Story Archives

by JR Johnson

Five men stood in a semi- circle on the street corner. Street lamps
poured down their gracious light covering the drugstore in the background.
It was 11 am and the last train to Sleepyville made its accustomed
run over the Urban Landscape. Breaking the silence a strident and
youthful voice rang out: "Someone's going to die tonight."

In the three-second interval there went a circular motion outwards
along with a glint that just as fast dissapeared. One of the shorter
men buckled to his knees, his hand clutched to his throat. My passenger
and I had observed this event , setting in my car, across the street.
Immediately we sped away. The next day I learned that at that spot,
a young man, his throat cut, had died the previous night.

I'm sharing this story with readers to put them on alert to the
possible consequences of intemperate language. From my understanding
on the topic, human beings project a varied array of mind-sets.
Descriptions such as a loving, a Wonderland, a stoic, a hateful,
a cynical, and a Hee Haw mental disposition only scratch the surface
of possibilities. Seen in context then, we can be made or broken
by our public utterances.

From the foregoing it's obvious that there are words and statements
which should be red-flagged and not verbalized to others at all.
That's to say, just as someone can say things to move you to anger,
your own life could hang in the balance were you to say the wrong
thi

Here recently in fact, while eating at a lunch counter, crossed
words were noticed being exchanged between a food-server and a patron.
In a slow, deliberate move, the worker came from around the counter
to confront his agitator. Again words were exchanged which I could
not hear. In one and a half seconds the younger man smashed his
fist to the jaw of the senior. It was surrealistic in that the victim's
light appeared to go out instantly, long before he crumpled to his
knees backwards, his head smashing to the concrete floor, a halo
of blood circling his head. The same evening after the paramedics
had taken him away, I learned the senior had repeatedly called the
young man a Punk.ng, to the wrong person, at the wrong time..

(back to top)

I would be willing to bet the victim learned a valuable lesson
from that experience. On that note, never likely will he address
someone in that manner ever again. The same good sense can be adopted
by the rest of us concerning words of ethnic put-down. Words such
as Wop, Japs, White trash, Niggers, Chinks, Wet-backs, etc., when
addressed to the wrong person, at the wrong time, could blow up
in in our faces.

Another take on human perceptions came in my attending a committee
hearing involving a member of the Clergy. The minister I will not
name, for good reason, weighed in at about 210 lbs and stood 6-foot
4-inches tall. He proudly evoked this saying, "No one can make you
mad unless you let them."

The only problem with that statement is its evident flaw. This
was made clear to me during a meeting being chaired by the same
Minister. Speaker after speaker stood up and gave their opinion
on the measure being discussed. Then arrived my golden moment. Before
I could give even a quarter of my wisdom, the Chairman told me that
was enough and to sit down. You probably guessed it: I didn't let
him, but he made me mad as Hell. The very next week, under similar
circumstances I was abruptly cancelled out. Again I was pissed off,
and in fact I told the Chairman in delicately chosen words that
I didn't appreciate his evident disrespect. Going a step further,
I never attended those meetings again.

Mr. Smart is another case in point. As head of an interaction
class he too approached the subject of human relations, I thought
in a cavalier manner. According to his point of view: no one can
make you mad unless you let them. In my opinion, Mr. Smart would've
served his students better by not sugar-coating how we differently
react to the spoken word. That would have revealed the dual nature
of words and the high respect they are due. Keep in mind some of
these uses are to heal, to make others sick, mad, angry, happy,
enthused, inspired, etc., etc. It can be added that, unlike machines,
our responses to others are based upon a complex inter-connecting
web of emotion intellect and sensitivity.

An incident from my youth underscores our myriad interpretation
of words and how they are reacted to. In my 7th grade classroom
one of the beauty queens openly dissed a fellow male student: "Hey
Ron, why are you so ugly?" The guy rebutted and said: "Your Grandma
looks like homemade sin." The pretty thing crashed and burned in
a torrent of tears, her beautiful world temporarily demolished.
Whatever moral can be extracted from these events could be aided
by another; I think timely observation. Most of us live under the
rainbow of personal narcissism. At any given time we think that
we know exactly how we would respond to every situation. Yet the
truth is, until the insult actually takes place it's difficult to
altogether plan for that reality. Then again, there are many of
us who undergo insults from others on a regular basis and shrug
it off. It's also true what the Minister and Mr. Smart said too,
to a certain degree. It's my suggestion the subject is really about
respect. Therefore, whenever we address and respond to others, it's
probably best we say it with roses.

by Joe B.

As I read the S.F.Guardian, you know the one with the clean 'shavin, homeless 'looking guy with the bright blue eyes carrying a poster.

He reminds me of someone but I degress. It seems Sup.Gavin Newsom is looking at former Mayor Giuliani's New York Model of helping homeless folks lead better lives but as I read further SF"G" informs me of flaws in the model.

Minor flaws such as working poor and homeless people sent or outside of Manhattan in centralized areas for Doe Fund (after a unknown nameless homeless woman) Mr. George McDonald, founder, former business exective.

He said "That people have to except personal responsibility and require regular drug testing."

Also known the Ready, Willing, and Able program where men, women trade welfare benefits for shelter beds and a street-sweeping job. Sound good but look below there is a kink or two in this yarn.

Dow Fund workers are paid $5.50 to $6.50 an hour, it also charges them $65 a week for room and board.

I don't doubt Mr. Mcdonald's heart is in the right place but don't know about this $65 weekly thing which seems like a locked-in, closed-in deal.

Another thing is Centralization.

In New York with its grid upon grid streets though most of it is flat it is still spread wide.

It reminds me of Malls,Supermarkets, Warehouse Stores, and neighborhood grocery store debate - in that Malls and giant supermarkets have nearly everything you'd need or want which is fine and good execept when it does not have an item such as food, medicines, or desserts
you are fond of; they tend to say "If its not here, you won't find it anywhere."

That's a false statement because the odd little one-person grocery or family run store may have that item.

Centralizisation in New York is only works if it way out of the way of businesses, neighborhoods, the only problem is people in need of help come from all over.

Unlike San Francisco it could help but here too people being people are not all able bodied mentally alert or willing to walk, take, busses, or cars to place way out of the way when multi service centers can be even scattered to where people are.

I distrust all-in-one-places it reminds me of killing fields or grounds (pick your own metaphor's) where everyone is gathered in one place to... Die.

Melodramatic?

Think Sup.G. Newsom is looking at New York as a model supposedly to help homeless folks off the streets but in The Old Apple homelessness has increased they not seen on Time's Square but hidden away from public view.

Could that be the game plan:

1. One centrilized location peope have to go to.

2. Banned from where they cannot be seen (did I say they?)

3. High fines working poor and homeless folk cannot be paid so
jail time is impossed plus working free for the city to pay off their dept.

4. Finally out of sight, out of mind and problems LOOK Like its solved meanwhile homelessness increases but John and Jane Public doesn't see people urinating, doing number-2, or aggressive panhandling which they did in the first place
BECAUSE THEY HAVE NO PLACE TO GO BUT THE PUBLIC STREET. How come there are more homeless folk on the streets.

Try asking City Mayor's all over the country about developers, landlords and real estate co.,[should I mention the honest folk of Enron or is it End-Run?] speculators and other business cronies in both Oakland, San Franciso, New York and anywhere else the homeless population is rising.

I was thinking of an old thought picture.
Four or five men, women, or young folks are artistic they draw or can render pictures of animals, objects or humans perfectly in wood, glass, plastic, metal, clay, or using light and in ice.

They all have work spaces to concentrate, and create, then cell their works. They are hard working bonafide artisans.

Now Imagine those same persons without homes...
finding nitches to do their works but always told to move on.

The told exact same artwork mind you is worthless junk.

Are the homeless people with the exact same talents when done on the street worthless?

Decentralization seems a better model that will help more people than one huge bureaucracy getting people hung up in more rules, regulation, red tape instead of higher education, technicals skills journalism, or higher income so people become more productive.

This New York "Magic Model" isn't working and I don't think 23-28 or a hundred "Get them out of sight and mind will help unless both noprofits, business, schools, and the jail system come together to prevent a problem and create more by keeping it out of sight.

That's all I can think of maybe other folks have better ideas.

Please send donations to
Poor Magazine or in C/0
Ask Joe at 255 9th St. Street,
San Francisco, CA. 94103 USA

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

As a House-Care Watcher Professional or [H.C.W. P.]
I'm a non drug user, smoker, drinker, pill popper - drug test me
anytime. Light vacuum, no windows or laundry.
Pets have their routine - make a list of walking times, foods, and
moods. INFORM FRIENDS, NEIGHBORS, POLICE; IN FACT
INVITE THEM TO PERSONALLY SEE ME, ASK QUESTIONS
THEN NO MISUNDERSTANDING, MISHAPS OR ACCIDENTS
OF IDENTITY CAN HAPPEN.

Prices: $25 a day apartments/flats

$50 a week for 2 to 4 bedroom cottage.

$2000, or $3,000 a month depending on home not area.
$50,000 to $100,000 monthly for certain homes with
7to10 room TO BE TRUSTED EVEN A LITTLE BY THE COMMUNITY MAKES EVERYONE MORE SECURE AND LESS LIKELY TO JUMP TO CONCLUSIONS.All prices are negotiable.

by Staff Writer

Everyone survived or recovered from Labor Day?
I had my rest, helping people, visiting friends, lover's and
family out of the City.

I had a good time not thinking of work, assignments, or late night, last minute to-do things.

Then I've recieved a troubling email from a quiet, green, place called Fairfield California. Below is the whole email I
recieved.

FLASH ! FLASH! Tugboat Fish & Chips #13 - 1350 Travis Blvd. Suite 1360-B, Fairfield, CA j94533
(Westfield Shopping Town Solano) Serves excellent meals but have no in-house bathroom available to their customers who wait 10 to 15 minutes for their orders. Feel free to call - (707) 421-9228  to find out if they have corrected the problem.  Jameelya.

That's it,call is all I can say. My feeling is have a restroom so customers can clean up before, during, or after
meals. If I spend my money in an eatery I'd want to be able
to use the restroom or it will not be a place for me to frequent ever again plus word of mouth and soon it ends up on an internet site.

by tiny aka Lisa Gray-Garcia, poverty scholar, daughter of Dee

“ We want Oakland our way – we demand a right to stay,” community voices in resistance to the predatory lending, eviction and foreclosure of poor folks of color rolled down the 94th street block of East Oakland this week past boarded up houses-remnants of lost families, lost communities and lost cultures.

“Thanks to all of your support, my family, my friends and neighbors, I have been able to remain in my home,” Karen Mims, resident of 9401 cherry street in East Oakland spoke through tears to a crowd of over 50 people gathered on her lawn in protest to a year long battle Mrs Mimms has been having with Aurora Loan Services to stay in her home of 12 years.

“My personal story is that I was with another lender – Homecoming (another lender), who never took responsibility for my loan and lost my payment and then sold my loan to Aurora loan services.” Mrs Mimms went on to explain that after that bankers bait and switch game Aurora Loan had agreed to place her in a repayment plan, but instead sent a speculator out to her home last year to inspect her home for foreclosure.

“We have been besieged by lenders who write loans that people can’t afford and then lay in wait for them to default, foreclose on the loans and leave our families on the streets which tears apart the neighborhoods of East and West Oakland,” said Ray Leon with councilmember Larry Reid’s office in district 7 where Mrs Mimms resides. Leon concluded, “It appears that most of these predatory lenders are waiting for these foreclosures to happen.”

As I stood on the corner of 94th street, a street littered with for sale and foreclosed signs, I was taken back to the not to distant past of me and my poor mama being evicted and landless in both East and West Oakland for years throughout my childhood. How no matter how hard me and my mama fought the evictions which in our case were from rental properties, if corporate interests, rich lawyers and unjust systems were stacked up against us as they are against Mrs. Mimms, we never had a chance. For us eviction meant homelessness. Thankfully, there are powerful resistance groups like Just Cause Oakland, who have been working in solidarity with Mrs..Mimms to fight this unjust land take-over by any means necessary.

“Our fight today and this complete fight is to defend our right to stay zone,” Robbie Clark, Organizer with Just Cause placed Mrs Mimms situation in the larger context of Right to a City and Take Back the Land resistance efforts happening across the nation, which questions who should be in control of neighborhoods and land and how corporations, governments and agents of the state are empowered with the ability to cause whole communities to become landless and without a roof.

The days rally of neighbors and advocates, re-ported and sup-ported on by POOR Magazine/PNN and many more allies ended with triumph. Because of the community pressure put on Aurora and the support of conscious legislators like Ray Leon and Larry Reid, the eviction was postponed. Now the pressure must continue.

Mrs. Mimms, a soft-spoken revolutionary closed with, “We are asking for the support of all the people involved in this battle – we can fight these battles, we cant just keep moving on and leave people in the streets.”

Postscript: WE must keep on the pressure. Mrs. Mimms needs our support. Please call Aurora Loan Services, please call their legal representative: Nicole Kim at 720-945-3217 and the loan officer in charge of Karen’s loan: Carrie Black at (720)945-4566, We are demanding they rescind the eviction for Karen Mims, loan number: 0021802152

Just Cause is also asking for people to make donations to Karen so that she can stay in her home, the rent that Aurora is asking her to pay is $50/day, if you can donate a day, or part of a day, that would be greatly appreciated, to make a donation contact Just Cause Oakland at (510) 763-5877

by Bruce Allison and Thornton Kimes

Sitting many hours, listening to the Planning Commission, is not an easy thing to do. Bruce did it for approximately 12 hours October 15th, 2009, I lasted less than 3. The CPMC hospital proposal for the Van Ness corridor, finally came up at 8p.m. after 4 hours spent on a project threatening Open Space on De Haro Street.

You can always tell when the Sutter Corporation people are around by the red folders and their unrelenting ability to be “on-message”.

This corporation has told many lies, done many interesting things (like sucking $1 million out of Marin General Hospital for who-knows-what), including their current hard and soft sell of transforming what used to be the Jack Tar Hotel—now the Cathedral Hill Hotel, mere blocks from Thornton Kimes’ SRO hotel—into a giant boutique for-rich-folks-only hospital, while draining the life, money, bricks and mortar from their other hospitals which have served poor people for, apparently, too many years.

This poverty scholar was not surprised (but the other writer of this article WAS…) to know that CPMC/Sutter doesn’t only want the Cathedral Hill Hotel, it wants space on the other side of the Van Ness and Geary/Post block for this Frankenstein’s Monster project lurching into our collective rear-view mirror. Many small business people, including the Vietnamese and other South-east Asian women who run the 24/7 doughnut shop that Tiny and Mama Dee loved and still loves, will see their dreams shattered and lose the source of their income. San Francisco will lose the tax money they have been paying into city coffers for years, for however long it takes to build this monster—if it is actually built.

They destroyed villages to "save them" in Vietnam. Now they want to do damage to the tax base of San Francisco to put in a hospital we don’t need (I almost quoted “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot”, not exactly the definition of “automatic writing” but close enough). This other poverty scholar article writer wonders if the doughnut shop women, who I have also come to appreciate (and took their doughnuts to watch movies down the street instead of buying vastly more expensive corporate movie theater candy…), feel a bit of “burn the village…” déjà vu?

Ms. Nancy, one of the workers at the doughnut shop, spoke at the hearing, using this poverty scholar’s time for an extra two minutes. She said that as a person who speaks limited English CPMC/Sutter’s project will make it incredibly difficult for her to find another job.

The people selling the hospital project visited the doughnut shop and told Ms. Nancy and others they didn’t need to bother showing up for any hearings, it was a “done deal”. The truth is they don’t even have permits to tear anything down or build anything new up, haven’t done an EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) or any other preliminary study the “Usual Suspects” do when they attempt dotting i’s and crossing t’s.

Among other truths here, the other poverty scholar responsible for this article experienced considerable construction of needed and unneeded stuff in the same neighborhood over the past 2 years—an “affordable housing” building at Hyde and Turk, a Community Housing Partners SRO right next door to his SRO--and a building on Van Ness between O’Farrell and Eddy. This is all part of the Eastern Neighborhoods Plan (ENP), the Cathedral Hill Hotel is on the far, well, frontier of it.

One of POOR Magazine’s alternative media allies/friends/partners, the Mission District-oriented El Tecolote monthly newspaper has run many articles about the ENP, so, please, readers of this space, check them and their coverage of it out, keep watching for more here, and, most definitely, we want your bodies sitting in front of the Planning Commission—and your voices talking to them about this and the need for more and better health care for those who really need it in this town: the poor.

by Leroy Moore, Darla Lennox, Maria Palacios, Zilwood, Tiny

Another group home Christmas

Another year of watching others loved ones

make their once a year obligatory visit

This day just feels like all the others

Told what time to get up

what time to sleep

What he wants to watch on t.v. is already

decided for him,

it's what the staff want to watch.

"Merry Christmas!" the staff say encouraging
him to be happy

"Hey, it's Christmas, let's see what Santa brought you?"

"Are you kidding me?!" he thinks, "I'm a grown ass man!

And what if I don't feel like being merry and bright?

What if I decide to just stay in my room tonight

and spare myself from eating salty lukewarm ham

and cold peas? "

"Yeah, it's another group home Christmas

and wishing like hell I was somewhere else."

Darla J. Lennox

Christmas 2009

by Joseph Bolden

A Death, a town, one Play.

Last week at the end of May on Berkeley’s K P F A’s
Dee and Tiny radio show I finally did a commercial for
Ask Joe, He Don’t Know.

It is thrilling and nerve racking simultaneously.
I’ve always said I’m available for commercials be it televised, radio, or possibly internet.

But the first time blowing my own horn or
website it’s a near flop-sweat incident.

Here’s my second commercial [money can be made by doing this, right?]

Umm, a large part of it is from an email addressed
to me by the Laramie Project.

The Laramie Project WRITTEN BY MOISES KAUFMAN AND THE TECTONIC THEATER COMPANY.

Moises and company traveled to Laramie to interview the townspeople and see if there was a deeper story there.

After more than 200 interviews they came up a truly in-depth look at a town and their reactions to Shepard's death.

This is not the story of the killing, nor of Shepard - although clearly he is there throughout the story.

It is a look at a small t
own rocked by tragedy and their reactions to it.

This part of the email I received near the end of May. Date:Sun, 27 May 2001.

To:(Help Bay Area LGBT Families)
Subject:Laramie Project 6/9 Benefit for LGBT Families.

Hi Friends,
Dateline Berkeley-From: Our Family ourfamily@ourfamily.
org>Save Address.

OUR FAMILY STILL HAS MORE TICKETS TO THE BENEFIT PERFORMANCES OF THE LARAMIE PROJECT AT BERKELEY REP'S LOVELY NEW THEATER.
CALL 510-540-7784 to order tickets now.

We will have to return unsold tickets to Berkeley Rep soon, so please help us sell out the shows and raise badly needed funding to help keep Our Family's programs
and events alive and available to everyone.

THE LARAMIE PROJECT, HAS PLAYED TO SOLD-OUT AUDIENCES IN NEW. YORK, LARAMIE AND DENVER, MAKES IT WEST COAST DEBUT HERE. A few weeks after the murder of Matthew Shepard, Moises and

PLEASE JOIN OUR FAMILY AND FRIENDS FOR THIS EVENT
WHICH IS A BENEFIT FOR OUR FAMILY-THE LGBT FAMILY GROUP.

The proceeds from this afternoon and evening will go toward hiring some permanent staff coordinators to make sure OF can keep up it's programming and continue to provide quality
services to LGBT Families throughout the Bay Area.

**THIS IS OUR FIRST ATTEMPT AT RAISING MONEY AND WE NEED YOUR HELP. Please call some friends and colleagues and encourage them to come.

We have arranged ticket prices the best we could so that this should be affordable for many folks. It is a theater event, however, and good theater is not cheap.

We did the best we could to provide pricing at all
levels and hope that you will give at the level that is comfortable for you.

REMEMBER ALSO, THAT THE AMOUNT YOU PAY OVER THE MARKET PRICES OF THE TICKETS IS TAX DEDUCTIBLE.

Our sister organization and main collaborator, All Our Families Coalition,
is a non-profit org and is acting as our fiscal agent.

WE NEED YOUR HELP TO MAKE THIS A SUCCESS!

CALL 510-540-7784 to buy tickets. Call 510-540-7774 for more information.

SATURDAY JUNE, 9, 2001 FOR 2 SHOWS

Performance Times/Ticket Prices:

Matinee at 2PM:$50, $75*, $125* and $250**Evening at 8PM:$75, $125and $250

* Wine and hors d'oeuvres reception after matinee performance and before evening performance at 6:30PM, both held in the
beautiful courtyard.

** Reception PLUS Dinner (which begins at 6PM and will be a Berkeley culinary masterpiece!) and donor recognition in our newsletter and web page.

Dinner will be catered in the new major donor room at the new theater. It's a beautiful location and our caterer is the best in town.

If you can afford it, this is a great way to enjoy a relaxed evening of culinary artistry and first-rate theater! And I forgot to mention, it's a great way to support Our Family!

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS NOW BY CALLING OR EMAILING:

510-540-7784 or laramie@ourfamily.org. Leave the following information:

1) Name as it appears on your credit card (VISA or Mastercard)
2) Address that the card is billed to
3) Phone numbers, day and evening
4) Number of tickets AND for which show time
5) Ticket price you wish to buy
6) Specify VISA or MC and the NUMBER
7) Expiration date of your card Tickets will be held at the door and can be picked up 1.5 hours before each performance.

Your credit card will be neededfor id and your signature will be required.

If you need any further info, please emailLARAMIE@OURFAMILY.ORG.

Thanks to everyone who has worked so hard and to all of you who have helped by buying tickets.

We look forward to seeing you and your friends on June 9th.

That's it.. Now my column’s a commercial space.
this is a freebee, because killing of any human being
for not thinking, looking, being, like ourselves means.

We as a society, culture, global, racial, species have not matured.

As long as we make alien's out of our own human species we will not reach the zenith of our human potential.

SEE THE PLAY, DONATE, AND ENJOY THE FOOD FOLKS.

Hi, Laramien(s) I'm the Ask Joe guy again. I might be able to afford the one ticket maybe two.

However as to the rest, all I can do is pass on some kind words. OH, I may forget
the exact date writting the wrong one I appologise for that not cause I know I'll get so busy at work it'll happen.

I've heard the town of Laramie is slighly ill-at-ease... Their town will be in a spotlight and would rather all the fuss go away.

But Mr. M.Shepard, a young citizen's who's life is taken from him for his
Sexual Orientation is a problem for some of its citizens.

As long as certain 'Hetero's have psychological problems with it. To kill is no solution but a symptom of a killer,(s) heterosexual's extreme insecure unease of their own orientation.

Berkelely use to me my home years ago, I'd be nice to visit for this controversial play about an American's Town's private
reaction to something so public and tragic.

P.S. Money Orders is how I pay then cash in evelope or donation bucket, jars, or baskets (Its a church-give thing)

Hope this gets to you in time, I'm not good at email; I do pray you get this letter in time so I can learn from the play and with limited funds, give more than a buck or two.

Thank You for sending me an email. May the people of Laramie Heal quickly.

Joseph Bolden/Staff Writer. for Poor Magazine.

Please send donations to Poor Magazine C/0 Ask Joe at 255 9th St. Street, San Francisco,CA. 94103 USA

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

by Alex Cuff/ PoorNewsNetwork Community Journalist

Room 551 at 850 Bryant Street was filling up when I arrived for the Police Commission meeting this past Tuesday,
January 8th. Before it began we all stood to go through the motion of pledging allegiance to the amerikan flag. (I
was amused later on to look at the official meeting agenda and see that the Pledge of Allegiance was actually the
first item.) The reason I was there was to cover the scheduled hearing regarding the banning of SFPD practice of
consent searches. I was ready for a comprehensive report from those who are advocating the ban and accounts of folk
who have been victims of racial profiling. What I got was almost 2 hours of police-affiliated speeches on the
necessity and constitutionality of consent searches and less than an hour of personal accounts where folks have been
victims of consent searches.

A consent search is when police officers ask permission to search an individual, or the belongings of an individual, in the
absence of probable cause. Although people have the absolute right to refuse, most of us don’t know we have that right. Data
collected by the SFPD shows that the practice of consent search is used twice as often against African Americans as whites and
that the searches usually don’t find anything. According to an ACLU report on stops and searches of motorists titled "A
Department in Denial - The San Francisco Police Department’s Failure to Address Racial Profiling" the SFPD is failing to take
the issue of racial profiling seriously. The author of the report Mark Schlosberg, who was present at Tuesday’s meeting, states
"The department’s consistent failure shows the need for a clear policy prohibiting racial profiling and an independent auditor to
oversee the data collection program."

The first speaker to address this report claims "we didn’t see racial profiling as an issue until we saw a report. The data we
have is clearly flawed...We need to work to change the perception because racial profiling isn’t a part of the SFPD." He assured
us that by June 2004, all SFPD officers would have received racial profiling training. He said that the proof of racial profiling in
the report is flawed due to "statistical problems" or a problem of "technology."

Although it’s nothing new, I am always terribly dumbfounded that individuals and organizations that devote their entirety
to a specific topic such as police brutality, homelessness or mental health issues are not paid any mind by the state when it
comes to a remedy for the proposed problem. A great example is the Care Not Cash campaign victory over folks who knew the
"care" wasn’t there and who are veterans of poverty and homeless advocacy such as the Coalition on Homelessness and Poor
Magazine. So there we all sat for almost 2 hours while the SFPD took up our time and the Police Commission’s time defending
consent searches and the US Constitution while those who had experienced the intimidation and injustice of these unwarranted
searches, were given 3 minutes each to speak sometime around 7:30pm.

I was sitting next to Gregg Lowder, the Director of the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice. The entire time before he went up
to speak, he was pouring over a document filled with so many red marks and scribbled out sentences that it looked like
anyone’s
worst nightmare of a graded paper. At the podium, he claimed that a consent search is a sound strategy for criminal
investigations because it is a psychological strategy that catches those who are guilty. He pointed out that a guilty person
thinks differently than someone who is not guilty so they consent to a proposed search. According to Mr. Lowder, a guilty
person will a) think they are too clever to be caught and consent or b) figure they are already caught and will win favor with the
police for cooperating.

Lowder apparently believes that in most cases of consent searches, the police are not using intimidation, threats (verbal
or with drawn guns) or other forms of coerciveness such as telling a victim that a warrant is on its way. He did though relate
that "the mayor is aware of this problem – nobody tolerates racial profiling, racism, certainly not in the police department." He
went on to say that the stats are wrong since the police didn’t collect the data they were supposed to and that "the mayor is
concerned about inaccurate numbers." We were told that a leading authority in this area, from Harvard…I’ll stop right there and
say, Who gives a shit what an academic from Harvard has to say about the relationship between the SFPD and the men,
women and children who are being targeted by them, in their own neighborhoods, as criminals? Stay in Cambridge with your
analysis – we are trying to address local topics such as the military-esque intervention of a fight in a Bayview Hunter’s Point
high school or the epidemic of youth who are sleeping in their cars due to HUD’s One Strike policy. These
issues are not quantifiable especially by ivy league numbers - they have to do with accountability of police practices
in SF and of oppressive policy effecting the poor, people of color, and disabled persons and youth.

Another SFPD affiliate remarked that consent searches are embedded in our law and social systems – we learn from our
parents that if we want something, we ask politely for it - which is what the police are doing when they seek compliance for a
consent search. When it was finally time for those who are trying to get consent searches banned to speak (the same persons
who actually asked for this hearing to take place) it was 2 hours since the meeting had begun.

Mark Schlosberg was given 5 minutes and it was said that each additional citizen that wanted to make a public comment,
would be given 3 minutes! Schlosberg began by pointing out that after an hour and a half, he probably wouldn’t be able to
respond to the pro-consent search rally in 5 minutes. He responded to SFPD’s "wrong stats" excuse by admitting that the
"unreporting" doesn’t invalidate the ACLU report but that it could be worse! He pointed out that we don’t have the data from
those officers who didn’t do what they were supposed to do. He also talked to the fact that among the persons who spoke
earlier about consent searches, some said they are used a lot; others said they are hardly used. He proposed that both of
those claims couldn’t be right…who could argue that?

"Plug the biggest loophole in the 4th Amendment – consent searches." These words came from our own Public Defender,
Jeff Adachi, who went on to say that if he had a dollar for every police report which said that the accused consented when the
accused denied the consent, he would be a very rich man. He said the 3 problems with consent searches are 1) most people
don’t know their rights 2) it’s a coercive environment (being stopped by the police) 3) it is ineffective – less than 10% of
consent searches result in finding anything.

Now the line of citizens waiting to speak their mind about consent searches filled the room and poured into the brightly lit
hallway. Ishmael Tarik of the Bay Area Police Watch, a project of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, took part of his 3
minutes to tell the overcrowded hearing room a story: The story was about Mr. Lies who was naked, and Mr. Truth who was
clothed. Mr. Lies steals Mr. Truth’s clothes while Mr. Truth is asleep. Mr. Truth who is now naked chases Mr. Lies around town.
The moral of the story is: When you see Lies, you’ll soon see the Naked Truth. After the amusing and palpable anecdote,
Ishmael’s clear voice of reason related that consent searches are inherently coercive – to everyday citizens who unfortunately
don’t know their rights (as I surely didn’t when the cops busted into my apartment and scared the shit out of me), a search is
clearly an affront.

Quentin Adams, an African American network engineer and SF resident, told his story of being stopped by 2 officers for
stepping off of the sidewalk and then back onto the sidewalk when the light was red. I can’t even count how many times I’ve
"jayed" all over town in the presence of passing police vehicles. I’ve never been confronted like Quentin was: he was asked if
he was on parole, if he had any sharp objects on him, he was patted down, asked for ID. They found nothing on him but he
was given a citation.

When he asked how much the ticket would be, one of the officers replied that the fine for running a red light is $170. The
only other interaction Quentin has had in the past with the police is through the check he sends each year in support of the
Police Activities League. Before he stepped away from the podium he commented that he doesn’t want to vilify the SFPD but
there seems to be a problem with racial profiling when a "computer geek gets stopped and frisked on the street."

A white woman came up and testified that while driving home she saw several police cars pulled over and they had 5 or 6
youth cuffed against a wall near 3rd Street. She pulled over to see what the problem was and learned that the cops found
nothing on the kids. Another time while at home, she heard sirens and saw lights outside of her house. Someone had been
pulled over. The cars were blocking another woman’s car who was yelling that she had to get around because her children were
home with a babysitter who was due to leave. The cops pulled her out of her car too. After the officers released both of the
victims she heard one say "It’s not even worth writing up but I don’t feel like getting yelled at." She commented that the
police actions are demoralizing for the youth in the city and although the police have no problem harassing the kids, she
knows of actual shootings that aren’t even investigated.

Although a ban on consent searches won’t eradicate the racism and classism that infects our criminal justice system and
fills our prisons, it is a start to prohibit racial profiling by law enforcement. I didn’t know that we have the right to say no to
police. If you are asked for consent to be searched, remember you have the right to say no! If you do consent, keep the
following in mind: the request for consent must be uncontaminated with duress or coerced stress; once consent is given, it can
be withdrawn; you can consent to only certain areas of a house or car – for example, you can search the car but not the trunk,
etc.

by Tiny/PNN

"It's the snow that appears late at night on our TV... it can reach across oceans and mountain ranges and beyond...it has the potential to provide a channel of access to many independent broadcasters, which is why the big telecoms are trying to seize it,"explained Eloise Rose Lee, from Media Alliance based in California, one of five people speaking at "The Future of the Internet" panel at the National Conference of Media Reform held in Minneapolis last week

The walls of the conference hall auditorium were white and tall and engulfed the humans who sat in rapt attendance. I sat quietly, in panel after panel, afraid to move or make too much noise as tech-embedded words like, White space, Bit Torrent, Net Neutrality and Blogosphere floated past my ears. They bounced off the walls and knocked up against my head like thick steel rods, knocking my fingers off their tenuous hold onto the edges of the digital ravine, which seemed to grow sharper and taller with each obtuse reference to a technology I had never had the time, privilege or the access to learn in all of my 38 years of poverty and homelessness.

"I want to make sure that everyone knows about the plans by corporations for the take over of white space", panelist Jef Perlman, from Public Knowledge, concluded an extensive talk on the current and future plans of corporate take-over of the internet, the recent acts of censorship of our cel phones and text messages by telecoms like Verizon and the very strange phenonena of "white space"

Perhaps this "white space" was also a metaphor for the conference, the internet in general and/or much of the race and class divide that exists between poor people of color and rich, mostly white people in power locally and globally? I mused.

The panel was one of over 50 panels and workshops on issues ranging from New journalism to Faith based Organizing and Media Reform, as well as films, presentations and plenaries featuring former corporate media stars Bill Moyers and Dan Rather and progressive media producer Amy Goodman from Democracy Now.

"I am asking for 10 ambassadors for OneWebDay," Susan Crawford, another panelist spoke about her personal crusade to create one day a year that was dedicated to the preservation of a free and open internet, which this year will fall on September 22. Ms Crawford was hoping to engender as much excitement as there is for Earth day with the mission to create, maintain, advance and promote a global day to celebrate online life.

"In this way we will insure access for low-access people who are lacking skills, and access to the internet," She concluded her presentation on why the internet should remain open and free and then added the strangely codified term of "low-access people" to her list of beneficiaries.

This reference sounded strange to my ears and yet oddly similar to several other terms used in this conference for poor folks of color like myself. When she was finished the other members of this and other panels at the conference followed suit with references like the "so-called digital divide", "unskilled people" and "people on the margins of the net"

Once again I mused, would we all be members of the "low-access" tribe if we had more of that handy "white space"?

"We use the internet to do research, to reach across the channels of access and without it being free and accessible, poor people like us would never be able to get this information and help to make change for our communities," Gloria Esteva, one of the reporteras from POOR Magazine was suddenly speaking in Spanish on the big screen into the minions of Auditorium One, breaking through the malaise of euphemisms about people in poverty that were being thrown about with such ease . Quite unexpectantly for me, Eloise Rose-Lee who was the sole woman of color on the panel, centered her presentation on the future of the internet, access and in some ways for me, the real notion of media reform itself on the powerful voices of poverty scholars from POOR Magazine's Voces De Inmigrantes en Resistancia Project, a new project that teaches POOR's brand of revolutionary journalism to migrant workers in poverty, who spoke at an FCC hearing last month at Stanford University in support of keeping a free and open internet or "Net Neutrality"

Her presentation loosened the imaginary chains that had begun to tear into my hands, I was free to question what I believed to be real media reform. True enough, the words of Bill Moyers were important, the "radical" actions of Dan Rather were crucial, but so was the words and actions of poor youth, adults and elders of color across the globe who everyday are systematically silenced and excluded from so many channels of access on the internet, in racist , classist school system , in the criminal Injustice system, in the access to resources and beyond.

So if we were to truly achieve media reform as this conference stated was its goals, it must be with the inclusion of the Dan Rathers and the Gloria Esteva's, with the Amy Goodman's and the poor youth of color from West Oakland and Spanish Harlem.

I know that the conference organizers were beginning to try to practice some inclusion with panels on Hip Hop Activism and Grassroots Lobbying but they have a long way to go.

As I left the Minneapolis conference hall I reflected on the strange concept of "white space" and how it actually has the potential to provide real access to poor people of color locally and globally – which sounded oddly like some kind of 21st century digital reparations and how it was potentially being ripped out of our hands by possible corporate take-over before we even have the chance to benefit from it.

Which made me wonder if there will be any white space left for me..

After this conference was over and I began to write this piece I heard from my fellow fighters for media and economic justice at the Poor Peoples Economic Human Rights Campaign (PPEHRC) that after multiple attempts to get some coverage from media, independent and mainstream alike on the fact that the PPEHRC are being threatened with arrest if they march at the republican National Convention which will also be held in Minneapolis in August, they were forced to do an action on the Media Reform Conference in an attempt to get some real media reform and media justice. As well, I heard that there was an impromptu appearance by my comrades in media justice JR and Chairman Fred Hampton from the P.O.C.C.

Lisa Gray-Garcia aka Tiny, poet, poverty scholar, revolutionary journalist and lecturer is the founder and executive director of POOR Magazine/ PoorNewsNEtwork (PNN), the author of Criminal of Poverty: Growing up homeless in America, mama of tiburcio and the daughter of Dee.

by Bruce Allison/PNN

The Governor caused letters (one of several sent about various services to folks with fixed limited incomes) to be sent to folks with in-home support services, a deliberately confusing communication which will cause many to lose those services. It will create major hardships for them and home-care workers (independents and/or relatives).

Folks should call (Consumer Rights For Community Living) 415-703-0286 or (Bay Area Legal Aid) 415-982-1300 to get help understanding what to do if it is necessary to ask for a Fair Hearing. If you are a social worker or case manager at a SRO or senior housing, confused about the letter, you too can call those numbers. Anyone who wants to help Consumer Rights For Community Living as a volunteer can call
415-703-0286.

Fair Hearing appeals will help folks using in-home support hang on to 2 or more months of services. There are only 5 “Administrative Law Judges” for the entire state of California, the more appeals the slower the process—which is a good thing! This should be done immediately, Fair Hearings can only be requested 10 days after the post mark is stomped on the letter, a nasty little piece of the Governator’s “practical joke”.

Social workers and case managers with clients living in SRO hotels that still don’t have in-hotel mail box service from our “wonderful” U.S. “Probable” Postal Service—which still has hostility in its semi-corporate heart for SRO tenants—should energetically encourage them to check their mail EVERY DAY (which seems like every day…) that they are in the Governator’s crosshairs.

If the client is vision-impaired or doesn’t speak English or Spanish, this, too, must be mentioned in the Fair Hearing request because the letter is limited to those languages and was printed in very very very fine print that even challenged the eye sight of the writer facilitator of this article, and the trans-gender staff writer for POOR Magazine, sitting nearby kibitzing on the writing of this article.

Due to the limited number of “judges”, this elder scholar believes that if virtually everyone affected by this situation appeals the process it will take 9 months to slog through the case load, which will create a lovely end-run effect around the Governator’s horrible strategy.