Email to HPN

The Homeless People's Network is an email list for homeless and formerly homeless people to talk about whatever, and share information. A lot of the posts direct attention to items in the news about homelessness. Yesterday there were two opinion pieces noted. One was this Seattle Times Editorial, the other was this Las Vegas blog. Both were outrageous and I immediately wrote this in reply, only to find that my email reply function wasn't working. I think I worked around it and the email should be posted to HPN soon. In the meantime, it's here:

I'm having trouble doing email replies in this account, so I'll just respond to the gist of the two posts yesterday regarding Seattle's "pink tent city".

There's some bullshit in both that needs calling out. Both refer to Seattle as one of the most liberal cities in the country with respect to the homeless. This is crap. Until a year and a half ago you could make a case for that claim. In spite of the fact that we've never had more than about half the shelter beds we have needed, we could claim to be liberal because food was easy to obtain and homeless people sleeping outdoors were not often harassed if they stayed away from downtown and away from residences.

But in the spring of 2007 our current mayor, Greg Nickels, SECRETLY initiated a draconian policy of sweeps of outdoor homeless encampments. Even though our One Night Counts have determined that there have been as many as 2600 homeless people in the city in addition to the number that can fit into about 2700 existing beds (these don't count car campers and people who scored couches that night; if you count them there are fewer than half the shelter beds as there are homeless people), even though the mayor has not been willing or able to challenge those figures, he has ordered "cleanups" of homeless encampments. These "cleanups" consist of ripping up tents, sleeping bags, mats, even blankets, and trashing them. People were left with no survival gear, vulnerable to the elements, and no new shelter.

Real Change, the street paper I work with, had to use the Freedom of Information Act to find out what was happening. After we uncovered the policy, which had been hidden even from the city council, the mayor's office "revised" the policy to "take into account public concerns." The revised policy has the appearance of meeting objections, but the fine print contains major loopholes. We have already seen the loopholes exploited since the revised policy went into effect early this year. We have also seen safeguards advertised in the revised policy turn out to be lies.

The revised policy brought with it new shelter, that was touted as the place people swept could go. How many new beds did they provide for the more than 2600 at risk? TWENTY! Not even one percent of the need.

In the meantime, we already have had at least one confirmed case of a man who has died as a direct result of the sweeps. He was driven from a safe spot under a bridge and died from exposure soon after. The fact that they are continuing the policy in the face of that death, a death that was predictable and certainly not the last, is proof that Nickels is a criminal who must be stopped. This policy amounts to attempted genocide, and it has succeeded once so far.

The Seattle Times says Nickels is no Hoover. Given what he has been doing, he is worse than Hoover. He is engaged in nothing short of criminal, unconstitutional, harassment of the homeless population. He has attempted to carry out government policy changes without public view or legislative oversight, a violation of democratic principles of open government. There's nothing liberal about Greg Nickels on this issue, and if Seattle as a whole lets him get away with carrying out these crimes, then Seattle will have lost the right to call itself liberal, too.

As for the pink tents. They're temporary. The plan is to use them only until permanent structures can be built. As for whether they came from a breast cancer charity, I don't know, but I know that Real Change got them earlier from the Girl Scouts of America, and we turned around and gave them to the Nickelsville people. Maybe the Girl Scouts got them from a breast cancer charity, but it's not like a breast cancer charity handed them directly over to Nickelsville.

-- Wes Browning, Real Change News, Seattle

Me Bad

Above is a scan of a certificate signed and mailed to me by Seattle Minister Rick Reynolds, director of Operation Nightwatch, pictured at left wearing what is undoubtedly an imported stole made by Central Americans willing to work all day for one US dime so they can eat meat once a week and eventually send their kids to school wearing shoes, instead of naked. If you can't read what the arrow is pointing to, clicking on the image will get you a larger more legible version.

Having never actually used a shelter during any of the times I've been homeless, owing to the PTSD and all, I had no idea of the protocol involved. I thought if I didn't show up to Rick Reynold's tent on time he would just wedge someone else into it in my place.

I've already attempted to excuse myself on Rick Reynold's blog. Here's what happened: Anitra, not I, asked if we could sleep in Pastor Rick's tent at the City Hall camp out on Thursday. He said OK. We had no agreed-upon ETA. After the dinner though, I wanted to go home and nap in a real bed and watch the Daily Show and the Colbert Report before camping. After all, I'm too old to lie on concrete for a whole 15 hours. I thought 8 or 9 hours would be sufficient. Besides, I had to go home to get my stuffed skunk and change into my ninja-homeless-camper costume.

Here's the very bad thing Anitra and I did. We forgot to tell Pastor Rick we'd be back after midnight. Then, when we got back and were ready to crash, we were sorry, because we didn't know if Pastor Rick and the other clergy in his tent were asleep or not.

Oh, the moral dilemma! On the one hand, I desperately wanted to wake a bunch of clergy up and loudly set myself and my woman down amongst them, and prattle on for an hour or two about anything that crossed my mind. That is JUST the sort of thing I like to do to people! On the other hand, it's wrong to wake a sleeping minister. So we asked around and got into a tent with some other night people like ourselves.

I know now that my excuse is unacceptable and I earned the one-night bar that I have received. I will never violate shelter protocol ever again.

Stoles, Tents, Lasagna

Last night was the second camp out at City Hall to protest Seattle's inhumane and unconstitutional sweeps of homeless encampments. I had passed on the first one back in December in the interest of my own emotional stability. It was too soon after my daughter's death and I wasn't up for any more stress.

This time Anitra and I were there. I still wasn't up for a full 15 hour camp out. So we did it in two shifts. We came for the dinner and rally, went home and chilled, then came back around midnight and stayed until after 8 AM.

For me, the high point of the event was discovering clerical stoles. I'd never really paid attention to clerical stoles before. Most of my life whenever there has been a priest or minister with a stole, he or she was alone and I felt no compulsion to make comparisons. But during the course of the dinner and rally I ran into 7 members of the clergy and several of them were wearing stoles.

The first one was David Bloom, who happens to be on the Real Change Board. He had a beautiful stole with gold embroidery. I begged to feel it. As I did he told me the stole was from Assisi. Wow, I thought. "Are all stoles from Assisi?" I asked. No, they're from all over.

Or are they? I conducted a survey throughout those clergy there that I was able to spot and corner. The results: Assisi, 1. Thailand, 1. USA, 1. Guatemala 3. Unknown Central American country (possibly also Guatemala), 1.

Apparently our US clergy are supporting the importation of foreign-made clerical stoles at a rate of 6 to 1. The United States is tied in last place for a share in the clerical stole market with such backwaters as Thailand and Assisi, while a Guatemalan stole cartel has taken over.

[Below: Mayan stoles! They're here; they're bold; they're taking over!]

I heard from more than one of the clergy that whenever they got together in their little clergy groups they bragged up their stoles and showed them off like peacocks.

It represents what Real Change and the Real Change Organizing project is all about. We're bringing classes together and finding common ground. After the clergy strutted around in their stoles, I was able to show off my stuffed skunk plush-toy, which I proudly purchased from the Goodwill Outlet Store at $1.79 per pound.

We all ate lasagna, slept in wet tents, and shared three porta-potties and a disgust for the Nickel's administration's homeless sweeps.