Extraordinary encounter this morning with “Mama” Gloria Kim of the Zion Gospel Mission, who we first saw praying from a mountaintop in Griffith Park, facing the Pacific Ocean. Squeezing my arm as I escorted the 70+ year old former nurse down the steep trails of Mt. Hollywood (after she conceded that her legs aren’t as steady as they once were), I learned that she has been delivering fresh vegetable soup and other foodstuffs to the homeless in MacArthur Park for the past 27 years. Reaching the bottom, she held our hands up for an extended prayer in the Observatory parking lot, then climbed into her van (loaded with bagels and bananas) for today’s mission work. I hope to see her again….





Linda’s art making continues, despite having had most of her artworks trashed during a series of clean-ups by the city

Necessity dictated that Gracie would have to panhandle to eat, so out she went to the ramp, damn it all…
The winter storms of 2017 have been a blessing for California, a succession of cold and heavy rains finally breaking the grip of several years of drought-like conditions. We can relax a bit, knowing there will no longer be a need to closely monitor our lawn-watering quotients and other givens, at least for the time being. On the other hand, those unlucky enough to be living outdoors are that much more uncomfortable and disadvantaged. So we find the fraternity of 405/Nordhoff, right back where they were swept up from and jailed less than a month earlier, but now banned from at least taking refuge under the expansive, concrete freeway bridge. “Where else are we supposed to go?” Linda asks with exasperation. The group is holding it together through ingenuity, teamwork (yes), and the resolve to endure. To think of them by this time as anything less than a family is unfair.
Craig, Terry and Amy, lacking tents or even the materials to put up structures as sound as Linda and Gracie right now, spent the night under a narrow awning against the windows of the businesses that share the space with 7-11. The owner of the Thai restaurant was good enough not to be any more direct than was warranted when telling them it was time to open soon and they would have to remove their possessions– which included bikes and shopping carts– from the vicinity. So it was done with the help of Manny Flores of the local North Valley Caring Services, who arrived with red backpacks stuffed with tarps, food and plenty of warm winter wear.


Craig, always the most demonstrative, was profuse in his thanks for a new winter coat, a big improvement over the jacket which had left him, in Terry’s words, “shaking like a wet mouse… without teeth.” He said it with a smile and a cuff on the shoulder, everyone feeling a bit better banding together holding hot coffee. Craig gets good-natured ribbings like this from the others at times, like the brother who is not above being teased. Manny called a contact he had at the Mission Hills Police to see if the ban on sleeping under the bridge could be relaxed until the rains passed. He reported that yes, he had been told that officers would not press the matter. Everyone seemed skeptical, with Craig relating loudly that Officer Diaz had been emphatic that there were no ifs, ands or buts about it. Everyone seems to believe that it is just this particular bridge that is off-limits, though no one wants to relocate to the Plummer underpass a half-mile north, where there are no freeway ramps and anyway it’s a huge ordeal to move that far, especially in this weather.

The recent incarcerations weigh heavily on the group, and Linda, living almost snugly now after combatting leakages all night, was content to stay put. She and Gracie both have small candles burning in their tarp-roofed abodes. They were both indoors this morning as the latest torrents beat down; Linda contentedly back at work painting small objects with glittery nail polish, pleased with a news shade of green Gracie recently brought her. Gracie herself was more restive, managing to put on a welcoming, friendly face for me when I stuck my head in. Noticeably feeling the weather, she told me she had been in custody for an entire week, due to what she alluded might have been a harsher judgment than some others received … Meanwhile Mike, under the awning with the other guys, vented boldly that he would like nothing more than to take a swing at the officer who had locked him up.



A more thorough report would provide the reader with details of the health conditions of this group. Though much younger than either Linda or Gracie, Amy’s situation is the most dire at the moment. She had taken shelter inside Jack-in-the-Box this morning, suffering from the flu and now, according to Terry, determined to kick her habit. A lot of negative influence and peer pressure from others in their realm will continue to make that a difficult proposition, Terry knows.

In their own words, members of the homeless community of the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles tell a little about their lives, and share their thoughts about the status and stigma associated with being stuck on the bottom rung, economically speaking, of our society … each portrait in this gallery features a link to an audio recording.

Much of society ends up treating the marginalized outdoor people differently in ways that are, intentionally or not, dehumanizing and sometimes even darkly comical. Our culture dictates that there can not be enough collective will and inspiration to find solutions that outweigh the costs; how can the average citizen, not to mention those who live tangled in safety nets, be expected to understand the intractable economic inequalities and social injustices this breeds?

Most self-respecting homeless folks in the San Fernando Valley know about the generous feasts offered at St. Nicholas Episcopal Church in Encino. Photography is not allowed at the Tuesday night dinners, I learned from a tall, deep-voiced gentleman who sidled over to me with the muted warning. Minutes later a young, fit man with slicked black hair, matching black clothes and a plastic-coated identification badge pinned to his pocket approached me with the demeanor of a no-nonsense bodyguard. Without a greeting, I was told to delete whatever photographs I had taken. With some impatience he immediately offered to delete them himself. Instead, like an idiot photographer I told him I knew how to operate my equipment, and showed him the few randomly composed snapshots I had taken of the crowded room. He was about to repeat his order when I told him why I was there. His tune changed quickly upon learning that I had come mainly to introduce myself to the pastor and learn about the dinners. He seemed as skeptical as he was apologetic when telling me that he had thought I was one of the “clients.” I imagine he had been watching me mill around the crowded dining room, chatting, maybe acting a bit too comfortable. When, as sometimes happens, I’ve been mistaken for a member of the homeless community, I find it disconcertingly humanizing. Orders to delete my photographs ceased.

Attention turned to Shane, in his 40′s a playful, lunkish Bill Murray kind of guy I met at a community breakfast at the North Valley Caring Services months earlier. We had a jolly reunion under the circumstances, until cold water was thrown on it when Shane himself was admonished, even though this was several minutes since he had used his own cellphone camera to make a selfie of us. The friendly Polish-American with the bull neck and shoulders didn’t take kindly to what seemed at the moment an unnecessarily strict rule. He snapped back, keeping himself in check though fuming, and for a moment could not be placated. “It’s OK,” I offered to the guard in our mutual confusion, “he’s my friend.” As though my credibility overrode Shane’s violation of the no-photography rule.
The guard, or whatever his official role is, was only reacting to the stresses that come with experience and knowing that Shane was just one of many in the room of 200+ experiencing emotional trauma and other issues, some bubbling under the surface, some on full display. The room was loud, conversations flowing freely, as men and women enjoyed a warm meal and a few hours indoors. Keeping the lid on is likely part of the job description, resulting in the occasional heavy-handed rebuke or warning … One can begin to understand why such a large percentage of homeless people prefer life outdoors to shelter systems and other institutional oversights. I compartmentalize the sadness of remembering Nancy, who when returning to meet us at a church breakfast where we were working on portraits and interviews last summer, met a harsh rebuke. Entering a side hall from the dining area, the aging, still proud southern former debutante was humiliated after being scolded for entering a section of the building that was off-limits. Weeping, she complained about being treated like “retarded kindergartners.” Goes with the territory sometimes, to be filed under tough love.
In an effort to mollify Shane and diffuse the situation, our guard leant in and apologized. Like a finger snap Shane was on his feet going for a hug. Life is better these days, he told me. Turns out he has found employment again as a waiter, something he had talked about enthusiastically months earlier. He’s met Wayne Gretzky at his Malibu café, and later texted a selfie he took with a game Cindy Crawford. Still homeless.
Listen to an interview with Shane, from August 2016.


“Most addicts will have similar stories – they are victims of rape, child abuse, and all manner of horrors. Many lack even the barest chance to get help, or any kind of family. I think what many fail to realise is that every man and woman has a breaking point. I’m no longer homeless, yet to this day it upsets me to see people ignore the homeless rather than give them money ‘to spend on drugs.’ If you’re going to be generous, if you’re that lucky to be able to do so, then do it without moral judgement. Those who use drugs will stop when they are able to, not when they run out of money.”
* John Doe, from an article in The Guardian
Update (Jan. 10-11) A chance meeting with Rachel and Rebecca on Sepulveda Boulevard provided some insight into what transpired back on December 30, and the fate of some of the principles…. it appears that the proverbial last straw was not a wheelchair-bound man’s tumble off the curb, but an incident in which one of the heroin users in the vicinity was found lounging in a folding chair on the makeshift patio her group had constructed on the southbound onramp, nodding out with a needle sticking out of her arm. Just then, if the story is to be believed, the local politician and their arch nemesis (and this is odd– everybody has stories about this man but none know his name or actual title)– happened by with a Caltrans worker. He allegedly vowed then and there to clean up the area once and for all. He had been raging and blustering threats to the campers for a long time, even, I was told by a Caltrans supervisor, considering having the homeless sprayed with a high-powered hose. So the signs that went up in early December, which were followed by the issuing of tickets, turned out to be not a bluff but a definitive strategy for clearing the area. Craig, at least from a pragmatic standpoint seemed impressed. “He said he was going to do it, and wow, he really did it!” What, how and with whom exactly our mystery protagonist did it with remains unclear, and could be the subject of some real investigative journalism, if such a thing still exists at the local level.
Contradicting what I overheard one officer explain on the day of the eviction, that if they had followed the law closer and not blocked the sidewalks during the daytime, they might have stayed, within the strictures of the existing and inconsistently enforced laws regarding camping on city property, authorities recently nipped in the bud any thoughts of re-establishing the camp, naysaying two small domiciles that had already sprung up on the sidewalk under the bridge again. One might have been Gracie’s, and the other one was Craig’s, identifiable by the large propane tank he insists on keeping for warmth, even though he has set a few accidental fires with it already, burning his own legs and hands in the process. Fireballs have been seen rising from his quarters, miniature mushroom clouds, Rebecca recalled with some alarm.

The words “no loitering” and “no soliciting” on “the entire block” on the signs planted with jackhammers in the sidewalks on both sides of the street indicate to Craig that the actual letter of the law (which allows citizens to sleep on city property between 9pm and 6am) no longer applies to bridges in general, or maybe just this city block under this this particular bridge. Still, just as plants sprout from the cracks, they are here. Craig, Mike and Terry are working the ramps again, while Amy reportedly just got out, Rebecca explained, because she had threatened suicide upon incarceration, but was inexplicably not sent for evaluation until after she was released from her cell several days later. Craig tells me that the two folks I had encountered scavenging under the bridge in the aftermath of the crackdown were wanted by the law, homeless grifters at least. They cannot be trusted at all, the word is out; in this subterranean world, there is a code of ethics, honor in poverty, even among thieves if survival dictates.
These days Gracie and Craig are waxing philosophically about their predicament. Craig has helped his friend and ally realize and accept that the way their presence affects property values and such makes their claims that this is “their turf” moot. Powerless they may be, but cleverness, luck, stoic determination and whatever lubricants can oil the joints between these variants are the currency. In the cold late afternoon gloom of this remarkable winter, unconcerned that President Obama would in a short time make his farewell address to the nation from Chicago, Craig boasted that he never got the stay-away order the others received, and is free to eke out his living and feed his habit with some sense of security. I ran into him just two days after seeing him in handcuffs, when he was the first one back on location. He explained how he parlayed a severe heroin withdrawal into an early, unconditional release. Showing a “get out of jail” card he was given by a police officer (really a standard-issue business card), he explained how he has been befriended and somewhat buttressed psychologically by the police, asked to at least help keep an eye out for the grifters, (still in the vicinity and sneaking in a few ramp shifts now and then). Officer Diaz in particular, who heads the homeless task force in the area, has been supportive, compassionate and reasonable with him, and is willing to take an “out of sight out of mind approach” to his transience as long as he stays out from under the bridge, no ifs ands or buts, rain or shine. Get a tent, that’s advisable.
Sitting on a deflated rubber mattress along the fence on the wide expanse of concrete that borders the northbound ramp, he spoke frankly about his heroin addiction. Craig assured me that unlike others in the area he was not a “junkie,” that is to say not all-consumed by the narcotic. Still, his need for the drug and a general sense of independence makes him, like so many others, reluctant to surrender to the strict regulations of cold-weather shelters. He spoke without a trace of desperation, buoyed by comments made to him by officers and others. He is a capable person. There are some people who would like to see him rise up out of his predicament. He appreciates that his better angels, and his intellect and reasoning skills are recognized, and that he is not considered a hopeless case.

Scratching the surface is the layer of inquiry that still seems too much like voyeurism, not leading to any solutions quickly enough. The prospects seem glacial. Society definitely needs to put a higher premium on finding lasting solutions to poverty and neglect.