June was National Homeownership month. It served to remind us that it was three years ago when former HUD Secretary Mel Martinez addressed the United Nation’s Habitat Agenda conference in New York, where the United States emerged as the only country not to recognize housing as a fundamental human right. While the Secretary’s speech that day provided an important lens into the Bush Administration’s thinking around federal housing policy, it perhaps more importantly revealed a social and political philosophy fundamentally shaped by American mythology. In his talk and in subsequent appearances, the then-Secretary and his successor Alphonso Jackson have both embraced a rather loose reading of U.S. history in defining the ‘American Dream’ as a means to assert the Bush Administration’s housing priorities.

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Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, the federal government’s campaign compelling cities across the country to write 10 Year Plans to End Chronic Homelessness looks increasingly like no more than pre-election political campaigning.

Recognizing Democrats were way too timid to seize the debate on the issues of homelessness and poverty, the White House has launched the Interagency Council on Homelessness (ICH) and its executive director Phillip Mangano.

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We may be broke but at least we’re not alone. Recently, more and more homeless and poor people’s organizations across America are cutting back on programs, laying off staff, or facing the prospect of closing their doors.

For the first time in the Coalition’s 17 years (and STREET SHEET’s 15 years) we’re doing the first two and looking hard at the third. Dedicated COH staff—sacrificing personal earning potential to pursue a social justice agenda—are now reluctantly seeking alternate income sources while others are looking for new employment.

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As we pored through fifteen years of STREET SHEET back issues for articles to showcase in the months approaching our 15th anniversary, we were struck yet again by how the local homeless policy cycle keeps turning in circles. This blast from the past, our lead story from the April 1995 STREET SHEET, observes a significant victory against the last local mayor to gain office on a downtown business-funded homeless criminalization campaign. It also goes a long way toward showing our message has always stayed the same.

And while we all hold our breath to see if Gavin Newsom can succeed in criminalizing homelessness from our streets after so many others have failed these last twenty years, we humbly offer one bit of COH’s experiential wisdom: a real commitment to creating low-income housing can actually succeed in reducing local homelessness, while quality of life enforcement crackdowns are repeatedly proved wasteful, inhumane and ineffective.

BOARD OF SUPES SAY “NO” TO MATRIX

On Monday, March 20, 1995, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted 9-1 to denounce Mayor Jordan’s “Quality of Life Enforcement” Matrix program. (more…)

There are two strands that weave through this story: degradation and waste. The first one is the province of homeless people; the second hits us all where we live.

Civil Rights. Historically, the phrase conjures images of buses and classrooms. Marchers and police dogs. Drinking fountains and fire hoses. Battles over, of all things, bathrooms. And, of course, the divide between Black and white.

The civil rights struggles of today are vastly different—yet curiously akin. (more…)

Desde su fundación en 1982 este centro ha sido refugio para refugiados centro-americanos, este programa consta de 120 camas de emergencia que provee alojamiento y apoyo a hombres sin vivienda principalmente de area de la Mision en San Francisco.

El Programa de Vivienda Dolores (DHP) es el provedor mas grande de servicios del area de la Mision y el unico que esta enfocado a los hombres latino americanos sin vivienda,proporcionando ademas comidas, cuidado medico y servicio de apoyo adaptado a a las necesidades culturales individuales.

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Nos estamos quedando sin dinero, pero no somos los únicos. Recientemente, más y más organizaciones de gente pobre y sin vivienda en los Estados Unidos han tenido que reducir sus programas, despedir a parte del personal y enfrentarse a la posibilidad de tener que cerrar sus puertas definitivamente.

Por primera vez en los 17 años de la Coalición y los 15 del STREET SHEET estamos haciendo exactamente eso. Los empleados de la COH – un grupo de personas comprometida en la lucha por justicia social – ahora tienen que buscar otras fuentes de empleo o ingresos alternativos.

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As the U.S. observes another Fourth of July, Americans across the board concede that our nation is in trouble. With an economy still in the doldrums and the can of worms that we opened in Iraq, there seem to be few things to be proud of this year. Not that we need actual achievements for the Fourth of July: as a rule, what we honor on this day is not what America currently does, but our idea of what America represents. It is due to the damage to this very idea that this Independence Day should give us pause.

No matter how you felt about Iraq, there was something about the prison abuse scandal that hit straight in the gut, that made you feel ugly to be American. The pictures were dark and disturbing, and they seemed to show everything that was wrong with this war. While Americans can bear to be wrong, to be criticised and even condemned, it has not been since Vietnam that the nation has felt such collective shame. It is a bipartisan shame, gripping Democrats and Republicans, greenies and independents, as well as the half of this country that doesn’t vote (when Rush Limbaugh tried to play down the abuse, I could tell that he felt it too).

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