How Liberal Mayors Lie About Unhoused People

James talks to experts and advocates for San Diego’s unhoused population about how the city allows so many people to die on its streets and the dangers of California’s upcoming CARE court legislation.

Follow on Twitter: @homelessnessSD @cutecooper2 @objkshn @thesolution619

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hello, this is it could happen here and today it's
me James, and I'm joined by four of my friends
here in San Diego, and we are talking about San
Diegos lying there and how he likes to punch down
on poor people even though he promised he wouldn't. So
joining me today, I'm gonna ask you guys to want

(00:25):
introduce yourselves. It can spend a little bit about what
relevant background you have in the area, and then we'll
get into it because there's a lot to talk about.
So Mandy, would you like to go first. I'm Mandy.
I am I'm a homeless advocate and mostly do on
the groundwork mutually aid UM, and then I advocate for
them as much as I can almost city municipalities, UM,

(00:48):
and just organize that way great, And Colleen, you can
go next to us. Okay, Yeah, my name is Colin Cusack.
I'm a criminal defense attorney and I uh represent uh
proximately fifty homeless person's pro bono right now who are
sighted with the crimes of survival such as encroachment and

(01:09):
overnight camping, so I can challenge and have them to
quote unconstitutional Michael McConnell, I'm an advocate for people who
are living unsheltered or homeless, and I've been working on
this for about thirteen years. First part working within this
system as a philanthropist, advocate, volunteer, former vice chair of

(01:34):
the Regional Task Force on the Homeless. I'm a founding
was a founding member of a local philanthropy group called
Funders Togethered and Homelessness San Diego. I have participated on
quite a few initiatives such as a blitzweek where we
housed about a hundred people in three days, Cities Initiative
where we worked on any veteran and chronic homelessness created

(01:57):
the regions first by nameless for veterans. Worked on a
lot of unmandated CEOC Continuum of care initiatives such as
how we score projects to get homelessness funding. UH long
communicated with are endless elected official Todd Gloria, who's now mayor,

(02:22):
who's made so many promises over the years and so
many claims on homelessness. People just doubt almost everything he
says about homelessness at this point, rightfully so. And UH
probably most most known for my on the ground advocacy
now where I do a lot of in Camas support

(02:43):
work with of course unsheltered people, film the police around
in camera sweeps and enforcement of of laws that target
homeless people and continue that till this day. Nice Yeah,
containing a lot of work on the street. It's great
to see and the Levi's at least indeed, Hi you guys,

(03:04):
I'm LEVI gapone with homeful Solutions, UM. I have lived
experience and being homeless. UM. I also work with a
group of kids called Lived Experience Advisors here in San Diego. UM.
We try to hold them accountable and keep them honest.
UM and uh we're also able to advocate for uh

(03:25):
a lot of what these people need in the recovery process,
just beyond like, UM, housing, which is the main thing.
We know that the homeless problem is a real estate crisis. UM.
And then I also work as a housing navigator downtown. UM.
So I work with a case load of about two clients, UM,

(03:46):
about sixty or seventy of them. I would say, have
UM S, M I S and I'm down UM really
in like uh kind of one of the main areas
of town that UM, you know, we have a lot
of these people living outdoors, so uh, UM I'm at
kind of the front lines of it every day when
it comes to people needed to get a shelter bed,

(04:07):
I'm the one that they cry to, um, you know
when when they think that it's a you know, when
they don't understand that it's the system that's broken. You know,
I'm the one that they get yelled at. But that
gets yelled at, but you know, they think I'm I'm
not doing enough, you know. And um so it's really
interesting to be able to see all sides of it
and see the promises that get made. And I literally

(04:27):
have clients come in and say, oh, hey, look everything's
gonna be fine because the mayor just said this week
he's opening a new shelter. And I'm like, all right,
let's do the math. That's a forty bed shelter, right
and there's eight thousand homes people in the county, so
you know, and so um yeah, I have to kind
of break down that. It's a good responsibility, I guess,

(04:49):
to to break down the system to my clients so
that they can understand how broken it is, as well
as uh, you know, me being able to teach some
patients to get them through the process too. So um yeah,
that's me yeah, that's good, thank you, And so yeah,
I want to get into how broken the system is
because it consistently I think, like every time, like I

(05:10):
like to ride my bike around a lot, I'm always
riding around town. Often are running to people who are
in distress, right, especially when we ride past the hospital,
which is something we can get into, and they'll be like, oh,
just just call up what you sort them out with
a shelter bed and like, and then they'll have this
horrible moment of realization where they're like, oh shit, like
there's nowhere for this person to go. So let's talk

(05:32):
a little bit about Todd Gloria. Right, Todd Gloria's are there.
He's a democrat. He ran on a very progressive platform generally,
and what he's done has been extremely reactionary. And I
wanted to start just by reading some Todd tweets. Todds
of poster um. Perhaps not not as much of a
poster as Rachel Richel laying his I guess communications manager.

(05:55):
I think she has the soul of a poster and
will attack people working like Michael to help people, which
is distressing to see. But I wanted to Uh, I
wanted to talk a little bit about Todd, So I've
got a few quotes here June. Yes, I will be

(06:15):
the first to enforce the law against those sheltered around
sheltered who break any law. But I will not use
our code to harass and criminalize sick and poor people.
That's the number one Augusten. What if we chose to
take the resources we used to criminalize the homeless and
redirect them to building housing instead? What if Todd um
January in his tag Michael in this one. Maybe right,

(06:40):
but the sad fact is that this doesn't just happen
before the p I t C. That's the point in
time count of unhoused people. It happens all the time.
It's unfair to the unsheltered and too STPD. My goal
is to end chronic homelessness. The only way to do
this is with permanent supportive housing, not criminalization. Uh. You're right,
but that's not what you do it. Uh, Californians of

(07:02):
all political views, No, a homelessness crisis is a serious problem.
More housing and services, not criminalization. It's past time to
tackle this problem. I could keep going with these things,
but I won't go. I think folks get the pictures
so Tod talked a lot about how we don't need
to criminalize poverty, how we don't need to criminalize living
on the street. UH, and then has proceeded to criminalize

(07:24):
living on the street, right, and so maybe we can
just start with these sweeps sort of happened pretty much consistently,
I think since took office and UH people might be
familiar with a little bit, Like they may have seen
some of the bikes being thrown away that that was
like Michael had a video of that which which had

(07:45):
how many views? Now, oh gosh, I don't know a
million or more. Yeah, it's a lot of people have
seen that. But perhaps one if you would like to
describe like exactly like how a sweep goes down right,
Like like there's there's a process of posting sometimes the
process of personal notices, but you don't have two personal
notices because people are encroaching. Like what's this sort of

(08:07):
justification for it? And then what does that look like
for people on the ground. February fourteenth of this year
is when Todd Gloria's started his UH sweep enforcement. Um
it was unspoken, but during COVID UH they were just
killing people with COVID and instead of my police, although

(08:28):
the police were doing your own thing. UM. So this
is what the police do at the sweeps as they
use a series of unconstitutional ordinances, city ordinances only existing
in the city of San Diego. UM. And these unconstitutional
ordinances taken together make it illegal for UM anybody to

(08:50):
exist in public space. So me, our mothers, our children,
anybody in public space can be ticketed for these violations
because they're so overbroad. For example, UM, standing on a sidewalk,
just being there on a sidewalk, UM will be enough
to get you a citation issued if you can't prove

(09:11):
you have a house to live in. UM. These laws,
like I said, they're written over broad. They apply to everyone,
but the police use their discretion to only use them
against poor persons. The Vehicle Habitation Ordinance UM lists a
series of items that if they're found in your car,
police could use those to arrest you. And those items

(09:33):
include things like food, water, trash. So everybody with food, water,
or trash. It doesn't have to be all three, just
one of them. UM could be the objected to being arrested,
have their conford, have their taken to shelter, having their

(09:55):
children taken to CPS and all because um, the city
wants to come after poor people with with ordinances. UM,
so here's the fund. The dis ordinances can be charged
either as misdemeanors or infractions. Mayor Glory announced a progressive
ordinance scheme, which means on day one, say Monday of

(10:19):
the week, the individual is issued a warning. On day two,
the individual is issued a infraction citation. That infraction citation
gives them a day to appear months down the road
UM to contest the case. But the very next day
they can be issued a misdemeanor citation. That misdemeanors titation

(10:40):
also has a date months down the road the resolution
and then UM gave four they can be arrested and
taken into custody UM, all without ever having a day
in court. UM. The citations, if there are issued to
people in Midway or downtown San Diego, direct them to

(11:02):
appear in Claremont Mesa. It's about twelve miles away. These
are individuals that have mobility issues. They can't get to
and from court. They can't They can't really get to
and from the end of the street very well without
police starting to take away their property. Court won't allow
them to bring their property in with them. The buses
won't allow them to bring their property on the buses.

(11:22):
So they have to make a choice. Do they risk
losing all the remaining property that they have in the
world to go to court to defend against the charge
that they're really don't have the h The police can
cite either as a misdemeanor infraction. But when they site
as an infraction, that individual doesn't get UM an appointed

(11:45):
attorney and UM nor jury trial and so UM the punishment,
the issuance of the citation becomes the punishment process. We're
just just trying to get to court and take care
responsibilities becomes a chore, even if later it's dismissed. We
found out two public records requests that of the misdemeanors

(12:09):
that are being cited, are them are being dismissed. So
people aren't getting their attempt, their their opportunity to defend
themselves in court. They're all being dismissed UM and so
if the city was was serious about believing that these
individuals were committing criminal offenses, then they wouldn't be dismissing
them after of them after they were were issued so

(12:33):
colleens talking about the the the laws or the codes
that are used to used during enforcement sweeps of people
out here on the streets. So the police go out
and use these codes and municipal codes two write people

(12:53):
tickets and eventually take them to jail. That's just one
kind of sweet that's the enforced and sweeps. There's also
clean up sweeps or abatement sweeps. We call them homeless
and canment sweeps or homeless community sweeps where per settlement
with past lawsuits, the city has to post three hour

(13:15):
seventy two notices in areas. Then they come out with
the police and environmental services and clean up cruise and
they'll throw away all your belongings if you're not there.
So that's another kind of sweep. So there's actually two
kinds of sweeps. There's these clean up sweeps where they
throw away your belongings, and then there's the enforcement sweeps

(13:39):
where they just go out with sometimes, oh gosh, Colleen,
we've probably seen as many as fifteen maybe fifteen plus
police go out to ticket people in a particular homeless
community so and just put them through the ringer with
all these citations that Colleen went through yeah, and then

(14:00):
press LEVI are you familiar with the system? Right? I
think maybe the the idea here is that the police
are supposed to offer them shelter, right, if they asked shelter,
they're supposed to offer it to them. Can you just
explain about how that shelter could be extremely difficult or
impossible for people to access? Yeah? Absolutely, and then I'll
tell you kind of some of the consequences that UM

(14:21):
people face even or as a result of this. But
um so, basically, like let me paint the picture for you.
So UM our location as a drop in center, we
don't have any housing here on site. UM and uh
so the clients will typically there's a line out the
gate when we get here at eight o'clock in the morning.

(14:42):
At eight o'clock in the morning until nine o'clock, all
I do is shelter referrals. So that's everybody that's coming
in the door that wants to get a shelter bed
for that night that night. Right. We're doing this at
eight o'clock in the morning, and oftentimes I will get
one or two. Some days I don't get anyone into shelter,
um because by nine o'clock all of those beds are full.

(15:06):
And that's what they report back to me as the
service provider, right is is at nine o'clock in the morning,
there's no more shelter beds. Um. And uh. On top
of that, to the other thing to to mention too
is like, you know, the police are supposed to offer
them shelter, but um, we have like some kind of

(15:28):
like conglomerates as far as organizations go in the shelter space. UM.
So if a client is for some reason not allowed
to go back to that shelter, um, that's one pretty
much forever. Um and be it could be something like
behavior like they got anxiety and yelled at somebody right,
or it could be uh, someone who can't complete their
A d l S as they call it, um, or

(15:48):
like an incontinence issue. Um. So there's times where a
doctor will say, yes, it is sanitary and medically necessary
for you to use this little bottle or whatever, But
then the shelter will then kick them out and not
let them return for that kind of thing. So by
nine o'clock, the shelter beds are full. Um. In the beginning,
when the Padres first started playing, they were doing their

(16:08):
sweeps real early Um, now they're doing their sweeps, um,
after the time that I'm being told as a service
provider that the shelters are already full and um and
on top of that our shelter system, you're you can't
stay there during the day, right, So some of these
people that they're taking their stuff and throwing it away

(16:31):
are actually in shelter. You know, they just had to
take their belongings with them back to the streets where
everyone can see them every day, and and you know
all that. But recently I had a client who we
had spent like a month and a half trying to
get him in the shelter every single day and it
wasn't going through. Finally we got him in the shelter,
and um, a ticket for encroachment had come up that

(16:57):
you know, was not paid and he didn't go to court.
So even though he was and shelter in the middle
of the day, the police officers stopped him, they arrested
him for his warrant. He was in there all weekend
and he lost to shelter them. Yeah, so that's and
perhaps you and Mandy could explain then, like some of
the things, because yeah, under the guise of I guess
a clean up or abatement or whatever you want to

(17:19):
call it. Like often they're actively stripping people of the
things that they need to access shelter, to access housing,
to transport themselves around, right, and just what if you
want to take on like what this means, M, Well,
they'll you know, they do it under the guys, we're
gonna you know, we're cleaning up the area. UM. But

(17:39):
they will drag entire tents full of people's belongings and
put them in the compactor. They won't go through them.
They never look. Oftentimes there's medication in their ideas, paperwork,
things that you know, people have to have to survive. UM.
You know, people can't get housing if don't have identify vacation.

(18:00):
It's really difficult for them to get identification UM living
on the streets. You know, it's it's a process, and
that process UM sets outreach workers back. So you know
you've got an outreach worker who may have gotten a voucher,
got them an i D, and you know they've taken
their UM. It's called the espadat when they're entered into
the housing system and they're waiting a housing match, and

(18:24):
then their I D and everything gets thrown away, So
then the outreach worker has to take time to go
back and help them get another I D when they
could be helping you know, someone else get set up
to maybe get into housing. UM. You know, they don't,
they don't look through the things. This causes um so
much trauma for these folks. I've seen UM so a

(18:48):
lot of times with sweeps. UM Sometimes I say, they'll
allow people to gather their things and move them and
then they'll sweep the area. I've seen times when they
have had people gather their things, they moved their things,
and then the police surround their things while people are

(19:10):
standing there and they placed their things in front of
them while they are begging for their things, and they
will not let them have them, and they will put
them in the trash compactor in front of them. And
it's I mean, the only way that you can view
that is it's just punishment, Like you're not you know,
you're out here, you're poor, we don't have many options
for you, but we're going to do this to deter

(19:31):
you because we just don't want to see you here. Yeah,
Like I remember I was talking to someone downtown a
couple of weeks ago and stop to give some folks
some water, and like, uh, this person was saying, like,
this is the ship I chose to bring with me,
Like I didn't, you know, It's not like I could
take everything, and these are the things that I wanted
to keep because they were special to me. And yet

(19:52):
now now they're being trashed. Indeed, I think a person
was thrown in one of those bin lorries, right, yeah,
like inside their tent and just fucking unbelievable. And so, yeah,
we've established these sweeps are cruel. We've established that there's
not really anywhere for people to go, right, and that

(20:16):
they don't they don't provide a lasting solution to homelessness.
They just they just move people around and make it
harder for them. And so one of the things that
we do in San Diego is that we have this
thing called a point in time count, right, and I
think there have been some fairly credible suggestions that the
sweeps were increased in certain areas around the point in

(20:37):
time count. So is what if you want to explain
what that count like is and does? Yeah, so the
point in time count really only captures like one night
out of the year, people experiencing homelessness. UM, there was
a couple of hostitles even in UM that process this
year it was particularly really cold that night. UM there

(20:57):
were some tech glitches that should have been worked doubt
way more in advance. UM. But UM that really only
pictures like takes capture of one night. UM. The data
I like to often refer to because it just feels
more realistic to me is um our TFH. UM states

(21:17):
that in any given year, there's thirty thousand people seeking
assistance for homelessness. So UM, whereas our point in time count,
you know, shows one night. UM, there is data being
collected all year round. So at the point in time count,
you have a lot of volunteers, UM go out very
early in the morning. UM, they have them count the population. UM,

(21:40):
try to do some interviews with them real quick. UM.
The interviews are very personal. UM. You know, it's a
it's it's not necessarily something somebody wants to wake up
an answer at five am. But we found some people
that were, you know, willing to talk. UM. But that's
that's the point in time account and a nutshell okay,

(22:02):
And then like what's I know that Downtown? I think
the Downtown Partnership collects our own data, right, because the
data we have is very unreliable, what's our best guess
at people like maybe in the city who are unsheltered
at this time. I believe it's over fifteen unsheltered homelessness,

(22:23):
meaning that they're not in a shelter or you know,
some kind of program, Okay, in just and that's just
in downtown San Diego, not the whole county, okay, yeah, yeah,
So downtown San Diego, for people not familiar, is a
pretty small part of a very large county, right and
with I think San Diego has the highest ratio of

(22:43):
average income to property prices anywhere in the country now,
if I record correctly, it's incredibly unaffordable. And so this
has led unfortunately but probably pretty predictably, to a number
of deaths on our streets, right and four or four
last week if I recall correctly, or four in a
seven day period this August is it's hot. It's hot

(23:07):
for San Diego right now. And despite this, we've seen
this just like incredibly callous response from the city, I
guess where Like we've seen Todd, for instance, talk Gloria,
who's on there giving a speech in front of a
shelter where somebody's remains were taken away a few hours before,

(23:30):
and not mentioning that someone had just passed away in
that place. I want to talk to people about the

(23:53):
gap between rhetoric and reality, because if you were only
learning about this from the city and its Twitter account,
you'd think that it was fined right because he's posting
about these new shelter pits. But perhaps you can explain
how best that's to drop in the ocean and the worth.
It's a distraction from the problems getting worse. I think that, um,

(24:14):
you know, there's the reality that they want the public
to see, and then there's the reality that's happening. Um.
And they think that they're failing so badly um at
getting people into services because um, many of the services
just don't fit people's needs. UM. So they want to
paint this picture that all the unsheltered people that are

(24:36):
out in their tents, living on the street, or living
in their vehicles are service resistant. UM. And I hear
that all the time. You know, we asked them, they
don't want services. It's not that people don't want services.
Many of these people have tried some of the service
centers in San Diego, and the barriers are extremely high. Um.

(24:57):
You know, the check in time and check out time
can be difficult for people that are working. Um, they'll
separate families so um. You know sometimes the they'll tell you, oh,
you can go in together if your husband and wife
or if your partners, and then you get to the
shelters and they say, I'm sorry, you can't be together

(25:17):
because we don't have family space. So you have to
go to a men's shelter and you have to go
to a women's shelter. Um. They'll also do that with uh.
Say a mother has a sixteen year old son and
she needs to go into a shelter, and there's not
a family shelter. Um, she cannot take her son into
a women's shelter with her. He has to go into
a men's shelter. UM. So you know. Then you know,

(25:41):
people with their pets, they're only source of like love
and acceptance. You know, a lot of places won't take pets.
A lot of places take people if they're using substances.
So we've got all these boundaries that are keeping people
on the streets and no one's talking about at and
no one's talking about the fact that some of not

(26:04):
all of them, but some of the service providers UM
are profiting off of these poor people because they represent
state and federal dollars UM. So you've got shelters that
are run horribly, and you know, the more people that
come in, they just want to cycle them through because
that gives them money, and that pays their CEO and

(26:24):
all of their family members that are you know, working
for the nonprofit UM. And and these people because they're unsheltered,
they don't feel they have a voice, they don't feel
they can speak up because of retaliation. So they're just
constantly abused. And then you've got the city who's saying,
look at all these fantastic things we're doing UM, which

(26:46):
is is couldn't be farther from the truth UM. And
then they constantly use the narrative that folks are service
resistant UM, when in reality, the services that are out
there are too few and UM too difficult, and just
they're not meaning people where they're at and they're just
setting people up to fail every time. Yeah, as well

(27:07):
said another thing I want to get into with the
shelter specifically is these congregate shelters, right, and what in
the in the context of an ongoing pandemic that maybe
is transitioning into another pandemic. Can you explain what what's
a congregod shelter right, it's along way, but it's it's
what does it mean? And how are those dangerous? Especially
for medically compromised older people living on the street. Or

(27:30):
bulk of our shelter system here in San Diego, in
the city of San Diego is congregate shelter h meaning
people are just placed in one big room or in
some cases big circus type tents. We have a few
of those where people are sleeping in cots literally three
ft apart. So you can imagine how horrible that is
for the spread of disease. That's why we've had some

(27:53):
very large outbreaks of COVID in our in our shelter system,
and and they're frequently closed. The new intakes. I think
it's really important also to let folks know that, like
you said, if you live, if you look at mayor
glorious Twitter or social media feed, you think they're doing
everything they can and there's all these resources, but on

(28:15):
any given day, there may be a few dozen shelter
beds available for literally thousands and thousands of people that
are sleeping on our streets at night, and the only
reason there's a few dozen shelter beds is because they've
kicked some people out that day for a break in
some minor rules. Most people who leave shelter go back
to the street, so shelter is not a very good

(28:38):
pathway to anything. Roughly one in seven people who leaves
a City of San Diego shelter go to a permanent
housing solution. That's that's a very very In fact, under
Mayor Gloria, I've seen some of the lowest success rates
of our system than I've ever seen in my thirteen
years of working on this. Our our system has actually

(29:03):
is actually working worse than it was before Todd Gloria
took over. So he has done very very little, and
most of what he's done has been mostly performative, adding
some shelter beds here and there, uh very little on
the housing front. In fact, he's left tens of millions

(29:25):
of dollars on the table that he hasn't applied for.
He did not utilize a California funding stream called Project
Room Key that would have allowed him to rent hotel
rooms mostly on the government dime on our taxpayer dime
to get people off the street. He actually refused to
do that. He has refused to open safe camp areas

(29:50):
where people could go and camp and get off of
the sidewalks. Many of us and and others in the
community have pushed for real solution and for him to
utilize these funding sources, and he's absolutely refused to do it. Meanwhile,
like we stated earlier, he has deployed the police, garbage trucks,

(30:13):
and everybody else to go out there and make people's
lives miserable. So he's just been an absolute failure on
this issue. And at the same time, he's been the
one who's given the most lip service two solutions for this.
It is absolutely incredible what a disaster he has been for,

(30:37):
not only for the unsheltered community, but for San Diego.
I've begun, I've began saying that he is San Diego's
worst enemy. And and I just can't believe as somebody
who supported him, supported him in his election urge people
to vote for him. You can imagine how who do

(31:00):
winked I was. I just can't believe that this guy
has been so horrible for our city, and and and
every indication is that he's going to continue being He's
gonna continue running the ide into the ground and letting
people die on our streets at record numbers. Correct me
if I'm wrong, But but didn't when he came out

(31:21):
of the gate, didn't Gloria estimate how many people he
was gonna house under his term and did me low
ball at me, lower the number than than in previous years.
Oh yeah, that was some kind of was that a
state or a federal government goal that he set? And
he actually set a goal of housing people that was

(31:42):
less than we had done in the previous year. So
his his big stretch was to actually house fewer people.
I don't know if he's even I don't even know
if he's even getting there. I mean, this guy, this
guy is unbelievable. The kind of nonsense that he is
pulling on the citizens of our city. It is unbelievable.

(32:07):
But he has invested so much in pr and he's
got these folks who who are just good at spinning
this this nonsense to make it sound good. And because
he gets a lot of media attention, he has a
big obviously a big pulpit to disput this nonsense from

(32:30):
he's he's able to get a lot of people to
believe it now on homelessness, anybody who has a decent
set of eyes, it's basically calling bullshit. Yeah, I don't know.
I don't know a whole lot of people anymore who
think we're we're doing very well on this issue. And
so I think he's gonna have a harder and harder
time convincing people that he's worthy of worthy of re election,

(32:55):
are certainly worthy of a higher office at some point,
which is all he seems to care about. Yeah, and
more so so, he's personally to blame. He has personal
involvement of getting rid of ten thousand s r o
s single rental units that that if we had those today,
minus our eight thousand almost people, we would not have homelessness.

(33:19):
So of units that he was required to replace and
never replace them, that's his fault. I call him a monster.
I I was, you know, Kevin Falconer criminalized, but he
was a Republican. We expected it of him, and he
didn't tell the promise lest he was gonna end criminalization
to get our vote. Um. One of the reasons that

(33:41):
are probably the only the main reason that that Gloria
didn't didn't put funding into Project GROUPTI. Um was because
the city is in this unique position of owning and
operating the nonprofit that runs the convention center. So when
COVID hit, they were looking at non up at going
belly up because they couldn't put any events in there

(34:02):
and having to layoff all their staff. So instead of
putting people in hotels where they'd be safe, they put
them in a convention center where they'd be exposed to
COVID and would die. But the city funded convin nonprofit
would be funded. So um, that's just heinous and a
hundred and thirty two million dollars is what Todd Gloria
got the city to to pay out on a settlement

(34:25):
on Ash Street, his boom doggle He cost the stad.
He convite city Council to invest all this money to
slide donor money to his just slide city money to
his donors. For the listeners who aren't familiar with our
real estate griff scene, So, James, if you were going
to go buy a house right now, uh, you would

(34:46):
think it is important that you get a property inspection? Correct? Yes? Yeah?
Would you think it would be important to google or
seek out documents that may inform you of as best
as prior to your purchase. Yeah, I want to know that. Yeah.
So UM, these are two of the opportunities that they

(35:06):
missed when they entered this deal with UM. Uh with
the one on one Ash Street. Um. So they basically
had a middleman SISTERA come in and purchased the property
and then at least to own it back to the city. UM.
At no time was an inspection done. Um. The asbestos
was uh, people were aware of it, um, but there

(35:28):
was no studies done on what the impact was going
to be in all that. So now we've got ourselves
sunk into this deal that m is estimated to cost
taxpayers two hundred and two million dollars. Right, So I
punched some of the maths. Okay, And if you assume
uh one year's rent as twenty four thousand dollars, right,

(35:52):
twenty two hundred and two million divided by twenty four
thousand dollars is more than eight thousand people that this
taxpayer money, you know. And it's always it's just and
it's in a cycle, and it's it's not only the
cycle there, but it's also the cycle of we don't
have enough police, so they're bringing in more police when
we don't have the housing. And then the police that

(36:14):
we do have are working overtime to pick up shopping
carts and throw away tens. You know. So, um so
the astreet deal, there's plenty to google on it, but
it is it is uh like historically going to go
down in in San Diego. Screw ups for sure. Yeah,
it's a giant monument to grift go ahead, but we
don't have any police. Is also more gaslighting. We have

(36:37):
plenty of police. When I started practising law thirty years ago,
two police officers would show up at the scene. Now
at least six police officers show up every single time.
We have an overblight of of police, and we could
afford to lay off two thirds, agreed, Yeah yeah, but
instead we just built childcarecenter for them. Yeahs back on

(36:59):
that quick about the police. Um, one thing that I
think they also push the narrative that you know, there's
this hot team, the homeless Outreach team that the police
they never take water, they never really take anything, um
And they search for unsheltered people and they have these

(37:20):
pop up events and they rarely get any traffic to
these things, and people often wonder why, Um, we cannot
expect unsheltered people to trust and accept help from the
same people that criminalize them, terrorize them, harass them and

(37:40):
throw their things away. Um. So you know, adding more
police to deal with homelessness, Um, it's just also a
waste of money. It caused more trauma to the unsheltered people,
and it's completely unnecessary. So we're talking about this duality

(38:13):
between like what said and what what what exists on
the street, right, And it's it's very apparent people on
the internet love to be wrong about George or well.
But I think like the one time recently where I
felt that like, oh well would be a useful things
to deploy. Is the idea of a care court, like
which is the thing that has been very strong on

(38:34):
to Gavin Nuisance. First, Right, courts, in my opinion, don't
care about people. It's not their role. Can someone explain
what a care court is and why it's relevant in
this setting. So the framework of this is you have
a bunch of um liberals in Gloria and Gavin Newsom's

(38:55):
ear saying we have to we have to end homelessness,
and the politicians are saying, oh, well, we can't and
homelessness because they're all mentally ill drug users. Okay, so
that's the first premise that we're working with, and they're not.
Ten are used drugs in a mental illness and debilitating
to an abilitating extent in the homeless population. Um, and

(39:19):
the drug use uh is parallels the rate of drug
use in the house community. We don't take houses away
from drug users who are housed and make them get
sober before we return their houses to them. So requiring
that they be sober beef before we get a house
is asked backwards. Um, we have to get them into

(39:39):
housing first. Now, the care court is set up just
to pass more money to their donors. That's all it's
set up to do. It's not gonna ease anything. It's
gonna set up a situation where a person is considered
gravely disabled, then they can be put into a conservatorship.
And grave disabled is defined as unable to provide shelter

(40:03):
for oneself. So essentially, everybody who is poor is now
gravely disabled, and the rich who got them in this
position can make all the decisions for them. I'm very
passionate about this. Because it's it's cruel, and it's it's
it's it's essentially the return of all the institutionalization that

(40:24):
was set set turned off. The whole reason that you know,
Reagan got every get everybody released from the prisons because
of the mental illness, but he never paid. There was
never any payment into community mental health services. So um,
now they want to return them to the institutionalization after
never providing any street a sufficient street um services for them.

(40:46):
And that's that's just cruel. Yeah. And so with the
whole care court plan, there's like a few very large
holes in it. One is that it does not mention
that there is any housing uh stipulation at all, So
it does not say that the conservator must provide them shelter. Um.

(41:07):
The checking guidelines are once every thirty days, which is
about like the same time period that we have them
checking with their case managers. Is at least once every
thirty days. Um. And they also try to try to
tell it like, um, well, it's it could be temporary, right,
like once they get better, then they'll be off the conservatorship.
And what that says to me is it's like okay,

(41:28):
you force them into treatment and then once they get
kicked out of treatment, you say, okay, they're healed, and
then you know they're back away from their services. And
I've had clients who thought maybe a conservatorship is right
for me. I've had clients like begging where they're like,
I just can't do stuff right, like you know. Um.
And I had one client specifically asked me to be

(41:49):
her conservator, and I care about her so much, UM
And if I thought that her having a conservator would
really benefit her, then absolutely. But as of right now,
there's no difference in um, whether a conservator can get
somebody shelter better than me as a service provider, or
if they can get them into a treatment program better
than a service provider. Now, Colleen was talking about how

(42:11):
only ten percent of our homeless population has a drug addiction,
but in San Diego County as a whole, fifteen percent
of Sandy agains have a substance use issue. Right my time,
percent was debilitating a debilitating Uh yeah, okay, good to clarify, um.
But so that being said, fifercent is way more than

(42:32):
our homeless population. Those aren't the only ones with substance use.
But if you're on medical right, if your low income
and low income in in San Diego as anyone making
less than seventy six thousand dollars per year UM, which
is a lot more people than they realize. If you
are low income UM until bumping just because if you're

(42:54):
low income. But I have some memes here. I want
to point some facts on the Care Court care to
address houselessness, but of its sixty five million dollar budget,
zero will go to housing and zero will go to
mental health services. That's shocking. Zero to mental health services
are housing care cord will weaponize its unchecked power and

(43:17):
worse than historical violence against black and ground communities, and
care Court claims to address mental health ability disabilities, but
allows a judge to rub anyone they find unfit of
autonomy over their health, home, and life. Yeah, and I
did remember my thoughts. So um, like the people on
medical um there as far as detox facility goes, like

(43:41):
we already know fentin als and everything. Now, even if
somebody thinks they're gonna coke or or whatever they think
it is, typically there is fvent al in it. So um,
anyone who does wish to go through a detox um
it's impossible to get them bets, Like I have clients
who come in they're like, please, I know, I know,
I gotta get worked this out of my life. And

(44:02):
I'm gonna try. Can you get me into detox and
we will spend the whole day, you know, And and
and there's one and like all these people are competing
for maybe one bet at the detox facility. So if
it was like we had the infrastructure set up and
we had this awesome mental health care and we have
these awesome like street medics and street therapy, and we

(44:22):
had okay, and everyone in the Conservative ship is gonna
be housed at this place like then then maybe. But
like this whole thing, it's just it's it's a load
of crap. So believe if we had if we had
all those things, if we had a good system that
had good substance use treatment, good mental health care, and housing,

(44:45):
we wouldn't have all these folks on the street. Amen.
So it's kind of interesting that they're they're creating something
to solve an issue that they don't have the infrastructure
to solve. But I think it's important to note that
care Court is a conservatorship, but we already have conservatorship

(45:05):
laws on the books conservatives laws, they're very strict. It's
a very high threshold to get somebody conserved currently for
good reason. You're taking away somebody's civil You're taking away
somebody's right to make their own decisions, is what a
conservatorship is. But for some folks that are gravely disabled

(45:26):
and and impaired, it is the best thing to do.
It's for you know, for very few people. But but
the the city attorneys and the people in the hospitals, uh,
the workers, Uh, they don't want to go through it
because it is very difficult and challenging, and oftentimes the judge,

(45:49):
the judge will deny it because that's how how important
it is for people to have these civil rights. So
sometimes even have to do a multiple times with somebody
who probably you know, who may actually need it. And
I speak from firsthand experience of helping people you know,
go through this process and try to you know, and

(46:10):
and trying to get a conservatorship on somebody who just
really really needs it. Care court would lower that threshold
so much, I I doubt it's legal. I'm sure it's
gonna get challenged in court. It it is such a dangerous,
dangerous leap against our civil liberties or civil rights. Uh

(46:33):
that I I just am gonna find it incredible if
if judges allow this to move forward when it's challenged. Uh.
But the main point is that people need help. They
need care, not court and if we would provide the care,
which are elected officials don't want to do. I think

(46:54):
this is just a cop out on their part. I
think this is this is this is the elected official saying, uh,
we have failed, so we'll just pun it to the
courts and let them take ownership and control of this,
which in effect, the courts are just kicking it to
the counties because the county is are behavioral health provider

(47:17):
who's gonna have to provide these services and be responsible
for these folks. I think this is gonna be set
a train wreck. But the one thing it is illuminating
is that our behavioral our behavioral health system is so broken,
so dysfunctional, that they would even be trying to do this.

(47:42):
I think it's basically a an indictment of our system
and but care courts not going to fix anything. That's
and I think it's setting people up for failure. I've
talked to some families who are who are really. Now,
these are house folks who have uh seriously mentally ill

(48:06):
loved ones, whether it's spouses or children, UM, siblings. They
see this as a silver bullet two get care for
these their loved ones. And maybe it works better for
that segment of the population because they have somebody, they

(48:28):
have a loved one as an advocate to make sure
that the care is the care is the focus. But
for for unsheltered folks, they're gonna be abused and used
by this system. Uh maybe warehoused. Who knows, they're gonna
end up worse off in my opinion, And so I

(48:50):
for one, am against it as it's written, and certainly
fear that the implementation of it is going to be
a travesty. Uh that I just can't imagine. I can't
imagine that this so called liberal state uh would try

(49:11):
to trample the rights of people like this. And oh boy,
I tell you it's there's so much dangerous about this
that I mean, we could we could have a whole
show talking about this and maybe and I'm sure there
will be a lot of talk about this down the road.
Yeah yeah, I think they will, all right. So what
I want to do is focus a little bit to

(49:34):
finish up here on some solutions. So the things that
a lot of you guys are doing right now to
provide people with help, to provide people with the basic
necessities of living a dignified existence, and like how the
state could do better? Right? Like what what housing first
solutions look like? What solutions are informed by evidence rather

(49:56):
just informed by sort of cruelty and the desire to
brush the problem aside. What do those look like? Well,
I think you have to you know, you can't expect
people to get well living on the street, so you've
you've got to get them inside UM and congregate shelters.
We've already talked about why those are so problematic on
so many levels. UM. There is a model in San

(50:17):
Diego that's being used by a nonprofit UM where right
now it's only for elderly UM individuals. It's called Housing
for the Homeless, and they put UM unsheltered elderly folks
in hotel rooms and it's had tremendous success. For some reason,
it cannot get funding city or UM county funding. UM.

(50:40):
But getting these people off the street and out of
survival mode is first and foremost, and then you've got
them in a stable place so that services can find
them when they need them. They can get the health
care they need, they can get mental health services. UM.
You know, we need to bolster our our rehab an

(51:00):
addiction UM services. We also need more harm reduction UM.
You know, it can take you one to three weeks
to get in just a detox at McAlister, which is
the only UM detox center in San Diego south of Incionidas,
and detox is separate from UM, so we living. So

(51:21):
you made detox, and then it may be another one
to three week way to UM get into Solver Living,
which is just enough time to get turned back out
on the streets and relax again. UM. And after that,
even there's no housing at the end of the tunnel,
so you know, really the biggest thing that we're missing
is housing UM, and then everything else trickles down from there. UM.

(51:45):
You know. Just building these relationships with people so that
they can can trust that you're on their side and
you're not going to lie to them, give them emptie promises,
or or use them in some way to uh, to
monetize them for yourself is one of the biggest things
that I've found of importance for me as an on
the ground UM, you know, outreach worker and doing mutual aid. UM.

(52:06):
You know, most of the time, these people just don't
have water. You know, they're they're thirsty, they're hungry, UM.
And that's what poverty looks like. UM. So I think
we've you know, we've got to get these people inside
UM immediately, and then we start deploying the resources to them,
UM to help them recover from the trauma you know,

(52:28):
on the street or you know, whatever trauma led them
to be in that situation. UM. I think people often
forget that a lot of folks on the street. UM.
You know, there's the foster to the streets pipeline, there's
the jail to the streets pipeline. UM. So you know,
many people don't end up on the streets because they

(52:49):
have family to help them. And a lot of these
folks on the streets they don't have any family members.
So UM. You know, as a community, we need to
step up and be their fan. So that that's great,
and I think I think we we have to understand
that the homeless service system, and I'm gonna talk about

(53:10):
some of the good things that are happening because I
think that's it's important for people to know there's a
ton of stuff happening, both grassroots all the way up.
But it's important to understand that the homeless service system
can only do so much. As as Manny was talking
about these pipelines that feed homelessness, people are becoming homelessness.
I've never seen so many new people out here on
the street in my work. I'm on the street some

(53:31):
part well a lot of the every day, and I'm
seeing more new people than I've ever seen in my
last thirteen years. And there's all these feeder systems. It's
it's child welfare, it's foster care, it's it's criminal justice,
it's the education system. You know, you can name it.
It's it's uh, the health care system. All these things
are feeding homelessness. It's the it's the how we've commoditized housing,

(53:54):
it's I mean, I can go on and on talking
about what's feeding homelessness. It's the lack of safety nets,
it's a lack of good mental health care and substance
use care. So homeless services cannot control these things up above.
These systems, these billion dollar systems that are feeds that
are failing people and feeding homelessness what homeless services system is.

(54:16):
And I like to say they've got a lot of
mission creep going on here, because ideally they really should
be focused on getting people into housing and out of homelessness,
but they've become this this big system that's uh is
really getting very costly to feed, and it's very inefficient
and effective. But we know what solves homelessness. Housing and

(54:36):
services solve homelessness, period and it works. We see when
these new quality projects like Zephyr or Trinity place these
these housing uh they're not projects, they're housing. They're housing
with services, so we call them projects, but they're just
like any other apartment building really, except they have supportive

(54:58):
services for folks and they work extremely well. They have
a N plus success rate of keeping folks housed, even
folks who have some who are disabled and have some
significant issues. And it helps provide that self sufficiency by
providing a deep rental subsidy and supportive services for folks

(55:18):
who aren't ever going to be able to take care
of their own rent totally themselves. There is no free housing.
Everybody who gets these these units pays their income, whether
it's disability income, social security retirement, whatever, they're paying some
money that's not free housing. People are helping themselves and

(55:39):
that's really important to say, and they're participating in services.
But once you're in housing, your participation in services rates
go up because people want to continue to keep doing
better and stay in the housing. These things are being built,
they're being built as we speak, but at a snail's pace.
And that's the things that I fault are elected leadership

(56:02):
for is they're nibbling around the edges. So Todd, has
Todd Gloria done some some good things, a few, but
they're so small and he blows them up to like
he's solving something and he's not. Has the county done
some good things? Yeah, they've actually done more good things
that I've ever seen them do, but it's still not
anywhere close to the pace that we need. They've opened

(56:25):
up some mental health crisis centers that are actually walk
in centers. They put together some mental health crisis teams
that respond to a small percentage of cases of when
you call. But it is helping. All of these things help,
but they need What really needs to be done is
the things that we know work need to be taken

(56:46):
to scale. But we have to also understand the challenges
of that. We can't just fault the elected officials for
some things they don't have control over. As we all know,
there's it's hard time. It's a hard time hiring people.
So we need a lot more staff that work with
that are providing mental health services and substance use services.

(57:08):
But we won't get there. And this is where the
elected officials have have a lot of fault is they've
really not put a priority in on this issue. And
this is where there's the biggest disconnect. On one hand,
you have Todd Gloria constantly saying how this is his
number one issue. On the other hand, his actions don't
show that. I'm a big believer in in bicycle safety

(57:32):
and safe roads and things like that. But he seems
to put more importance on a bike lane than he
does solving homelessness. And they're both important. But we have
five people dying on our streets because they're homeless. That's
you know, he he needs to put He needs to
back up his his talk with action. Just like you know,

(57:57):
they're they're expanding some bike lanes and I think that's great. Uh,
I think they need to do it a lot smarter.
Because some of them don't seem to be that safe
to me. But that's a whole another show to involved in.
But they don't seem to be very strategic to me,
and they just don't seem to be very They don't

(58:17):
seem to care. They seem to be more interested in
hoodwinking the public so they can get their next job.
We need people who care mostly that care about people,
but also care about spending our money efficiently and effectively.
But some of the grassroots stuff, like I say, getting
people into hotel rooms and then getting into housing is

(58:38):
a good pathway. The county opened a small shelter I
think it's forty four beds or so. It's the first
small shelter that they opened that's really more tailored towards
people with substance use and mental health needs. It has
a great uptake rate and and and the feedback from
people on the streets is good. So here we have

(58:59):
something that the county did that was good. We need
a lot more of them. But instead they're opening another
jumbo tent. So these things are very frustrating to folks
like myself and Mandy Felleen. The different people that the
people who are actually on the ground working that are
trying to get people into the assistance. We know what

(59:21):
we know the things that people will go into, including
substance use help. But whenever you try to get somebody
in it and you're told there's a three week waiting list,
you lose that person. They want to go, They want
to go now. You've got to be responsive to the
person's motivation in that moment to get the help. And

(59:43):
it's heartbreaking for people like Mandy and me who are
out there on the street and people are crying out
for this help, and it's just bullshit when these folks,
whether it's the police or the mayor, say that there's
the people who don't want help. It's really disgusting because
when you're on the street like we are and people
are pleading for this help and we can't help them

(01:00:04):
because it's not available, we know firsthand and we call bullshit.
We call bullshit on on the rhetoric that comes out
of these people's mouths. We know the people, We see
their faces, those tears are real, that pleading for help
is real, and we can actually help them if we

(01:00:25):
do what's right. And so, uh, we could talk all
day about some of the good things too, that the
grassroots people like Mandy are out there, um, just on
the ground doing We're not paid to do this. None
of us here on this call except for Levi. Levi
works within the system, and thank goodness for him. And

(01:00:46):
the last thing I want to say, and I I'm
always remiss if I don't remind remember to say this,
but I always want to send a shout out. This
is not the fault of the hard working people on
the street, whether you're paid or not. I just want
to say thanks to all of the folks who take
on this job, paid or not, to go out and

(01:01:08):
help people firsthand and try to do the best with
this shitty system that they're given. So there's a lot
of people who take very little pay they do this
because they care, or the volunteers who do it because
they care to help people. And there's a lot of
folks out there really trying hard to help folks, and

(01:01:29):
they are helping people one by one by one, and
we need to support we need we have to have
the support of the Todd Gloria's and the Nathan Fletchers
of the world and the Gavin Newsom's to do the
right thing and and to keep funding what works and
to quit doing what doesn't. And so, UM, I think

(01:01:52):
it's just important to round out by saying that, Yeah,
I think it's pretty good. Alright. So both of you
are out helping people. I see it all the time
on your on your social media. Where can people find you? Uh?
And how can they support what you're doing if it's
getting people, tend to getting people water that kind of thing. Uh,
tree start with UM, let's just go down and this

(01:02:14):
will start with Mandy. UM. I usually UM kind of
bum off of Michael for funding. UM because most of
everything I do, UM, I pay for myself. UM, so
I you know, if he has he does a go

(01:02:35):
fund me and then you know he'll be like, hey,
I gotta go fund me money. And you know I
meet him and he like loads up my car and
off I go. UM. You know people can can find
me on Twitter. UM, I think I'm cute Cooper to UM,
I'm very passionate. So UM, you know it's like and

(01:02:56):
be careful what you look at on my feed. UM.
You know, I just I love these people, and UM,
I want to see them because they're all people. I
want to see them get the help and One thing
that Michael taught me in the very beginning of this,
because you know, I started this, um maybe about two
or three years ago. One thing that Michael said to

(01:03:18):
me that resonated with me, because you know, I was
out doing these you know, like I call them parades now,
which are like liberal marches, um, you know, yelling at
buildings when I wants in, and you know, then going
home and feeling good about what I did. UM. And
he said, you know, Mandy, he said, every single social
justice issue that everyone fights for, Black lives Matter, immigration, UM, disability, UM.

(01:03:49):
You know, all of these things come together, you know, UM,
l G, B, t Q, I A plus all of
those people are overrepresented in the homeless population, and so
it shakes down to that. And so I thought, you know,
my mind was like bloan and I was like, oh
my god, you know, I'm not her marching for people
and the most marginalized of them are living on the street. UM.

(01:04:15):
And there's very little help for those people because unfortunately,
whether what whatever marginalized group of you come from, when
you become homeless, that overtakes all of them. And there
is a huge public hatred for unsheltered people, and it
is my parson across the board. Um So we we

(01:04:36):
all just need to realize that this is, you know,
this is a societal failure and a social justice issue.
Um And I hope that you know, more people would
will get up and and get go to the ground
and start talking to your unsheltered neighbors. Try to build
a relationship with them, reach out to their humanity. Um
And and if you just do it with one person,

(01:04:58):
if each of us just did it with one person,
it would make such a difference. Even if you can't
get them in housing or you don't have a lot
of money, literally, just treating them like a human being
means so much to these folks. Yeah, that's that's very important. Kelly.
What would you like to say? Where can people find you?

(01:05:19):
How can they help? That was just like how to
find us? Right, I know, I thought it was great.
I welcome it all right, I thought it was really good.
Everybody should have a Mandy. Um. I my name is
Colleen Q. Sack c U s A C K. You

(01:05:41):
can Google me and find me. I'm in searchable on
the attorney directory. My number six two three or six
three zero and my email address is C another c
U s a c K dot policy at gmail dot com. Um,
and I'm on Twitter at symbol O b j K

(01:06:04):
s h N, which stands for objection. Great. Thank you,
all right, Michael. So, I, like Mandy, I've just funded
my work myself also except for about oh gosh, I
don't know. A month or two ago, I was out
on the street film in some sweeps, watching the police
and the environmental service workers throw away people's tents and

(01:06:27):
and I and I UM, and I said, well, I'm
gonna go get those people some new tents. And the
police officer told me, go ahead. We can throw them
out faster than you can give them out. And I
tweeted about that, and you know, I think it really,
you know, it struck a chord with people. So I've

(01:06:48):
had people offered to help before, but I've just had
this real outpouring of of offerings to help lately. So
for the first time ever, I set up a go
fund Me, and in the first day I just said,
you know, this is just to help support encampments that
are impacted by the sweeps or or whatever is needed,
and to support other grassroots people like Mandy who are

(01:07:08):
out there. And I think I raised about three thousand
dollars in the first day, and I was like, wow
that it really was touching because you know, I didn't
even hardly. I just put it out on Twitter, I think,
and I haven't promoted it much since, but I think
we're up to six or seven thousand dollars use that

(01:07:29):
every day. I don't where are you the Uh I'm retired,
so I get to do this uh all day long.
People like Mandy, they have a job. They're doing this
as a second job that's unpaid. So um so what
I do is is is is help. Uh is the

(01:07:50):
buy stuff? I help other I funneled money to other organizations.
I also UH promote that it uh go fund me
of other people on my social media site. So I
really would appreciate you following me. On Twitter, it's at
Homelessness s D at Homelessness SD. On Facebook, it's Homelessness

(01:08:14):
New San Diego. On on Instagram it's the same, and
on YouTube it's I think it's Homelessness New San Diego
on YouTube. I just started a YouTube page. Well actually
I started a long time ago, but I just started
posting stuff on there. I have a lot of followers.
It's a pretty active conversation. Especially on Twitter, I get

(01:08:34):
the bear's people lashing out at me, attacking me because
they don't like me calling them out. Um, I get
you know, I get haters on there too. I let
them voice their opinion. Uh, I let the conversation flow. Um.
But what I do is your what And I do
warn you that, especially on Twitter, it's heart wrenching stuff.

(01:08:57):
So I'm out here on the ground, I'm seeing people die,
I'm seeing horrible stuff and I'm sharing it with you
because I think people deserve to know the truth. So
elected officials like Mayor Todd Gloria, they don't want you
to know the truth. But I'm gonna bring it to you.
I've worked every day to bring you the truth that's
going on out here on the street. And it's ugly,

(01:09:17):
it's it's but it's also I also see some amazing stuff.
I also see some amazing, heartwarming stuff, people helping people.
So it's everything, but it's it's a roller coaster ride, folks,
So you know, just be prepared and from there you
can find my go fund me. Um. But most of all,

(01:09:40):
you can get educated on the issue, make up your
own mind. Uh, don't just listen to the bullshit that's
spewed out of city hall. Uh, see it on the
ground for yourself. Take people out with me. Uh. I
do a lot of work with the media, but but
just just just joy in the conversation, join the conversation, learn,

(01:10:03):
donate if you want to learn where you can donate
your time to other people. Yeah, message me, you can
cut me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We're just real people out
there doing, you know, doing stuff. And I worked within
the system trying to I went to all these meetings.
I spent a whole ton of money within the within

(01:10:26):
the mainstream system, which I'll never do again because it's
a black hole. So I mostly promote grassroots stuff now
and we're just out there doing it and and doing
what we can uh in a very difficult situation. But
join the conversation and see what's going on. And that's James.
I just I appreciate all your support over the years,

(01:10:49):
um uh, both amplifying our messages, getting messages out on
social media, and just for everything that you do on
social justice issues and and and safety issue is um
so I can hold them accountable on the bike stuff, yeah, absolutely,
well do that's another episode. I will plug leavi on

(01:11:09):
Levi's behalf because I leave, I had to jump off
to sort out an emergency. But it's homeful Solutions, which
on Twitter is at the Solution nine. You can find
them there and leave. I can help folks if they
are in San Diego access services and so yeah, that's
being us today. Please do follow these people. Please get

(01:11:30):
out and try and be a good neighbor to the
young housed community. Wherever you are, feel free to reach
out to any of us if you need some help
or advice on how to do that or want to
come out here in San Diego. All right, thank you
very much. Everyone appreciate you taking some of your afternoons.