H.O.P.E. (less)

Chaos reigns at the 405 and Nordhoff. Officer Diaz of the LAPD’s purportedly “compassionate” HOPE program has got a “hard on” for certain members of the homeless community there. This is exactly how it was characterized to me this morning, in remarkably similar language in separate conversations with Lynda, Amy and Terry. The small refugee camp that had once again grown into something that was appearing semi-permanent along the northbound onramp was forcibly dismantled a couple of days ago, and in what appears to be a coordinated effort  between state and city officials, sanitation moved in quickly with the LAPD.  Most everyone (except Craig and Gracie it seems) was once again ticketed, this time for illegal use of shopping carts. Terry and Amy moved to a nearby residential sidewalk, Lynda and Gracie to another, and once their carts were taken away, all of their belongings remained strewn on the sidewalks. Thursday (tomorrow), they have been warned by Diaz, is “arrest day.” How they are to move their things without the carts, is a Catch-22 level head scratcher…

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Stress and anxiety rule the day. Lynda, while still managing to show me her latest artwork, is now desperate to get out of this area, and Terry has plans to move their stuff to another location (which I will not disclose here for the time being). Being out of the jurisdiction of Officer Diaz they believe will lower the threat level to their freedom. Nobody is in a hurry to go back to jail.

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Terry showed the most frustration, sifting through their belongings which were organized to look like a yard sale where there was really nothing worth buying. Meanwhile today is Amy’s birthday; considering she was coming off a night where she spent most of Terry’s earnings ($70 on a bag of heroin), she seemed in a reasonably light mood a few blocks away at the North Valley Caring Services Methodist Church site, picking out a free bicycle with help from Manny, Jose Ruiz, Jr. and the others. Terry desperately wishes she would do what she has done before, go into a rehab environment and kick her habit; it’s a decision she has to make for herself and is apparently just not ready…

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This week’s events bring to mind what Gracie said during her interview late last year, which bears repeating here:

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Inexplicable?

It is unacceptable that such conditions exist, and that so many are allowed to fall so low. To sleep outside, no matter the weather, while churches, temples and mosques shutter their doors to keep them out. So much of the most passionate and inspiring writing remains relegated to the comments sections of social media activists. Why aren’t the professional media people trumpeting this humanitarian crisis? Inexplicable….maybe not. It could be that the media has done all they are entrusted to do, and have done it well. 

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There is no shortage of intimate and revealing photographs of want and despair, degradation and madness. Stories, too. What is left is for the municipalities and business interests to marshall the resources and strategies to end the scourge. The scourge– in broad terms, that’s how it feels when considering the ubiquity of urban squalor that has taken root. Those out there in the streets, alleys and cars tonight, who have navigated the social services and judicial systems only to land back on their feet in pretty much the same place, wonder when will real change will come …

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#oneofusarts #oneofus 

“I trusted people too much because of my Christian religion. People would just take advantage and advantage and advantage of me and say, ‘trust me, trust me, I’m a Christian also and lend me, oh I see that you have great credit, but my credit is bad. Can I borrow your social security number?’ This was an escrow lady that’s living in one of my houses right now. Well, it’s her house now. I had sold to her and because of my good credit, she was able to buy my house, but before she could transfer her name over to my name, when the market crashed and everything, she stopped paying me. So the banks were foreclosing on me, not on her, even though I had already sold her the house. It was a big, big mess, a big paper mess. Everything was done crooked.”

* Robert “Bobby” Delgado

reflections

bottom line

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Resources. Shopping carts and tarps, cardboard and polythene. Often-dirty blankets, especially in this weather. Another rainy night in store for our friends and others outdoors. Chronic homelessness is an apt title for the living conditions of thousands of human beings. Not unlike the conditions of refugees and other marginalized populations, as they work the days and survive the nights, frustrating thoughts of the glacial pace of real change in their situations are dulled by the relentlessness and the seeking of stress relief. Good humor doesn’t exactly abound, but is in evidence rain or shine. Who can say– maybe it is not so much an indictment of the officials and advocates and charities who are at least trying, but of society as a whole. Structural issues need to be reconsidered, but for that to be recognized society has to consider all priorities. It does come down to resources. Unless a person has made this kind of living a lifestyle choice, and is on a permanent campout …

One of Us

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This morning I visited the Holy Family Center at St. Charles Borromeo Church in North Hollywood, to deliver some items to Dori, one of the homeless women who agreed to participate in the One of Us project. (I wrote an update on her situation in my previous post). She was sitting with a few others around a table eating breakfast, and I broke the news that it looks like the exhibition at city hall is going to be cancelled. When I explained that the main reason was that I refused to allow their portraits to be used as office decorations, and was standing by my promise to them to carefully control the use of their stories and images, to ensure they would not be used in any way that objectified them or did not provide appropriate context, their reaction was to thank me for that. If you look back at the emails I was writing to LAHCID in November, you will find this to be a consistent theme.

When we started One of Us, the driving philosophy was to humanize the homeless by “changing the conversation.” No longer allowing society’s most unfortunate members to be randomly selected and displayed as symbols of a dysfunctional society that doesn’t do nearly enough to help them is part of that change. Unlike the good people at LAHCID, Dori and the others in the group this morning understood that while it is a shame that the stories we recorded will no longer have the high-level audience of influential politicians, and that this would have been a rare opportunity for them to actually have their voices heard by people in power, the more important principle must be given priority, if we are to ever truly change the conversation.

Perhaps this concept is too revolutionary to grasp; it is easier to fall back on tired and ineffective methods, including coveting images for their “value” over what they actually represent. What I was led to believe was a partnership turned out to be little more than just another one-sided power play. If necessary we will find other venues and audiences for these images and stories, with or without the real support of the City of Los Angeles.

Dori

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When I first met and spoke with Dori last August at the St. Charles Borromeo Church in North Hollywood, the most enduring impression was her cheerfulness in the face of great hardship. As her story printed below testifies, Dori’s life was shattered by a tragic fate, a brain aneurism which derailed her dreams, put her at death’s door, and still affects her physically and otherwise…   

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Revisiting Dori’s story today, after finally locating her cluttered but homey RV (a camper shell) parked for now on a residential North Hollywood street, I’m struck by how little she talked about her early career in music. She had told me about a song she had once written that was included in a high-profile movie soundtrack, but not much more. Today she shared an old CD which contained that song and five other well-written and produced tracks, recorded by the band she sang and played keyboards in. The music is lovely, her voice sweet and strong. As she sang along with the CD, it was still her song, still her voice. Dori also took out an old 11x14 portfolio that held several high-quality black and white portraits of her in those salad days, portraits of a beautiful and sensitive artist. There were also pictures taken with Rick James, Gary Wright and other luminaries of that era. Most surprising, among the memorabilia stuffed in the side pockets of the portfolio, was a card (a love letter really) written to her by Prince. It’s envelope also held a color Polaroid of Dori and the legend, taken sometime in the late-70s before he hit superstardom. She mused about selling it to some collector, but seems to have decided that in spite of her dire straits, it’s not worth it. 

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“Because of my aneurism I might forget some of the things you ask me, My name is Dori, my age is 58. Before I had a brain aneurism, I owned a spa called the Oasis Day Spa in Studio City and we did facials, massage, nails. I had about ten employees and I was working about eight days a week. And I think the stress of it all just got to my head. One night I was working in my studio at home and writing music and then I suddenly started to feel lightheaded so I went down to the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror and I saw this black blood that was under my skin and I had white circles through my eyes, then I just fainted and then went in a coma from that point.

I was in the hospital when I woke up … I came out of that stroke and was like ‘okay I have to get back to work.’ You know, I was telling everybody I’ve got to get to my spa because I just started it four years prior and I really wanted it to do well. And it was, and I was very busy that day, so my receptionist kept calling me and she said you always answer the phone so what’s the matter with you Dori?  So she came to my house and found me in bed with the two dogs next to the bed lying there and I couldn’t move so she called the ambulance and they took me into the hospital and said that I was experiencing a brain aneurism.

Actually I could talk or think about what people were saying but I couldn’t respond. So that was what the scene was all about for three weeks. They were going to take me off life support and then Greg, my ex-husband, came up to me and said Dori, I want you to know that it’s okay if you go but if you want you can stay. But they are going to take you off life support so you need come to and give me a sign that you are going to come to so I squeezed his hand and he said ‘I think she’s awake come on in,’ and they all came running in saying ‘yep she’s out of the coma,’ so get it out so we can get her going.

Now I didn’t have my business because it had died probably a couple months before I was out of the coma because they just didn’t know how to keep it running you know, which I understand. So that died and then I had a house that was going to have to be put up for sale, which I went bankrupt on. So I went into bankruptcy from that, and then I got an apartment, which I could afford because I was babysitting dogs on the side too as well as getting money from the government.

And then the rents went up and from there I lived in a house on Irvine. For six years I rented a room and he let my dogs in and let me do music and everything so it was fine but then he decided he wanted to sell the house. And when he sold the house, looking at rents and stuff and how much they are, it was so expensive I couldn’t afford it. So I got an RV. And that’s where I live now, in the RV. Since probably, six months now. The police say that neighbors are complaining occasionally because I was living with a guy that we’d fight a lot. And so he’s gone now thank God. I got a ticket the other day for being there for more than three days because the police had come. 

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I love the homeless people that I meet. To me it’s like another family you know, it’s a good family and the food is good that we get too because we can go to different places everyday and get fed. So that’s helpful. I’ve never been homeless, I never ever thought I would even be in this position. I get money from the government. Every month I get like $889 for disability. And then I’ll house-sit on the side and (watch) animals you know, which brings in a little cash. And that’s really what I live on. Six hundred of it is already spent with the storage that I have and that kind of thing.

My family, both my parents died and my sisters, one lives in Nashville and the other one I’m not sure where she lives. They don’t even know. Because I don’t know if they know how expensive rents are …

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Yeah it would be nice if I could write a hit song, that would be good. That’s about what I want to do now. And I have a whole studio setup. I’m trying to get the electricity so I can plug it in and work on my keyboards. But I’ve got 15 songs that I wrote on my own that are pretty good.”

A Bitter End

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It was a harsh and dehumanizing end to the encampment, inevitable under the circumstances. 

A garbled, hurried text message from Gracie, before she was put in handcuffs clutching only her phone and an avocado, informed me that the police were on site at the 405 & Nordhoff. Linda had already been taken away and others were also being detained while officers and Caltrans workers moved in to clear the area once and for all. That the bottom fell out of their tenuous little community settlement was not surprising. A miniature skid row had formed in the vacuum created by lack of cohesive and comprehensive policy. Proper intervention requires compassion for those members of the public often derided as bottom-feeders, and are in fact survivalists hindered by their own impoverishment, vices and bleak prospects. The sidewalks had become unbearably overcrowded and filthy, with trash piling up in bags and pooling up in loose piles against the walls. There were as many as 8-10 separate makeshift living quarters in use, and complaints from residents had increased. Students from nearby Monroe High School and other pedestrians were finding it increasingly difficult to pass. The tipping point, according to accounts from both the campers and the police I spoke to, occurred when a man in an electric wheelchair could not navigate past some of the temporary structures on the sidewalk under the freeway bridge, and toppled off the curb. (see update for clarification)

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The good-natured twenty-something leader of the orange-clad Caltrans team (ten or so workers) told me that he had tried to warn everyone that “something big was coming,” and it was clear that he was taking no joy in this operation. It was true, the oddly contradictory  Municipal Code 41.18 signs that had been planted on the sidewalks a few weeks earlier declaring “no loitering or solicitations,” and the tickets citing violations such as “illegal encampments” that had been written just days earlier were all a portent of doom for the squatters. Now Caltrans and city workers ripped apart the tents and other makeshift shelters, exposing a hoarder’s bounty of all manner of personal possessions, some essential, many not. 

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Terry and Amy were handcuffed, standing fifteen feet apart against the wall under the bridge. Stressed out, they snapped at each other like the old married couple they have become. Amy, who had been on yet another drug-fueled downward spiral in recent weeks pleaded for matches or a lighter so she could have one last smoke before being loaded into the squad car. Sitting against the wall with her hands behind her, she asked me to take her Chihuahua so that it wouldn’t be confiscated. The police agreed I could save the dog, which I ended up leaving with Rachel and Rebecca, who had a pup of their own. The mother-daughter team had been living in the most expansive tent/compound, on state property (the northbound onramp). They were being allowed to hang onto most of their supplies, including their tent, having convinced the police that they were going to receive enough money later that day to afford a motel room. They didn’t get off completely unscathed though, as the usually good-mannered and thoughtful Rachel lost her cool when told she couldn’t salvage her dog’s bowl, and injured her foot kicking a post. 

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Across the street, Gracie, Craig and others were being sequestered along the freeway onramp. Those with previous warrants like Gracie (”misdemeanors”), along with Craig and another man named Mike were in handcuffs. Sixty-six-year-old Gracie’s hands were bound uncomfortably behind her back.  Craig, apparently in the early stages of narcotic withdrawal, was completely despondent, wondering aloud what was going to happen now. After sitting slumped in a plastic chair for more than an hour, he told the officers he preferred to lay prostrate on the warm cement while waiting to be taken away. His posture led one officer to approach me and ask how my photographs would be used, well aware that images of a man laying on the ground, hands bound behind his back while officers hovered around, didn’t look very good from a public relations standpoint. I assured him that I would provide the proper context. Rebecca and the others sort of rolled their eyes, telling us that Craig, the former child actor, tended to be “dramatic” at times. 

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Still, it always pricks the conscience to see humans shackled… 

I watched as Gracie, and later Craig, were escorted in cuffs to where their things were, as an officer asked them what was essential, sifting through the piles of clothing, foodstuffs and personal effects for the items, stuffing them into black plastic garbage bags. Everything that was not salvaged would be trashed. I managed to find one last piece of Linda’s fingernail polish-painted artwork and tucked in my back pocket … 

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The police were professional and patient, for the most part displaying at least a requisite amount of empathy, bound as they were by the statutes they are entrusted to uphold, and their own daily involvement with these situations. “We’re basically social workers with guns,” one young officer with a military background half-joked. He spent several minutes explaining all of the various programs available through the city’s new H.O.P.E (Homeless Outreach Pro-Active Engagement) program, revisiting the litany of reasons why many homeless don’t feel comfortable or even able to stay in shelters or seek other forms of assistance. Watching a young woman light another cigarette, he expressed quiet frustration at Emmy Lu’s refusal to accept an offer to move into a woman’s shelter, preferring instead, even in her seventh month of pregnancy, to live in the street and indulge in bad habits. She was hurriedly and tearfully trying to gather whatever belongings she could pull together before their domicile was destroyed. Mike, her child’s father, sat on the sidewalk across the street with his hands cuffed behind his back, taking everything in stride with disconcerting calm.

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If anything this incident points to the serious need for consideration and thought on how to avoid these kinds of environments from being necessary at all… 

I rode back to the site on my bike several hours later, in the late afternoon, and found Rebecca and Rachel still waiting on a corner with the possessions they were allowed to keep. By nightfall they would be in a motel room … Terry, Amy, Craig, Gracie, Linda and Mike were presumably in the Van Nuys jail. Another couple, who had been living under the bridge for the last month or so, (part of the influx of new campers that Gracie had warned was making the place too overcrowded and dirty), was sifting through the meager remains, debris that had been left behind, deemed to small to be swept into the trucks. The man told me that they had “ducked out” when the law enforcement first arrived that morning, and had waited until now to return, to see what if anything was left behind for them. 

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As his partner Debra poked through the detritus, someone yelled at her from across the street, warning her to “keep your hands off that, it doesn’t belong to you!” It was a pathetic scene, heavy with portent. I asked Debra where they would go now. She glanced around furtively, and told me that she didn’t feel safe going anywhere after this. They had been warned not to even panhandle on the ramps any more. (Note: in a later post it will come to light that this couple Jeff and Debra, are among the lesser-liked for reasons legal and otherwise). It seems that there has been a shift in policy, though what it is exactly is unclear.  One hopeful thought to hold onto– one of the officers confided openly that he thought this should lead to a more cohesive squatting policy between city and state bodies. 

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Hard to believe that just a few weeks ago Gracie had stood in front of the North Hills East Neighborhood Council and tried to plead for understanding on just this issue. She specifically expressed the desire of the more responsible members of the Nordhoff group to keep the area clean and not be a nuisance to the community, which she said in her characteristically straightforward manner, “gives to us so generously.” Yet while she may have been listened to politely, nary a finger was raised on her behalf or on behalf of the others, and the alternative to her laying in the soot of traffic (lest we forget her respiratory health issues) turned out to be a jail cell. That we can’t do better than this for our most unfortunate citizens is just a low-down dirty shame …

the end is nigh …

Unusual for Southern California, winter came with cold, wet and windy weather. While several of the occupants of the 405/Nordhoff group were given holiday gifts of “Notice to Appear” tickets this past week, citing “illegal encampment,” the bad weather has actually earned them a reprieve from the impending evacuation of the area by law enforcement. It was supposed to have happened as early as yesterday.

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Rachel, still holding out in a tent with her mother Rebecca on the corner of the Northbound freeway entrance, explained that LAMC 56.11 allows them to stay as long as there is rain and temperatures below 50 degrees. That might give them a few more days.

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Meanwhile, Terry works the ramp, Craig compulsively sweeps the sidewalk, Amy and Shay discuss their dilemma while Linda sleeps off a very rough night under the bridge.  Alcohol, pot, meth and heroin serve to keep these folks down while also anesthetizing them from the harshness and uncertainty of life….

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Craig shares tips on how to create signs for working the ramp that will garner the most empathy from the public …

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“It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour.”

― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol


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The first day of winter, and for once Los Angeles feels like it … here is wishing that Isaac, Kim and their two hearty boys are no longer camping in a supermarket parking lot, and have found better shelter …

The internally displaced; our own refugee crisis, right here in Los Angeles. Pisces, Shay and Amy bide their time on a city sidewalk in North Hills, CA.

The internally displaced; our own refugee crisis, right here in Los Angeles. Pisces, Shay and Amy bide their time on a city sidewalk in North Hills, CA.