- Hey everybody, I am here in the Haight-Ashbury,
and this is Mary Howe,
and she runs a homeless youth organization,
here in the Haight-Ashbury that's actually homeless.
- That's correct, yes.
- Tell me about it.
- It's called the Homeless Homeless Youth Alliance.
- The Homeless Homeless Youth Alliance.
- Yeah, we'd like to get rid of the first 'Homeless'.
But you know, all in good time, it could happen.
- They were in a place for 14 years.
- Yeah.
- Tell me about it.
- We had a really beautiful amazing drop-in center
two blocks up the street for like 14 years with showers and
a space where people could just be,
and couches, and offices and privacy and bathrooms.
You know, basic needs people need,
especially when they're on the street.
And we lost that on Christmas 2013,
and have been unable to secure a new location,
so now we're just on the street ourselves,
and do all of our work on street.
- And being homeless for a homeless organization,
I don't mean to keep harping on that,
- Right.
- But it's very unique and ironic.
- It's not by choice, as usually homelessness is,
regardless of what you want.
- You're right.
A lot of organizations may have started
where they're offering street services, and then they,
you're kind of like me.
See, I was riches to rags, riches to rags.
And you guys are kind of the same thing.
So they had a facility, and now they're out on the streets,
but it didn't stop you.
- No, not for one day.
- Not for one day.
- We did not miss one day of services.
- I think, let's start, we're in an iconic area,
for peace, love, drugs, hippies,
- Community, - Community,
- Acceptance - Acceptance,
I mean this is the Haight-Ashbury.
And it draws homeless youth, homeless youth travelers,
many of you know I have a soft spot
for homeless youth travelers.
Tell me first about the kids, the culture, this area.
- I mean kids will always show up here.
They show up by the hundreds,
probably the thousands a year come through the Haight
and search for something better than what they're leaving.
You know I always think it's a little different
when we're talking about youth homelessness and
I think a lot of people look at that
as a choice people are making,
and while it is in a way a different kind of choice,
they're still leaving something.
There's a reason they're making the choice they are.
You know I always say is it really a choice
if you've decided to leave home because you're being
abused or neglected to be on the street?
Sure, it's a choice.
But they're being forced to make that choice.
So people, it's always been kind of,
and there's no way to get away from the history
of what the 60s was here,
that they will have community and acceptance here.
And while that is sort of true,
I think the criminalization of homelessness and poverty
especially in 2019 in San Francisco is really harsh.
And it's much harder now, the amount of trauma
and violence and policing the youth are subjected to
on a daily basis is huge.
- Now,
twice I've met adults,
18, 19 years old, young adults,
who told me they left home at five years old.
Five.
Five years old.
And the reason was they were being abused.
I remember one kid, he told me, or one young adult told me
at five he felt so uncomfortable at home
he went out and lived in the car at first.
But then met some other kids on the block,
and then just kind of migrated or adopted
to the homeless youth,
and that became a culture.
That became his family.
- You build your own community and families.
- Yeah.
How do you help these kids?
I mean, I will get into how you help them,
but how do we, as a society,
because if we don't, I gotta say this.
There's no research on how many homeless youth travelers
become homeless adults, and there should be.
How do we stop them from becoming homeless adults?
- I mean I think there's a systemic problem
that's been created by our government.
I think homelessness was not by mistake.
It's a result of moving funds away from affordable housing
and programs that help people living in poverty.
We created homelessness on a federal level.
And until we can acknowledge that and change that,
you're not gonna see it change on the streets.
I think we as individuals have to be informed
and have to vote and have to fight
and have a revolution to change things.
But I think also as individuals we have to
do the work ourselves.
We have to acknowledge people.
I always say if you don't have money to give,
it doesn't matter, you have time.
You have that moment of time to acknowledge someone.
Time to learn someone's name.
I mean you know the person
sleeping outside your house is your neighbor.
They're just outside, right?
And they have a name and they have a story,
and I think what people don't understand
is the profound thing that can happen when someone
is acknowledged and seen,
can really change their self esteem enough
that they're able to do the next thing.
To move beyond homelessness.
But I think when we create a society that just
steps over, ignores, and complains about people,
they feel like trash, because that's how they're treated.
I think we do an excellent job in this city especially
at ignoring and blaming and complaining
and no one's actually building relationships.
To me, relationship and community and bearing witness
is the key to solving homelessness.
- I agree, and the second,
well there's been several people,
but the first person that ever opened my eyes to,
I don't know if you know Tanya Hall,
- Mhm.
- Tanya Tall.
She is the first person who started Housing First,
many years ago.
And she said to me, she said Mark,
in the 1980s, we created chronic homelessness.
There was no such thing,
and then we created an industry
to take care of chronic homelessness.
I mean it wasn't in the 70s and 60s,
there was nothing like we see today.
- America's really good at building fucked up systems.
I mean prison, industrial complex, all of it, you know?
- I think that needs to be a t-shirt.
- Yeah, what we're best at I would say, as a country.
- Yeah.
Now, you're just telling me you take care of a hotel
that has 27 kids in it,
and you're taking care of the kids all here,
you set up tables, and tell me about the services
and what you provide helping.
- So we do street outreach.
So we pack a lot of bags, you know.
Everything we used to have in the center
we take onto the street,
so that's socks, clothing, dog food,
human food, hygiene supplies,
harm reduction supplies, first aid supplies,
safer sex supplies, all the referrals,
people's mail,
we have a mailbox we get everyone's mail,
literally everything you can think of,
we pack it up, we go onto the street,
we meet people where they're at,
we give them what they need.
If we don't have what they need we get it for them.
Then later in the day,
so depending on who we see in the morning,
someone will be like I need this, I need this thing,
I need to get a birth certificate,
or I wanna go get my ID, or I just want to talk.
And we set up meetings to meet kinda one on one with people.
And that can be done in a restaurant,
or like, you know, if people don't feel comfortable
'cause everyone is always staring at us,
we'll get food to go and just go sit on the sidewalk
or in the park and just build relationships
and get to know each other and help people
set goals for themselves and we assist them
in accomplishing them.
We're not saving anyone, you know?
We're giving people the tools they need to save themselves.
- Oh, I like that.
And it's, you've kind of adapted
because you don't have a home base anymore,
which it's kind of cool what you're doing,
by the park,
- It is cool.
- Or going to a restaurant,
having a place that would have showers,
and storage, and different facilities to help people.
- While I think it's really beautiful how we operate,
I think, and it's nice not having to have a drop-in
that there's always craziness going on, you know?
And you're always telling someone not to do something,
but it did take away this moment that anyone
with privilege has, that the moment I have,
and I have this moment every day when I get off work
at like 11 at night, and I walk into my door,
and I close it, and I'm just alone, and I'm safe,
and I'm in my house, and I have that door.
And the drop-in provided that moment for these kids.
And that is something they now never have,
- Right. - Right?
And I think that it's really hard to understand how
important that is unless you have not had it.
But I always tell people to think about that moment
when they get home and walk into their house,
and really acknowledge the privilege that you get to have
when you have a door, because these kids never
have that privilege,
they never even get to close the door
when they use the bathroom,
or they never get to just make food or
if they're having a bad day to just have a moment
to break down about it, because someone will see them,
someone's gonna walk up on them.
You just have zero privacy when you're living on the street.
- Yeah.
Now a couple of things that you told me when
we were sitting in the park, your office,
- My other office.
- Your other office.
You talked about all the lives you've saved.
Or how you sat with kids while they passed.
And some of what you're talking about were actually
beautiful, I mean it's very sad.
- Totally.
- That somebody's dying,
but you were there with them being present.
- Yeah, exactly.
I don't feel like anyone, unless by choice,
should have to be alone going through
either the hardest or the best days of their lives.
So yeah, from kids giving birth to kids passing over,
I have been there with them
so many times I can't even count.
You know, and paying to get people cremated,
and having services,
and keeping in touch with kids for decades.
Like I've been here for 20 years and I've seen
tremendous change happen.
And I've also had my heart broken thousands of times.
- So earlier, you said you're not really a nice person,
you're just doing it to spite everybody.
- I'm doing it to spite everyone, yeah.
- And I'm stealing that.
Because people all the time say I'm nice,
and I'm like I'm not that nice.
So I'm gonna steal that.
- Yeah.
- I'm just doing it to spite you all.
- If everyone else was nice
I wouldn't probably have to do this.
- It's the non-conformist in you.
- Yeah, it is.
Yeah, I have to go against the grain.
- As we're laughing though,
I mean kids, they're all along the streets,
and many of them might not see tomorrow.
And that's the reality of homelessness,
addiction, mental illness, criminalization,
how cities, and you know it's not just San Francisco,
cities are criminalizing homelessness.
And that just is, wastes taxpayer money and does
absolutely nothing to help people.
- San Francisco has the most homeless blots on the books
than any major city in California.
- Can you explain that a little?
- Well you know, like here it's illegal to sit,
- Sit and lie.
- Sit and lie on the sidewalk.
It's pretty stupid.
- Unless you're waiting for a new iPhone to go on sale.
- Right, they can.
- Right.
- But.
- If you're a homeless youth,
- If you're a homeless youth you can't
which, I mean, it just makes zero sense.
Because I'd actually much rather walk by someone
who's getting rest sitting down
than someone who's been harassed by the cops
several times to move,
which is what you see all the time here.
I mean I've been cited for sitting.
Which took a long time, the cops used to be like,
don't worry, we're not gonna cite you.
And I'm like, but you should cite me,
that's the whole problem.
- Right.
- With the laws you only cite people
who are not gonna be able to pay the fee,
and then they go to jail,
and then they have warrants,
and then they can't get on the housing lists,
you know it's just like constant, ridiculous, game.
- So what do we do to fix it?
- Again, people have to be involved and have to give a shit.
And I'm not sure that people do enough, you know?
- How do,
- I have to have faith in the young people.
- I do too,
- That it's gonna get better.
- I, you know, I try,
- 'Cause we done fucked it up.
- I try to be that glass half full person,
I try to be very real about the crisis
that we're seeing, especially poverty and homelessness,
but I also wanna have a silver lining,
otherwise I won't be able to process it.
And that's youth.
I mean, kids today care.
They care about homelessness.
They see what we're leaving them,
and they're like we've got to do something.
- I also think young people,
I mean I have hope for them because I think also
young people are in the worst time in life.
I guess some people like that time in life,
I didn't.
You know like the teen years are fuckin terrible.
But you know there's a lot of bullying that happens.
And I think young people can translate that
and understand that what we do with poor people
in our country is we bully them and ignore them.
And I think when people experience some kind of oppression
themselves, they can, if they push themselves enough,
see how they in turn do that also.
Like where in my life am I oppressing and judging people.
So I have to have faith.
The young people are gonna do better.
- Yeah.
Where can people find you if they wanna donate or support?
- Well, wherever you're gonna find me is on the street.
But, we have a website, homelessyouthalliance.org
people can donate money through that.
- If you are local, help her get a home!
- You could buy us a building, is what we really want.
In the neighborhood.
- Yeah, in this hood.
It has to be in Haight.
- Has to be in the Haight.
- If you're anywhere watching this,
- Tax deductible.
- Please donate.
They're doing good stuff.
I have been in San Francisco for a week,
and almost every day
somebody is telling me to go meet you, so.
- Well I'm glad you did.
- I am too, thank you very much for
letting us interrupt your afternoon,
and thank you all for joining us,
and let's work together and affect change.
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