Story Archives 2015

“They have a date next month for the movers to come and take us somewhere, but we don’t  even know where that somewhere is,” I was on the phone with a disabled elder resident of 939 Eddy, one of 14 San Francisco buildings recently non-profitized ( aka Privatized) under the new HUD public housing dismantlement program called RAD (Rental Assistance Demonstration). RAD is the newest in a long line of multi-billion dollar poverty industry ponzee schemes aimed at gentrifying public housing and leaving the poorest of the poor with nowhere to live.

In San Francisco like almost every city in the US- the pyramid scheme of public to private housing which has been happening since the 1990's with (No) Hope VI and has culminated in the final solution of RAD, has been enabled by the perfect storm aka "excuse" of Public Housing Authority's intentional neglect causing broken elevators, bedbugs, broken toilets, doors, windows, hinges, no plumbing, electrical, etc, while at the same time, discovered by fellow poverty skolaz at Western Regional Advocacy Project, HUD and the endless stream of poor people bating poltricksters leeches and strips public housing budgets and section 8 programs by the millions every year. 

Yet through-out the multiple hand-throwing up sessions by HUD and public Housing Authority departments across the nation, always resulting in statements like, "We have no money to make repairs"  no-one ever questions the ways in which these “problems” are all exactly alike- how from city to city, from State to state the very low-income, no-income, poorest of the poor families, elders and youth whose families have lived in these buildings for generations, whose lives and bodies have been used, exploited and enslaved to build this stolen indigenous land I call amerikkklan, who have crossed false borders and endured US fueled wars across mama earth only to arrive here to work for the rich and wealthy and whose lives and struggles caused by the centuries of exploitation  end up being used for grant applications and philathro-pimps to launch more jobs in the poverty industry, are the ones left to struggle with extremely dangerous habitability issues in buildings that were supposedly set up to safely house us.

“There is big money to be made off non-profit housing contracts, thats why the non-profits and the politicians came together to dream this RAD scheme up together in 2000,” An elder, disabled poverty skola at POOR Magazine who is living in poor people, non-profiteered housing said shaking his head, “Everyone gets paid and we poor folks get less housing or no housing at all,”

From New Orleans to New Hampshire we are losing our last acre and our one remaining mule..
 

wrinkles and cellulite
rats and roaches
a boring Saturday night
downsizing and outsourcing
muggers and rapists
bad hair
bad breath
acne
underarm hair
My terror is as real as yours.

It keeps me much to busy
to consider
poverty famine war
sickness old age and death.

It justifies whatever measures necessary
to sanitize
eradicate
decry and deny.

My house is a war zone.
How can I care about anything else!
My kitchen a bombed-out hell
awaiting new marble countertops
and a Subzero freezer.
Living on take-out for months
has been no picnic,
let me tell you.

I don't have time
to read the news any more.
I don't have time to care
about Syria and Sudan
or even another body
found on Potrero Hill.
Anonymous brown skin
in a too-tight leather outfit
breasts spilled out
like golden apples.
Nappy head wrapped
in an African scarf.

She went down to Capp St
to sell her body for money to feed her kids.
My husband goes to the whore zone—
to get away from me.

One Wednesday

I was walking home from a 

Rehearsal with Vukani, at First Congo—

Or was it Capt. Crossman’s for John Brown’s Truth

Or an UpSurge! production meeting with Ruth?

Anyway, I thought I’d brave a security experience

And quench my thirst—I checked my wallet and

Prepared for sticker-shock—first!

I fixed my mental coat of mail and chain,

Slid the visor down on my brain

For the battlefield, shopping while black

Though this day my bassist friend, Henry

Had my back…

I was taken by the scents emanating from a former

Cadillac dealership across from the sanctuary, it was

African-American History Month, the shortest month

Of the year: February

I thirsted for a Kombucha or Reed’s Ginger Beer,

My internal clock told me I wouldn’t have long to

shop without fear…

After rehearsing, practicing or meeting I’m usually

hungry, too, so I headed for prepared foods, like a

bolt out of the blue

With my appetite growing, while foraging for a

Reasonably-priced nosh—my black uniformed

shadow, mirroring my movements, applied the

kibosh!

disrupting my simple pleasures with profit 

preservation PTSD masked by symptoms of 

‘white’ supremacy measures—maybe he thought

He was antioxidant, and I was a free radical to frame?

Or, just some dumb darkie he could bluff and shame?

I’d just seen some Bogey, Brando and Gable

So, I decided to Chekhov in turning the table

Stopping short in the middle of the floor—

As if I just couldn’t take any more, questioning

My shadow in my most moral, authoritative, voice

As if offering him freedom of choice:

“May I help you?”

What I really wanted to say was, “Look, MrMuthafukkka, you need to find

 some real work to do around here today, and not try to use my shopping to

 pimp a paycheck under the ruse of profit preservation, the pretension of 

‘loss prevention’— ‘cause if you’d been paying attention, the ‘white’ girl

in the black business suit just slipped a lipstick down her boot… the ‘white’

boy yappin’ on his phone just conned a Black family with a sub-prime

‘Loan’—effectively stealing their home!”

My shadow in black uniform turned red as an ember—

Before the loudspeaker shrieked from a Team Member: 

“Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Comin’ in 

Not ‘white’ hued!

There were old one, young ones,

Rich ones, poor ones, passive ones

Lame ones, wanna act the same ones

Standing watching the Staten Island massage

Like it’s Shangri-La, and all a mirage…

Brought to them by Korporate Kings of

The Lone Star state: Old Foods pickled in

Hate! It was like returning to school in

September nails on chalkboard voice of

A Team Member:

“Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Spill some blood—

Choke this dude!

Say amen

Gertrude!

By then I’d lost my taste for a Kombucha drink—

Before I saw the big sign written invisible ink:

WE RESEVERE THE RIGHT TO REFUSE 

SERVICE TO POOR FOLKS AND CROWS!

That’s why I shop Lakeshore Natural and Trader Joe’s…

Raymond Nat Turner © 2015 All Rights Reserved

Un Dia en El Salvador
Por Tere

Migrante/Poverty Skola

Un dia en el salvador era una noche con luna llena venia yo caminando por la calle de repente senti que ,alguien se me aserco pero era un hombre de repente senti que agararon y fue que ese hombre me agarro de mis manos y me jaloneo me quito mi ropa y me hizo sexualmente ala fuerza yo tenia como 15 anos ese fue muy duro y triste por yo era una persona ignorante yo siento que ese dia me marco para .toda mi vida.

Pues mi vida fue muy diferente en todo sentido por que desde pequena tube que trabajar y seguir adelante por que despues de la violacion yore mucho y no pude confiarle ami madre pero se lo confie a una senora pero no me gusta acordarme de eso por que me da mucha coraje y impotencia no poder defenderme de ese perro animal su cara nunca la puedo olvidar noche mustrosa y mucho miedo y no puedo ser feliz con ningun otro hombre por eso que me hiso ese perro cuando me veo que sangraba sin para me sentia morir de tristeza y soledad de mi vida lloraba sin parar por que sola botada en esa calle y noche oscura lo que me iso ese perro yo gritaba y gritaba desesperadamente pidiendo ayuda y nadie pudo ayudarme solo lloraba y caminaba sola en la calle caminaba y ycaminaba y no allaba para donde caminar sentia y sentia muy sola sola llegue donde mama y me fui acostar despcionada de lo que me paso ,

Hola soy una madre soltera de el salvador y tengo 4 hijos son ninos y nesesito contarles una parte de mi.historia sali de mi pais el salvador un 30 de mayo del ano 2000 un dia antes de salir de mi casa me dolio mi corazon un dia antes en la madrugada me dolio mucho mi corazon yore mucho por tristeza en mi corazon y en mi vida ese momento solo pensaba en que iba a dejar amis dos primeros hijos que tube en mi pais el salvador al dia siguiente hera 30 de mayo en manana me levante arregle a mis ninos para . Ir al quinder es la escuela pre escolar aqui usa los lleve a su grado alos dos ninos los deje y luego me regrese otro momento para verlos la ultima vez sali de ai llorando mucho con un gran dolor en mi corazon .

A Day in El Salvador

By Tere/ Migrant/ Poverty Skola

One day in El Salvador, it was night and the moon was full. I was walking on the street and all of a sudden, I felt someone get close; it was a man. He grabbed my arms and began to push me around. He tore my clothes off and raped me. I was 15 years old. It was very hard and sad for me. I was ignorant and that day has marked me for the rest of my life.

My life was very different in all respects because since I was a child, I had to work to get ahead. After I was raped, I cried a lot and I couldn’t speak to my mother about it. I told another woman. I don’t like to remember because it makes me feel rage and impotence because I couldn’t defend myself from that dog, that animal. I could never forget his face, my fear and that monstrous night. Today, I cannot be happy with any man because of what that dog did to me. He saw when I was bleeding non-stop, and I felt that I was dying from sadness and solitude. I cried without stopping, kicked to the side on the street and the night was dark; I screamed and screamed desperately calling for help and no one came to my rescue. I cried and cried and then I walked alone. I walked and walked. I didn’t know where to go; I just walked and felt very alone. I went to where my mother was. I went to bed disappointed.

Today, I am a single mother from El Salvador. I have 4 children; they’re boys and I need to tell them a part of my history. I left my country May 30th, in the year 2000. A day before I left my home, my heart pained me. In the early morning it hurt a lot and I cried a lot from the sadness in my heart. At that moment, the only thought I had was that I was going to leave my first two sons. The following day on the 30^th of May in the morning, I got my children ready for Kinder’ and preschool and dropped them off. I left them in their grade and then I returned once more to see them one last time. I left there crying with a large pain in my heart.

Translated and co-edited by Laura Cedillo

There are three arenas that I’m focusing my demands to

In The Home

In The Community and

In The Political arena 

You notice I didn’t mention police because since the 80’s when I first began advocacy about police brutality against people with disabilities I and other activists have been making recommending and/or demanding repeatedly to three stakeholders: 1) The police, 2) the media and 3) lawmakers and we have seen some changes but not enough to secure justice and safety for Black disabled people. 

I want to bypass this group and speak directly to you, not with blame about the incident outside of the Twitter headquarters in San Francisco. However, after reading/listening to this, I want each one of us to imagine that Mr. Musa Fudge (the Black homeless man with a prosthetic leg that was brutalize thy SFPD in Aug of 2015) was in your family and in your community and imagine that he is a little Black boy with one leg, how would you raise him, how would the community hold him as a child and now as a grown man with a disability?  Would he be an important part of the family and community?  Would his voice be heard?  Would he see himself in the community?  Would he be taught about his history as a Black disabled boy and now as a man? We, in the home and in the community must answer these questions for not only for him but for future generations. Long before the wounds from police brutality, Mr. Fudge and many other disabled Black people have deep pain with open wounds and those wounds might have come from the home and community.

So today my demands go further than a quick band-aid, a toothless policy or another four year grant cycle or begging corporations like Twitter to do some sensitivity training or more money to train police, it goes to the heart of the places we all treasure, the home and community.  As we grow older, a place that becomes our second home, institutions from schools to non-profits to political arenas aka our jobs.  In all of these areas from home to community to institutions all need a heavy dose of how to not only live but strive together. I know it sounds lofty but we are not going anywhere so we must learn, we must not leave it up to institutions to teach us about everything.  We must teach in our homes, opening our doors to the knowledge of community scholars. We must hold institutions accountable by using the political and legal arenas to ensure that they follow through on what we, the community, propose. Lawmakers must write and implement laws that reflect the needs and issues as described by affected communities and the courts must uphold the laws.  When this does not happen we must use our family/community power in the courts and in the vote on the people we put in the positions of power and decision making.

Many times activists think that there is only one way for sweeping change and that is new policy.  We have become a country of laws, even laws for common sense.  What we see is that initially many laws leave people out and there is need for amendments.  If we are going to commit to this notion of unity for change, then communities and families should have success by demanding the law is followed. In bringing justice for Musa and other people with disabilities who are abused by police, especially homeless folks, The Homeless Bill of Rights, and the new AB 953 which is written to halt racial profiling by law enforcement, and was amended to include people with disabilities, are the tools for justice. 

Knowing that many of our services and advocacy now comes from non-profits.  We must fight to make certain that services and empowering space for Musa and me be inclusive to all Black/Brown people with disabilities.  That includes the good work that has been happening for Black/Brown men and women from the NAACP, to local incentives for Black/Brown youth to adults. These organizations and initiative must open their doors to their disabled brothers and sisters. And we must ask why Black national organizations and political leaders haven’t reached out to the National Black Disability Coalition (the only national Black disability organization) and recognized Black disabled activists?  This question is even more staggering knowing that Black disabled youth and adults are highly at risk to experience violence.  However, at the same time we must not only work in the non-profit sector but we need to be critical and call non-profits out when they are not doing anything but collecting a paycheck on our backs of poor Black/Brown people with disabilities.  We can start locally here in the Bay by asking these programs how we can help them be more inclusive or from economic justice, start our own group.  

We must break the usual cycle when it comes to the one size fits all solution toward the issue of police brutality against people with disabilities. That is more funding to the police for training and we must switch our conversations form police to our community groups like Idriss Stelley Foundation and more.  We can demand more non-grant money, media and awareness to go to cultural projects like Krip-Hop Nation who have a record doing cultural work around police brutality against people with disabilities and many others.  We can support the National Black Disability Coalition’s work around implementing Black Disability Studies at colleges and universities and their work in the community creating advocacy and cultural outlets to Black families and Black disabled people.  Can you imagine if Musa and other Black disabled victims of police brutality grew up with Black disability courses, books, movies, art and music on a local and national level in popular media?  As street activists in this fight against police brutality can start and continue to ask, are our rallies accessible, is the disabled community represented not only in your rallies but on the stage, on your media, in your talking points and are the politics of disability justice practice implemented in social justice left and their work before and during a movement?

Yes these demands can’t be answered in a day, week, month or year and I know I might be long gone before seeing these demands becoming a part of our everyday lives.  We can not only begin, but for many of us we are continuing the work.   All I’m saying is to make sure that we don’t feel alone in this work and think and come up with solutions that are outside of the box...

By Leroy F. Moore Jr.

Poor Magazine Columnist and Founding Member of The National Black Disability Coalition

Friday, August 28, 15

(Photo by Al Osorio for PNN)

The canonization of the murderer Junipero Serra by Pope Francis, which happened on Wednesday, September 23rd, 2015, was resisted by Indigenous Peoples of the West Coast of Turtle Island, and all peoples of conscious who refust to believe the Doctrine of Discovery. 

Words from 1st Nations Ohlone Warrior Corrina Gould:"The canonization of Serra is not complicated or complex. Its fairly simple, as I explained to CBS news in front of the Mission Delores in SF today. My ancestors were enslaved at this concentration camp created by Serra for his own ego, for the Spanish crown and for the Catholic Empire. Serra didn't save us. We already had our own religion! In fact, we were the ones that were civilized and it was Serra that introduced us to HELL.

Click here to watch Power-FUL Queer Clergy of Color resist the canonization

Poor, Houseless, Disabled and Criminalized Mamaz, Daddys, Elders and Youth Release Findings on the Racist , Classist Broken Windows Theory

“Welcome to the 2015 WeSearch Policy Group 2015 report. Today we, the houseless, criminalized, displaced, elders and youth will present our well documented findings on the abuse, violence and criminality of the ‘Broken Windows Theory’ and European settler colonizers who steal and hoard indigenous resources and land and then create laws to incarcerate us,” said Dee Allen, WeSearchPolicyGroup Data Investigator to passerbys outside the Marriot Marquis Hotel in San Francisco, the location of the 2015 International Downtown Association(IDA) . 

A 2015 WeSearch report (poor people-led, not Academic-ethnographed, research project of POOR Magazine) was released outside the Marriot Marquis Hotel because the IDA is the epicenter of all private , anti-homeless policing and this year was hosting a workshop by none other than Kelling, the co-author of the anti-poor people theory, Broken Windows implemented by mayors of cities across the US and the world.( because we are exporting private policing and hater laws across the world as a “new” business model) .  
 
The broken windows model of policing was first described in 1982 in an article by Wilson and Kelling. Using code words like “disorder” and the metaphor of “broken windows”  the model focuses on the importance of “fixing” , aka policing, getting rid of, cleaning out  broken windows as a way of “preventing” more “serious crime”.

The poor, disabled and houseless scholars from POOR Magazine, who have experienced the violence of this private policing through programs like the “ambassador” programs in San Francisco and Berkeley, launched the WeSearch Policy Group(WPG) in 2013, because as our tag-line reads, “the ruling class only honors acronyms” to use the same paper trails, numbers, “data”, laws and confusing tactics that the gentry uses against us poor people all the time to evict, test, arrest and incarcerate us.

“In my Afrikan neighborhood since 2012, over 2,500 children and youth under 18 have been abused, profiled and threatened by policies inspired by Kellings Broken Windows theory. In addition, I as a poor Afrikan mama, have been abused, profiled and harassed by private police for walking, living and shopping while black stemming from those same racist theories,” said QueenandiXSheba, WPG Data investigator.

“Broken Windows is broken,” chanted a crowd who marched around the corner to join us. The fake corporate-quiet of the Marriot Marquis, colored a burgundy marble-esque, meant to lull the housed, jobbed, and oblivious into a relaxed feeling of “cleanliness”  a corporate settler -colonial wallpaper over the world, was beautifully disturbed by over 50 private policing resistors from across this stolen land. We resist these racist, classist laws and we are not broken windows,” said Bilal Ali, powerful revolutionary organizer with the Coalition on Homelessness. In addition to the COH, we were joined by Los Angeles Community Action Network and Western Regional Advocacy Project( WRAP), all of whom, like POOR have been conducting powerful research on the ways these laws force thousands of poor people into jails and increased poverty, often resulting in our death at the hands of the state. 

“As a young Black male child, if I stand together in my neighborhood with other youth of color I am automatically at risk of criminalization and arrest due to laws inspired by the Broken Windows theory, said 13 year old Tyray Taylor from Deecolonize Academy, a revolutionary school on the land at Homefulness. Three of his fellow students ranging in age from 12-14 also added their WeSearch Findings on the ongoing abuse to their communities caused by Broken Windows theories.

“As the child of a houseless mama – my family and I were harassed multiple times by private police for being houseless – this did nothing to solve our homelessness – but instead made our life more difficult,” said my sun Tiburcio, 12 years old, a student at Deecolonize Academy. 

From New York to Berkeley, poltricksters work with corporations to create new codes like the Business Improvement District’s  and Downtown Business Associations to hire private police whose sole purpose is to arrest, harass and move out poor people. But lest you think these are new, these same laws were already written throughout history to harass poor people. These are the same theories that were used in the anti-Black Sundown Towns, anti-Disabled Ugly Laws and now underscore laws like Sit-lie and Stop and Frisk.
 
I am Philip Standing Bear, an indigenous single, teen father. I am releasing WeSearch Findings today on the criminalization of poor youth and families. Since 2012 Over 350 families like mine were separated because they were sleeping in their cars. In my families case this crimialization never got us housing, but rather caused us to become more traumatized. As a Lakota Sioux person my family and myself has already suffered generations of ancestral trauma from the abuse of settler colonial land and resource theft

Sadly , often times even activists and revolutionaries don’t care about the struggles and resistance of houseless people, and don’t realize our incarceration as well as our liberation is all linked, as witnessed on Sept 21st with the I Did Die in SF County Jail” action led by Idriss Stelley Foundation, Krip Hop Nation and POOR Magazine.

“Hello Everyone, I am Bruce Allison, with a Phd in Shelter Studies from Shelter University, As a houseless, disabled elder since 2013 i have been profiled , harassed, incarcerated and arrested over 230 times.”

One of many “controlled” studies conducted by the WPG in Oakland, Berkeley and San Francisco,, our WeSearch Policy Group discovered that due to the racist and classist nature of the Broken Windows theory – the law only applied to people who looked “homeless” - you could be of any race but if you appeared to be poor- ie old clothes or living with a disablity the police would harass and arrest you . Another powerful study was just released by the Coalition on Homelessness, called Punishing the Poorest, also corroborated these findings.

The WPG conducted the same controlled study in San Francisco with the Downtown Associations crafted Sit-le Law. Over a period of six months if you appeared disabled or poor you were cited and arrested –of you were a Black man you were twice as likely to get cited and arrested. if you were disabled and an elder – this also increased your chances of arrest and citation.

From day laborers standing on corners to houseless people sitting on the street, our struggles might seem different but they are frighteningly similar.

“Hello Everyone, this is Muted Silence- A migrant, indigenous,poverty scholar with a Doctorate in Border Jumping and I have the following WeSearch Findings to present: In my intentionally blighted, poor black and brown neighborhood since 2012 over 6,700 black and brown youth and adults have been abused and profiled by the Broken Windows Theory

“Mr Kelling would you please come out and join us, and stop making theory about us without us,” I screamed one last time into the lobby of the hotel as I did many times throughout the day. “Mr Kelling would you please come out…”



--
 

The Beast on Bryant luxury development comes before the Planning Commission on September 10. It was submitted by the Nick Podell real estate company in 2013 and will demolish 246 houses in the Bryant st neighborhood.

There was a hearing for the Beast on Bryant (the bryant st project) and the Planning commision approved it. Developer Nick Podell cut a deal with the operators of InnerMission a community art institution.

Another plan that the planning commission wants to approve that is not very different from the Beast on Bryant is the Monster in the Mission. With both of the projects on their plate the planning commision must be kind of overwhelmed.

“I am here to support the passing of the legeslation called No Eviction 2.0” said Francisco Herrera, a revolutionary man who is running for mayor in San Francisco. He talked about the Beast on Bryant a development that will destroy the Bryant S.t neighborhood.

“There are at least 27 families that live off of that block” Francisco said frowning. Many people depend on the Bryant block because that is where they live, own shop and their children go to school there.

“A group of investors got a community center in the bryant area and are trying to destroy it” Francisco said with a sense of finality. And we all realize that unless we are able to fight back everything else will be destroyed too.

Editors Note- Deecolonize Academy's Revolutionary Youth Media Education(RYME) class and POOR Magazine family re-ported and sup-ported on the huge rally called The City Takes City Hall on September 10th.. As low-income students of color these issues impact all of our children and their families so not only are they learning multi-media, writing and journalism, they are also learning how to resist the endless attack on their communities.

I and my Deecolonize Academy and POOR Magazine family went to a protest at City Hall, the protest was about gentrification, housing, and displacement.

An example of housing displacement is the Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD). RAD is impacting low income families who live in public housing in San Francisco and all over the nation, because RAD is a move to privatize all the public housing buildings in the United States.

The RAD program was created by the San Francisco Housing Authority and non profit organizations.

''Rental assistance Devastation'', said Queennandi Xsheba from POOR Magazine, who we spoke with at the protest. She continued,''What The RAD program has done to my Nation is made them house less and pass away and die because they had no family and no where to go'', she concluded.

What I think about this is that it will eventually effect my friends and family so we have to find a way to fight back and take back what is ours.

Editors Note- Deecolonize Academy's Revolutionary Youth Media Education(RYME) class and POOR Magazine family re-ported and sup-ported on the huge rally called The City Takes City Hall on September 10th.. As low-income students of color these issues impact all of these children and their families so not only are they learning multi-media, writing and journalism, they are also learning how to resist the endless attack on their communities.