not have to be an isolated training on how to work with low-income based communities, because black people are human, white people are human, Chicanos are human, and the list goes on. We need to hear from everybody. The group I was in had concerns about how corporate government might destroy what they built, but hopefully that doesn’t happen. Another statement was that the people in the movie are not just making a garden, they are creating a green community that doesn’t have to rely fully on the government.

The problems facing Detroit and the Bay Area are deeper because a lot of people with no education mostly tend to be poor people, and they have no jobs. No jobs means more crimes, and that is what the main leader of the “We Are Not Ghosts” group brought up after they announced, “The people in Detroit are not Ghosts and they are showing how to make the planet.” They are flipping around the way things usually go, turning away from violence.

The reason I wrote Homefulness in the title is because all of us poor and indigenous, multi-generational, multi-racial, multi-lingual folks at POOR Magazine launched  a similar almost exact project in East Oakland on sacred Ohlone land we call Homefulness in Deep East Oakland. This is a neighborhood that is intentionally blighted and destroyed by what Tiny at POOR calls poltricksters and real estate snakkkes, causing folks who dont know to be is terrified to enter because of the violence, but  we are humbly building this landless peoples movement with love and our own values as fellow poor people who have been racialized and hated. We create jobs when we have the money to that get distributed to the community already there and actively work to lift up the neighborhood through jobs and prayer and spirit, which then works to keep the violence down. We see this as an example of a poor people-led autonomy and self-determination. We collaborate humbly with other poor people-led groups and learn from the examples of the Zapatistas in Chiapas, the Landless peoples movement in Brazil, the Shackdwellers Union in South Africa and now, hopefully our beautiful comrades from Detroit.
 

April 15, 2014

The bedroom is a refuge, its walls boasting photographs of a young life as it unfolded. Little league, first communion, high school prom. A SWAT team had violated its sanctuary immediately after the shooting, looking for something to validate the police officer’s version of events. Sage and prayer restored purity to the room.

Her mood melancholy, she sinks wearily into the rocking chair. Melancholy is the best she can hope for, its implicit gloom and sadness preferable to the clutches of infinite emptiness which overwhelm one’s defenses and tear at the soul.

Abruptly a desperate emptiness floods her being. Time has not eased the mother’s loss, nor has it softened the weight upon her heart. She whispers his name, sliding off the chair onto her knees as if to pray, arms supporting her weight as she sinks to all fours.

“No no no, oh God noooo, sweet Jesus no, oh God no”.
The mothers arms weaken and she pitches forward, shrieking her son’s name, clawing at the rug as nails break off at the quick. A final scream then dissolution into weeping and moaning.

Becoming aware that minutes or possibly hours have passed, she swipes at the tears and snot and spittle streaking her face and rises to her feet. Leaning against a doorjamb, she crosses herself and asks Him for the strength to get thru another day.

Face washed, makeup lightly applied, hair tied back, the mother gazes at her reflection and is struck by deja vu. Something about her eyes. She rarely looks at herself, idly wondering if her eyes always have that look now.

The sun was alone in a cloudless sky, it’s rays warming a mother who sat in a park, also alone. Near her feet a ladybug with missing legs slowly and painfully dragged itself in a circle. Regarding the creature with both pity and empathy, she speaks down to it softly. “just like me, poor baby. Just like me“. A thin finger rests upon its wing cover, lingers, absorbs its pain, ends its suffering. Squatting, the mother scoops dirt over the tiny creature then with a fingernail scratches a cross alongside.

That night she dreams of a sun alone in a cloudless sky, it’s rays warming her back. In the dream is a damaged ladybug, dragging itself in a circle. She picks it up, crying as she speaks to it of her son. Her tears wash over it’s broken wing covering, cascading slowly off to become new legs. The mother watches it take flight.

The bedroom is a refuge, its closets filled with his clothing and memorabilia, a nightstand contains keepsakes and writings and pictures too sensitive or precious to hang on the walls. Sage and prayer maintain its pristine spirituality.

Her mood desolate, she sinks wearily into the rocking chair. Desolation is preferable to the clutches of infinite emptiness which overwhelm one’s defenses and tear at the soul.

Recalling the previous morning’s encounter with deja vu, she reaches inside the nightstand drawer for an envelope and extracts a photograph – their last picture together. His cheek had been so cold against hers. The look in her eyes was haunted, ghastly. She recalls looking up at the camera, instinctively starting to smile then grasping that she would never have reason to smile again. She had become like he was, she had become what she had clung to in the photograph, she too was an empty vessel.

(The exquisite painting ‘A Response to a Distant Echo of Pain‘ is by Rowan Newton, his website is here: http://rowannewton.co.uk/artworks/ )

April 15, 2014

Three figures repose in the fallow soil, holding hands, gazing skyward, two small figures flanking a larger one. The mother’s arm raises to point at a cloud above, the twins heads moving to follow.

The cloud is majestic as it slowly passes across the horizon. Ubadah tells her children the greatness of Omnipotent Sky God, of His wisdom and infinite mercy. Another cloud’s wispy tendrils brings to mind Spider, the mother sharing tales of the trickster her own mother had told her as a child. The twins giggling devolves into a contest to laugh the loudest, and the mother knows it is time to bring her tired daughters back to the village. Ubadah arranges the slings of the small harvest bags over the twins foreheads, shrugs her own bag full of cassava over her shoulders and follows the girls as they set forth onto the trail.

Sniffing at the breeze, the mother’s senses come alive. She hears a dry branch snap behind her, turns to behold a group of men in the distance who begin to run towards her. Shrieking “Panin! Kumaa! Gwan! GWAN!” she throws off her burden and runs to protect her children.

As her daughters sleep alongside her, each one chained to an ankle, Ubadah quietly endures the thrusts of a Foreigner. What had once been a loving gift to her husband was now something foul. Eyes closed, her lips move silently in prayer, devotion and dreams their only respite from the fear and misery of the slave ship. Eventually she joins her daughters in blessed sleep.

Elder Twin stands alone on a flat white mound, surrounded by Foreigners wearing crowns. People of all ages sit upon the ground nearby, chained ankle to ankle. One Foreigner emerges from the crowd to approach Elder Twin, pulling her mouth open to peer inside then squeezing her arms and legs.
Now it is night, and Elder Twin is in a large hut, candlelight flickering to alternately hide then reveal her face. A Foreigner enters, roughly pulling off her garment. Eyes closed, lips moving silently in prayer, the child endures.
The child’s eyes snap open, staring directly into hers.

The mother awakens, tears fresh upon her cheeks. Looking to one side, she hears Younger Twin’s soft breathing. Moonlight illuminates the sleeping girl. Turning to the other side, she gasps. Elder Twin’s eyes still stare directly into hers. Her daughter whispers urgently, asking where Younger Twin was, asking where Ubadah was, begging not to be left by herself again.

There are names for the Foreigners. Red Face Foreigner, Angry Foreigner, Wood Leg Foreigner. One exhibits a bit of kindness, unchaining the women so they might more easily relieve themselves and bringing extra water to sick children. He was called Young Foreigner. Along with a weapon that would soon be hers, he represented a path to freedom.

Ubadah has begun to smile at Young Foreigner, her smiles rewarded with extra yams at mealtimes for herself and the twins. Once she allows her legs to part slightly, her reward an obvious stiffening of his root. It will be time soon.

She smiles widely at Young Foreigner now, allowing her legs to part again. Drawing near, he sinks to his knees and crawls the last few feet to kneel in front of her. Ubadah holds both hands in front of her eyes briefly, then glances at each daughter. She makes the gesture once more, again glancing at each daughter, then brings her hands together in a supplicating gesture. Young Foreigner nods and unchains the three of them. The mother drops a hand to her side, throbbing shredded fingers closing upon the iron nail she has painfully extricated from the wooden planks.

Thrusting the nail into his scrotum, she rips upward, cleaving his root in two. Scooping up her screaming daughters, she races onto the deck and leaps onto the edge of the ship.

Her eyes deep pools of pain and adoration, Ubadah presses her lips to each terrified child’s forehead and then bends her head back to regard the sky. Whispering “Onyame fofora biara nni ha ka Wo ho“, she hugs the twins tightly and steps forward.

Three figures repose on the ocean floor, holding hands, gazing towards the surface, two small figures flanking a larger one. Undersea currents buffet the larger figure, lifting a skeletal arm to point upward. Two small skulls move to follow.

April 15, 2014

“Toto I’m beginning to get the feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore”- Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz

While strolling through Pacific Heights one afternoon I began to wonder if the manuscript for the “Wizard of Oz” was conceived during a ride through this the wealthiest neighborhood in America. I found out differently but then realized that the quickly changing pace of the city especially during the new technology boom has transformed the city into a bizzaro Wizard of Oz, a Wizard of Oz in the Twilight Zone if you will.

What makes it bizzaro is we are the ones who are lost like a slew of Dorothies while the political leadership takes on the roles of the other characters.

Let us begin by matching names to characters and the reasoning behind it, though some things aren't exact or even consistent.

We’ll start with the Scarecrow. That distinction would of course go to the mayor of our city, Ed Lee. It’s not that Mr. Lee is a complete moron but rather because, although he tries to be secretive with many of his schemes, it's not long before light is shed on them and the brains of them are figuratively knocked out.

Next in the role of the Tin Woodsman would be none other than Police Chief Greg Suhr. His cold piercing stare and desire to give his troops whatever they ask for or overlook any of their liabilities would suggest he doesn’t have a heart.

The Cowardly Lion would have to be Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi. Reason being his claiming to be down with the people but afraid to speak up for them, even requesting a new jail to lock even more black and brown people in.

The Wicked Witch of the West is most definitely Kamala Harris who as local DA built her career on locking up 35 black people to every 1 white person and used her blackness as a reason to be elected State Attorney General!

Former SF Mayor and current Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom of course would be the Wizard! Why? you might ask? He is the “wizard” behind the scenes who put on the big production by placing Lee in his former spot, George Gascon in as police chief, and sitting while watching and waiting hoping to be ignored but all the while trying to get everyone to pay attention to the illusion.

But of course the lines aren’t always clearly defined and the roles and characters are often interchanged with State and Federal leaders.

In fact the original story “the Wonderful Wizard of Oz" written by L. Frank Baum and published in 1900 had its own political implications, some direct and some implied.

Baum apparently was a political activist in the 1890s .
There were in fact 3 different versions of the story: a novel in 1900, a Broadway play in 1901, and the famous Hollywood film in 1939.

Much of the political implications regarding the 3 versions of the story connect to visual images in the story line. Much of Baum's activism was in regard to silver and gold, and in the Broadway production he actually made reference to figures like then-President Theodore Roosevelt ( and yes at times Obama is the wiard!). The yellow brick road is a direct reference to the gold standard and the silver slippers (later became ruby slippers) reference the silvirite sixteen-to-one silver ratio.The cyclone that got Dorothy in Oz in the first place would suggest political upheaval much the same as the current tech boom that is causing a diaspora of sorts.

There's no place like home.... when are the ruby slippers gonna kick in?

April 14, 2014

In San Francisco and elsewhere, the new mantra being pushed by the Mayor's office and shills for the affordable housing industry is to claim that we need to breakdown the barriers between public housing and affordable housing. This is a sham meant to bamboozle the public out of it's public housing units locally, and elsewhere. This same type of privatization scheme is occurring all across the nation to privatize our public housing, and needs to be countered by any means necessary, whenever possible.

We need to strengthen the walls between public housing and affordable housing before all of our nation's public housing units are privatized and sold off to the so-called affordable housing industry.

What government officials and the shills of the affordable housing industry are not telling you, is that privatizing our nation's public housing units is bad for the tax payers. Privatization places the buildings at risk of foreclosure, displaces the poor from their long-time homes, further enriches the executives of the so-called affordable housing industry, cheats the public out of it's public housing units, and destroys good middle class union jobs in the process.

Simply put, the federal government needs to fully fund public housing projects all across the nation, and the government should purge the shills of the affordable housing industry out of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) that are pushing for the privatization of our nation's public housing units.

Recently, San Francisco has embarked on a scheme to sell and privatize around 3,491 public housing units under the federal Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD) program. A number of nonprofit developers are involved in the privatization scheme including the Tabernacle Community Development Corporation, Mission Economic Development Agency, Bridge Housing, Mercy Housing California, John Stewart Company, Japanese American Religious Federation, Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, Community Housing Partnership, Bethel A.M.E., San Francisco Housing Development Corporation, Ridgepoint Non-Profit Corporation, Community Housing Partnership, Glide Community Housing, Bernal Heights Housing Corporation, Bridge Housing Corporation, Chinatown Community Development Center, and the for profit housing developer Related California, owned by out-of-state billionaire's Jorge M. Perez and Stephen M. Ross.

It is still not a done deal, and HUD may not approve all, or part of the scheme to privatize the 3,491 public housing units under RAD. However, unless the public gets involved to protest, and stop the process of privatizing our public housing units, the affordable housing industry is in a position to grab and exploit tens of thousands of public housing units all across the nation. The affordable housing industry schemes to reap billions of dollars in profits for years ahead, once it gets it's hands on our public housing.

The scheme to use for profit developers, so-called nonprofit affordable housing developers, bank loans and tax credits to privatize and rehabilitate our public housing units results in poor people being replaced by higher income tenants, to make the new projects viable. Making matters worse, most so-called nonprofit housing developers use "minimum income requirements" at their projects, that discriminate against the poor.

As an example of how tax credits change the makeup of the low-income tenants at public housing developments that have been privatized, what is happening in Berkeley sheds light on what is really happening to public housing projects when they become privatized.

Profile of Berkeley's Public Housing Tenants In 2009

Berkeley's public housing tenants that resided in 75 town homes received a shocking notice dated October 27, 2009, announcing that the Berkeley Housing Authority (BHA) planned to privatize and dispose of their long-time public housing units.

On February 11, 2014, the public housing tenants in Berkeley were sent a notice telling them that their public housing units have been sold and that transfer of ownership was to occur on February 14, 2014, to the new owners who happen to be some out-of-state billionaires named Jorge M. Perez and Stephen M. Ross, of the Related Companies.

The data available is not complete for all 75 public housing units in Berkeley during 2009, but from what data that is available for 57 units of public housing, the data reveals that 15 out of the 57 public housing units had households earning more than $35,000 annually.

Additionally, according to data about Berkeley's public housing units in 2009, there were 39 persons that received Social Security benefits, 36 persons that received SSI benefits, 23 persons that received TANF benefits, and 22 persons that received General Assistance benefits.

From the data available, it appears that at least two-thirds to three quarters of the public housing households relied on one or multiple forms of public subsidy for daily living expenses, and that almost three-quarters of the households earned less than $30,000 annually. Additionally, 60% of the units had three or four members per household, with 85% of the residents that identified themselves as being "Black/African American." There were 11.2% of the tenants that identified themselves as being "White," and 2.2% identified themselves as "Asian." The 2009 HUD AMI for Oakland-Fremont, CA., was $89,300 for one person.

Presently, the average Social Security monthly benefit in California during 2014 is $1,294 per month. The average SSI (disability) benefit payment is $877.40 per month. The average TANF (CalWorks) family in California is an adult with two children that receives $510 a month in benefits. General Assistance in California during 2014 pays $336 per month to a single person. Food Stamps (CalFresh/SNAP) for one person is $189 per month, and persons receiving SSI/SSP are not allowed in the program.

Profile Of Berkeley's 75 Public Housing Units After Privatization in 2014

In regards to the 75 public housing units that were privatized as of February 14, 2014, the affordability breakdown for the new tenants in the privatized units will appear very different from what the tenant's income was as public housing tenants during 2009, according to the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee (CTCAC).

According to data released on September 25, 2013 from the CTCAC for the newly privatized 75 former public housing units in Berkeley using tax credits to rehabilitate the buildings, Related plans for an affordability breakdown of 8 units at or below 35% of AMI, 49 units at or below 50% of AMI, and 17 units at or below 60% of AMI, and one unit for a manager. Currently the 2014 HUD AMI for Alameda County is $88,500 for one person.

The current information available in regards to the situation at Berkeley's 75 former public housing units, reveals that public housing privatization schemes using tax credits to buy and rehabilitate the public housing units, results in the displacement of poor people from their homes and communities.

Strengthening the walls between public housing and affordable housing would help to stop the displacement of poor people from our nation's public housing projects.

Lynda Carson may be reached at tenantsrule [at] yahoo.com

(Image of a young sista-mama from the Black Riders Liberation Party at the 1st Anti-gentriFUKation DGZ bbq in Oakland)

Cuz if we don’t De-Gentrify, if we don’t Decolonize – Our hoods will die-If we don’t De-Gentrify, if we don’t Decolonize –Our Hoods will die..

 DGZ is fo U & Me- its for us Po’ Black, Brown, Red, its fo  mamaz, daddys, abuelas, y tias, its fo da babies & its for dese streetz….excerpt from the DGZ plan-poem

Gentrification has a short-term memory loss. Few people or organizations look further back behind the high –speed evictions, re-devil-opment plans or endless influx of newer, richer, witer people that we see in front of our faces, ripping communities apart, evicting families and elders, to see what came before it.  For us Po peoples from Oakland to the Bronx caught in the struggle of survival economies we rarely if ever have the time, energy or resources to stop and examine the system that is criminalizing, incarcerating and gentrifying us out of our own neighborhoods, barrios and communities.

But we must, cause if we don’t de-gentrify, if we don’t decolonize, our hoods will die. And we can’t de-colonize without understanding the beast we have been forced to be a part of.

After years of wite-supremacist capitalist gentrification at full throttle in San Francisco we have extreme evictions now, and like extreme sports and other wite-people activities, the numbers of evictions are insane, scores of people a week being given eviction notices, most of them are disabledelders and families of color with young children, while most activists, operating defensively, endlessly fighting to keep the few people still housed, and the horrible laws up-turned, have no time or space to connect the dots.

And yet as flagrantly evil as all of this is, I must ask why does it rate as shocking at all? GentriFUKation is built into capitalism, it is an integral part of the roots, values and laws of this Amerikkkan capitalist system which is rooted in old colonizer laws from England. The place where the word “gentry” was birthed. It is how this stolen indigenous land was stolen, it is embedded in colonization.

And sadly some of the downest organizers and so-called activists of color don’t speak upon the inherent in-human-ness of capitalism because long ago our families were taught to become part of it to survive. Making money from capitalist philanthro-pimps and off the industry of poverty. Getting degrees from institutions that by their very existence, perpetuate the industry and its harm. It’s true that we all exist in this highly urbanized lie of civilization and we have been stolen, lied to and separated from our lands of origins so that we only have the option of taking  corporate crafted jobs, institutional educations and pay rent or a mortgage if we are lucky enough to get a home and therefore have to make more and more blood-stained dollars just to survive.

But gentriFUkation is built into every City charter.

For capitalism to exist, thrive and continue it must always feed off, find a “new” market. Which means that capitalism operates in a change for change sake model. In this model there is no space for history, archive, preservation, honor and even more frightening, there is no room for people who are not producing or consuming, children, elders, ancestors, sacred places, sacred sites are all “burdens’ on a capitalist system unless they can somehow be profited off of. Elder ghettos or old peoples homes functions in two ways – it separates our elders wisdom, love and resources away from our young people, which keeps people in a vacuum of hyper immediacy and in no way connected to the roots of our spirits and love and knowledge that came before us. And as well, and probably more importantly it allows corporations and government entities to make money off the care and housing of our elders. Similiarily with age-grade, institutional schools it allows for separation of our young peoples from us, there growing un-knowing and eventual disrespect of us and older people as well as the easy criminalization, productization  and ghettoizaiton of our young people without our clear supervision or intervention.

And by us collectively not always talking about gentriFUKation’s relationship to capitalism, it is a tacit and dangerous form of approval of the framework of the system that supports it, relies on it and demands it.

In San Francisco, this looks like many of the same people who vehemently fought the circa  1999 Dot com evictions in the Mission signing off on the 2010-12 devil-opment plans to gentriFUK the mission district of San Francisco, because their paycheck comes from the Poltrickster- Government bodies who are invested in the gentriFUKing.

Now we have exactly the same thing going on in Oakland. Never-really progressive Mayor Quan and many non-profiteers shuttling in devil-opers, real estate snakkkes and land-stealers to slice and dice the entire town of majority working-class communities of color. This is already resulting in the evictions of poor elders, poor Black, Brown and migrant/immigrant families with Cracker codewords used like “beautify” and “clean-up” when describing our peoples hoods, our barrios, our gardens and our bodies.

In addition to the building of plantation prisons and the leeching of our public school systems, another logical progression of the brutality of wite-spuremacist capitalism is the privatization of public housing, which is being sanctioned, supported and underwritten not just by the corporate devil-opers but by the non-profiteers and non-profit housing devil-opers.

So where do we as poor and gentriFUKed people really need to take this fight. We first need to take it out of the fog of daily life. The blur of “I’ve got mines” cult of independence. Where only my survival and “happiness” matters. My ability to attain more and more things, newer and newer things means I have “made it”  because as long as conscious peoples continue to take part, if even partially in the very system that is profiting off of so many peoples destruction it will continue.

The next place we have to take it is what I call the De-Gentrification Zone (DGZ) a pro-active movement, led by us Po’ peoples, landless peoples that uses the man’s plans and codes and laws and lines to seize back what used to be ours, Cause if we don’t de-gentrify our hoods will die….

The DGZ is a 10 point plan for liberation-barrio to barrio- hood to hood, calle to street—An offensive move to take back stolen, colonized streets, devil-oped & privatized indigenous lands, scam-lorded buildings. We intentionally use the colonizers words and ridiculously confusing acronyms all throughout the “plan” cause its the same words and terms and papers and laws the colonizers has used for centuries to kill, jail and most importantly confuse us, not to mention colonize our indigenous spirits and steal and profit off the theft of Mama Earth and our indigenous bodies communities.

The DGZ is a four prong strategy that includes collective, poor people-led media framing, street-based outreach and community organizing, pre-IMF-ed savings circles and middle-class allies in humble solidarity working to become conscious revolutionary donors. Us poor folks, working in solidarity with humble non-profit allies who aren’t trying to own and claim and profit off anti-gentrification work to jam politrickster moves – like creating a moratorium on devil-opment, gentrification and removal and finally man-plan-jamming, from Research to WeSearch, from preservation to landmarks, from real estate snakkkes to land trusts, from codes to maps. We Can preserve what’s still left and do our best to take some of this colonizer theft back.

Sadly, a DGZ is almost impossible in San Francisco and many other already deeply gentriFUKed neighborhoods across this stolen land the colonizers call Amerikkka. But many cities and towns like Oakland still have a chance.

Cause if we don’t de-GentriFY, if we don’t organize, Our hoods Will Die…

DGZ is fo U & Me- its for us Po’ Black, Brown, Red, its fo  mamaz, daddys, abuelas, y tias, its fo da babies & its for dese streetz

This is how Homefulness was and is being built- a landless peoples land liberation movement in Deep East Oakland. Us humble poor mamaz, daddyz, brothers and sistaz from POOR Magazine, Healthy Hoods, Black Riders Liberation Party, Peoples Community Medics and more aren’t trying to lead this fight, we are merely trying to make sure more of us folx aren’t erased from our hoods, like we were never there.

Please contact us by email at deeandtiny@ poormagazine.org if you want us to visit you and do a DGZ assessment and help you launch a DGZ in your barrio, hood or street , become a wite or middle-class solidarity donor or supporter or visit our DGZ weekly talk-circle at Street Newsroom on Thursdays from 2-3p at the sacred land we call Homefulness on the streets in front of 8032 Macarthur bl in Deep East Oakland. You can also join our DGZ page on Facebook

April 21, 2014

On March 22, 2014 Alex Nieto was shot and killed by SFPD, citing claims that he appeared to have a firearm that he allegedly drew on officers. It was later disclosed to be a taser he used in his work as a security guard.

Three days later police held a town hall meeting at Leonard Flynn Elementary School regarding the incident. It was disclosed there that he aspired to one day be a probation officer and respected the police.

Let this be an example to young people: be careful who you look up to... they might kill you one day!

But this story is not about Alex. It is instead about the growing problem of the police killing unarmed suspects with zero accountability for their actions. This is not a Latino problem or black problem or even an exclusively people of color problem. Instead it is a growing human rights issue where the police claim of “we/I feared for my life” is not just GETTING old: it’s BEEN old!

These types of situations not only cry for community policing, but also for a federal mandate to equip all peace officers with cameras as part of their uniform with the stipulation that none of the footage gathered can used as evidence against suspects, instead being used exclusively for accountability purposes.

Ironically, last year around the same time of year I wrote a story and did a podcast for PNN that later aired on KPFA entitled “Shoot down the Taser.”

It appears that the SF Board of Supervisors is set to have a hearing to get community feedback on arming police with cameras as part of their uniform. This is one step in the right direction, however, as the saying goes, “a picture is worth a thousands words.” Without community policing and the use of these cameras being limited to police accountability, they may as well just give each officer a sketch book so they can draw their own version of the story!

To this I might add that there needs to be a human rights bill, because in the case of non-documented workers and people with serious health issues, mental or otherwise, the cameras could simply give police a license to kill!