I need people to understand something: poverty was never a choice for me. I was born and raised in homelessness. I graduated from UCLA after getting my GED in prison, and later I went to LSU for my MFA as a single parent with my daughter. Even while working there as a graduate teaching assistant, we were still homeless and still in poverty. So when wealthy people say all you have to do is work hard and go to school, I know from my own life that is not true.

This is bigger than me. There are single parents in Los Angeles doing everything people tell them to do, and they are still one missed paycheck, one rent hike, or one emergency away from losing housing. Kids pay the price when their parents are forced to move from place to place, sleep in cars, or try to survive without stable support. Poverty is not a personal failure. It is a system that leaves families behind while blaming them for what they are going through.

That is why I am calling on Los Angeles city leaders to expand housing support for homeless and unhoused single parents. We need more family housing placements, faster access to rental assistance, and support that actually matches what parents and children are facing. A city like Los Angeles cannot keep acting like families should just work harder while housing stays out of reach. If we are serious about dignity, then we need policies that make stability possible.

If you are tired of people acting like poverty is a choice, please sign this petition. Sign if you believe single parents deserve real housing support, not judgment. Sign if you believe children in Los Angeles should not have to grow up in homelessness because the system failed their family.