10 30 2019 by Street Sense Media

VoL. 16 Issue 26

oCT. 30 - NoV. 12, 2019

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The Cover

The Street Sense Media Story, #MoreThanANewspaper

residents of an encampment in the noMa neighborhood work together to take down their tents ahead of a regularly schedule cleanup on Sept. 19.

originally founded as a street newspaper in 2003, Street Sense Media has evolved into a multimedia center using a range of creative platforms to spotlight solutions to homelessness and empower people in need. the men and women who work with us do much more than sell this paper: They use film, photography, theatre, illustration, and more to share their stories with our community. our media channels elevate voices, our newspaper vendor and digital marketing programs provide economic independence. and our in-house casemanagement services move people forward along the path toward permanent supportive housing. At Street Sense Media, we define ourselves through our work, talents, and character, not through our housing situation.

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EVENTS

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News In brief Foggy Bottom residents press Mayor Bowser to tighten restrictions on homeless encampments By Nick Shedd // Volunteer

Don’t Mute DC: A Call to Action Conference Saturday, November 16 // 9 a.m. - 2 p.m. Busboys and Poets // 2004 Martin Luther King Junior Avenue, SE “This Spring, D.C. residents and musicians rallied with Don’t Mute D.C. to reverse tens of millions of dollars in cuts to health care, education, jobs programs and schools. Looking ahead, as gentrification continues to lift D.C. revenues, what is possible if we play offense? What happens if we bring the same energy and voices to shape the future direction of our city in the next legislative/budget cycle? Can we push back against displacement? Can we invest in cultural preservation and education? Can we get closer to racial equity, improve our health, and increase the peace among old and new neighbors, and on the street? MORE INFO: www.tinyurl.com/DMDC-conference MonDay, Nov. 4

updates online at ich.dc.gov

Saturday, Nov. 9

Panel: The Social Costs of Mass Incarceration

D.C. Interagency Council on Homelessness Meetings

5th Annual Friendship Walk To End Homelessness

6 pm - 8:30 pm Washington National Cathedral 3101 Wisconsin Ave., NW More people are incarcerated in the U.S. today than in any other country in the world. Join us for a discussion on the history and costs of mass incarceration, its significant consequences, and possible solutions. TICKETS:

Executive Committee Nov. 12, 1:30 pm // TBD * Likely 441 4th Street NW ***List features only committee meetings. For issue-focused working groups, contact ich.info@dc.gov.

9:30 am Registration, Fun 10:30 am Walking Begins Begins at Lincoln Memorial steps Friendship Walks is a 1.5-mile fun walk around the National Mall focused on ending homelessness in the Washington D.C. region. All proceeds benefit Friendship Place, a nonprofit organization addressing homelessness. REGISTER: tinyurl.com/fwalk19

www.tinyurl.com/cathedral-reentry

Submit your event for publication by emailing editor@streetsensemedia.org

Audience exchange United Way of the National Capital Area @unitedwaynca

#UpRooted: Episode 1. To share one of the region’s most prevalent issues through the lens of individuals who are or have experienced homelessness, #UnitedWayNCA and its partner nonprofits will publish an intimate documentary series, #Uprooted, that follows three individuals in the region to bring attention to the issue. https://tinyurl.com/uprooted-ep1 7:30 AM - 4 Oct 2019

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser wore a Washington Nationals scarf to celebrate the team’s first World Series appearance as she fielded questions at the October meeting of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2A, held on Oct. 16 at West End Library. She faced complaints from two Foggy Bottom residents about the impact of homeless people and encampments on their safety and quality of life. Bowser denied that the presence of encampments in the city is driven by a lack of places for people experiencing homelessness to stay. “We have a shelter bed for each person that you see ... but for a number of reasons they don’t come in,” Bowser said. One resident urged the mayor to authorize the Metropolitan Police Department to ask homeless people to move their encampments 100 yards away from any residential building. The other suggested that Miriam’s Kitchen outreach and food distribution operations to homeless people in the neighborhood are “just encouraging people” to move in and camp. “It is against the law to camp[, but] it is not against the law to be homeless,” Bowser said. She then accused advocates for the homeless community and pro bono attorneys for violating the spirit of the city’s encampment clearing protocol by encouraging residents not to leave — or simply to leave and immediately return — when warned of impending clean-up operations. Encampments, Bowser said, are “detrimental to quality of life for everyone” and, with millions of dollars investment in new shelters, “we have an alternative for people living on the street.” The District is nearing completion of the seven new family shelters designed to replace the D.C. General family shelter, which was shuttered in November 2018. A comparable redevelopment of shelters for individuals is part of the city’s strategic plan to end homelessness, with groundbreaking for the new 801 East men’s shelter expected before the end of this year. Other topics covered at the meeting included the state of overcrowding at School Without Walls at Francis Stevens, Mayor Bowser’s plans for eventual curbside pickup of food waste, disruption caused by a possible illegal hoteling operation, and wages and employee rights for restaurant workers.

Corrections 1. In the Oct. 16 edition of Street Sense, the film review “Josh Hayes’s ‘The Invisible Class’ is a film meant to inform, not entertain” misstated that the filmmaker cited “substance abuse and mental illness” as one of three top causes of homelessness in the America. The online version of the article has been corrected to show the film identifies a shortage of affordable housing as the top cause of homelessness in the United States. 2. In the Oct. 16 edition of Street Sense, the name of a co-author of the opinion piece “The coming storm for D.C.’s citizens with disabilities” was left out of the byline. Barbara Merrill and Ian Paregol wrote the article together.

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News

Researchers assess link between health care and evictions By Jared Brey NextCity.org

Culture Of Health

xpanding Medicaid in the United States may help reduce the rate of eviction by lowering the cost of healthcare for lowincome people and giving renters a better shot at keeping up with housing costs, according to a new study published in the journal Health Affairs. Researchers at Columbia University and Boston University analyzed eviction data in 51 California counties before and after the state’s expansion of Medicaid in 2011 and 2012, following the passage of the Affordable Care Act. They compared that data to eviction records in 14 other states that did not expand Medicaid. (By comparing before-and-after records from multiple states, they attempted to control for some of the inﬂuence of other factors, like changes in the housing market.) After Medicaid expansion, they found, California counties had “significantly fewer total numbers of evictions” — and “expansion was associated with 24.517 fewer evictions per month in each county, compared to a pre-expansion mean of 224.718 evictions per month.” “Poor health can be a contributor to eviction when people with limited resources cannot afford both housing and medical care. Medicaid may mitigate the risk of eviction directly by reducing the cost of medical care and indirectly by protecting earning potential through better health,” the researchers write. The new research answered a call from the Russell Sage Foundation to study the social, economic and political effects of the ACA, also known as Obamacare, according to lead author Heidi L. Allen, an associate professor at the Columbia School of Social Work. Another study by the same team published in the American Journal of Public Health in September found reductions in nationwide eviction rates that were associated with Medicaid expansion. And some of the same researchers also published a related study in 2017 showing that Medicaid expansion in California was associated with reduced payday borrowing among low-income people. Allen, who began her career as a social worker in a hospital emergency department, was also an investigator with the Oregon Health Insurance Experiment, a series of randomized controlled trials monitoring the impacts of health insurance expansion on low-income people. “[The reduced eviction rate] wasn’t surprising to me because we knew from prior work — pretty definitively — that Medicaid is good for the finances of low-income people,” says Allen. “And I knew from working with low-income populations and growing up in a low-income family myself how tight the financial margins that low-income families are operating under are.”

a synthetic control group of counties for each California county using an algorithm created by Alberto Abadie and colleagues, the economists who developed this specific methodology for comparative case studies.13 The algorithm assigned a weight of 0 to 1 to each synthetic control The study was published in Health county so as to closely match the pre-expansion Affairs amid growing national trend in evictions in the treated county across the recognition that eviction is pre-expansion period.We then calculated the ava cause of poverty, and not erage difference between the actual evictions just one of its outcomes, as each month in the treated county and the evicillustrated by the work of the tions in the synthetic control group after expanEviction Lab and Princeton University sion. Details on the synthetic control approach sociologist Matthew Desmond. Tenants’ are in the appendix.12 rights movements around the country have Limitations The primary limitation of our focused on limiting evictions in various ways, study was the aggregate nature of the data. We by pushing for renttocontrol to keep costs down and data were unable directly link individual-level promoting rules that prevent landlords from evicting on insurance status to people’s rental histories tenantsorwithout just cause. Some efforts, like the eviction records. The data we had on evictions nationalwere Homes Guarantee campaign, have started administrative in nature and included very drawingfew explicit connections betweendemographic healthcare costs, details about people’s characeviction, housingsuch instability and homelessness. teristics as insurance status, income level, “Health insurance is fundamentally a financial or age. To examine the link between insurance product,” says Tal Gross, an associate professor in the anstatus and eviction, we performed stratified Department of Markets, Public Policy andexpecting Law at Boston alyses by uninsurance rates, that the University andeffect co-author theexpansion Health Affairs report.be “It most main of of the would doesn’t prominent directly affectinhealthcare mucha as who pays countiessowith greater share of for healthcare, and itresidents affects thebefore price ofexpansion health care.”if the reuninsured In other the expansion of Medicaid in places sultwords, was tied to the change in insurance status. like California primarily a financial benefi to low-a comThereiswere also issues related tot using incomemercial people, evictions Gross says. database instead of undergoing “They’re still suffering and getting sick would and missing primary data collection (which have been out on work,” Gross says. “But they’re not getting hit One prohibitively costly and time-consuming). with that big bill. thatwe means they’re likely to every issue was So that could not less verify that end up eviction not paying rent.” was included in our data set. However, Healthcare — and,Lab to aatlesser degreeUniversity housing —examthe Eviction Princeton has become an issue once again the Democratic ined undercoverage in theinAIRS data by comparpresidential primary aggregated campaign this year. Some ing internally counts of evictions in candidates the ways that a lack AIRShave with emphasized publicly reported aggregated counts of of access to affordable health insurance has been evictions by states. Fewer than 5 percent of coundetrimental low-income people’s lives, eithercounts ties intoAIRS states were suspected to have 11 below externally verified ones. physically or fithe nancially or both. After the passage of An additional limitation involved the assumpthe ACA, some states declined to expand Medicaid to tions underlying approach. more people, even though the underempirical the law, the federal The difference-in-differences government would cover 90 percentestimation of the cost.strategy Some asevictions California of thosesumed states, that like Florida andin South Carolina,and are other along parallel trends. dealingstates with awere rangeevolving of problems related to the lack That assumption might be violated,residents. and in fact of affordable housing for low-income Theexhibit 1 suggeststoa an slight divergence trend before report “contributes existing body ofinliterature California expanded Medicaid. For that reason, suggesting that one of the principal benefits of Medicaid we explored empirical approaches, such as expansion is related other to protection from encumbering synthetic control methodology, and adjusted medicalthe debt, leading to improved financial welllinear in our main being,”for the county-specific authors write. Allen saystrends one limitation specification. of the research that she’d like to know more about is Wetoalso could not completely rule out changes how access expanded Medicaid impacts the lives in who the housing market mayeviction. have affected of people actually have gonethat through rates of eviction during our study period, although we had no reason to believe that such changes would have coincided specifically with

iMage CoUrteSy oF arek SoCha / piXaBay.CoM

Medicaid expansion. The nation faced a housing crisis during the Great Recession (2007–09), which led to increased regulation and oversight of the mortgage industry. New federal regulations were not specific to California, although California experienced a disproportionately “I’m interested in economic policies that can high increase in evictions during the Great Reimprove health, and health policies that can improve cession. California did implement a law in 2017 the finances of low-income families,” says Allen. that allowed some evictions to be sealed from “We know that low-income people make really tough disclosure, but this did not affect our study. choices every month, but losing your housing is a really big deal. So the fact that money saved from spending on healthcare would be used on housing Study Results doesn’t surprise me at all.” We found that the Medicaid expansion in California ledwas tooriginally a significant reduction in the numThis article published by Next City, a nonbert of evictions occurring in each amplifi county. Exhibprofi news organization whose journalism es solutions and spread them one city to the city. Support it 1helps illustrates thisfrom relationship as next an event study its www. nextcity.org. ofwork the atmonthly number of evictions. Before the expansion, California expansion counties had slightly higher rates of evictions (particularly Exhibit 1 Estimated monthly number of evictions in California counties that expanded eligibility for Medicaid relative to counties that did not, by time period relative to expansion, 2008–13

StUDy aUthorS’ analySiS oF Data FroM aMeriCan inForMation reSearCh ServiCeSanalysis (airS), pUBliSheD in the SepteMBer 2019 eDition SOURCE Authors’ of data from American Information ReoF health aFFairS.

search Services (AIRS). NOTES The exhibit shows point estimates from one regression of evictions in each county on a series of indicator variables for time relative to the expansion of eligibility for Medicaid. Estimated numbers of evictions during the period 1–6 months before expansion are omitted. The error bars indicate 95 percent confidence intervals. All coefficients with the exception of that for the indicator on 1–6 months after expansion are statistically significant at the 5 percent level. The associated pvalues for each coefficient from left to right are 0.003, 0.011, 0.023, 0.872, 0.030, and 0.017, respectively.

StreetSenSeMeDia.org

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After 14 years not being heard, this formerly homeless veteran is a board-certiﬁed counselor trained to help others By BoNNie BiShoP bonnie.bishop@streetsensemedia.org

t can take just one wrong step, one incorrect diagnosis, to change someone’s life. Xavier Justice’s time in the U.S. Army was cut short when he fell headfirst while doing vertical push-ups at his workplace. The accident left him unconscious and in need of medical assistance. After being treated for a broken nose, Justice — a mechanic from 1993 to 1995 — was honorably discharged. He went on to attend the University of Valley Forge without giving a second thought to the extent of his injuries from the accident. Before long, however, Justice noticed changes in his behavior and a decline in his mental functioning, preventing him from finishing school at the University of Valley Forge. In a recent interview, he recalled his struggles back then with memory deficits and an inability to focus. Confused about why he was experiencing these difficulties, Justice began relying on Percocet and other painkillers in an attempt to escape the dissociative state he was in, which included absence seizures — brief, sudden lapses in awareness. This reliance became an everyday pattern in the matter of three weeks as he sought to escape his discomfort. “I needed nine — nine per day,’’ Justice says. He drowned himself in medication, unaware that the ultimate cure to his problems would involve someone who was willing to listen to what he had to say. His strong attachment to pills created a tear between Justice and his family. The addiction, Justice says, also led him to a life on the streets for 14 years. He reached his low point when his family told him they were unable to provide the help he needed. “Home was always a place that I could go,’’ Justice says, sharing how his sanctuary eventually became unavailable to him. Having turned to theft when his income was no longer enough to pay for his growing use of painkillers, Justice was eventually arrested in 2009 and sentenced to jail time. After his release, Justice went to a Community Resource and Referral Center in Washington, D.C., where a nurse connected him with a coordinator at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs after hearing about his time of service. He was then directed to Veterans on the Rise, a proactive nonprofit based in Northeast D.C. that offers services such as housing, therapy, and job training for vets. VOTR has created an ambitious but flexible program that allows for homeless veterans to heal, build resilience, and create lives for themselves outside of the organization. The program collaborates with homeless veterans to co-build a path to success that they can use to recover from poverty, according to David Kurtz, the group’s executive director. Aside from the clean residential facility that Justice said “will meet your basic needs” and rehabilitation programs provided by the organization, VOTR was able to connect Justice with a case manager, someone interested in listening to what Justice had to say. This connection led him to open up about the hardships he had faced and, after hearing what had happened, his case manager pushed for a medical re-evaluation. After further discussion and evaluation, Patricia Jones, Justice’s case manager, discovered in 2014 that both his immediate care physicians and discharge physical had failed to diagnose Justice’s Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) — a lifealtering mistake.

The united States Marine Corps War Memorial. photo CoUrteSy oF pXhere.CoM

and case managers. Having someone to confide in — someone With the help of Jones and Charles Avery, a former clinician who cares — was an aspect at VOTR that he said helped him at MBI Health Services, Justice was rightfully diagnosed with immensely. “I’m not a patient, I’m a person,’’ says Justice, a TBI and began treatment for recovery — about 18 years after referring to how he was treated with respect by those who sustaining the injury. helped him. He also received treatment such as cognitive processing While one wrong step can drastically change someone’s therapy for his Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder that has helped life in an instant, one correct step can shepherd a cycle of him recover. Since the 1990s, Justice had not been able to go positive change and success. Justice said that it was invaluable near a motorized vehicle or smell motor oil without feeling fear, for someone to sit down and ask him the given that his accident occurred in his right questions in order to obtain the help workplace, which was a mechanic area. that he needed, all while respecting him His dreams consisted of endless falling, and seeing him as a human. leaving him restless and unable to escape But Xavier Justice and others know his disorder even in his sleep. that his story is just one that has been After his diagnosis, Justice received heard, while there are countless homeless enough compensation from the federal veterans currently suffering with no one government to get back on his feet, Xavier Justice to share their troubles with. According leaving the VOTR program in less than to data analysis conducted by the U.S. seven months. Interagency Council on Homelessness in He went on to receive his board its 2018 census, there are 306 veterans currently living on the certification in counseling from Princeton Theological streets of D.C. That’s 306 individuals who could share a similar Seminary in New Jersey. He listens to others now, giving experience to Justice, all with stories to tell. people what he needed when he was at his low. Justice is now With Veterans Day rapidly approaching, VOTR is developing pursuing a Ph.D. its plans to reach out to homeless veterans living in street A troubling thought remains, however: Instead of facing encampments to provide them with bottled water, clothing and 14-plus years of torment and anguish, Justice could have other items. The group is currently seeking volunteers willing begun receiving the treatment that he needed minutes after to help with outreach. the incident if he had received the correct diagnosis. Veterans on the Rise also has continuing opportunities for “No one ever asked what happened the day after,’’ Justice volunteering by making and serving hot meals, helping with says, referring to the immediate reactions he encountered after recreational activities, and tutoring. There are also fundraising his fall. If someone had asked and listened, Justice could have events throughout the year that volunteers can participate in. been diagnosed correctly. Veterans on the Rise can be reached at 202-388-4090 or at When striving for self-sustainability and self-sufficiency, info@veteransontherise.org. Justice says, it’s essential to focus on the basics. That’s not just about food and shelter; it also means access to counselors

“I’m not a patient, I’m a person.”

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NEWs

Report maps out the experience of poverty based on the voices of those who have lived it By Brianna Bilter Editorial Intern

he ideas of subjugation and cycles of poverty, as well as the feeder systems that interact to create an inescapable poverty trap, have long been discussed in academia, ” Economists such as Paul Collier and Jeffrey Sachs have contributed widely cited work on global poverty systems, while Michelle Alexander is hailed as a leading voice on the dynamic between race, poverty, and the criminal justice system in the U.S. The International Movement ATD Fourth World, however, alleges that while academics offer valuable insight, the discussion of poverty has been too reliant on their analysis. ATD Fourth World collaborated with Oxford University to illustrate the experience of poverty using a participatory research model. The 2019 report included a U.S. component called the Multidimensional Aspects of Poverty, which uses the Merging Knowledge Approach to incorporate the perspectives of academic experts, social workers, and those who experience poverty every day. The U.S., the report contends, has never extended the equal opportunity it romanticizes in its founding documents to all people. According to UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston, the U.S. is plagued by twin narratives, in which “the rich are enterprising, altruistic, hardworking, dedicated. The poor are losers, scammers; people trying to profit from the system.” Academics, practitioners, and activists participated in peer group meetings around the country, a process the report called “a scientific approach to the creation of new knowledge.” Three years of research resulted in a detailed map of the aspects, constants, and aggravators that forge a process of subjugation, the cause of poverty. The study identified seven aspects of poverty. People experiencing poverty often live in disadvantaged areas, in which social services, infrastructure, education, and other institutions are dismal and underfunctioning. People experiencing poverty also experience workand employment-related hardships through unemployment or underemployment and may only have access to unsafe or undesirable jobs that are not conducive to long-term advancement. Thus the cycle of subordination transfers to subsequent generations. A lack of adequate health and well-being is induced by unaffordable health care, lack of preventive care, lack of access to nutritious food, and health coverage that does not encompass vision or dental services. These added stressors create and exacerbate mental health issues, and with the fourth aspect of

Graphic courtesy of ATD Fourth World

subjugation. The aspects of poverty do not inadequate resources, support options to operate in isolation, but instead accumulate address these issues are meager. to create a “never-ending cycle of crises.” An The stigma and shame associated are activist from New York asserted: “two sides of the same coin,” according to “The system is not the report, and the designed for people to discrimination people evolve out of it. It keeps experiencing poverty us in a constant phase of face is intersectional, being below.” whether it manifests ATD Fourth World’s as a formal inquiry report states that poverty about a home address is not entirely about on a job application or money; in fact, the through interpersonal report acknowledged interactions. Poverty that one of the most can lead to social surprising findings was isolation, either selfthat not having enough imposed or at the hands money was not named of others. Sometimes, as the top concern. The self-isolation can even experience of poverty be a coping mechanism. ATD Fourth World is inconsistent, and “a The final aspect short-term increase in of poverty the report income cannot compensate for decades of identified is unrecognized voice and exclusion underfunded and failing school systems, high from participation. People may be ignored or unemployment rates, or marginalization.” distrusted, rendering them silent on the very “Many people in poverty can live through issues that have created and exacerbated their

“A short-term increase in income cannot compensate for decades of underfunded and failing school systems, high unemployment rates, or marginalization.”

a lack of resources,” a practitioner said. “But having a lack of community and human connection can destroy a person in poverty.” Each of these aspects form what the report broadly refers to as “the struggle.” The struggle is external, an enduring fight for survival, and internal, a pursuit for balance and peace. The struggle is not measured by resilience, a term the report argues reinforces negative perceptions of people who can’t bounce back. Rather, “the struggle” is a state of perpetual resistance. Two constants the participants identified as having a substantial impact on experience of poverty are uncertainty and hard choices. Unexpected incidents are more disruptive to the lives of the vulnerable, and choosing between necessities means sacrifice is inevitable, especially when those choices are impacting the livelihood of one’s children. Lastly, the report identified the aggravators as the final force on their experiential map. Racism, the intersectionality of social identities, time spent in poverty, reduced lifespan, lack of value placed on people’s time, and the accumulation of aspects all intensify the subjugation people experiencing poverty endure. In the comprehensive report, racism was dissected and discussed separately. Though racism is nearly always acknowledged in discussions of poverty, a practitioner stated “no one really emphasizes it enough.” The myth of the American dream and the romanticization of openness, the report found, mask the “nativism” and “white supremacist dominance” that have dominated the U.S. since its inception. Members of the U.S. research team met at an international seminar in France last year to merge their findings with the other five countries that participated in the international project. The dimensions illustrated in the U.S. report were largely consistent with the international model, with the exception of the modifier “environment and environmental policy.” Though the U.S. report acknowledged that disadvantaged areas often have “poor water and air quality” and noted “environmental hazards” are a threat to health and well-being, the undeniable presence of environmental racism in this country was not discussed. While the intent of the project was not to generate concrete policy recommendations, ATD Fourth World endorses a comprehensive approach to overcoming poverty. The report argues that racism and poverty must be addressed simultaneously, with people experiencing poverty present at the strategy table.

StreetSenSeMeDia.org

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AT A GLANCe

A quantitative sample of NoMa’s homeless population aNalySiS aNd Photo By SeaN McBride sean.mcbride@streetsensemedia.org

On Sept. 20 and Sept. 25, Street Sense Media surveyed 25 homeless residents encamped in the K, L, and M street underpasses within the NoMa Business Improvement District. After initial difficulty soliciting responses to this relatively long survey, $10 gift cards to Dunkin Donuts were distributed to each homeless person who completed it. Gift cards were donated by Apprenticeship Corner. It is our belief that respondents were honest and forthcoming when answering these quite personal questions.

Findings: The range in age varied between 18 - 68 years. The average age of people interviewed was approximately 37 years. The ratio of men to women among respondents was relatively equal, and the vast majority of them were African American. Sixty percent of respondents were born in Washington, D.C., while the remaining forty percent came to D.C. from Ethiopia, Florida, Maryland, Michigan, Ohio, and Virginia. Fifty-two percent of respondents stated they have lived in Washington, D.C. their entire lives, while the remaining fortyeight percent reported living in the District for a range between one month to 45 years. Seventy-six percent of respondents said they choose to live in the District and sixteen percent said they do not choose to live in the District. Among the sixteen percent of respondents who responded “No,” they do not choose to live in the District, seventy-five percent said they are unable to move. For these people who want to move but are unable, the destinations of choice were: North Carolina, South Carolina, southern Virginia, Alabama, and Georgia. Some respondents reported to have family in these southern states. The remaining twenty-five percent of respondents who said they do not choose to live in the District said they do not know where they would want to move. Twenty-four percent of respondents reported to be physically incapacitated, which is defined in the survey as being physically unable to work. Sixty-eight percent of respondents said they do not own an ID. A lack of ID prevents people from gaining meaningful employment, accessing government benefits, or applying for housing assistance. Not a single respondent interviewed for the survey veteran. According to 2018 figures by The United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, there are 306 homeless veterans living in the District. Twenty percent of respondents were unaware that D.C. has a “right to shelter” — being defined as a legal right to receive shelter. Regarding education status, fifty-two percent of respondents had at least a high school diploma or GED.

Jobs that respondents have held in the past include: construction, babysitting, dog walking, secretarial work, landscaping, maintenance, cashier, stocking shelves, car wash, driving, cooking, cleaning, masonry, roofing, self-employment, customer service, food service,bartender, lifeguard, dishwasher, telemarketer, delivery, working at Kaiser Permanente, hardware store, group homes, baker, hospitality, warehouse, electrician’s apprentice, and retail. Fifty-two percent of respondents reported to have a problem with drugs, such as: K2, PCP, marijuana, heroin, cocaine, bath salts, and ecstasy. Of those fifty-two percent of respondents, approximately thirty-one percent had a problem with more than one type of drug. Eighty percent of respondents reported having a diagnosed mental illness, such as: bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, PTSD, and major depressive disorder. Forty-eight percent of respondents said they received some form of government aid, such as food stamps or Social Security disability benefits. Twenty percent of respondents were ineligible to stay at a D.C. shelter, for reasons such as being barred. Explanations were not requested as to why respondents identified themselves as being ineligible. 20 percent of respondents reported utilizing shelter services in neighboring Virginia and/or Maryland. When asked if they choose to live in an encampment, ninety-six percent of respondents answered “yes” and gave these reasons: shelters have theft, bedbugs, rats, fights/violence, gangs, curfews, and can be unsanitary. One respondent, James Williams said, “the shelters are run like prisons by people who used to be in prison.” A key finding was that many of the residents consider their encamped neighbors “family.” One survey participant referred to his neighbors as, “my people.” Another, Laticia Brock was recently awarded a housing voucher. Consistent with the stated appeal of this close family dynamic, she continues to return to the encampment to be with and support her “family.” Many encamped individuals say they do not want to be separated from their tight-knit web of friends and family. When asked if there was anything encamped individuals are vulnerable to, responses included: theft, being around other people who are on drugs, weather, car crashes (encamped individuals reside adjacent to busy streets), violence, sexual violence, rodents, mosquitoes, diseases, lack of privacy, dangerous people living in the encampments, judgmental people, the now biweekly encampment cleanup, and harassment by pedestrians—one individual detailed a story of being pepper sprayed by a pedestrian. Fifty-six percent of respondents said they have had their personal possessions thrown out during a cleanup. Encamped individuals said they recover from having their possessions removed through: donations, foraging for more items, and “the will of God.”

After 33 years, I ﬁnally received my housing voucher in September. Now I’m seeking donations so I can buy the items I will need in my apartment. I have a job, but I’m on standby waiting for a new project. Thank you for your support because I can’t do this alone. Thank you very much for your concern. ronald smoot, Artist/Vendor

BIRTHDAYS Andre Brinson Nov. 9 ARTIST/VENDOR

our stories, straight to your inbox Street Sense Media provides a vehicle through which all of us can learn about homelessness from those who have experienced it. Sign up for our newsletter to get our vendors' stories in your inbox.

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8 // St reet Sens e Me di a / / Oc t. 3 0 - No v. 12, 2019

NEWs

Volunteers sign up to observe encampment cleanups By Sean McBride sean.mcbride@streetsensemedia.org

ccording to the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, the presence of an advocate or official observer at a homeless encampment cleanup can help to ensure that homeless occupants are treated with respect and adherence to the city’s protocol. Due to their small staff, the Clinic has been recruiting volunteers to observe these city-led “cleanups” of homeless encampments, and advocate on behalf of homeless individuals who live in the encampments located throughout the city and may not know their rights. Several training sessions for new observers have been held so far. During a training in October, Ann Marie Staudenmaier, a staff attorney for the Legal Clinic, said these group encampments have increased within the last five years. Before that, unsheltered people were usually more hidden, such as in bushes or under bridges. She attributed this shift to a few “well-intentioned” individuals who took it upon themselves to hand out tents to people experiencing homelessness, as well as big retail stores such as Walmart and REI moving into the District. According to Staudenmaier, an incident in 2003 ultimately led to the city’s policy that now guides encampment clean-ups. A resident of a high-rise in Georgetown had complained to the city that he could see an encampment from his home and city workers threw the encamped persons’ property away. The Legal Clinic referred the person whose belongings were destroyed in Georgetown to private attorneys who helped him sue the city for a small amount of damages. The group also reached out to the city administrator at the time to discuss the city’s potential liability for incidents where they disposed of someone’s

personal belongings without due process. This led to the creation of a task force that drafted the first version of D.C.’s Protocol for the Disposition of Property Found on Public Space, which was adopted in 2005 and has been updated several times since. According to D.C. law, it is not illegal to sleep in public. However, since 1981, it has been a ticketable offence to “set up, maintain, or establish any camp or any temporary place of abode in any tent, wagon, van, automobile, truck, or house trailer, of any description, or in any combination, on public or private property, without the consent of the Mayor.” Despite this regulation, city officials allow the people living in encampments 15 days notice before an encampment cleanup takes place. In past interviews, the Office of the Deputy Mayor of Health and Human Services has said that their “encampment engagements” do not aim to enforce this law and only respond to sites that have been deemed a public health risk. When an encampment cleanup takes place, Department of Public Works trucks, MPD officers, outreach workers, and a representative from the deputy mayor’s office usually begin the cleanup around 10 a.m. As Street Sense Media has previously reported, many encamped people have learned to move their belongings to the end of the block to wait for the cleanup to end, before moving the encampment right back to where it was. At the Oct. 3 training, Staff Attorney Karen Malovrh characterized this behavior as a cat and mouse game, calling the city’s effort a “huge waste of time and money only to drive people crazy.” DMHHS responded, saying, “The reason we engage an encampment protocol engagement is when there is a health or safety risk both for residents living in the encampments and the greater community,

All Photos by Sean McBride Taken Sept. 19.

and the amount of biohazards that we pick up in NoMa is not safe for residents that are living there, and if we did not do cleanups on a regular basis those items would pile up.” Because camping in public is illegal, it is difficult to find a legal defense to protect people who live in the city’s many encampments. However, there are legal grounds to protect private property left in public space. For example, when someone’s car is illegally parked, the car is not destroyed, it is ticketed or towed. Likewise, the city’s own protocol mandates the storage of private property up to “disassembled tents” and personal property that can fit in up to two 40-gallon bins. In a 2018 interview with, a spokesperson for the deputy mayor’s office said bins are kept in city vehicles present for the cleanup and are available upon request. Regardless, this is not always how cleanups have been conducted, according to Malovrh. She described one incident where outreach workers were listening to music instead of speaking with camp residents, and others

where tents have been picked up with the intent to trash them without checking inside for personal property such as vital documents, irreplaceable items such as family photos, or other items of high value. DMHHS responded to this saying outreach workers were probably communicating with DMHHS reporting their whereabouts and objectives in real-time for safety reasons. The Legal Clinic is optimistic that a recent change in personnel for who oversees the encampment cleanups on behalf of the deputy mayor will lead to more consistent adherence to the protocol. In March of 2018, two homeless residents filed a class-action lawsuit against the city seeking an injunction ordering the District not to destroy the unattended personal belongings of homeless residents without first storing them for 60 days so they can be reclaimed. They are represented by the law firm Covington and Burling LLP. The case is ongoing.

streetsensemedia.org

Citing ‘very, very dirty’ shelters, many settle for encampments By Clifford Samuels clifford.samuels@streetsensemedia.org

t is 10:30 a.m. on a Thursday at the NoMa encampments, several communities of people living in tents at the K, M, and L Street underpasses in Northeast D.C. The roar of a Lamborghini echoes down First Street NE and pedestrians hurry by during the morning rush hour as encamped residents break down their tents and help each other gather any belongings before the garbage trucks come. Most everyone seems to know the drill, this happens almost every two weeks. As the trucks park and the workers step out, it is straight to business. In silence, the workers pick up and dispose of anything within the cleanup zone, which is marked off by caution tape. Police officers stand by, vigilant yet similarly quiet. According to the city’s encampment protocol, the District aims to “assist these individuals to better stabilize their living condition by conducting outreach and offering certain support services, including temporary shelter and permanent housing placements when they are available, applicable, and the individual is interested in receiving these services. Yet residents say the only support system they truly have is each other. “The last cleanup, they removed all of our s*** and just came and swept; they didn’t do no power washing, none of that,” said one resident, who gave his name as Micheal and was helping others collect their belongings. “They talk about the urine smell, but they had a porta potty out here for three months and didn’t do no maintenance.” Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Communications Director Sward Tondoneh said the NoMa Bid, who does power washing services, does not have enough capacity in a power washer to wash all three streets. “We do power wash when we’re in NoMa, it just might not always be all three underpasses,’’ she said. “One of the issues they run

into is that people return so quickly after we do our cleanups they don’t even have the ability to do all the streets. They’ll run out of water in the tanks, when they go back to fill the water up and come back, they can’t power wash any longer because residents have already moved all their belongings back. We are working through some other options both for NoMa and citywide to be able to increase the amount of power washing

// 9

we’re doing.” As for the porta potties, Tondoneh said there are no plans currently to implement them near encampments. Residents of the encampments have to deal with extreme weather conditions as well, including occasional temperatures upwards of 100 degrees and, soon enough, cold weather conditions that can lead to health issues such as hypothermia. One solution for encampment residents would be to go to a shelter, which would provide safety as well as further assistance towards permanent housing. But several residents who had stayed in D.C. shelters said they are now purposefully avoiding them because of substandard conditions, such as bed bugs, lice and scabies infestations, off-putting odors, violence, and theft. “A lot of shelters are very, very dirty, leading to a lot of fights, people stealing stuff, and they don’t have a lot of storage space,” said a former shelter resident who gave his name as Jeff and said he has been to multiple shelters in D.C. He said the city’s family shelters — which he has been in with his wife and son — are “way better” than single shelters “because they have staff that help you find resources, it’s cleaner [and there are] more services for permanent residency.” Another camp resident criticized the low-barrier shelter hours, 7 p.m. - 9 a.m., saying they require the need for multiple trips across town to and from the shelter.“I don’t approve of them,” said Ray, a NoMa encampment resident who only gave his first name. “That’s why we out here, because you want us to come in there but you don’t help us out.” In response to these complaints, Tondoneh said the administration is putting a lot of capital dollars toward the redevelopment of the low-barrier shelter system. “We are in the process right now of building a new shelter at 801 East,” she said. “We went through a really aggressive engagement process around the development of that shelter, doing focus groups, different meetings, town halls, and even outreach ... in encampments.” They explicitly asked unsheltered residents what would need to change in city shelters to make them a viable option, according to Tondoneh. One Department of Public Works employee working the clean up that day said local officials are at fault for the encampments’ existence. The employee’s name has been withheld for privacy. “The city could do more than what they are doing for these homeless people,’’ they said. “It’s a lot of them out here that wouldn’t be here — believe you, me — if they had some place to go.”

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opinion

The more the liberal establishment hates Trump, the more popular he gets By Jeffery McNeil

President Trump. Photo courtesy of Gage Skidmore / Flickr

Why does the GOP hate Democracy? By Jeff Taylor

It's been clear for at least the last decade or so that the GOP views as legitimate only those election outcomes that favor their team. Anything other than a GOP win is, in their eyes, a call to change the rules or throw the rules out the window altogether. They have lied, cheated, gerrymandered, suppressed, and stolen their way into power time and again. Why is this? Get ready for some ugly truth about the GOP mindset. The GOP and their constituents hate the left. I mean, really hate the left. I mean, hate us as in they resent our very existence. They would rather be governed (ruled?) by Vladimir Putin's proxy than any, as they tend to put it, "Demon-crat.” They truly believe those of us on the left are just plain evil. They can't stand the idea that Democrats will give someone somewhere (people of color in particular, the poor in general) something that they believe is not deserved — things like food, housing, and medical care. The GOP are social Darwinists. They believe the moral thing for them and their ilk is to cull the herds, weed out the weak. They rail against the left and accuse us of social engineering, which is yet just another classic case of projection: accusing someone else of doing what they themselves are doing. Two of the primary constituencies of the GOP are white evangelical Christians (WECs) and the extremely wealthy (TEW). While there is some overlap between these groups, the thing they have in common is a deeply held worldview. The WECs place their belief in the power of a supernatural supreme being. TEW place their belief in the power of their wealth, the notion that their wealth entitles them to act as the high priesthood for humankind. TEW are more than willing to partner

A writer is similar to a doctor. A good doctor gives you an opinion based on the evidence. You may not like the fact that your doctor says you have stinky feet but in the end, your doctor doesn’t care how you feel, he's telling you what the consequences will be if you don’t follow his prescription. Using the same evidence-based method, I write a diagnosis and fill out the prescription. I don’t lose any sleep over what I write because I do my research and I have been prophetic. In 2015, when Donald Trump announced his candidacy, all the experts said he'd never be president. I predicted otherwise. In August 2015 I wrote that Hillary Clinton shouldn't measure the drapes, and in October 2016 I wrote that Trump would win. The liberal establishment was in denial back then and they are in denial today. Like many committed Trumpsters, I wasn’t always on board the Trump train. I was a lifelong Democrat. I helped Jesse Jackson in '88. I marched to free Nelson Mandela. I helped New York City's only Black mayor, David Dinkins, get elected. And when Barack Obama won in 2008, nobody was happier than me. What steered me towards Trump wasn’t Trump himself. Both parties were running the same rubber stamp politicians that serve the donor class rather than the working class. If Trump didn’t run, we would have either had Hillary Clinton or Jeb Bush and we would have continued down the path of neocon wars, corrupt lobbyists, more jobs leaving America and a sense of decline. As the Democrats became ideological to the point of attacking other people’s viewpoints, it became easier to support Trump. I didn’t need a Russian bot to tell me that Clinton wasn’t speaking to me. While Trump talked about jobs, Obamacare, immigration and getting out of endless wars, Clinton was talking about empowering women. If you are pushing that kind of identity politics, what becomes of the people who aren’t women, Hispanic or LGBTQ? Trump talked about making America great and liberals claimed it was racist. I began saying to myself, "If liberals don’t want to make America great, then what do they want?" While I loved Bill Clinton, he betrayed the working class with the North American Free Trade Agreement. Many African American men still haven’t recovered from the mass incarceration of the Clinton era and while I didn’t think the Monica Lewinsky affair was impeachable, it didn’t sit right with me that he looked the America people in the eye and lied. I didn’t like the Clinton shills defending the Clintons while virtue-signaling about women’s rights. I felt Hillary Clinton had a sense of entitlement. I don’t know if she committed a crime with the emails but it disturbed me that there was a set of rules for people like Clinton and another set of rules for everyone else. Trump didn't come off that way. He's a billionaire but he speaks the language of a regular guy. I believe Trump has been a very good president. The economy is doing well, we’re not getting into any wars, there have been no major terrorist attacks and people have hope. This is my opinion and my assessment.

with WECs to delegitimize Democrats, even though the two groups' moral codes differ significantly. The WECs are in this fight to oppress women and the LGBTQ community. TEW are in it to oppress women, though to a slightly lesser extent. But mostly they're in it to protect their wealth and to maintain a status quo that keeps everyone but them on the lowest rungs on the economic ladder. When it comes to the climate crisis, WECs and TEW have differing views. WECs believe the planet is ours to rape. And since Jesus is due to return any day now, the climate crisis won't matter because the good people will be raptured up to heaven while the bad people are the only ones who will have to suffer any ill effects. TEW, though they publicly promote denial and skepticism around the issue, know full well that the climate crisis is real. And not only do they know it's a very real threat to humanity, they welcome it. Again, the GOP are social Darwinists. Climate change paired with dramatic cuts to social service programs and bingo, the most vulnerable are sifted out for extinction. There was a time when we had two opposing parties who shared a common Jeffery McNeil is an artist and vendor with Street Sense Media. goal, the good of the people and the nation, and simply differing opinions of how best to achieve it. But those days are long gone and most likely never to return. - Have an opinion about how homelessness is being addressed in our community? Democrats are going to have to - Want to share firsthand experience? fight harder than they've ever fought - Interested in responding to what someone else has written? before if they are to win against a team that hates democracy and has Street Sense Media has maintained an open submission policy since our founding. no sense of decency. We aim to elevate voices from across the housing spectrum and foster healthy debate.

Join the conversation, share your views

Jeff Taylor is an artist and vendor with Street Sense Media.

Please send submissions to opinion@streetsensemedia.org.

streetsensemedia.org

/ / 11

The city I love By Robert Warren

I’m a life-long D.C. resident who remembers when we marched down Pennsylvania Avenue to the monument grounds in the freezing rain, saying to the world that we wanted a holiday to celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday. I remember looking up and seeing in all the windows along Pennsylvania Avenue the white faces looking down on us. We shut down the city for most of the day. Most Black folk in the city took a day off work to celebrate Dr. King’s birthday. I don’t know how many people may have lost their jobs that day, but we came together and stood up for what we felt to be a just and right idea, to have a national holiday for America’s great civil rights leader, killed fighting for justice in 1968. The year was 1983, and some people would say that a few years earlier was when the plan began to remove Black folks from Washington, D.C. Then, a few years later, President Ronald Reagan signed legislation making Dr. King’s birthday a national holiday. In those years, we were at the height of being “Chocolate City.” Some people say that the CIA sponsored a cocaine-crack epidemic plan, bringing down whole communities of color across the city and the nation. The NRA and gun sales in the ‘90s were turning D.C. into the murder capital of the world. New laws and more jail time for Black men brought us broken families with housing needs. There was no money for new startup

businesses for Black people to help grow and build up their communities. But there was a New Community Initiative that uprooted and displaced whole communities with no real right of return and no real help of raising a family out of poverty. The reasoning the government and the powers-that-be used to uproot these families was that we can no longer have areas of concentrated poverty. But they never answered the question of “How did poverty get concentrated in the first place?” Instead they brought in more upwardly mobile people and built for their needs with not too much thought about people who couldn’t afford to stay or homeless families living on the streets and in shelters—and lifelong residents who were living and dying, hopeless on the streets. I have seen my city go through a lot of changes over the years, not all of them bad for the city. In some respects I think capitalism and its impact on longterm residents — left out of business opportunities and “gentrified” out of some parts of the city — has been hard and stressful for many residents who were born here in Washington, D.C. So, like in the early ‘80s, we must come together and stand up for justice, equality, and universal housing rights. We are the first human rights city in the nation and that should mean something to our elected officials and the business- and service-oriented community.

“New laws and more jail time for Black men brought us broken families with housing needs.”

Nationals Park. photo courtesy of Ryan Cogswell / Flickr

Can baseball help bring our hurting communities together? By Eric Thompson-Bey

I have said it a thousand times: It can happen to anyone, anywhere, anytime. We see it every day: the homeless on the street, the homeless living in tented communities, the homeless living under bridges, sleeping over warm grates and in seats on the buses. The homeless sleeping in trains, occupying vacated buildings, and subsisting in the back seats of junkyard cars. I hear the media talk of bad weather and people “living” in schools set up as emergency shelters. They are not living; they are existing. I read about foreign cities, where people are shot at, gassed, bombed, invaded, imprisoned, and tortured. Millions of Kurds, pawns in the power politics of a half dozen or so countries, are now homeless or will be homeless by the strokes of a pen. Do any lives matter? If so, let’s end homelessness everywhere!

he Washington Nationals won their first ever National League Championship Series on Oct. 15, beating the Saint Louis Cardinals 7-4. It was a great feeling to see my Nationals win the NLCS after so many years of heartbreaking playoff losses. Maybe that win and a World Series will help lift some of the pain on our community, as far as stopping the violence in our city. However, the murder of a 15-year-old near Nationals Park in the James Creek Public Housing Complex encouraged me to write this article. I had just been in that neighborhood a few days earlier, doing an event with Second Story Cards. I am devastated and hurt when violence strikes upon kids. What will it take to stop the violence? How can we bring our communities together? The attacks of September 11, 2001, brought America together like I have never seen. It brought unity. Sports can also bring people together in unity and peace. When Hurricane Harvey hit Houston in 2017, a World Series Championship won by the Houston Astros helped bring that city together. We have a major crisis in our city and it's the murder rate. I'm tired of hearing on the news about another murder in the District. As I write this article, the Nationals are in the W.S. and they lead the Astros 1-0 in the series. Also, there have been 141 murders in D.C., compared with 131 in 2018. Two recent murders stand out: the murder of 10-year-old Makiyah Wilson last year and the murder of 11-year-old Karon Brown this summer. They were only kids who were out of school for the summer. These are senseless killings of kids. These killings are happening in these high-crime neighborhoods because of the lack of police presence. How can we have several gunshots ringing in these high-crime neighborhoods and no police? Believe it or not, these crimes affect not just the neighborhoods were the crimes happened, but our city as a whole. Those same people with those same guns could be in your neighborhood harming you and your kids. I too have lost family members to violence. My mother was murdered in the ‘60s due to gun violence. My nephew was murdered in a driveby shooting in 1993, and my sister was killed in her apartment with a handgun on March 8, 1989. I also had my youngest sister stabbed to death in 2001. I want no more pain. It all starts in the community: "If you see something, say something". Then our city officials have to do a much better job of protecting our most dangerous neighborhoods — and our kids. Put more police substations in our most vulnerable neighborhoods. Start the “guns for cash” program. These are some of the first steps to keeping our streets and neighborhoods safe.

Angie Whitehurst is an artist and vendor with Street Sense Media.

Eric Thompson-Bey is an artist and vendor with Street Sense Media.

Robert Warren is an artist and vendor with Street Sense Media.

Homeless in the blink of an eye By Angie Whitehurst

1 2 // S t reet SenSe Me Di a / / o Ct. 3 0 - no v. 12, 2019

ArT

Real Science

Militant Victorianism:

The forced faith

By roN dudley, a.k.a. “PookaNu” Artist/Vendor

By JerMale MckNight Artist/Vendor

Every card stacked against you. What do you do first? Pray to God. Go hard. Then come up with a vision. A desire, a plan. Organize, research. And dare to differ accordingly. Meaning, be Roman in Rome. 13% yourself and 87% the expectations. Terms and conditions apply. Except don’t be Rome, For they violently sought change. And didn’t put God first. Now prepare for the unexpected. Make backup plans. Stems and loyalties. Act royally & embody the heart of the class. Redeem needed peace. Replenish or cope profoundly. No smoking or dining. And buy your advocate’s books. Sweet donations, sweet. Give your values and things you admire. Insist before you pay to get the goods out. Build your circle. Renew your surroundings. Add something to yourself everyday. Love good and better than yesterday. You are building a resume.

The Pitch

By MarcuS greeN // Artist/Vendor

No, I’m not talking about baseball. Your sales pitch could be lame, so-so, great or magical. I put a lot of thought into my pitches. What works for me is making eye contact, remaining in a humble body-language position, and always smiling. A lot goes into my pitch and how I grade a potential sale or potential friend and “family.” Not only does my income depend on it, but some of my customers really are like family. When our relationship reaches this level, I love them like a mother, aunt, sister, or brother. They’re some of the most loving and caring people in my small world. I’m so thankful for all of my customers and the staff at Street Sense Media. Thank you, everybody, for your support and God bless.

Treading the Waters, Part 2

Real science I feel like a ghetto lab rat Real science My favorite teacher had a bad habit Real science She was a victim of the system Real science She had an opioid addiction Real science Now it's heroin and fentanyl Real science She was teaching when I seen her fall Real science Now it's K2 with like a million strands Real science We use to march to save a million mans Real science Now it's Twitter and Instagram Real science Oh how they could kill a man Real science Now it's Black groups and white groups Real science Hate groups and fight groups Real science I was on my way to work Real science Now the police wanna purge Real science Now the police cruise Real science Now the police wanna shoot Real science They say the warrant wasn't for me Real science But the bullets were waiting for me Real science Now that's scary a** s*** Real science When police shoot and don't frisk Really, they don't miss Real science.

By gerald aNderSoN // Artist/Vendor

When we were last with Gerald in his hometown of New Orleans, he was on the streets again, kickin’ it with his new friend Minew who was telling him about an opportunity with Sam Clayton... Sam Clayton was the biggest man in New Orleans. The Clayton Family. He just Skully. That’s what they really call him, Sam Skully. Sam Skully a big old weight in New Orleans. They big shots. I’m talking about they heavyweight boys. Minew was kicking it to me about Sam Skully came to him talking about, “Man, I want you to get on my team,” blah, blah, blah, blah. I’m like, “Man, s***. I’m getting on that n****’ team too. I’m tryna get some work in too.” Sam Skully already heard how we pulled them triggers. And when dope boys hear that you pull triggers, that you

moving around, you got some shufﬂe on your feet, they gonna gab you on they team cause they scared of you. That’s where the pressure come in at. You don’t really even want nobody scared of you. But when you out there, you can’t trust nobody. It’s like, we used to be in a house, we call it a lab house. A lab house is where all the dope fiends meet up at, everybody shoots, everybody has some dope you want me to test. Every killer up in that house, what I mean killer — every gun man up in that house got a gun. When we used to get high, everybody up their gun. Up, up, up it. Pull it out. Everybody up it. But don’t put it on you. That’s how the druuuug be having you feeling. He might go hit me. Because every dope dealer have a hit on one of us in that house. But we call it the lab house, see, all the killers meet.

But it ain’t like I’m killing you. I don’t know what you hiding. But I can get close to you. We all knowin’ each other — we all killers. He might come in here with $50,000. And he might come in here with $40,000. But you the only one can touch me. Cause you coming in the lab house. Cause most us shoot dope. So I’m telling Minew, I said, “Man, s***, what’cha wanna do?” He say, “Man, I’m gonna get you on.” So, we went to work for Skully selling powder, getting money for him and ***t. To be continued. Anderson’s first book, “Still Standing: How an Ex-Con Found Salvation in the Floodwaters of Katrina,” is available on Amazon.com.

StreetSenSeMeDia.org

A dedication to all cancer survivors

Everything can change in a heartbeat

By aNdre BriNSoN // Artist/Vendor

By Joe JohNSoN // Artist/Vendor

My body recently shut down on me. I passed out (from what I later learned was very high blood pressure) at the McPherson Square bus stop. Someone called 911. When I opened my eyes, I was in the George Washington Hospital emergency room. I stayed for three days hooked to tubes and machines. I was watching my diet. But now I must be even more careful. I can't have most candy, and I definitely cannot eat fried chicken. My diet is extremely important because sugar diabetes runs through my family. My mother

has it. My grandmother passed away from the additional health problems it causes. But, I am staying strong, taking care of myself, and keeping my house clean. I'm also trying to manage my medication better. My doctor said I have to get back on it slowly; if I don't, I'll end up at GW again. Most of all, I need to stop running the streets so much. So, my friends, if you are not taking care of yourselves, please do! Thank you for all the love you show me. Remember to keep your head high and put God first.

Six years ago, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. From that point on, I have been going with her to some of her doctor’s appointments. Listening and learning how this terrible disease works. I always pray for people in this world, especially her and my daughter. My mother had one of her breasts removed and she’s my champion. She is 84 years old. I watched how strong she was and I tell her every day I love her. She loves to tell the story about when I was born. She was willing to give her life for me to live. It was 1968 and she tells me that she had to sign papers to let her go so I could live (unbelievable). God bless her sweetheart (and she never smoked a cigarette in her life! Please, my friends, this story is not meant for you to feel sorry for me at all. I love selling the paper and meeting so many customers in my community. You are my family and strengthen me, always.

Stories within “The Triple Crown,” Part 1 By JuaN calleJoN // Artist/Vendor

This is the story of a Puerto Rican who is homeless in D.C., or “homefree," as I would prefer to be considered. Directly from the land of enchantment, this is the story of Juan Alfredo San Jose Gonzalez, the last Puerto Rican among this generation of his family who refuses to leave an island perishing drowning in an ocean of greed and ignorance! My family's history is marked by its exodus toward the continental United States in an effort to simply survive, escaping from the co-existing poverty and extreme decadence brought about by an exploitative, imperialist colonial relationship between the United States and Puerto Rico's population. The notion that Puerto Ricans live off the wealth of the U.S. federal government is false. We are instead kept mired in need, in a state of dependence. Our people could otherwise be living off the fertile land and sea, in a peaceful and mostly self-sufficient existence. . Our island provides much. Even though I am a U.S. passport holder identified as an "American," I cannot vote for the president of the country that grants me citizenship. We are also denied self-governance. A control board was recently imposed on us by the United States Congress. And its sole objective seems to be systematically selling off and dismantling the future of all Puerto Ricans until we cease to exist. We are being gentrified. My mother was born in the town of Utuado, within the island's central mountain range, a stone’s throw away from major mining perforations made by the U.S. Government agencies and corporations in the 1960s. It is one of the largest deposits of copper and gold (among other minerals not to be disclosed) controlled by the United States. The natural deposits are so large that they cannot be mined and exploited without altering the topography and rendering the land useless and inadequate for living. Yet the mining plans are moving forward and will permanently destroy the land to satiate the insane greed of a few. The plans look more and more like something out of a horror film or science fiction novel every day.

// 13

The government and the capitalist investors that would benefit from such extractive practices, certified and supported by the U.S. government, are paving the road for this to happen through a new land classification plan. It will put the whole island up for sale, piece by piece, fast tracked for investors and the government to prey on. The fifth of seven sisters, my mother was born in 1931. Two of her sisters died young of "raquitismo," an epidemic of preventable tropical diseases that killed many people in poverty who also suffered from malnutrition, lack of proper hygiene and lack of access to simple medical treatment. The workingclass population was neglected and fell victim to American landowners who exploited Puerto Ricans, devalued the currency, and forced people to sell their land at rotten fish prices. Without land ownership, the potential for a self-sustaining agricultural economy (that already existed and was dismantled and destroyed to use for development of privately owned extensive plantations), was strangled. Many were forced into the sugar cane fields and factories in order to survive. Depending on low wages and company housing, these virtually enslaved workers and their families were drained of life and died in misery. By the end of the 1940s, in the midst of the Great Depression aftermath, my mother migrated to New York in the biggest exodus of our people to the U.S. until what is going on now, in the wake of Hurricane Maria and under pressure from developers swooping in for cheap land. She went along with her surviving sisters, my grandma “Mamabuela,” and my grandpa "Papito." Her parents went to work immediately, Mamabuela in the textile industry and Papito as a dishwasher and as an ''alley-barber," doing haircuts and trimming beards and mustaches after work. Mom and my aunts worked and went to school. All the family lived together, renting a tiny apartment in a Jewish neighborhood practically ripped from the pages of West Side Story. Along with her sisters, they obtained their education,

became professionals, and returned to the island to start their own families. My mother always remained extremely grateful to the United States and their people, she lived the American dream in all its glory. I share the same feeling for all the good people in America, the “true American nation” with exemplary moral values, the free nation that depicts one of the crowns I feel proudly part of, I believe in the dream of a free, multicultural nation of hard-working people that provides high standards of living for all its good people. But that dream was purposefully structured to exclude certain people and was certainly never shared with Puerto Ricans. I cannot feel grateful toward the government that forced her and my family out of our own nation, a non-belligerent nation, which had already been victimized by other empires before this one. Puerto Rico has been referred to as the “triple crown” by some historians. The first “crown,” long ago, refers to the Taino indigenous heritage. In the arawak archipelago nation. Puerto Rico was seen as the island where God lived, in the sacred mountain of El Yunque, our rainforest, which is unique to all the caribbean islands. The second crown refers to when Spain invaded and colonized in our island in the name of God. And most recently, the third crown is held by the American “empire,” retaining Puerto Rico as a colony disguised as a “non-incorporated territory” for obvious political and financial reasons, because… “In God we trust”. So you can see, our story in recent history has been one of invasion, colonization, and exploitation — leaving a confused trace of our own identity. Puerto Rico should be free to guide our destiny in peace. I grew up between the country town of Utuado and the city of Rio Piedras in San Juan. My family later moved to the city for good, where I went to school, During my senior year I moved to the United States and studied at Amherst High School while attending the University of Massachusetts at Amherst through a transitional program. It was here that I first experienced the complicated multi-cultural scene in the United States, with its privileges, worries, prejudices, opportunities, and inequalities. Missing my “terruño,” my homeland, I returned to the island to attend the University of Puerto Rico’s main campus in Rio Piedras. To be continued. Juan Callejon is a pseudonym that translates to "John Alley."

1 4 // St reet Sen se Me di a / / Oc t. 3 0 - No v. 12, 2019

Fun & Games

Challenging Sudoku by KrazyDad, Volume 1, Book 2

Sudoku #4 2 7

2 6 Answers

5 6 8Sudoku #1 3 5 4

3 1

3 6 4 1 5 2 7 9 8 2 3 7 9 8 5 6 4 1 5 2 3 8 1 6 4 7 9

5 1

1 8 9 7 3 6 3 2 4 5 4 8 9 1 2 4 6 3 9 5 2 7 6 4 9 1 8 5 2 3 7 4 1 3 6 5 2 5

9 1 6 7 8

25 7 6 7 331 6

7 9 8

Fill in the blank squares so that each row, each column and each Sudoku 3-by-3 block contain all of the digits 1 thru 9.#3

Challenging Sudoku by KrazyDad, Volume 1, Book 2

I told you I was sick

Sudoku #2 3 1 2 5 4 5 9 2 7 8 6 4 9 2 3 1 6 4 8 9 5 7 1 8 2 3 7 6 8 9 4 3 1 6 5 7

9 8 1 7 3 6 5 2 4

6 7 8 4 7 6 3 1 3 2 5 9 5 8 4 6 2 1 7 5 4 3 9 2 9 4 1 8 1 5 6 7 Poem and photo by Frederic John 8 9 2 3 Artist/Vendor

1 4 7 5 2 2 3 4 8 6 9 8 2 1 3 4 1 8 6 7 3 7 5 9 4

Sudoku #4 8 2 4 7 3 5 6 1 9 6 1 5 9 8 4 2 7 3 plastic picket fence 9 7 3 2 6Behind 1 8 4the 5 2 5 6 8 4 Epitaphs 7 3 9 1 that make no sense 1 8 7 3 9 6 4 5 2 When Sawhain rears its scabrous head 3 4 9 5 1 2 7 6 8 1 8 6 that we’re not dead! 5 9 2 4 7We 3 rejoice 7 3 1 6 5 8 9 2 4 Sawhain, often seen as Samhain, is the ancient Celtic name for harvest, the harvest of souls. 4 6 8 1 2 9 5 3 7

Sudoku #5 1 7 8 3 4 2 5 7 9 3 6 1 6 5 7 4 2 9 4 5 3 8 1 6 5 6 9 2 7 4 3 8 8 1 2 9

2 4 9 6 9 1 5 8 4 3 2 8 8 1 6 9 7 2 4 3 7 1 6 5 7 5 3

7 2 9 1 3 7 4 5 1 8 2 9 6 4

Sudoku #6 4 6 1 5 3 8 7 9 9 2 5 4 6 5 4 8 7 9 2 1 8 1 3 2 2 3 6 7 5 7 8 3 1 4 9 6

Sudoku #7 6 7 4 8 9 5 1 7 2 8 3 1 8 4 2 3 7 1 6 2 3 9 5 4 4 3 7 6 5 2 8 9 1 6 9 5

2 3 5 6 9 8 1 7 4

9 3 1 5 4 2 8 6 6 9 7 4 1 5 9 7 5 4 3 8 7 1 6 2 2 8 5 9 3 6 4 1 8 7 2 3

Sudoku #8 8 4 2 5 9 7 3 4 6 1 5 2 1 9 8 7 7 5 6 1 2 3 4 9 5 8 9 6 3 2 7 8 4 6 1 3

SUDOKU: Fill in 4puzzle 6 3 guesswork. 8 2 9 7 5 1 without If you use logic you can solve the the blank squares 7 shows 5 8a logical 4 order 6 9to solve 3 the 1 2 puzzle. so that Need a littleeach help? row, The hints page Use it to identify next square you should solve. Or use the answers page each columntheand 3 2 9 1 7 5 6 4 8 if you really get stuck. each 3-by-3 block 2 4 7 8 5 6 1 3 9 contain all of the digits 1-9.

Last edition’s Puzzle solution >>

"Our vision is to speed up time, eventually eliminating it." -- Alex Schure

8 5

3 9 9 1 7 6 7 4 5 9 3 5 2 1 8 2 6 6

2 6 7

5 4

1 9

8 1 7 3 6 9 5 4

8 9

6 3

8 7 1 5 4 2 9 6

7 9 4 6 5 3 1 8 1 9 2 8 4 3 7 5 6 9 8 4 6 2 1 5 3 7 2

6 9 2 1 7 8 3 2 8 4 1 5 4 3 9 6 5 7

3 5 4 6

9 7

2 1 8

Author Gene Weingarten is a college dropout and a nationally syndicated humor columnist for The Washington Post. Author Dan Weingarten is a former college dropout and a current college student majoring in information technology. Many thanks to Gene Weingarten and The Washington Post Writers Group for allowing Street Sense to run Barney & Clyde.

StreetSenSeMeDia.org

CommuNITY serVICes

SHELTER HOTLINE Línea directa de alojamiento

(202) 399-7093

YOuTH HOTLINE Línea de juventud

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HOTLINE Línea directa de violencia doméstica

(202) 547-7777

Education Educación

Health Care Seguro

Clothing Ropa

Legal Assistance Assistencia Legal

Case Management Coordinación de Servicios

Food Comida

Employment Assistance Assitencia con Empleo

Transportation Transportación

Showers Duchas

All services listed are referral-free Academy of Hope Public Charter School 202-269-6623 // 2315 18th place ne aohdc.org

Bread for the City 202-265-2400 (nW) // 561-8587 (Se) 1525 7th St., nW // 1640 good hope rd., Se breadforthecity.org

Calvary Women’s Services // 202-678-2341 1217 good hope rd., Se calvaryservices.org

Catholic Charities // 202-772-4300 catholiccharitiesdc.org/gethelp

Central union Mission // 202-745-7118 65 Massachusetts ave., nW missiondc.org

Charlie’s Place // 202-232-3066 1830 Connecticut ave., nW charliesplacedc.org

Christ House // 202-328-1100 1717 Columbia rd., nW christhouse.org

Father McKenna Center // 202-842-1112 19 eye St., nW fathermckennacenter.org

Food and Friends // 202-269-2277 219 riggs rd., ne foodandfriends.org (home delivery for those suffering from HIV, cancer, etc)

Foundry Methodist Church // 202-332-4010 1500 16th St., nW iD (Friday 9am–12pm only) foundryumc.org/ministry-opportunities

Friendship Place // 202-364-1419 4713 Wisconsin ave., nW friendshipplace.org

Georgetown Ministry Center // 202-338-8301 1041 Wisconsin ave., nW georgetownministrycenter.org

Jobs Have Priority // 202-544-9128 425 2nd St., nW jobshavepriority.org

Loaves & Fishes // 202-232-0900 1525 newton St., nW loavesandfishesdc.org

Church of the Pilgrims // 202-387-6612 2201 p St., nW food (1-1:30 on Sundays only) churchofthepilgrims.org/outreach

Martha’s Table // 202-328-6608 2114 14th St., nW marthastable.org

Community Family Life Services 202-347-0511 // 305 e St., nW cﬂsdc.org

Miriam’s Kitchen // 202-452-8926 2401 virginia ave., nW miriamskitchen.org

Community of Hope // 202-232-7356 communityofhopedc.org

Covenant House Washington 202-610-9600 // 2001 Mississippi ave., Se covenanthousedc.org

D.C. Coalition for the Homeless 202-347-8870 // 1234 Massachusetts ave., nW dccfh.org

BEHAVIORAL HEALTH HOTLINE Línea de salud del comportamiento

1-800-799-7233

Housing/Shelter Vivienda/alojamiento

1-888-793-4357 Laundry Lavandería

Patricia Handy Place for Women 202-733-5378 // 810 5th St., nW

Samaritan Inns // 202-667-8831 2523 14th St., nW samaritaninns.org

Samaritan Ministry 202-722-2280 // 1516 hamilton St., nW // 202-889-7702 // 1345 U St., Se samaritanministry.org

Sasha Bruce Youthwork // 202-675-9340 741 8th St., Se sashabruce.org

So Others Might Eat (SOME) // 202-797-8806 71 o St., nW some.org

St. Luke’s Mission Center // 202-333-4949 3655 Calvert St., nW stlukesmissioncenter.org

Thrive D.C. // 202-737-9311 1525 newton St., nW thrivedc.org

unity Health Care // 202-745-4300 3020 14th St., nW unityhealthcare.org

Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless 1200 U St., nW // 202-328-5500 legalclinic.org

The Welcome Table // 202-347-2635 1317 g St., nW epiphanydc.org/thewelcometable

My Sister’s Place // 202-529-5991 (24-hr hotline) mysistersplacedc.org

N Street Village // 202-939-2060 1333 n St., nW nstreetvillage.org

New York Avenue Shelter // 202-832-2359 1355-57 new york ave., ne

// 15

Whitman-Walker Health 1701 14th St., nW // 202-745-7000 2301 Mlk Jr. ave., Se // 202-797-3567 whitman-walker.org

For further information and listings, visit our online service guide at StreetSenseMedia.org/service-guide service-guide

HeLp! we’re LooKING for

volunteers Become a Street Sense Media volunteer and help further our mission to empower people experiencing homelessness. get to know the vendors and make a difference in their lives and yours! you’ll support hard-working newspaper vendors by volunteering your time, four hours a week, distributing newspapers at the Street Sense Media office. if interested, please contact gladys robert gladys@streetsensemedia.org 202-347-2006 (x10)

How are you engaging with Street Sense Media? By lyNN MaNduJaNo // Street Sense Media Volunteer

What I learned volunteering for Street Sense Media By daVe Meyer Volunteer

started volunteering for Street Sense Media because I wanted to get to know my community better. I was sick of seeing so many of my neighbors struggling to get by in a city that has so much and I wanted to see how I could help. It was a bit of a shot in the dark. To be honest, before volunteering, I didn’t even really understand how the paper worked. I bought a paper every week from the same vendor, and we’d talk for a minute or two, but beyond that I was pretty clueless. So, what did I learn after a year and a half on the job?

How it works (for those afraid to ask…) Street Sense Media vendors go through a vendor training process and purchase papers from the Street Sense Media office for 50 cents each. Vendors can also earn papers by writing for the newspaper, volunteering around the office, or participating in workshops. My volunteer role was doing the paper sales: a vendor would come in and I would sell them however many papers they wanted, plus give them any they had earned, and then enter it all in the Street Sense Media iPad. (Note: Looking for an easy way to support Street Sense Media? Anyone who has volunteered with them will tell you they desperately need a new iPad…) My shift was Friday afternoons. Fridays are big days because the offices are closed over the weekend and many vendors load up on papers to make sure they have enough to get through the next few days. Every other Friday is also two-for-one, which means papers are half off.

One paper makes a difference On one of the first shifts I worked, a vendor came in and bought one paper. That costs $0.50, but he gave me $0.60 instead. When I tried to give the dime back, he insisted that I put it in the pouch with the rest of the money from paper sales. As you know, one paper sells for $2.00 – and an hour later, the vendor was back with $2.00 and looking to be in a better mood. This time he asked for three papers ($1.50) and handed me the $2.00. When I tried to give him $0.50 back as change, he refused again, leaving $0.50 to Street Sense Media this time.

Watch the video for more about this story at StreetSenseMedia.org/volunteer

Just before closing, while I was handling a few different tasks at once, the same vendor came back and handed me $7.00. I did the transaction with the iPad and handed him 14 papers before being distracted by someone else. When I turned back, the vendor had gone but he had left 1 paper behind on a chair – for the third time that day he had made a donation to the Street Sense Media community. So, just to recap: assuming he sold all the papers he bought at the end of the day, this vendor started the afternoon with $0.50 and finished it with $26.00 while donating $1.10 to Street Sense Media. One paper makes a real difference!

Selling papers takes courage There are so many stereotypes in our world about people who are experiencing homelessness, and none of them are positive. To stand out on a street corner wearing a blue vest that labels you as homeless and to try to sell papers to passersby who are probably vaguely scared of you takes real courage. Street Sense Media vendors are tough!

We are a community It wasn’t long after I started volunteering that I started seeing vendors I knew in other areas and contexts around town, and often we would stop to say hi and chat. Some vendors have met my wife and my son. It can be so easy for those of us who are not dealing with homelessness to push away those who are, but the truth is that we are all part of the same community – and ending homelessness takes a whole community working together. It has been great to be part of the Street Sense Media community this past year and a half.

If you are reading this issue of Street Sense, you have already most likely met a Street Sense vendor. Such was my case when I began commuting to D.C. on the Metro and bought my first copy of Street Sense. Afterward, I became a regular customer of the vendors who were near the stations I frequented, and they became friendly faces in the crowd for me. That was the extent of my engagement. But more recently I decided I wanted to know more about the lives of these vendors. I started volunteering a few hours a week at the Street Sense headquarters. Now I am acquainted not just with individual vendors, but I have also discovered the significance of the whole group of vendors who fan out over the D.C. metro area. It is a perspective that I hope more readers will attain. As a group, these newspaper vendors are D.C. residents whom everyone who works or lives in D.C. should know. They may not have a roof over their heads, but they are striving to make D.C. a better place for themselves and others who cannot afford what it costs to live in D.C.. They are working to overcome challenges that are greater than what many of us have ever faced. Many Street Sense Media vendors take part in civic action and strive to educate others about what it means to tackle homelessness. They attend writing workshops and learn computer skills at the Street Sense Media office. They learn how to tell their stories both in print and with video and photography. Most important, they are willing to stand on the street and engage with the rest of us. Thus, ask yourself whether you recognize the work that your vendor is doing. They welcome your patronage and support, but they prove each day that they do not want your pity. They have talents and abilities beyond what you might assume. Your goal should be to watch these friends blossom. Expect to see progress. Encourage each one you see! Don’t be afraid to engage with your fellow Washingtonians. They’ve summoned the courage to be there to talk to you.

Thank you for reading Street Sense! From your vendor OCT. 30 - NOV. 12, 2019 | volUMe 16 iSSUe 26

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