Category: Homelessness

Amikas Emergency Housing Expo March 15 – 26

By Anna Daniels /San Diego Free Press

The super bloom of wild flowers in the most inhospitable of places–the Anza Borrego desert– has captured the attention of San Diegans, who are flocking to get a glimpse of this short lived phenomenon.

Closer to home, an equally remarkable blossoming takes the form of the cluster of cabins that has sprung up like wild flowers at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in North Park. San Diego has been the most inhospitable of places for enacting solutions to our growing humanitarian crisis of homelessness. Volunteer activists from Amikas have stepped into the leadership vacuum, displaying what can be done to address the immediate housing needs of the most vulnerable among us.

A way to change this:

to this:

San Diego County / City of San Diego are in the middle of a serious emergency shelter crisis. The Point in Time Count numbers for 2016 for the county counted 8,692 homeless persons, with an 18.9% increase in the number of unsheltered individuals.

Numbers from the recent count will not be available until April, but are expected to be worse. San Diego has the unenviable distinction of having the 4th highest number of homeless people in the nation – more than Las Vegas, Washington DC, Chicago and San Francisco. By comparison, Santa Clara County / San Jose reported 6,556 homeless persons in 2015, and came in 9th for number of homeless people.

By Dave Patterson / Vets for Peace

On a cold night in January I joined Stan Levin and Gil Field delivering sleeping bags to the San Diego homeless, what we call the compassion campaign. Dealing directly with the homeless is painful because there they are in our faces with their cold, hunger and suffering laid bare.

What’s surprising is the number of people with just a thin blanket that will decline a sleeping bag because others nearby need it more. How ironic that people with nothing can have more compassion than those of us with plenty.

By Women Occupy San Diego

San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer touts the 640 of 3000 miles of City street repaired during his 32 months in office. Good for you, Mr. Mayor, this shows you can accomplish something when you set your mind to it.

NEXT UP: Get people made homeless by the past 6 years’ replacement of 10,000 units of affordable housing by market-rate housing, vacation rentals, hotels, offices and retail OFF THESE STREETS.

Now that the Chargers have announced they are moving to L.A. — YOU can make that GARGANTUAN parking lot at City-owned Qualcomm Stadium into a network of SafePark (people sleeping in their vehicles),

COME INSIDE FOR THE PETITION

Issue of Homelessness in Midway Area Dominates Monthly Meeting

By Geoff Page

The Mayor’s Office was put on the proverbial hot-seat during the recent Midway/Pacific Highway Community Planning Group (Midway) monthly meeting – held on Thursday, January 19, 2017 at the San Diego City College – West City Campus on Fordham Street Room 208. (The meeting is ordinarily held the third Wednesday of the month, the Thursday meeting was a one time occurrence.)

The meeting started at 3:00 in the afternoon and continued until 5:00. There were not enough board members present to constitute a quorum but this was not a serious problem because no action items, requiring a board vote, were on the agenda.

At the end of January, members of the OB community are hosting the San Diego Yoga Festival, an event that has been in the planning since last summer.

The idea supposedly was initiated by a San Diego Police supervisor, Sgt. Yu, who patrols OB, as a method to clear OB’s parks and waterfront out. He told the San Diego Reader that:

“… I love seeing those people doing their workouts; the more they show up, the more we fill these public spaces with this type of positive energy, the more quickly transient gangs will move on…and I call them transient gangs because they gravitate and congregate in groups of 5, 10, 15 and intimidate people; they are no different than a gang.”

The mission behind the yoga festival has deepened since then, and as Katrina Thomas wrote in the San Diego Entertainer Magazine, the festival organizers are “, inviting teachers and participants from around the country,” and aim to place San Diego on the map in the yoga world.

By Women Occupy San Diego

Press Conference & Performance by the Voices of Our City Choir
THURSDAY, January 12, 2017, about 7:30-8:30pm (following Mayor’s State of the City)
Horton Plaza Park (Near 4^th & E/across from the Balboa Theater)

After attending the Mayor’s 2017 State of the City address at the Balboa Theater, Women Occupy San Diego, Voices of Our City Choir and other concerned San Diegans will gather nearby to share reactions to what he proposes as solutions to homelessness.

By Colleen O’Connor / Times of San Diego

Let’s cut to the chase. San Diego must have a new football stadium for five good reasons.

1. We have already solved the problem of homelessness.

The mayor has made it his priority this year; so that is fixed. Forget that the official count of those on the streets is now 8,700 — an increase of almost 3 percent from last year.

The city can and does just move them out of sight (so if you can’t see them, they don’t exist). Move them from downtown to Hillcrest. From Mission Hills canyons to the bridges and overhangs near Fuller Liquor and along the San Diego River. Ocean Beach doesn’t count because everyone there looks almost homeless.

No need to waste precious money on the homeless. Build a stadium. Let the homeless sleep in the old one.

Progress at Apple Tree Market on Newport

Community Beach Cleanup – Jan. 7th

Larry Himmell Remembered in OB Son’s Foundation

Local Muralist Puts Brush to Wall – Paints Storefront

Silver Gate Students Get New Crosswalk

OB’s Serial Sharpie Tagger – “Mama Bear” – Gets Some Press

Suspect Jumped into San Diego River in Midway Area – Refused to Leave Sandbar

Sensory Deprivation in OB?

Now that La Jollans Are Upset with Planned Flight Route Changes – Something Might Happen

Worries About the Eucalyptus in Loma Portal

Sleeping Toddler in Jeep Stolen in Point Loma Heights Found After Thief Calls Cops

COME INSIDE FOR THE STORIES

It’s that time of the year when media and press outfits turn reflective and ponder the “best” or “most important” stories they’ve published over the last 12 months. We’ve done something similar here after reviewing our archives from 2016, and have come up what we think are the “top stories” from OB and Point Loma for the year.

The “stories” are really news, photos, analysis and opinions about real issues within the communities of the Peninsula, a number of which have continued from last year. So, here they are, the top 15 stories – not in any precise order, but in some kind of semblance of importance, with the mostest at the beginning

1. Short Term Vacation Rentals

Definitely a hold-over issue from 2015, short term vacation rentals continue to spark an invigorated opposition from coastal communities – including OB. The loss of community that vacation rentals pose for Ocean Beach and other beach communities was explored here in The Loss of Community .

Editor:We received a report of police confiscating the blankets of OB homeless at the beach, we commented recently about Park and Rec crews removing homeless sleeping material from a tree in Robb Field, and below is a post by Anna Daniels who lives in City Heights with an accompanying video of trash workers removing tents and belongings of homeless. (If you cannot view the video, go to the original store at San Diego Free Press.)

Finally, at the end of the article is a petition being circulated calling upon Mayor Faulconer to confront the nightmare of homelessness. They are demanding Emergency Humanitarian Action to stop criminalizing homeless people in San Diego. It would be very Christian of him.

Did You Wake Up this AM in a Warm Home? Thousands of San Diegans Didn’t

By Anna Daniels / San Diego Free Press

The first of two storms expected to move through the San Diego region this week arrived last night with steady moderate rainfall here in City Heights. It was sixty degrees on the porch at 6:00 am this morning. The cats had taken shelter there and were curled up in loosely strewn bedding. I was still bed warm and savoring the first cup of coffee. Then I remembered this:

OB Boy Uses Savings from Lemonade Stand to Buy Backpacks for Homeless

A community has rallied around one little boy’s “Pay it Forward” project to create backpacks to distribute to the homeless of San Diego. 7-year-old Dylan Rodrigues of OB saved $120 he earned from putting up a lemonade stand to buy backpacks … .

Elizabeth Sullivan’s Death Called Homicide

Elizabeth Sullivan, the young Navy wife and mother of two who went missing 2 years ago, and whose body was found in early October off Liberty Station, was the victim of a homicide, police say.

Developments in Yoga Guru Death – Autopsy Results Weeks Off – No Suspects

The autopsy of CorePower Yoga founder Trevor Tice has been completed, but the results won’t be released for weeks, …

MORE NEWS INSIDE ………………>>>>>>>>>>