On International Women’s Day of Action, Homeless Mothers Demand Housing
On Thursday, March 6, homeless families and their supporters gathered on the steps of San Francisco’s City Hall, to mark the week of International Women’s Day and to demand expansion of City-funded rental subsidies as well as a lifting of the arbitrary time limit that had been placed on them.
Last year, the City of San Francisco made a commitment to support homeless families with a subsidy program that would help them move out of shelters, garages, and crowded and dangerous single-room occupancy (SRO) hotels into longer-tem and livable family housing. However, when the program was put into place, changes were made from the original plan as written by its advocates, resulting in rules that made it difficult or impossible for families to hold on to their new housing, and which made others ineligible.
Under the new rules, the subsidies would only be for a year, or extended to two years. Many needy families didn’t qualify because their income was too low! Others were disqualified because they couldn’t demonstrate the ability to raise their income by $6,000 within two years.
As Hillary Klein of the SRO Collaborative said, “The rental subsidy program was a positive step toward alleviating homelessness, but it doesn’t go far enough.”
Parents, children, extended family members, friends, and allies with signs in English, Spanish, and Chinese, gave testimony about their lives and struggles. One after another, they told about their hard-working lives, how the subsidies had helped improve things for themselves and their families, but how because of the subsidies’ limitations, they were in danger of losing this housing and being worse off than ever.
Xiu Huan Cheng, whose family is from Chinatown and on the edge of homelessness: “We can only squeeze into tiny rooms in SROs, of less than 100 square feet. We are asking the government for subsidies to help our families, and that the City will look at the experiences our children are facing. It is really stressful for our families. We hope the subsidies can be deeper to ease the situation that we’re in. Our hope is that we have better housing, and that the subsidy is not cut off in two years’ time. We can’t catch up with the rising cost of living. We hope we don’t have to worry that any time now our subsidy will end.”
Janet Ray, Coalition on Homelessness: “I am a mother of three who can’t afford to raise her children in San Francisco. I’m living from room to room with my children. Let’s all unite and fight for the right to real housing.”
María Avilés, of the Tenderloin: “The amount of support they’re giving us is insufficient and needs to be long-term. There are families not accepted into the program in the first place because their income is too low. We’ve been struggling around this for a long time. We hope the authorities will respond to us. We need a viable solution. For those of us already in the program, when it is taken away from us we are in a worse situation than we were before. Our rent will double, and we won’t be able to pay it.”
Leslie Flores Martínez, a child living with her family in the Tenderloin: “We didn’t have space to do our homework, had to share a bathroom. I felt sad because I didn’t have any privacy. Now [with the subsidy] I have my own bedroom that I share with my sister. I have space to do my homework in the kitchen, and can take a long bath. I would like to make the subsidies last longer. People don’t have a lot of money and can’t pay the rent by themselves. They are being driven from the city because they can’t afford it here.”
Araceli Lara, St. Peter’s Housing Committee: “Every day, people are facing injustice and discrimination by the landlords. We, as women and immigrant families, have a right to decent housing because we work hard and pay taxes. We ask ourselves what happens to those taxes we pay. They are being put to work destroying houses and lives in Iraq, that’s where they’re going. That money should be put toward decent affordable housing. How is it that the government can use the people’s money to destroy but not to take care of its people? Big corporations are privatizing the necessities of life, even water. It’s shameful that in such a rich and powerful country, so many people are living in the streets. Our families need to live in decent conditions. That’s why we’re here today. The program as it is is like a band-aid just covering a wound. The lack of affordable housing is an emergency. Housing is a right! This is our message for International Women’s Day.”
Alex Tom, of the Chinese Progressive Association: “The gaps and disparities in this so-called liberal city are getting wider every day. Poor families are invisible. Being a mother is not easy; there is no compensation for a mother’s work. We demand the right to permanent and affordable housing in San Francisco. I am here to talk about jobs. Most SRO families can’t access subsidies unless they increase their incomes by 30%! Families include individuals who are low- and no-wage workers. We did a survey of SRO families and found that the unemployment rate was 22%, so most are unable to access the subsidies. Unless the City actually provides good jobs for working families, this will never be resolved. But there is one thing they can do, raise the monthly subsidy to $1,000.”
I also spoke to Jesus Perez, who works with the Coalition on Homelessness and the South of Market Community Action Network (SOMCAN), which represents groups from the Mission, the Tenderloin, South of Market, and Chinatown. He told me, “poor neighborhoods are working together. We went to the Mayor and the Board of Supervisors on the issue, and this is what we have to do now to get a response. When the subsidies expire, the families end up homeless again or in the hotels.”
The families and their supporters then marched into City Hall to the Mayor’s office. There they were met by the Director of the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Services, Mike Ferrah, who led us down to a conference room (safely away from the Mayor’s ears), where residents described their lives and how the holes in the program were making their lives—lives already full of hardship and struggle—even more difficult. With small children in laps and toddling under the conference table, they told their stories.
“I come from the Tenderloin,” said one of the mothers. “We were looking for housing many places. We have two children, and many places will not allow children, though they will allow pets. We did manage through Compass to get into the subsidy program. My husband works, sometime overtime, and I go to school to study English.”
Another testified, “We were following the program, doing all they told us to do. Then my social worker told us that our subsidy is going to be cut off. They are telling us, you’re on your own. Why did they give us hope in the first place, then expect us to magically raise our income so much? Suddenly we will have $1,400 rent for a very tiny space. This is like they’re mocking us. My husband’s income goes up, they take that from the subsidy. It’s impossible to get ahead. We’re not criminals, or sitting around waiting for something to fall from the sky. We’re working people, willing to work. Why is there money to kill people in Iraq when people don’t have housing here? In such a developed country, it’s just incredible that they can’t provide resources for our communities.”
“We met with the Mayor Newsom last year, on May 10, but he has never answered or met with the families or organizers to this day. This month it has been three years since the Mayor said he would sit down with us and talk to the families about this program.”
The families and advocates basic demands are:
Remove the arbitrary time limit and make the time-line needs-base.
Raise the monthly amount of the subsidy from $500 to $1,000.
This would reform the program so that it could really help the families most in need and most in danger of, and already in, homelessness.
In an Open Letter from the Housing First for Families campaign, published in the March Street Sheet, this call went out:
“Families of all economic backgrounds are leaving San Francisco because of the huge crisis of affordability. This crisis has a disproportionate impact on the poorest families. Ethnic and racial minorities are particularly affected by this trend. This, the loss of families with young children, is compounded by the loss of diversity. San Francisco is on the verge of committing demographic suicide by transforming itself into a playground for the wealthy, white, and single only.
“Brothers and sisters, we would like to invite all families to be part of the Housing First for Families Campaign. Unity is very important because it’s the only way that we will have the power to combat the problem of homelessness in San Francisco. Without you, the campaign cannot move forward.”
The spirit, determination and eloquence of the families who rallied at City Hall and went inside with their righteous demands, showed this unity. It is in the interest of all San Franciscans that the families and children among us not be driven down and driven out, impoverishing all of us, but are treasured for the present we want to make better and the future, the children playing there on the steps, whose parents work so hard to raise and protect them. Without their presence, we lose our soul.
Gandhi once said that a culture should be judged the way it treats its most vulnerable members: mothers and children, the old, the disabled and the poor. Here is a step that the Mayor and the City of St. Francis can take to guarantee that we become, and remain, a city that belongs to all of us and is not just a playground for the privileged few.
On International Women’s Day, homeless families spoke up loud and clear: housing is a human right!
Sarah Menefee
