I bet you think the Wood Street homeless slum went away. Physically it did, but the people who used to squat there are still around. They’re now actively lobbying the City Council to provide them with free everything. Carroll Fife is their de facto leader. They have their own website, under the moniker Wood Street Commons, where they list their demands as:
- No mouth goes unfed
- No back goes unclothed
- No heart untouched
- No human goes unhoused
At the July 23 meeting, Fife encouraged the speakers to talk at length about their demands—including, amazingly, that the Oakland Coliseum site somehow be devoted to providing the former Wood Street squatters—and presumably all homeless people—a place to live (I wonder how AASEG feels about that). One speaker also complained about conditions at the Lake Merritt Lodge, which also houses a lot of homeless people. All the speakers made it clear that they demand “Housing First,” which the National Alliance to End Homelessness defines as “a homeless assistance approach that prioritizes providing permanent housing to people experiencing homelessness.”
I want people to think about what these demands mean. In the last point-in-time count, there were nearly 10,000 homeless people in Alameda County. We can safely assume, based on past evidence, that at least half of them, or around 5,000, are in Oakland. Therefore, what the Wood Street Commons people and their allies are demanding is that 5,000 people should be supplied, for free, with the following:
- All food
- All clothes
- “Permanent” housing for life
But wait. Food, clothing and housing are only part of what these activists expect. Fife will not tell you, nor will the Wood Street Commons people, that these things entail far more spending. I mentioned the National Alliance to End Homelessness, which is the model that Fife turns to for guidance. It’s clear from their website they also demand free healthcare, including mental health, for homeless people.
The most radical homeless advocates such as Fife are calling for permanent, across-the-board life assistance for all of their constituents’ needs—in other words, the creation of a brand new underclass of welfare recipients totally dependent on the dole. This is clearly objectionable for at least two reasons: it’s obviously unaffordable, and it’s morally wrong. Individuals who have chosen to drop out of the system must live with the consequences of their tragic decisions. They cannot expect, in any sane world, working, tax-paying citizens to support them. “God helps those who help themselves,” the old saying goes. The Lake Merritt Lodge wasn’t designed to be the Ritz-Carlton. The people who are sheltered there should consider themselves lucky to have a roof and four walls around them.
Across the Bay, in San Francisco, Mayor London Breed has repeatedly emphasized her belief that local government must “make [homeless people] so uncomfortable on the streets of San Francisco that they have to take our offer” of shelter or housing, or else leave the city. Let’s demand that our current Oakland mayor (who may not be mayor much longer) takes the same common-sense approach. Lest you think this approach is at odds with San Francisco liberals, the statistics prove otherwise. Breed is “surging” in the most recent mayoral polls, while the most progressive candidate, Aaron Peskin, is struggling, with only 12% favorable to him. This proves that people want a moderate approach to politics, with a strong crackdown on crime and encampments, not a far-left style of communism. I suggest that voter attitudes in Oakland are similar. People are fed up with woke, progressive politicians who are killing our city by turning it into a slum where criminals are given get-out-of-jail-free cards by unscrupulous politicians. This is why Pamela Price and Sheng Thao will be recalled in November. The wokes have had years to prove that their ideology is correct; they’ve failed disastrously. What they’ve proved instead is that their anti-cop, pro-encampment, racist policies are the cancer that destroys cities.
Steve Heimoff