February 11, 2025 • 40 mins
In the second part of We the Unhoused's LA fire coverage, Theo speaks with JTown Action and Solidarity co-founder Mario Correa about the mutual aid response to the fires, both with the existing unhoused community and newly displaced people. Then, he checks in with longtime unhoused veteran activist in West LA Ryan Thompson, who speaks on how the unhoused vets living outside the VA were nearly permanently displaced during evacuation.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Previously on Weedian House, we went straight into the pantry
to see what goods we had.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Easter just started cooking up, packaging and sending it to
those who are running towards the fires to help other people,
and then those who are running away from the fires.
I think at the end of the day, we just
want to feed people.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Well, it got really real, really bad. The winds were
really strong, like my roof blew off, and transformers were
exploding near me. There was power lines that were down.
I hid out in this little cubby like where I
was able to shelter, and then I put up on
my Twitter that I was looking to voluntarily evacuate and
(00:46):
clothing I was pushed out of trouble.
Speaker 4 (00:58):
Welcome back to Weedian House. I'm your host, Theo Henderson.
This is the second part of our chronicles on the
Los Angeles fires and their aftermath. We're going to delve
deeper into different directions of houselessness, veteran houselessness, and civilian houselessness.
But first on House News, our top story pertains the
(01:23):
Grants Pass, a disability rights group, Disability Rights Oregon and
the Oregon Law Center filed an injunction to stop the
grants pass ruling, the judge granted the emergency restraining order
on a punishment for the unhoused community until February seventeen,
twenty twenty five. The order states that the city cannot
(01:47):
remove tents from campsite from city parks or ticket, issue citations,
or arrest people from camping on city property. Our next
story turns to New York City. The New York houselessness
population has doubled in one year. Houselessness rolls more than
fifty percent from twenty twenty three to twenty twenty four,
(02:11):
more than four times than the rest of the country.
The number of houseless children increased from twenty thousand, two
hundred and ninety nine in twenty twenty three to fifty thousand,
seven hundred and seventy three in twenty twenty four, meaning
one in three people experiencing houselessness are children. Our next
(02:35):
story brings us back to San Jose, California. The city
plans to make a neighborhood of no return, though for
the unhoused community after public outcry. Neighbors complained the unhoused
were peaking in their homes, stealing water and looking threatening,
and they don't know what they are doing. I will
leave this to you to ponder. Our last story returns
(03:00):
us to Los Angeles and the weather. We've had a
few cold snaps and our current week weathers highs our,
sixty degrees in the day and forty five degrees at night.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
And that's un House news.
Speaker 4 (03:18):
Our returning guest is discussing how the LA fires affected
the un House community who didn't live in the mansions
of the Pacific Palacey, do you, oh.
Speaker 5 (03:29):
Citizens and apology for being absent while their homes were burning?
Do you regret coming the fire department budget by millions
of dogs, mount of fare?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Have you nothing to say today?
Speaker 6 (03:41):
Recent rainfall has public health habituals warning about toxic debris
runoff along hour beaches in both the water and on
the sand. Several beaches are closed because of the potential
health hazards associated with the runoff. We did see large
pieces of metal and debris sprawled across a few of.
Speaker 5 (03:59):
The beaches, like.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
I said, and.
Speaker 6 (04:01):
That's exactly why these warnings are in place. This is
stuff you do not want to Inhale. I just want
to remind you that we have a wildfire smoke advisory
and you don't see the smoke, but you definitely want
to wear the N ninety five masks. You want to
wear the proper masks as we continue, as a matter
of fact, in the next several days, because it's still
going to.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Be an issue.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
Literally looks like a bomb dropped. There is things.
Speaker 7 (04:22):
Everywhere, pesticides, batteries, including the risk of damaged withinum ion batteries.
Speaker 8 (04:29):
And I've done a lot in my life, but this
is definitely some of the hardest work I've done, and
it really has made a difference in my life. So
I really appreciate the opportunity to, you know, not be
in prison and be out and change lives and saving
lives and camaraderie was my crew, and I really appreciate this.
Speaker 9 (04:47):
Yeah, and seeing these fires my whole life, and this
is definitely the worst I've ever seen. There's really no
kind of centralized organization, no one really on the top,
and it was just everyone here was asking how they
can help and where they can help. Then we got
a lot done. It is really amazing. I don't know,
it's just so amazing to see everyone coming together.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
We're healthy, we're still breathing.
Speaker 5 (05:08):
Everything else can be rebuilt, which is what we're going
to do.
Speaker 4 (05:18):
Mario is a founding member of the Mutual Aid group
that I partner with jay Town Action and Solidarity. I
got a chance to speak with him shortly after the fires.
Here's our chat. This story is going to be an
unfolding of a story from all walks of life, because
this brushfire affected all walks of life and in different ways.
(05:40):
So first place I hit is from the Mutual Aid
where we have in Little Tokyo. Jaytown Action and Median
House have partnered to be available for the un housed community.
And I've gotten one of the members of jay Town Action,
Mario Correa, take us through what happened and how were
they able to meet the moment or were they able
to meet the moment?
Speaker 7 (05:59):
Hey, thank you?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (06:01):
The wildfires caught everybody by surprise. We started getting calls
throughout our own communications, people wanting to know where they
could donate stuff. So it's been one really inspiring to
see that the mutual Laid work we started in pandemic
to help unhouse people, we've we've been training for this moment,
(06:26):
so we're ready, We're out, we're distributing things, we're getting donations,
we're getting out getting it out to people who needed
one thing. I would like people to understand as much
empathy and sympathy and feeling we're having for people who've
lost everything because of the fires. We've been dealing with
(06:47):
people who lose everything on a daily basis, on a
weekly basis with all the sweeps, so we are well
trained to deal with people who have lost everything, who
need community care, who need an ear, who need a shoulder,
and who need you know, basic survival things.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
I've been asking this on social media and I hadn't
got an acceptable response, but I saw lots of sheet
of them saying that they were meeting the needs of
helping unhouse people. But I have been asking people that
have involved in mutual aid some of the unhoused, and
they have never heard of any of these services that
they've been provided, and barely some of the services. Even
(07:24):
one of my sources stated that it's a lie. They
only offered one day hotel rooms for unhoused people that
are that were not impacted by the fire. So did
you hear anything about the city coming off offering hotel
vouchers or mask or water or anything, because I have.
Speaker 7 (07:41):
Not, no, no, The opposite actually we're seeing how unequipped
the city is to respond to things like that. In fact,
I've seen instances where the city is reaching out to
mutual alaid groups for supplies.
Speaker 6 (07:58):
So no.
Speaker 7 (07:58):
We have seen also on the ground sweeps still being
executed all around the city. In County. We are also
seeing even before the wildfires, heavy sweeps downtown. People have
been being cleared for I'd say at least like a month.
People have been complaining. I know the people here near
(08:19):
in Jaytown, near city Hall, near in and around skid Row.
Today we're here at our power up. We're finding out
where people are, where they're going to so that we
can find them during the week as we get more
donations coming in. We want to be able to locate
people because they're scattering. The city has got people scattering
and it is it's super unsafe and.
Speaker 4 (08:42):
If you want to this is my shameless plug, but
really this is the time to people that are listening
to you start to donate financially materially to Jaytown Action
to be able to boost up these levels of neat
because there is a huge level of neat. We also
are going into a cult snap and it's cold is
going to be affecting unhoused people now they have to
(09:02):
contend with the ash, which I did with it's bothered
me and my breathing and things, and as you can imagine,
many people have, you know, Max, But I keep saying,
even though it's a mask, it doesn't stop the brush
or the debris that still is going to be seeping
through those masks because unhouse people are outside. The second
thing is that you have to understand that this is
(09:23):
not They're going to be contending with several inclined weather situations.
They're former spots where they used to be are no longer,
so they're going to be on the hunt to try
to find new places. And we need more financial support
as well as more material support in order for us
to meet the moment.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Did I miss anything?
Speaker 7 (09:42):
No, No, that's a great point. Aside from these fires,
it's getting cold at night, people are exposed. People need help,
and I'm yeah, I'm really hoping. Like I said, all
the sympathy that we're feeling for people who have lost things,
we need to open our eyes because that's been happened.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
You know.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
There's also been things going on on the social media.
People have been frustrated or annoyed because of the lack
of empathy, and they want to talk about that a
little to expand on that of it.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
They're upset that wealthy people from.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Palisades are losing their houses, but they are missing the
moment and none of the point of there are people
that are in dire straits or in pressed situations that
are working for the wealthy, that their stories are not
being illuminated. So when we talk about it, every walk
of life is affected. We all are not in the
same boat. We're in the same ocean. But some have
the tools to repair their boat and move along, and
(10:34):
some people are just drowning. And these are the people
that we need to talk about and highlight the unhoused community.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
They medically compromised.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
I just saw a story where father refused to leave
his disabled son and died, and and son died as
well because there was no resources or there was no
way to get him and his disabled son out of
the building. There are people that couldn't move or leave
and there was another finger wagging moment that you let
them stand, particularly when this brush fire was it's so unpredictable,
(11:02):
the news was scant at best, that people were just
maybe paralyzed and't nowhere to go because they were focusing
going on as one area of the shelter. Then they
found out it was a brush fire there or they're
getting evacuated, so there was a lot of confusion and chaos.
It's easier for us to armschair quarterback the situation when
it's not affecting us.
Speaker 7 (11:22):
Yeah, No, that's a great point. Domestic workers are affected.
We're seeing farm workers affected. Yeah, And as you mentioned,
I saw that same story too. There's a historic black
community in Altadena that's been wiped out and insult to injury.
We've got cops out there saying that people are looting
(11:43):
and it's people trying to go recover their things.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
And that's the same conversation. That's the same point that
they use with unhoused people when they're going back to
get their things. Even if they're doing survival looting, if
some of the stuff is going to be torn down anyway,
they're getting what they can because that's what's human nature,
that's the human condition. So it's this idea to ramp
up the anti blackness, the anti poor kind of sentiment
and using violence to solve what they cannot control. I
(12:08):
think this is a powerless situation, and I think it's
ridiculous that we can we have in passing these narratives.
Speaker 7 (12:13):
On absolutely absolutely I agree.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
Thank you so much, Tomorrio for his coming back on
the show. You can learn more about Jaytown Action and
Solidarity at the links in the description. They are always
seeking donations, particularly financial, so give if you're able. When
we come back, I'll be speaking with journalist Ryan Thompson,
whose beat is the veteran on the House community. Welcome back.
(12:41):
This is theo Henderson with Leedy and Howse. My next
talk today is with Ryan Thompson. He's a journalist who's
been covering the plight of the veterans who are displaced,
particularly at the VA Hospital in Westwood.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Let's hear what he's uncovered.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
My name is Roan Thompson. I am all I guess,
an independent, unpaid volunteer advocate for disabled and or homeless
veterans rights and entitlements to National Soldiers Home, which is
popularly known as the West Los Angeles VA. It's basically
about a thousand acres of land that's been you know,
whittled down so far by I legal land use about
(13:21):
four hundred plus an annex over on the beach front
in Santa Monica, and all that land is deeded in
perpetuity to the federal government, which is accepted by Acts
of Congress to serve as nothing but exclusively as a
home for homeless and disabled veterans when they needed time
of homelessness. And so I'm not a veteran. I never
(13:42):
expected to be involved with anything like this before. My
background is in technical visual effects productions and stuff like
that for decades. But I've always grown up for a
lot of my life next to the soldiers home there
and was curious about it. And as I learned what
was going on with illegal land use there, just as
blowing my mind. And so since about two thousand and
nine and I've dedicated my efforts full time to try to,
(14:04):
you know, contribute whatever I can skill wise against this
illegal land use racket that is killing disabled veterans with
homelessness by stealing their home. And the big issue now
is they're trying to take it and build a downtown
Brentwood in the four hundred and fifty thousand square foot
mega mall, in a hotel and a bunch of purple
lines to take people from new stations in Sherman Oaks
(14:27):
and Beverly Hills and the Century City, so they can
shop at this you know, new mega mall and there's
nothing legal about it. So that's where it stands at
the moment. And then regarding the fires, my family and
I have been very stressed out because we were evacuated Tuesday.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
And what were you in?
Speaker 5 (14:44):
We're in Topenga. So we moved from West La next
to the soldiers home about a year and a half
go to Topenga and our neighbor, our little pocket neighborhood
has been like two hundred to two hundred and twenty
degree radius surrounded by fire from like Tuesday night to
just as they started letting people back in. So it's
(15:04):
it's like one of those things where you're so stressed
out it starts to hurt your body. Yeah, but we
we have survived, the home has survived. So I guess
that's I guess that's another mini lesson in you know
a little piece of what it's like for people who
are almost who are dealing with that every day.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
Yes, from a personal standoa, how did you react in
what was going on? Did your family have to evacuate?
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Right? Away or were they?
Speaker 4 (15:30):
Were you able to evacuate and what was the steps
that it took to get you guys to a place.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Where you're at now? A sigh of relief that your
place is still standing.
Speaker 5 (15:38):
Well, you know, we could see smoke on Tuesday, and
I had been watching you know, like pretty sophisticated weather
models and stuff like that, you know, data or whatever,
so I could see a week in advance we were
going into hell from a risk standpoint. I actually pretty
much woke up on Tuesday expecting fire. And when we
smelled it, it was like okay, and we had go
(15:59):
bags ready and all that stuff, and we got the
eviction warning and it wasn't. I don't know, maybe within
an hour after getting the eviction warning, evacuation warning, we
got the mandatory evacuation.
Speaker 4 (16:12):
I also, I have noticed the mid following your stories
about the forced evictions and things, tell us a little
bit about that with the veterans, because that right there,
it's a flag that usually is not waived well because
everyone has sympathy for the veterans, least superficiently. But what's
been going on with the veterans about them being forced
evacuated or what was.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Going on there.
Speaker 5 (16:34):
Sure, so gosh, what day was it? Friday night? I
think it was. I hope I'm remembering the dates correctly,
but I think it was Friday night, not this last one,
not the other day, but the one before that. Myself
and other advocates, including the Senate Devermont, this checkpoint always
for the people, started receiving phone calls and text messages
(16:56):
of you know, formerly homeless veterans reasoning in different parts
of their National Soldiers home, some in buildings that are
subject to these things called enhanced used leases, which are
these illegal agreements that are privatizing them, some of them
in domicillary programs that provide services as well as housing.
And then also these you know, tiny flammable sheds that
(17:19):
they called tiny homes for a while, which were used
to obstruct those when we help get veterans inside from
the sidewalk, to prevent them from getting into building you know, here,
we'll give you a ship. We'll call that home instead,
because we're busy sealing these buildings. So probably a real
key aspect of this to focus on is the folks
who are sequestered to these sheds, you know, which, as
(17:40):
you probably already know, the men they are familiar with,
you know, they're like less square feet in area than
a what a maximum security prisoner's entitled to in the
State of California constitution. These have no bathrooms, no toilets,
no sinks. We have people, you know, who are one
hundred percent disabled veterans who've served twenty years honorably discharged,
one hundred percent disabled, paraplegic wheelchairs with stomach feeding tubes
(18:02):
in them, and their senior citizens, and they're in these
sheds and we get these distress signals that hey, they're
not letting me take my Seatpap. And it's midnight and
there are armed guards here and a contractor telling us
that we all have to get on these buses that
have all shown up, and we don't have a choice.
(18:24):
And I don't know where we're going, but they're saying
that we have to go, and that we have to evacuate.
I said, well, evacuate what they said, We don't know,
They won't tell us. And the reason I said evacuate
what is because at this time it was even further
but the closest the fire ever got, because I've monitored
it is two point four miles away and the whole
(18:45):
area of the soldiers home there. It gave West Lava
as well as the surrounding adjacent neighborhoods and town centers,
you know like Westwood Village and rent with thereby, Samvesani
and West La None of them were under a mandatory
evacuation nor and evacuation warning. And as we know, we
have all these illegal land users who are still in
(19:05):
that land, like brentw With School or UCLA Athletics, for
these parking lot companies, you know, et cetera, et cetera.
There's no evacuation concern in their minds, right, So we
asked these folks, which they'd pretty much you know, do
anyway because they think on their toes, to get video
and photographs and audio and cover what was going on.
(19:28):
And so we were able to, you know, get a
small repository a video showing that indeed, in the middle
of the night, you know, between midnight and two am
or whatever, under armed guards and contractors, they're being forced
onto these buses. They can't take their belongings, you know
that they have in these sheds and they have no
(19:49):
idea where they're going, and they get dropped off over
at Pmpacific Park right next to Rick Crusoe's Grove megaball
and put into a gym. And so then we got
pictures of what was going on in there, and there
were folks including Geno Viola, thank god for her, who
you know, went down there to assess and monitor the
situation and report on it. And you know, there were
(20:10):
issues where you know, we had basically the entire shed
population human trafficked over there to basically wipe them off
the land. And the first story was that it was
and I don't think they really wanted anyone to know
originally that they that this had happened and that they'd
gone to this park. There were not even enough blankets
for people, and there were even people trying to donate
(20:30):
blankets and stuff like that, and Red Cross was saying,
you know, you know, we don't really want to take
these types of direct donations, but you could donate cash.
So as that started to really unravel for the all
say racket that's trying to wipe veterans off the land
and looking to you know, make use, in my substantial opinion,
(20:51):
a disaster that's hurting a lot of people, whether they
have money or not or homes or not, you know, again,
to take advantage of something so low and use it
an excuse to wipe people off land you're trying to
steal and you know, kill more people with homelessness. And
as that started to unravel, there were I guess another
you know, three or four hundred or so that they
(21:14):
were also trying at the same time to wipe off
the land in all the other programs, and Brentwood School
started even providing its own buses to try to get
these people out of there. And it came to a
point where the fire was almost gone, the fire that
was two point four miles away from the area where
they were. There was not even a warning zone and
(21:35):
you can't even see it anymore. And suddenly these people
are saying knocking on door, saying, look, we got to
go because even though you can't see the fire, there's
the toxic air. But fortunately, you know, these other three
or four hundred that they wanted to wipe out of there,
basically in a nicer way than I would say, said,
you know, take a hike, you're full of it. And
so that backed off. So first a press release comes out,
(21:57):
you know, saying that you may have heard that this happened,
and so our excuse for it is that out of
an abundance of caution, we're evacuating these people, you know,
in concern for their safety. And you know, as that
really wasn't panning out because there was no evacuation warning.
All the illegal land users stayed there, even the surrounding
(22:18):
neighborhoods didn't have to evacuate. You know, the fire's going away,
where is it? You know, why were they dumped at
a park? And how is that safer without their medical equipment?
And then of course at the time, at that time too,
they're getting afraid because people were going to the park
and realizing it. So then they transferred them to another park,
and then they transferred them over to Babbo Patriotic Hall,
which was funny because then it's like, well, thank you
(22:39):
County of LA supervisors for letting us know you're involved
with this too. So two days later, I think it was,
they came out with a new press release, and that
press release, you know, it was kind of like, forget
about the whole fire thing. We never said anything about
the fire. What this is is we evacuated people from
this shed program CTRS because they're at risk people, and
(23:02):
so for the safety of the community, we move these
people out. And you know that's disgusting. You know, that
is like total fucking Alabama nineteen fifties trail of tears,
just bs slandering people as you're throwing them out into
homelessness and taking the public funds that are there to
(23:25):
have them and robbing those to buy your Megamo and
taking advantage of a county wide emergency in the process.
I mean, what remorse is evident in any of that.
And at the same time that that happens, right, you've
got our new DA needs and Hawkman who's getting up
and making a statement talking about looters, you know, and
we're going to go after you guys who are doing
(23:46):
this and doing that. It's like, why I didn't hear
them talk about the people looting billions of dollars and
four hundred acres of land, making thousands of people almost
until they're dead. I'm just hearing about looters, who are
your poster homeless vagrant character. You know that's been around
since maybe Berlin was approaching in Olympics in the nineteen thirties.
(24:07):
So it's like, you know, doing something stupid to double
down on stupidity, you know, when they came out with that.
But anyway, we all knew where everybody was, we all
knew what happened. And so then they you know, went
hellbent on saying, look we're bringing them all back. See
everybody's coming back, everybody's here. And then, as you can
probably see, Red Cross has been running a lot of propaganda.
(24:28):
There's actually, generally speaking, this you know, been quite a
bit of propaganda putting out now, you know, trying to
recover from well earned reputational damage to themselves. Sometimes this
stuff gets so dumb. If you watch these Red Cross
articles where they're talking about, you know, how they helped
these veterans evacuate into homelessness when there was no reason
to evacuate. They say in their articles and their propaganda
(24:51):
that you know, they were at the Bob Hope Patriotic
Hall because it sounds better than a park, and you
know how they're caring for them there and all this stuff,
and they have like studio life and there's nobody in
the place. But the place that they use is a
park gym and there's a basketball hoop in the background.
So it's like, now, come on, guys. You gotta think.
(25:11):
But if they if they weren't smarter than they are,
I think our work would be harder. So, you know,
at least, thank god they are dumb. But that's that's
that's what happens.
Speaker 4 (25:20):
So there's from what I'm gathered, is that there's really
no calls for accountability. They get some hastily press conference
to cover up what was going on.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
So where are.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
These house community members now? Are they backed indu sheds
or they provide accommodations for them.
Speaker 5 (25:37):
Well, so this is a very important question because I
think the first step in accountability we're trying to figure
out now with just limited ad hocs, you know, people resources,
is how many didn't come back? Because there is no
way that we're gonna believe that everybody who left came back.
You know, there are people who are scared, saying, why
is this happening? There's no reason what's happened. I'm scared something,
(25:59):
you know, much much worse is going to happen. So
I'm gonna I'm going to bail this part, you know,
or bail before they, you know, try to put me
on this bus. So you know, you have you have
people there that we know are back, and then there's
going to be more. So we're open to ideas and
also trying to figure out who didn't make it back,
you know, what's the attrition rate there. And then also
(26:20):
when you're talking about the other end of accountability in
terms of what needs to happen here to prevent this
sort of thing that from happening, my perspective is that,
you know, in review of criminal law, we've tried everything
that a land grab has asked us to do while
it's stolen our money and stolen homeless people's lives, and
the only thing left to do is criminally prosecute this landgraft.
(26:43):
These looters, they are not going to stop until they
start going to prison. And when a couple of them
start going to prison, I think we're going to see
a huge drop off. And I think generally speaking, we're
going to see more money going to housing the homeless
than you know is being misappropriated because people who are
(27:04):
doing this don't want to be what the county currently
have call is permanently housed in prison. So everything that's
ever been recommended, right, Hey, I got a great idea
for one hundred times, why don't we have billionaires come
to the call and save the homeless by taking all
the public money. Well, we know that doesn't work three
times over, right, Well why don't we build am all
(27:25):
in and veteran homelessness or homelessness in general with shopping malls.
Well we know that doesn't work either. Yeah. So you know,
I think it's just time to follow the law and
as Naven Hawkman would say, prosecutes criminals. But the criminals
aren't the homeless, They're the people stealing their homes.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
Will finish this conversation after the break and we're back.
Speaker 4 (27:52):
Have you known any people that had passed away as
a result of the fires or heard any stories that
the house people that have passed away as a result
of this.
Speaker 5 (28:01):
I have not, because I was at this particular time
dealing with our own situation, being evacuated in our own place,
trying to keep it from going on fire. I was
unable to pay up attention to see whether or not
I know of any people who are in house that
passed away other than someone I don't know that I
(28:21):
heard about on a discussion group that I think we're
both on, which is pretty tragic. But we have neighbors,
you know, in the neighborhood. Yes, I think a couple
who have passed away that I did not know personally,
but they were in their homes, but they were not
in house. Generally speaking, I have personally known, you know,
quite a few homeless veterans who have passed away.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I'm sorry to hear that.
Speaker 5 (28:46):
Yeah, me too.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
So I feel that this conversation has taken such a
different turn. What do you like to see happen to
change the trajectory for the un house Because when I
covered this story a few years ago, the unhoused was
outside of the gate and then they were swept and
they were forced inside. And you're telling me now it's
(29:06):
twenty twenty five that they're still outside in these tiny sheds,
and there seems to be no movement forward, movement of
getting them inside literally inside building. But they don't have
to be subjected to, you know, the winds and rains
and the temperatures living and in the tiny shed.
Speaker 5 (29:22):
So, yep, glad you asked this, because this is extremely
important to understand this trick. Now, the folks who were
on the sidewalk that we were helping out and providing
tents for for a couple of years, as those lined
up and we had the flags on them and everything.
Those folks wanted to go inside. They were there because
they wanted their home, and they were you know, so
(29:46):
many of them promised, oh that they have that home.
A lot of them went there and said, hey, I'm here,
I need it now, and they're like, can't whatever. But
it was never intended that the concept of what that
is would be a shed without a time, it in
the sink, and people constantly trying to sign you up
for research that you don't want to be involved with,
(30:06):
or be a post boy or girl for propaganda, or
people telling you to go when there's nowhere else to
go because you've been here, you know, thirty days or whatever,
and you know that's it. So you know, that was
kind of a trick too from a public opinion standpoint, right,
because they wanted to show this that Okay, look we
did it. They're all inside now, Yay, we're great, you know.
(30:30):
And then the other more difficult to see is with
the buildings. So the buildings that the homeless veterans over
the last couple of years or two years have started
moving into. A lot of folks don't realize most folks
don't realize many of those buildings are buildings that were
(30:56):
full of formerly homeless, disabled veteran tenants. So I'll give
you an example of one of them, building two O seven.
That building you know, in twenty sixteen twenty seventeen had
about one hundred and ten tenants living in there who
were formerly homeless, and they were receiving services and care
(31:16):
and house there. And when these private developers came in.
There's a couple of different rackets of them, but this
one involving Thomas Saffron and Associates and Century Housing Corporation
and US VETS. They created this paper LLC called the
Veterans Collective, Westley Veterans Collective or something like that. What
they do is they go in criminally and they quietly
(31:42):
secretly undercover, evict and mass all of the tenants in
one swoop. That's why I jumped on this whole thing
with the fire evacuation, because I know how it goes,
and suddenly the building becomes empty and then an illegal
contract made. It'll put you on the scope of this discussion,
I think. But there are many reasons, many times over
(32:06):
why these enhanced use lease contracts that they do are illegal.
But then when they finish renovating the building, right, this
building two seven that we're using for an example, goes
from one hundred and ten units or one hundred and
ten or so housed to none for years to then
sixty and the apartments are renovated. And you know, if
(32:28):
you take a look at them, they're kind of renovated
to where they could double as like a luxury bachelor
pad one day in a downtown Brentwood. And that's because
these are on ninety nine year illegal deals, right that
they're going to have them for. But if you look
at the hud Vash program, which is the program that
they will only rent the homeless veterans on these units,
(32:53):
the maximum term of it is twenty years. Twenty years
for homeless veterans on a ninety nine year steel So
that's pretty obvious. But the other thing is that's also obvious.
Homeless people don't pay rent. If homeless people could afford rent, say,
it would rent right most of them. So how in
(33:16):
the world are you doing this? Well, that's why I
think we have to understand there's been a mission creep
in La County where we've gone from let's say in
twenty sixteen, not just with veterans, but with all the homeless.
We need to house the homeless. Hey, approve these bonds,
approve these billions. We got to house the homeless because
we're going to pull on your heartstrings to house the homeless.
(33:36):
And then today somehow, what are you talking about? How's
the homeless? No, we said affordable housing. I mean they
pulled that one right out from under the wall of us.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
Right.
Speaker 5 (33:45):
It's a complete change in what they said. All this
was about between twenty sixteen and now over the past decade. Right,
So with the affordable housing, the way it works with
homeless veterans, right, bill since they have to, at least
for a little while, only put in veterans there who
are disabled and at least at some point homeless. What
(34:06):
they're also doing is they're taking a building that the
taxpayers have already paid for that the veterans who are
homeless are already entitled for. The whole thing is paid already.
We're still paying for them to be there rent free
because they can't afford rent when they're homeless. And now
you're putting another taxpayer billing program on top of it
(34:26):
that creates a full kakamami program that takes a long
time to get your voucher and do all this stuff
called the Hudbash program that is meant be out in
the community, not where the federal government already has land
and resources and buildings and services that are being gutted
as they're being stolen. So those units are charging no joke,
(34:49):
one hundred and sixty percent on average the average area
rent there in the Brentwood West with westl area. These
veterans who were homeless or or at homeless at the
time that they're moving into let's say Building two o seven.
After they fight like mad and spend all this time
trying to survive to get one of these vouchers to
(35:10):
get what they're entitled to in the first place that
they're evicted from. They get these vouchers, and the vouchers
cover not anything affordable but a one hundred and sixty
percent average market rate rent price dag going directly into
the pockets of these thieves calling themselves developers, case managers,
and property managers that are getting everything for free and
(35:32):
taking some of that money they're getting for free and
handing it back to the politicians that they are bribing
with public corruption to keep it going. And so in
this whole process we have left housing, more death, more
public corruption, and more robbery of the taxpayer's general welfare.
We cannot go thinking, oh shit, they got us, Okay,
(35:54):
what's the next step, because forty one to eighteen works.
No way, no way. I mean, when they were making laws,
you know, Jim Crow laws, were people saying, oh shit,
they that worked out. Can't do that, what's next now?
Unacceptable that if a law is unconstitutional, especially one that
is that is intentionally made with fraud in federal criminal conspiracy,
(36:16):
there is no reason to accept that. It can't be accepted.
It is unlawful. Even the Supreme Court in its history
has fraudulently protected unconstitutional legislation, and the people did not
stand for that. And so if this country is going
to survive, and if it's going to prosper over the
long term, you know, we do have to come together
(36:39):
and peacefully and lawfully advocate in the most assertive manner
possible against pool and unusual punishment, you know, because it's
it's like we're creating a scenario here where not just
homeless veterans, but homeless people in general, which is a
growing popular even have to these spires right is being
(37:02):
pushed forward. The only option being what they're calling you care,
which is a you know, being strapped down to a
bed in a hospital that they're trying to build as
fast as possible and become who knows, research guinea pigs
or something like that. I mean, it's scary where it's going,
and it cannot be accepted. It just can't happen. And
(37:26):
the only way this is going to work is if
people who try this sort of thing or contemplating being
part of this sort of organized crime against humanity and
against this country, they need to realize that they're going
to go to prison and have a tiny home of
their own, but one with a toilet and to sink
and just to coveyat something. The last part of this
endless die dribe here of mine is I'm not partial
(37:49):
to homeless veterans. This goes for anybody who is homeless
that is trying to survive. I am just, I guess,
being lazy and focused on veterans because there are so
many laws and appropriations and regulations in place that don't
leave any excuse to be created. To how and to me,
(38:12):
I've always felt since being involved with this, that that's
a pretty good starting point to demonstrate. Okay, well, if
we can do it here, why can't we do it
with everybody who's homeless.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
Well, I have thankfully been brought up to speed on this.
Thank you, Ryan, You have been very thorough in that.
Speaker 5 (38:29):
Thank you so much for providing an opportunity for me
to talk. You know, I mean, I'm really thankful for that.
I appreciate that you're such a good guy. You know,
you've shown up too in courted times where I had
no idea even knew what we had going on there.
You know, I'm so impressed and thankful for what you do.
(38:49):
I think you're a very honorable person.
Speaker 4 (38:51):
Oh that's such harder to be coming from another honorable
person that really has this heart set to right some
wrongs in this world.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
And I think, thank you for that. Thank you again.
Speaker 4 (39:02):
I hope you don't mind if I invite you back,
because I don't think this conversation is going to end soon.
So this is one of those developing stories and we
must keep an eye on it and make sure and
justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
That's from doctor King's writing.
Speaker 5 (39:18):
Thank you.
Speaker 4 (39:23):
Thank you again to Ryan. You can follow his work
at the links in our description. This concludes another awesome
episode of Weedian House. If you have been impacted by
any of the fires recently or have a story to tell,
please reach out to me at weedian House at gmail
dot com or widian House on Instagram. Thank you all
(39:43):
again for listening, and may we again meet in the
light of understanding. Whedian House is a production of iHeartRadio.
It is written, posted, and created by me Theo Henderson,
Our producers Jbie Loftus, Baily Fager, Katie Official, and Lyra Smith.
(40:04):
Our editor is Adam Wand and our local art is
also by Katie Official.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
Thanks for listening.
Previously on Weedian House, we went straight into the pantry
to see what goods we had.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Easter just started cooking up, packaging and sending it to
those who are running towards the fires to help other people,
and then those who are running away from the fires.
I think at the end of the day, we just
want to feed people.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Well, it got really real, really bad. The winds were
really strong, like my roof blew off, and transformers were
exploding near me. There was power lines that were down.
I hid out in this little cubby like where I
was able to shelter, and then I put up on
my Twitter that I was looking to voluntarily evacuate and
(00:46):
clothing I was pushed out of trouble.
Speaker 4 (00:58):
Welcome back to Weedian House. I'm your host, Theo Henderson.
This is the second part of our chronicles on the
Los Angeles fires and their aftermath. We're going to delve
deeper into different directions of houselessness, veteran houselessness, and civilian houselessness.
But first on House News, our top story pertains the
(01:23):
Grants Pass, a disability rights group, Disability Rights Oregon and
the Oregon Law Center filed an injunction to stop the
grants pass ruling, the judge granted the emergency restraining order
on a punishment for the unhoused community until February seventeen,
twenty twenty five. The order states that the city cannot
(01:47):
remove tents from campsite from city parks or ticket, issue citations,
or arrest people from camping on city property. Our next
story turns to New York City. The New York houselessness
population has doubled in one year. Houselessness rolls more than
fifty percent from twenty twenty three to twenty twenty four,
(02:11):
more than four times than the rest of the country.
The number of houseless children increased from twenty thousand, two
hundred and ninety nine in twenty twenty three to fifty thousand,
seven hundred and seventy three in twenty twenty four, meaning
one in three people experiencing houselessness are children. Our next
(02:35):
story brings us back to San Jose, California. The city
plans to make a neighborhood of no return, though for
the unhoused community after public outcry. Neighbors complained the unhoused
were peaking in their homes, stealing water and looking threatening,
and they don't know what they are doing. I will
leave this to you to ponder. Our last story returns
(03:00):
us to Los Angeles and the weather. We've had a
few cold snaps and our current week weathers highs our,
sixty degrees in the day and forty five degrees at night.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
And that's un House news.
Speaker 4 (03:18):
Our returning guest is discussing how the LA fires affected
the un House community who didn't live in the mansions
of the Pacific Palacey, do you, oh.
Speaker 5 (03:29):
Citizens and apology for being absent while their homes were burning?
Do you regret coming the fire department budget by millions
of dogs, mount of fare?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Have you nothing to say today?
Speaker 6 (03:41):
Recent rainfall has public health habituals warning about toxic debris
runoff along hour beaches in both the water and on
the sand. Several beaches are closed because of the potential
health hazards associated with the runoff. We did see large
pieces of metal and debris sprawled across a few of.
Speaker 5 (03:59):
The beaches, like.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
I said, and.
Speaker 6 (04:01):
That's exactly why these warnings are in place. This is
stuff you do not want to Inhale. I just want
to remind you that we have a wildfire smoke advisory
and you don't see the smoke, but you definitely want
to wear the N ninety five masks. You want to
wear the proper masks as we continue, as a matter
of fact, in the next several days, because it's still
going to.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Be an issue.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
Literally looks like a bomb dropped. There is things.
Speaker 7 (04:22):
Everywhere, pesticides, batteries, including the risk of damaged withinum ion batteries.
Speaker 8 (04:29):
And I've done a lot in my life, but this
is definitely some of the hardest work I've done, and
it really has made a difference in my life. So
I really appreciate the opportunity to, you know, not be
in prison and be out and change lives and saving
lives and camaraderie was my crew, and I really appreciate this.
Speaker 9 (04:47):
Yeah, and seeing these fires my whole life, and this
is definitely the worst I've ever seen. There's really no
kind of centralized organization, no one really on the top,
and it was just everyone here was asking how they
can help and where they can help. Then we got
a lot done. It is really amazing. I don't know,
it's just so amazing to see everyone coming together.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
We're healthy, we're still breathing.
Speaker 5 (05:08):
Everything else can be rebuilt, which is what we're going
to do.
Speaker 4 (05:18):
Mario is a founding member of the Mutual Aid group
that I partner with jay Town Action and Solidarity. I
got a chance to speak with him shortly after the fires.
Here's our chat. This story is going to be an
unfolding of a story from all walks of life, because
this brushfire affected all walks of life and in different ways.
(05:40):
So first place I hit is from the Mutual Aid
where we have in Little Tokyo. Jaytown Action and Median
House have partnered to be available for the un housed community.
And I've gotten one of the members of jay Town Action,
Mario Correa, take us through what happened and how were
they able to meet the moment or were they able
to meet the moment?
Speaker 7 (05:59):
Hey, thank you?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (06:01):
The wildfires caught everybody by surprise. We started getting calls
throughout our own communications, people wanting to know where they
could donate stuff. So it's been one really inspiring to
see that the mutual Laid work we started in pandemic
to help unhouse people, we've we've been training for this moment,
(06:26):
so we're ready, We're out, we're distributing things, we're getting donations,
we're getting out getting it out to people who needed
one thing. I would like people to understand as much
empathy and sympathy and feeling we're having for people who've
lost everything because of the fires. We've been dealing with
(06:47):
people who lose everything on a daily basis, on a
weekly basis with all the sweeps, so we are well
trained to deal with people who have lost everything, who
need community care, who need an ear, who need a shoulder,
and who need you know, basic survival things.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
I've been asking this on social media and I hadn't
got an acceptable response, but I saw lots of sheet
of them saying that they were meeting the needs of
helping unhouse people. But I have been asking people that
have involved in mutual aid some of the unhoused, and
they have never heard of any of these services that
they've been provided, and barely some of the services. Even
(07:24):
one of my sources stated that it's a lie. They
only offered one day hotel rooms for unhoused people that
are that were not impacted by the fire. So did
you hear anything about the city coming off offering hotel
vouchers or mask or water or anything, because I have.
Speaker 7 (07:41):
Not, no, no, The opposite actually we're seeing how unequipped
the city is to respond to things like that. In fact,
I've seen instances where the city is reaching out to
mutual alaid groups for supplies.
Speaker 6 (07:58):
So no.
Speaker 7 (07:58):
We have seen also on the ground sweeps still being
executed all around the city. In County. We are also
seeing even before the wildfires, heavy sweeps downtown. People have
been being cleared for I'd say at least like a month.
People have been complaining. I know the people here near
(08:19):
in Jaytown, near city Hall, near in and around skid Row.
Today we're here at our power up. We're finding out
where people are, where they're going to so that we
can find them during the week as we get more
donations coming in. We want to be able to locate
people because they're scattering. The city has got people scattering
and it is it's super unsafe and.
Speaker 4 (08:42):
If you want to this is my shameless plug, but
really this is the time to people that are listening
to you start to donate financially materially to Jaytown Action
to be able to boost up these levels of neat
because there is a huge level of neat. We also
are going into a cult snap and it's cold is
going to be affecting unhoused people now they have to
(09:02):
contend with the ash, which I did with it's bothered
me and my breathing and things, and as you can imagine,
many people have, you know, Max, But I keep saying,
even though it's a mask, it doesn't stop the brush
or the debris that still is going to be seeping
through those masks because unhouse people are outside. The second
thing is that you have to understand that this is
(09:23):
not They're going to be contending with several inclined weather situations.
They're former spots where they used to be are no longer,
so they're going to be on the hunt to try
to find new places. And we need more financial support
as well as more material support in order for us
to meet the moment.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Did I miss anything?
Speaker 7 (09:42):
No, No, that's a great point. Aside from these fires,
it's getting cold at night, people are exposed. People need help,
and I'm yeah, I'm really hoping. Like I said, all
the sympathy that we're feeling for people who have lost things,
we need to open our eyes because that's been happened.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
You know.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
There's also been things going on on the social media.
People have been frustrated or annoyed because of the lack
of empathy, and they want to talk about that a
little to expand on that of it.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
They're upset that wealthy people from.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Palisades are losing their houses, but they are missing the
moment and none of the point of there are people
that are in dire straits or in pressed situations that
are working for the wealthy, that their stories are not
being illuminated. So when we talk about it, every walk
of life is affected. We all are not in the
same boat. We're in the same ocean. But some have
the tools to repair their boat and move along, and
(10:34):
some people are just drowning. And these are the people
that we need to talk about and highlight the unhoused community.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
They medically compromised.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
I just saw a story where father refused to leave
his disabled son and died, and and son died as
well because there was no resources or there was no
way to get him and his disabled son out of
the building. There are people that couldn't move or leave
and there was another finger wagging moment that you let
them stand, particularly when this brush fire was it's so unpredictable,
(11:02):
the news was scant at best, that people were just
maybe paralyzed and't nowhere to go because they were focusing
going on as one area of the shelter. Then they
found out it was a brush fire there or they're
getting evacuated, so there was a lot of confusion and chaos.
It's easier for us to armschair quarterback the situation when
it's not affecting us.
Speaker 7 (11:22):
Yeah, No, that's a great point. Domestic workers are affected.
We're seeing farm workers affected. Yeah, And as you mentioned,
I saw that same story too. There's a historic black
community in Altadena that's been wiped out and insult to injury.
We've got cops out there saying that people are looting
(11:43):
and it's people trying to go recover their things.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
And that's the same conversation. That's the same point that
they use with unhoused people when they're going back to
get their things. Even if they're doing survival looting, if
some of the stuff is going to be torn down anyway,
they're getting what they can because that's what's human nature,
that's the human condition. So it's this idea to ramp
up the anti blackness, the anti poor kind of sentiment
and using violence to solve what they cannot control. I
(12:08):
think this is a powerless situation, and I think it's
ridiculous that we can we have in passing these narratives.
Speaker 7 (12:13):
On absolutely absolutely I agree.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
Thank you so much, Tomorrio for his coming back on
the show. You can learn more about Jaytown Action and
Solidarity at the links in the description. They are always
seeking donations, particularly financial, so give if you're able. When
we come back, I'll be speaking with journalist Ryan Thompson,
whose beat is the veteran on the House community. Welcome back.
(12:41):
This is theo Henderson with Leedy and Howse. My next
talk today is with Ryan Thompson. He's a journalist who's
been covering the plight of the veterans who are displaced,
particularly at the VA Hospital in Westwood.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Let's hear what he's uncovered.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
My name is Roan Thompson. I am all I guess,
an independent, unpaid volunteer advocate for disabled and or homeless
veterans rights and entitlements to National Soldiers Home, which is
popularly known as the West Los Angeles VA. It's basically
about a thousand acres of land that's been you know,
whittled down so far by I legal land use about
(13:21):
four hundred plus an annex over on the beach front
in Santa Monica, and all that land is deeded in
perpetuity to the federal government, which is accepted by Acts
of Congress to serve as nothing but exclusively as a
home for homeless and disabled veterans when they needed time
of homelessness. And so I'm not a veteran. I never
(13:42):
expected to be involved with anything like this before. My
background is in technical visual effects productions and stuff like
that for decades. But I've always grown up for a
lot of my life next to the soldiers home there
and was curious about it. And as I learned what
was going on with illegal land use there, just as
blowing my mind. And so since about two thousand and
nine and I've dedicated my efforts full time to try to,
(14:04):
you know, contribute whatever I can skill wise against this
illegal land use racket that is killing disabled veterans with
homelessness by stealing their home. And the big issue now
is they're trying to take it and build a downtown
Brentwood in the four hundred and fifty thousand square foot
mega mall, in a hotel and a bunch of purple
lines to take people from new stations in Sherman Oaks
(14:27):
and Beverly Hills and the Century City, so they can
shop at this you know, new mega mall and there's
nothing legal about it. So that's where it stands at
the moment. And then regarding the fires, my family and
I have been very stressed out because we were evacuated Tuesday.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
And what were you in?
Speaker 5 (14:44):
We're in Topenga. So we moved from West La next
to the soldiers home about a year and a half
go to Topenga and our neighbor, our little pocket neighborhood
has been like two hundred to two hundred and twenty
degree radius surrounded by fire from like Tuesday night to
just as they started letting people back in. So it's
(15:04):
it's like one of those things where you're so stressed
out it starts to hurt your body. Yeah, but we
we have survived, the home has survived. So I guess
that's I guess that's another mini lesson in you know
a little piece of what it's like for people who
are almost who are dealing with that every day.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
Yes, from a personal standoa, how did you react in
what was going on? Did your family have to evacuate?
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Right? Away or were they?
Speaker 4 (15:30):
Were you able to evacuate and what was the steps
that it took to get you guys to a place.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Where you're at now? A sigh of relief that your
place is still standing.
Speaker 5 (15:38):
Well, you know, we could see smoke on Tuesday, and
I had been watching you know, like pretty sophisticated weather
models and stuff like that, you know, data or whatever,
so I could see a week in advance we were
going into hell from a risk standpoint. I actually pretty
much woke up on Tuesday expecting fire. And when we
smelled it, it was like okay, and we had go
(15:59):
bags ready and all that stuff, and we got the
eviction warning and it wasn't. I don't know, maybe within
an hour after getting the eviction warning, evacuation warning, we
got the mandatory evacuation.
Speaker 4 (16:12):
I also, I have noticed the mid following your stories
about the forced evictions and things, tell us a little
bit about that with the veterans, because that right there,
it's a flag that usually is not waived well because
everyone has sympathy for the veterans, least superficiently. But what's
been going on with the veterans about them being forced
evacuated or what was.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Going on there.
Speaker 5 (16:34):
Sure, so gosh, what day was it? Friday night? I
think it was. I hope I'm remembering the dates correctly,
but I think it was Friday night, not this last one,
not the other day, but the one before that. Myself
and other advocates, including the Senate Devermont, this checkpoint always
for the people, started receiving phone calls and text messages
(16:56):
of you know, formerly homeless veterans reasoning in different parts
of their National Soldiers home, some in buildings that are
subject to these things called enhanced used leases, which are
these illegal agreements that are privatizing them, some of them
in domicillary programs that provide services as well as housing.
And then also these you know, tiny flammable sheds that
(17:19):
they called tiny homes for a while, which were used
to obstruct those when we help get veterans inside from
the sidewalk, to prevent them from getting into building you know, here,
we'll give you a ship. We'll call that home instead,
because we're busy sealing these buildings. So probably a real
key aspect of this to focus on is the folks
who are sequestered to these sheds, you know, which, as
(17:40):
you probably already know, the men they are familiar with,
you know, they're like less square feet in area than
a what a maximum security prisoner's entitled to in the
State of California constitution. These have no bathrooms, no toilets,
no sinks. We have people, you know, who are one
hundred percent disabled veterans who've served twenty years honorably discharged,
one hundred percent disabled, paraplegic wheelchairs with stomach feeding tubes
(18:02):
in them, and their senior citizens, and they're in these
sheds and we get these distress signals that hey, they're
not letting me take my Seatpap. And it's midnight and
there are armed guards here and a contractor telling us
that we all have to get on these buses that
have all shown up, and we don't have a choice.
(18:24):
And I don't know where we're going, but they're saying
that we have to go, and that we have to evacuate.
I said, well, evacuate what they said, We don't know,
They won't tell us. And the reason I said evacuate
what is because at this time it was even further
but the closest the fire ever got, because I've monitored
it is two point four miles away and the whole
(18:45):
area of the soldiers home there. It gave West Lava
as well as the surrounding adjacent neighborhoods and town centers,
you know like Westwood Village and rent with thereby, Samvesani
and West La None of them were under a mandatory
evacuation nor and evacuation warning. And as we know, we
have all these illegal land users who are still in
(19:05):
that land, like brentw With School or UCLA Athletics, for
these parking lot companies, you know, et cetera, et cetera.
There's no evacuation concern in their minds, right, So we
asked these folks, which they'd pretty much you know, do
anyway because they think on their toes, to get video
and photographs and audio and cover what was going on.
(19:28):
And so we were able to, you know, get a
small repository a video showing that indeed, in the middle
of the night, you know, between midnight and two am
or whatever, under armed guards and contractors, they're being forced
onto these buses. They can't take their belongings, you know
that they have in these sheds and they have no
(19:49):
idea where they're going, and they get dropped off over
at Pmpacific Park right next to Rick Crusoe's Grove megaball
and put into a gym. And so then we got
pictures of what was going on in there, and there
were folks including Geno Viola, thank god for her, who
you know, went down there to assess and monitor the
situation and report on it. And you know, there were
(20:10):
issues where you know, we had basically the entire shed
population human trafficked over there to basically wipe them off
the land. And the first story was that it was
and I don't think they really wanted anyone to know
originally that they that this had happened and that they'd
gone to this park. There were not even enough blankets
for people, and there were even people trying to donate
(20:30):
blankets and stuff like that, and Red Cross was saying,
you know, you know, we don't really want to take
these types of direct donations, but you could donate cash.
So as that started to really unravel for the all
say racket that's trying to wipe veterans off the land
and looking to you know, make use, in my substantial opinion,
(20:51):
a disaster that's hurting a lot of people, whether they
have money or not or homes or not, you know, again,
to take advantage of something so low and use it
an excuse to wipe people off land you're trying to
steal and you know, kill more people with homelessness. And
as that started to unravel, there were I guess another
you know, three or four hundred or so that they
(21:14):
were also trying at the same time to wipe off
the land in all the other programs, and Brentwood School
started even providing its own buses to try to get
these people out of there. And it came to a
point where the fire was almost gone, the fire that
was two point four miles away from the area where
they were. There was not even a warning zone and
(21:35):
you can't even see it anymore. And suddenly these people
are saying knocking on door, saying, look, we got to
go because even though you can't see the fire, there's
the toxic air. But fortunately, you know, these other three
or four hundred that they wanted to wipe out of there,
basically in a nicer way than I would say, said,
you know, take a hike, you're full of it. And
so that backed off. So first a press release comes out,
(21:57):
you know, saying that you may have heard that this happened,
and so our excuse for it is that out of
an abundance of caution, we're evacuating these people, you know,
in concern for their safety. And you know, as that
really wasn't panning out because there was no evacuation warning.
All the illegal land users stayed there, even the surrounding
(22:18):
neighborhoods didn't have to evacuate. You know, the fire's going away,
where is it? You know, why were they dumped at
a park? And how is that safer without their medical equipment?
And then of course at the time, at that time too,
they're getting afraid because people were going to the park
and realizing it. So then they transferred them to another park,
and then they transferred them over to Babbo Patriotic Hall,
which was funny because then it's like, well, thank you
(22:39):
County of LA supervisors for letting us know you're involved
with this too. So two days later, I think it was,
they came out with a new press release, and that
press release, you know, it was kind of like, forget
about the whole fire thing. We never said anything about
the fire. What this is is we evacuated people from
this shed program CTRS because they're at risk people, and
(23:02):
so for the safety of the community, we move these
people out. And you know that's disgusting. You know, that
is like total fucking Alabama nineteen fifties trail of tears,
just bs slandering people as you're throwing them out into
homelessness and taking the public funds that are there to
(23:25):
have them and robbing those to buy your Megamo and
taking advantage of a county wide emergency in the process.
I mean, what remorse is evident in any of that.
And at the same time that that happens, right, you've
got our new DA needs and Hawkman who's getting up
and making a statement talking about looters, you know, and
we're going to go after you guys who are doing
(23:46):
this and doing that. It's like, why I didn't hear
them talk about the people looting billions of dollars and
four hundred acres of land, making thousands of people almost
until they're dead. I'm just hearing about looters, who are
your poster homeless vagrant character. You know that's been around
since maybe Berlin was approaching in Olympics in the nineteen thirties.
(24:07):
So it's like, you know, doing something stupid to double
down on stupidity, you know, when they came out with that.
But anyway, we all knew where everybody was, we all
knew what happened. And so then they you know, went
hellbent on saying, look we're bringing them all back. See
everybody's coming back, everybody's here. And then, as you can
probably see, Red Cross has been running a lot of propaganda.
(24:28):
There's actually, generally speaking, this you know, been quite a
bit of propaganda putting out now, you know, trying to
recover from well earned reputational damage to themselves. Sometimes this
stuff gets so dumb. If you watch these Red Cross
articles where they're talking about, you know, how they helped
these veterans evacuate into homelessness when there was no reason
to evacuate. They say in their articles and their propaganda
(24:51):
that you know, they were at the Bob Hope Patriotic
Hall because it sounds better than a park, and you
know how they're caring for them there and all this stuff,
and they have like studio life and there's nobody in
the place. But the place that they use is a
park gym and there's a basketball hoop in the background.
So it's like, now, come on, guys. You gotta think.
(25:11):
But if they if they weren't smarter than they are,
I think our work would be harder. So, you know,
at least, thank god they are dumb. But that's that's
that's what happens.
Speaker 4 (25:20):
So there's from what I'm gathered, is that there's really
no calls for accountability. They get some hastily press conference
to cover up what was going on.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
So where are.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
These house community members now? Are they backed indu sheds
or they provide accommodations for them.
Speaker 5 (25:37):
Well, so this is a very important question because I
think the first step in accountability we're trying to figure
out now with just limited ad hocs, you know, people resources,
is how many didn't come back? Because there is no
way that we're gonna believe that everybody who left came back.
You know, there are people who are scared, saying, why
is this happening? There's no reason what's happened. I'm scared something,
(25:59):
you know, much much worse is going to happen. So
I'm gonna I'm going to bail this part, you know,
or bail before they, you know, try to put me
on this bus. So you know, you have you have
people there that we know are back, and then there's
going to be more. So we're open to ideas and
also trying to figure out who didn't make it back,
you know, what's the attrition rate there. And then also
(26:20):
when you're talking about the other end of accountability in
terms of what needs to happen here to prevent this
sort of thing that from happening, my perspective is that,
you know, in review of criminal law, we've tried everything
that a land grab has asked us to do while
it's stolen our money and stolen homeless people's lives, and
the only thing left to do is criminally prosecute this landgraft.
(26:43):
These looters, they are not going to stop until they
start going to prison. And when a couple of them
start going to prison, I think we're going to see
a huge drop off. And I think generally speaking, we're
going to see more money going to housing the homeless
than you know is being misappropriated because people who are
(27:04):
doing this don't want to be what the county currently
have call is permanently housed in prison. So everything that's
ever been recommended, right, Hey, I got a great idea
for one hundred times, why don't we have billionaires come
to the call and save the homeless by taking all
the public money. Well, we know that doesn't work three
times over, right, Well why don't we build am all
(27:25):
in and veteran homelessness or homelessness in general with shopping malls.
Well we know that doesn't work either. Yeah. So you know,
I think it's just time to follow the law and
as Naven Hawkman would say, prosecutes criminals. But the criminals
aren't the homeless, They're the people stealing their homes.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
Will finish this conversation after the break and we're back.
Speaker 4 (27:52):
Have you known any people that had passed away as
a result of the fires or heard any stories that
the house people that have passed away as a result
of this.
Speaker 5 (28:01):
I have not, because I was at this particular time
dealing with our own situation, being evacuated in our own place,
trying to keep it from going on fire. I was
unable to pay up attention to see whether or not
I know of any people who are in house that
passed away other than someone I don't know that I
(28:21):
heard about on a discussion group that I think we're
both on, which is pretty tragic. But we have neighbors,
you know, in the neighborhood. Yes, I think a couple
who have passed away that I did not know personally,
but they were in their homes, but they were not
in house. Generally speaking, I have personally known, you know,
quite a few homeless veterans who have passed away.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I'm sorry to hear that.
Speaker 5 (28:46):
Yeah, me too.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
So I feel that this conversation has taken such a
different turn. What do you like to see happen to
change the trajectory for the un house Because when I
covered this story a few years ago, the unhoused was
outside of the gate and then they were swept and
they were forced inside. And you're telling me now it's
(29:06):
twenty twenty five that they're still outside in these tiny sheds,
and there seems to be no movement forward, movement of
getting them inside literally inside building. But they don't have
to be subjected to, you know, the winds and rains
and the temperatures living and in the tiny shed.
Speaker 5 (29:22):
So, yep, glad you asked this, because this is extremely
important to understand this trick. Now, the folks who were
on the sidewalk that we were helping out and providing
tents for for a couple of years, as those lined
up and we had the flags on them and everything.
Those folks wanted to go inside. They were there because
they wanted their home, and they were you know, so
(29:46):
many of them promised, oh that they have that home.
A lot of them went there and said, hey, I'm here,
I need it now, and they're like, can't whatever. But
it was never intended that the concept of what that
is would be a shed without a time, it in
the sink, and people constantly trying to sign you up
for research that you don't want to be involved with,
(30:06):
or be a post boy or girl for propaganda, or
people telling you to go when there's nowhere else to
go because you've been here, you know, thirty days or whatever,
and you know that's it. So you know, that was
kind of a trick too from a public opinion standpoint, right,
because they wanted to show this that Okay, look we
did it. They're all inside now, Yay, we're great, you know.
(30:30):
And then the other more difficult to see is with
the buildings. So the buildings that the homeless veterans over
the last couple of years or two years have started
moving into. A lot of folks don't realize most folks
don't realize many of those buildings are buildings that were
(30:56):
full of formerly homeless, disabled veteran tenants. So I'll give
you an example of one of them, building two O seven.
That building you know, in twenty sixteen twenty seventeen had
about one hundred and ten tenants living in there who
were formerly homeless, and they were receiving services and care
(31:16):
and house there. And when these private developers came in.
There's a couple of different rackets of them, but this
one involving Thomas Saffron and Associates and Century Housing Corporation
and US VETS. They created this paper LLC called the
Veterans Collective, Westley Veterans Collective or something like that. What
they do is they go in criminally and they quietly
(31:42):
secretly undercover, evict and mass all of the tenants in
one swoop. That's why I jumped on this whole thing
with the fire evacuation, because I know how it goes,
and suddenly the building becomes empty and then an illegal
contract made. It'll put you on the scope of this discussion,
I think. But there are many reasons, many times over
(32:06):
why these enhanced use lease contracts that they do are illegal.
But then when they finish renovating the building, right, this
building two seven that we're using for an example, goes
from one hundred and ten units or one hundred and
ten or so housed to none for years to then
sixty and the apartments are renovated. And you know, if
(32:28):
you take a look at them, they're kind of renovated
to where they could double as like a luxury bachelor
pad one day in a downtown Brentwood. And that's because
these are on ninety nine year illegal deals, right that
they're going to have them for. But if you look
at the hud Vash program, which is the program that
they will only rent the homeless veterans on these units,
(32:53):
the maximum term of it is twenty years. Twenty years
for homeless veterans on a ninety nine year steel So
that's pretty obvious. But the other thing is that's also obvious.
Homeless people don't pay rent. If homeless people could afford rent, say,
it would rent right most of them. So how in
(33:16):
the world are you doing this? Well, that's why I
think we have to understand there's been a mission creep
in La County where we've gone from let's say in
twenty sixteen, not just with veterans, but with all the homeless.
We need to house the homeless. Hey, approve these bonds,
approve these billions. We got to house the homeless because
we're going to pull on your heartstrings to house the homeless.
(33:36):
And then today somehow, what are you talking about? How's
the homeless? No, we said affordable housing. I mean they
pulled that one right out from under the wall of us.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
Right.
Speaker 5 (33:45):
It's a complete change in what they said. All this
was about between twenty sixteen and now over the past decade. Right,
So with the affordable housing, the way it works with
homeless veterans, right, bill since they have to, at least
for a little while, only put in veterans there who
are disabled and at least at some point homeless. What
(34:06):
they're also doing is they're taking a building that the
taxpayers have already paid for that the veterans who are
homeless are already entitled for. The whole thing is paid already.
We're still paying for them to be there rent free
because they can't afford rent when they're homeless. And now
you're putting another taxpayer billing program on top of it
(34:26):
that creates a full kakamami program that takes a long
time to get your voucher and do all this stuff
called the Hudbash program that is meant be out in
the community, not where the federal government already has land
and resources and buildings and services that are being gutted
as they're being stolen. So those units are charging no joke,
(34:49):
one hundred and sixty percent on average the average area
rent there in the Brentwood West with westl area. These
veterans who were homeless or or at homeless at the
time that they're moving into let's say Building two o seven.
After they fight like mad and spend all this time
trying to survive to get one of these vouchers to
(35:10):
get what they're entitled to in the first place that
they're evicted from. They get these vouchers, and the vouchers
cover not anything affordable but a one hundred and sixty
percent average market rate rent price dag going directly into
the pockets of these thieves calling themselves developers, case managers,
and property managers that are getting everything for free and
(35:32):
taking some of that money they're getting for free and
handing it back to the politicians that they are bribing
with public corruption to keep it going. And so in
this whole process we have left housing, more death, more
public corruption, and more robbery of the taxpayer's general welfare.
We cannot go thinking, oh shit, they got us, Okay,
(35:54):
what's the next step, because forty one to eighteen works.
No way, no way. I mean, when they were making laws,
you know, Jim Crow laws, were people saying, oh shit,
they that worked out. Can't do that, what's next now?
Unacceptable that if a law is unconstitutional, especially one that
is that is intentionally made with fraud in federal criminal conspiracy,
(36:16):
there is no reason to accept that. It can't be accepted.
It is unlawful. Even the Supreme Court in its history
has fraudulently protected unconstitutional legislation, and the people did not
stand for that. And so if this country is going
to survive, and if it's going to prosper over the
long term, you know, we do have to come together
(36:39):
and peacefully and lawfully advocate in the most assertive manner
possible against pool and unusual punishment, you know, because it's
it's like we're creating a scenario here where not just
homeless veterans, but homeless people in general, which is a
growing popular even have to these spires right is being
(37:02):
pushed forward. The only option being what they're calling you care,
which is a you know, being strapped down to a
bed in a hospital that they're trying to build as
fast as possible and become who knows, research guinea pigs
or something like that. I mean, it's scary where it's going,
and it cannot be accepted. It just can't happen. And
(37:26):
the only way this is going to work is if
people who try this sort of thing or contemplating being
part of this sort of organized crime against humanity and
against this country, they need to realize that they're going
to go to prison and have a tiny home of
their own, but one with a toilet and to sink
and just to coveyat something. The last part of this
endless die dribe here of mine is I'm not partial
(37:49):
to homeless veterans. This goes for anybody who is homeless
that is trying to survive. I am just, I guess,
being lazy and focused on veterans because there are so
many laws and appropriations and regulations in place that don't
leave any excuse to be created. To how and to me,
(38:12):
I've always felt since being involved with this, that that's
a pretty good starting point to demonstrate. Okay, well, if
we can do it here, why can't we do it
with everybody who's homeless.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
Well, I have thankfully been brought up to speed on this.
Thank you, Ryan, You have been very thorough in that.
Speaker 5 (38:29):
Thank you so much for providing an opportunity for me
to talk. You know, I mean, I'm really thankful for that.
I appreciate that you're such a good guy. You know,
you've shown up too in courted times where I had
no idea even knew what we had going on there.
You know, I'm so impressed and thankful for what you do.
(38:49):
I think you're a very honorable person.
Speaker 4 (38:51):
Oh that's such harder to be coming from another honorable
person that really has this heart set to right some
wrongs in this world.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
And I think, thank you for that. Thank you again.
Speaker 4 (39:02):
I hope you don't mind if I invite you back,
because I don't think this conversation is going to end soon.
So this is one of those developing stories and we
must keep an eye on it and make sure and
justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
That's from doctor King's writing.
Speaker 5 (39:18):
Thank you.
Speaker 4 (39:23):
Thank you again to Ryan. You can follow his work
at the links in our description. This concludes another awesome
episode of Weedian House. If you have been impacted by
any of the fires recently or have a story to tell,
please reach out to me at weedian House at gmail
dot com or widian House on Instagram. Thank you all
(39:43):
again for listening, and may we again meet in the
light of understanding. Whedian House is a production of iHeartRadio.
It is written, posted, and created by me Theo Henderson,
Our producers Jbie Loftus, Baily Fager, Katie Official, and Lyra Smith.
(40:04):
Our editor is Adam Wand and our local art is
also by Katie Official.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
Thanks for listening.
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