General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWhat If Unhoused People Designed Their Own Homes?
Unhoused individuals are often subject to about us, without us plans, which helps to explain what the industry calls the service-resistant. Israel Muñoz, who lived in a tent on and off for about five years before landing at Homefulness, explains that very restrictive rules kept him from traditional shelters: The people humiliate you. Thats a reason a lot of people live in the streets instead. At Homefulness, Muñoz feels part of a family, one that keeps him busy and away from his addictions. Here its not like, Im the manager, he says. If you got issues with anybody, we cancel everything and we sit down. The whole village.
Homefulness began over a decade ago by renovating an abandoned bungalow and has slowly grown with volunteer architects and engineers. Eight residents will welcome at least a dozen more once fully occupied. By Gray-Garcias ad hoc accounting, building it cost over half a million dollars. None came from the usual politrickster and philanthropimp sources, she boasts, but instead largely from the solidarity familya group, now numbering more than 100, of supporters and graduates of Tinys workshops deprogramming folks with race and class privilege. While donations to its 501(c)(3) are tax-deductible, Tiny insists, this is not charity. Its poverty reparations.
You dont get to have any agenda-setting power just because you throw down a bunch of money, says Cecilia Lucas, a lecturer in UC Berkeleys Global Poverty and Practice program, who has been one such supporter for eight years. Lucas says the model of giving helps materially secure people rethink your concepts of expertise and knowledge production.
Theres something really magnetizing about Tiny, says Lucas, who has lectured with Gray-Garcia. Tiny approached the appearances as political performances, arriving in character as a homeless person who starts going through the garbage bins. Once the audience is sufficiently uncomfortable, theyre let in on the shtick. Its a comment on how people quickly get called insane and seen as trash, Lucas says.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/04/oaklan-homefulness-unhoused-homeless-housing-townhome/
maxsolomon
(33,360 posts)"Participating in the design process" and "have a voice in management policies" is a tad more accurate.
"Traditional Shelters" are often run by proselytizing fundy Christians, so not wanting to adhere to those strictures is understandable.
Jilly_in_VA
(9,992 posts)they're frequently awful. Families packed into single rooms, roaches and rats, drugs everywhere. And many unhoused people have pets, who are often their only friends. They'll see to it that their pets eat even before they do. Pets are not allowed in most shelters.
maxsolomon
(33,360 posts)there's a range, no?
https://www.marysplaceseattle.org/
Jilly_in_VA
(9,992 posts)I've heard too many other stories.