PHOTO/SANDY PERRY
Editor’s note: The People’s Tribune interviewed some of the leaders of the movement to end homelessness in Silicon Valley. We asked them: What needs to be done immediately to address the homelessness crisis in Silicon Valley? Recent studies show that 10% of California university students experience homelessness and 20-40% experience hunger and food insecurity.
Alma Rosas, Affordable Housing Network: We need to end landlord discrimination against people in the Section 8 housing program. The landlords have a freeze on renting to anyone that receives housing assistance. No one on Section 8 can find an apartment to rent, because either the rent is too high or the landlord will not accept them. Some people on housing are even forced to leave apartments they already have. Then they lose their Section 8, because they do not speak up to demand that the Housing Authority renew their certificate.
Mercy Wong, CHAM Deliverance Ministry: We need to open up empty buildings so homeless people can move into them. We need to build tiny homes for people that have no place to stay. We also need legal encampments for as long as people need them until there is housing for everyone. Everyone deserves a home, especially the families with children.
Pastor Scott Wagers, CHAM Deliverance Ministry: When CHAM’s Mercy Mobile visits the homeless camps, it is about more than mercy. We not only organize church groups to help the homeless, we organize the homeless to help churches, and everyone to help one another. We strive for the vision of Dr. King, a non-violent army demanding that the government abolish poverty. We preach power, the power we all access when we understand how precious we are in the eyes of God.
Rose Wallis, Low-Income Self-Help Center: They need to stop police sweeps of homeless encampments. People need a common place to lay their heads at night, a place to get food, showers, and resources. They need a place where they can find the things they need. Without that they can’t move forward, they are just living day by day, second by second.
Sandy Perry is a longtime housing advocate from San Jose, CA.
