What's Hot? Supporting Businesses and People Who Care

Recently, fellow activist and writer Sue Hecht posted this short public service announcement by Woody Harrelson: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPGxxkB_ou0 After watching it, I realized that collectively we have the ultimate power. Almost half of the U.S. population is living at or below the poverty level. We can pull together and stop supporting businesses (or people) that are unwilling to make room for every human being. Every human being includes the homeless. And by "room for" I mean treating them with the exact same dignity and respect as those who have a home. After witnessing (and being the receiving end of) abuse from an anti-homeless group from San Pedro, I vowed I would never spend a nickel there. We need to reward the communities that ARE supporting Tiny Homes and boycott the ones that are criminalizing the homeless. In this Street Sense article by Rachel Cain: http://streetsense.org/article/susan-sarandon-homeless-hate-crimes-testimony/#.Vy0_MdIrLIW I was shocked to discover the following: "Although fatal attacks against the homeless occurred more than three times as often than those classified as hate crimes from 1999 - 2012, violence against the homeless is NOT considered a hate crime by the federal government." WHAT?! Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson wrote, "A hate crime is one of the most despicable and prejudicial acts done onto another human being by a human being and surprisingly these acts affect homeless people in great proportions." She added, "It is imperative that we give this issue the serious attention that it deserves by including homeless people in hate crime statistics." In California, you can decide which cities deserve your patronage by looking at this handy chart (on page 37) Appendix A: Count of Anti-Homeless Laws by California City http://www.homelesslivesmatterberkeley.org/pdf/CA_New_Vagrancy_Laws.pdf I'll give you the top ten cities to AVOID spending your hard-earned money in (ordered from worst to bad): 1) Los Angeles (especially San Pedro) 2) San Francisco 3) Long Beach 4) Anaheim 5) Modesto 6) Pomona 7) Fresno 8) Santa Monica 9) El Cajon 10) Berkeley Here are the ten BEST places to support in California (in order from good to fair): 1) Palmdale 2) Vallejo 3) Moreno Valley 4) Ontario 5) Oxnard 6) Rancho Cucamonga 7) Garden Grove 8) Hayward 9) San Luis Obispo 10) Santa Ana Next, I checked out the most recent 56-page report by the National Coalition for the Homeless: http://nationalhomeless.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Hate-Crimes-2013-FINAL.pdf and I was gobsmacked to discover: On page 19: "One in four attacks on the homeless end in death." On page 22: A whopping "49 percent of homeless individuals report being victims of violence, only 2 percent of the general population does the same." On page 44: "Over the past 15 years [roughly 1998 - 2013] the National Coalition for the Homeless has documented over 1,400 crimes committed against homeless people by housed individuals. These violent attacks have cost 375 homeless people their lives." Where are hate crimes committed against the homeless? On page 8, is a map which shows the geographical distribution of hate crimes across the United States. In short: "An astonishing 30 percent of the attacks took place in California and another 12 percent of the incidences were in Florida." In my mind, criminalizing homelessness sends a strong message to society that these people somehow deserve to be abused. Another reason for my open letter to officer (and public figure) Deon Joseph: http://roserightswrongs.blogspot.ca/2016/04/an-open-letter-to-officer-deon-joseph.html In this LA times piece that I commented on: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-homeless-count-20160504-story.html "Mayor Eric Garcetti and Peter Lynn, the homeless authority's executive director, suggested that most of the increase was driven by a more accurate tally — 2,388 — of homeless people younger than 25." So I checked out this excellent 16-page document by Shahera Hyatt, MSW and Jessica Reed, MPP titled Adding Insult to Injury: The Criminalization of Homelessness and Its Effects on Youth: http://cahomelessyouth.library.ca.gov/docs/pdf/CriminalizationOfYouthHomelessness.pdf According to Philip, 21 in San Francisco, "I’ve gotten tons of tickets, mainly for sleeping in Golden Gate Park. ... They’ll give you a court date and if you don’t go, the next time they run your name [and] they’ll send you to jail." And on page 10, I was relieved to read this quote by Sergeant Ric Declan, Multnomah County, OR Police Department: "We know that homeless youth are more often the ‘victims’ rather than the ‘perpetrators’ of crime and should be treated as such." Just two days ago, Tent City Urbanism posted a piece called HUD commissioned study recommends building Tiny Home Villages to increase Affordable Housing: http://www.tentcityurbanism.com/2016/05/hud-commissioned-study-recommends.html Could this be in response to the outcry from the HUD docket I wrote about? http://roserightswrongs.blogspot.ca/2016/04/we-only-have-until-april-11th-2016.html Over 5,000 comments were received and it appears the "Final Rule" has not been made (as of May 6th, 2016): https://www.regulations.gov/#!docketDetail;dct=FR+PR+N+O+SR;rpp=10;po=0;D=HUD-2016-0013 Typical comments sounded a lot like these: "As an individual who's considering purchasing a tiny home as a primary residence I strongly object to this course of action an ask that you consider the millions of people that this could potentially affect." "Well if this passes then next time there is a hurricane I'll assume it's illegal to live in a FEMA trailer so I'll expect a three bedroom house." "Hey, why stop there? Once you have badgered citizens for what is for many of them their only viable housing option, you may want to begin legislating against cardboard boxes!" And one of the most brilliant comments I read (and posted last month): "Have you people read the Constitution?? Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. Nothing about required minimum housing size, or worrying about your neighbor's imaginary property values, or whether someone is off grid, on grid, or lives only 'part time' in a given house, or full time. How do you propose to police this? Send a cop to every tiny house and RV every day and knock on doors to see if they are lived in year round or not? Is 99 days okay, but 100 days too much? Who decides? The mortgage companies who love 30 year mortgages and millions in interest payments, and builder's lobbyists who love lawyer foyers and obscenely sized houses, or the people who must pay the bills? If this passes, then you will have to arrest a LOT more people, and the net result of that is a bunch of people housed in substandard, sub minimal sq ft housing, without legal/safe egress in case of fire or natural disaster, at great expense to those who are willing to work like slaves to stay on the 'outside'. Certainly a jail cell doesn't meet your requirements, does it? Or do you plan on enforcing your 'regulations' and 'codes' with fines? Fines to people who need and sanely choose to live simply and cannot pay the fines? What will you do, evict them and raid what's left of their bank accounts? Perhaps you plan on garnishing their SS payments... Maybe you haven't noticed but I have; there are thousands of homeless people in this country (in large part due to unpunished bank criminality) and they have a human right to housing and not to be harassed by overworked police departments that you might want to call if you have need for them (or would you prefer they spend their limited time arresting an RV dweller and they'll just tell you they're too busy if your house is being broken into, or your child needs CPR?) For 62 years I've had the flag waved in my face and been told how 'free' I am. When does that kick in? And am *I* able to determine my lifestyle for myself, or are you going to legislate it arbitrarily and with no regard for my personal needs, expenses or situation? Feel free to produce documents assisting thousands of people in building safe, long term and inexpensive housing and even better, helping them source parking spots and land for those houses. That's your job. Hands off our liberties, or the backlash will be decisive." And she included this in her attachment: "No state shall convert a liberty into a license, and charge a fee therefore.” (Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105) “If the State converts a right (liberty) into a privilege, the citizen can ignore the license and fee and engage in the right (liberty) with impunity.” (Shuttlesworth v. City of Birmingham, Alabama, 373 U.S. 262) On a related note, this morning the City of Los Angeles returned (well, sort of) the Tiny Homes they illegally confiscated in the first place. Elvis Summers posted this on his Welcome Home: A Tiny House, Huge Purpose Facebook page: "All but 1 of the tiny houses the city illegally confiscated have been returned! Smokie's house is MIA and will be looked for by the department of sanitation. All of the wheels on the houses were damaged, some of the siding frames are damaged and All of the Solar Battery Control Boxes are missing from the houses. Willie who owns the red house, is both happy and sad. Happy his house is back, but sad he can't live in it now and has to return to his tent to survive in the rain. He said he's happy but feeling pretty depressed. MORE TO COME ... " ‪#‎ShareTheGood‬ https://www.facebook.com/mythpla/?fref=nf For now, here is the KTLA 5 News report I posted on Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/u/0/107889574670988423996/posts/eiiFQLg4ira I'll be in touch soon. Please sign and share our petition with friends, relatives, family and any other groups of humanitarians you can. Every signature counts and I read every comment. Take good care, Rose