Sleep Protectors Gather for Freedom SleepOuit #74
Date Tuesday December 06 Time 4:00 PM Tuesday – 9:00 AM Wednesday
Location Details On the sidewalks near City Hall, barred from taking shelter under the eaves in the rain, protesters will spend the night outside, under tarps, perhaps with a tent or two, and in nearby vehicles. For nearly a year and a half, a small community of housed and homeless have demanded an end to laws criminalizing survival sleeping and other life-sustaining activities. Watchers, well-wishers, blankets, and visitors welcome!
Event Type Protest
Organizer/Author Keith McHenry (story by Norse)
Email keith [at] foodnotbombs.net
Phone 575-770–3377
As temperatures dive below 40 and winter approaches in earnest, city and county authorities are providing $360,000 worth of nightly shelter for 50-75 people at VFW Post No. 7263 at 2259 7th Ave. in Live Oak. The mini-program (considering there are 3000+ unsheltered in the County) will expand to 100-125 in January with the opening of the Salvation Army building downtown at 721 Laurel St. –unavailable during a cold December because it’s being used for “fund-raising” activities.The usual NIMBY (Not-in-My-Back-Yard) approach is evident. The pick-up site is several miles from the 7th Ave. shelter. Clients are banned from walking or driving to the shelter. In-take worker Steve Pleich notes folks will have to go through an initial questioning process (5-10 minutes), presumably to satisfy the Take Back Santa Cruz-minded folks as well as provide data for more grant-grabbing activity.
Old-timers remembered when you got sheltered if you showed up. Not any more.
Meals will be provided for the few that get into the program, but the Homeless (Lack of) Services Center (a “supporter” of the Winter Shelter program) has made no move to restore the open meals that were its historic responsibility abandoned in June of 2015.
Run by the Association of Faith Communities, the AFC bosses may not require users to be present every night or be kicked out of the program–which they do regularly at their year-round 20-person shelter program that moves from church to church. Boss Debbi Bates reportedly excluded several women from the smaller program because they took Tuesday nights out to join the Freedom Sleeper protests. Bates now heads the far more costly $360 grand Winter Shelter.
Read the Sentinel’s sunny shelter spin at http://www.santacruzsentinel.
Also due to open at least for a night or two later this week is the Warming Center with downtown pick-up’s at Pearl Alley. Call 211 or (831) 234-9848 for more info.
HUFF has tried to get a record of police citations for sleeping, laying out bedding, and being in a park after dark (all survival behaviors in a town with shelter for less than 5% of those outside). As well as a record of how many of such cruel, costly, and unconstitutional citations are taken to court. We have been stonewalled by the SCPD and by its enablers in the City Attorney’s office.
Some have suggested that it would be “disrespectful” to those mourning Sean Arlt to spotlight general Santa Cruz police abuses and the crying need for radical change there. I disagree. I feel it shows the kind of rage and determination to act that Santa Cruz activists need to move beyond pious words, calls for “better police training”, and “let’s move on” suggestions.
In distributing word of the “Manifesto of Love” protest a few days ago to the HUFF (Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom) e-mail list, I included the following notes.
“Mainstream” Santa Cruz activists have generally been reluctant to confront Santa Cruz police abuse by name and incident. With some exceptions (surveillance equipment, the Bearcat scandal), broader policies have been ignored.
It’s time to link up with reform movements in other cities and demand real changes here.