What's Next, Los Angeles? with Mike Bonin
Los Angeles is at a turning point. We are living in a defining moment. What happens next is up to us. Over the past few years, problems and challenges have shaken this city -- and tremendous opportunities for change have presented themselves. How do we rise to this moment and emerge a better place to live? What will it take to create a more just and a more equitable community? Working together, how are we going to create a stronger, forward-thinking Los Angeles? Mike Bonin, writer, teacher, progressive activist and former City Councilmember, looks at the issues and problems facing Los Angeles, examines ideas, and talks with the people who will lead us to a brighter future.
Produced in partnership with LA Forward.
What's Next, Los Angeles? with Mike Bonin
Voices of the Unhoused
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Tens of thousands of people are living -- and many of them are dying -- on our streets. Homelessness is an epic humanitarian crisis, and we are not going to solve it unless we hear from people who are living it. In this episode, Mike talks with: Theo Henderson, a former schoolteacher who has been unhoused for 7 years, and hosts the "We the Unhoused" podcast; Sage Johnson, who has unhoused for 7 years in her late teens and early 20s before securing permanent housing, and who currently advocates for policy change with the LA Coalition to End Youth Homelessness (LACEYH).
LINKS
We the Unhoused podcast:
Hello Dogtown! Podcast
LA Times Column: When homeless people tell their own stories, we should listen and not turn away by Nita Lelyveld
Invisible People: Homeless Man Launches Podcast, Gives Voice to Unhoused People
More info on the proposed ordinance we mention that would ban sleeping in certain areas:
https://www.latimes.com/homeless-housing/story/2
020-10-27/l-a-city-council-set-to-consider-new-ban-on-homeless-camping
https://www.latimes.com/homeless-housing/story/2020-10-28/la-city-council-delays-vote-camping-ban
Info on Commission on Lived Experience with Homelessness:
https://www.dailynews.com/2020/08/05/la-leaders-tackling-homelessness-seek-more-advice-from-people-directly-affected-by-crisis/
Ten things LA can do to end homelessness:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_hi48Rb8HY&list=PLOtALmuScRr80f5yAPfhAg45ZlnusW9pG
What's Next, Los Angeles? is produced and hosted by Mike Bonin, in partnership with LA Forward.
Four of our unhoused neighbors in Los Angeles are going to die today. Four more of them are going to die tomorrow, and likely four more the day after that. By the end of the year, more than 1,000 unhoused Angelinos will have died on our streets. Homelessness is the epic humanitarian crisis of our time. Tens of thousands of people are unhoused and unsheltered in Los Angeles today. It is the challenge that we must meet. And we are going to discuss it today with some of the real experts, people who have experienced homelessness. That's this week on What's Next, Los Angeles. Namaste, everyone, and welcome. I'm Mike Bonin. Thank you for joining me on another edition of What's Next, Los Angeles. On this podcast, as we look at the issues facing Los Angeles and identify the solutions to some of our problems, we're going to be discussing homelessness a lot. You're going to hear what other people think and you're going to hear what I think. You'll no doubt hear me talk about the broken status quo and how we have an economic and a social system that actually creates homelessness. You'll hear me talk about how there are many pathways into homelessness and not a hell of a lot of pathways out of homelessness. You will certainly hear me explain innovative and faster and cheaper solutions that I've been fighting for. But not today. For our first discussion about homelessness and what's next Los Angeles, I want to do something we do too little of in LA. Listen to the voices of people who are or who have been homeless. If we're ever going to solve this problem, we need to center the discussion around the people who are living it. Joining me today is Theo Henderson, a former school teacher who became homeless seven years ago and remains unhoused. He's the host of a podcast called We the Unhoused, which he launched about a year ago to amplify the voices and to shine a spotlight on the struggles of unhoused people in Los Angeles. Also joining me is Sage Johnson. Until she found housing recently, Sage was unhoused for seven years in her late teens and her early twenties. She's a member of the LA Coalition to End Youth Homelessness, and she advocates now for better and smarter policies to end homelessness. I've been on panels with both Theo and Sage, and both of them have actually interviewed me. Theo on his We The Unhoused podcast, and Sage on Hello Dog Town, which is a podcast produced and hosted by Homeless Youth. Our conversation ran pretty long, so it's going to air in a couple different installments. Today, you're going to hear them talking about the struggles and the risks and the indignities of being unhoused. You're going to hear them talk about the myths and the stereotypes and the stigma. And as the city council gets ready to consider a proposal banning people from sleeping in certain public spaces, you're going to hear them talk about their interactions with police and their feelings about policies that criminalize homelessness. Here's our conversation, which was recorded over the weekend. Just a fair warning the recording circumstances were not optimal, and you're occasionally going to hear some pagers vibrating and some other noises. Please take a listen. All right. So uh thank you, Theo, and thank you, Sage, uh, for joining me today. I'm really glad to have you with me.
SPEAKER_03Thank you for having us. It's like like I say uh earlier, it's a pleasant turn of events. We both interviewed you, and now we're on the other s the other side of the microphone. So thank you for having us.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, podcast role reversal. I have been on Weaving and interviewed by Theo, and I've been on Hello Dog Town, produced in part uh by SPY in Venice, and Sage was one of the people who interviewed me there. So uh I got uh plenty of questions in in reverse. So part of the reason I decided to the part of the reason I asked you to to join me on this today is as I've been launching this podcast, I know that an issue I'm gonna have to discuss a lot because it is the biggest issue in Los Angeles right now is the issue of homelessness. And usually when you have a discussion about homelessness at the city council level, usually when you have a discussion about homelessness on a radio interview, it tends to be elected officials or community uh activists or uh some academic or uh um uh the the head of a social service agency. And uh uh really very, very rarely do we ever hear in the policy debate and in the debate about what programs we should be doing, the voices of people who who have been unhoused or who are unhoused, people with with lived experience. So I thought for the the first discussion I have on what's next Los Angeles about homelessness, it would be appropriate to talk to people with lived experience. So uh for the the people who are are are listening into the podcast, uh to can can you each tell us a little bit about yourself so they have some context about about who you are and and your experience. Sage, you want to go first?
SPEAKER_01Thank you. Hey everyone, I'm Sage. I am a Los Angeles native. I'm an Angelino, born in '95, still thriving in 2020. I have lived experience of homelessness, and we'll get into that later on. But outside of that, holy girl itself, I love karaoke night. Can't really do them in person now, so it's just me and YouTube and whoever's song comes on next. Um, I am an avid reader, I am a community leader and advocate, and I just believe that young people have the voice right now, and I'm helping us keep it amplified.
SPEAKER_00Karaoke. Well, the the the audience can rest assured that that's not something I will ever do. It would be a disaster of epic proportions. Uh Theo, how about you?
SPEAKER_03Well, thank you again. Um, my name is Theo Henderson. Um I'm a host and creator of Wheedy and House, and I am not a uh Angelino, but I'm a transplant. I was originally from Chicago. And um I just to briefly just tell you a little bit about it, I am a college educator, educator. I was teaching and I have had a functionary, a functional life in many respects, and I have seven years of lived experience of being unhoused. And I basically have basically used a the term unhoused and um contrast without saying homeless or how I use houseless and those kind of things in order to shift the conversation because there's a new change and evolution in terms and evolution of um ideas that's being put for the forefront in light of a lot of things that's been going on. So the long and short of it is is like I'm I am an unhoused Angelino here that's been unhoused for seven years, that's trying to stay afloat of the quack mire of what um the bureaucracy and the situation, the uh basically the wide-held beliefs that about houselessness that people have, and hopefully to change it for the better.
SPEAKER_00Well, you know, one of the beliefs that that a lot of people have about homelessness is that it can't happen to them.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_00And uh that's one that that that that from everybody I've spoken to has become unhoused can say, well, I might have thought that once, but I I certainly don't think that now. Yes. Can you can you tell us a little bit about what you were doing before you became unhoused and how it happened?
SPEAKER_03Well, actually, I can tell you clearly, I was an educator. I taught middle school and high school. Um I finished my undergraduate at a private school. I had an academic scholarship. I did my internship in a couple other different places in um in the states of like Michigan and what was it, Michigan, Louisiana, and I think Texas. I did some sub and then I taught every facet or um, I should say, nationality, ethnicity. Um I started out teaching adults first after finishing my internship, um, Serbians, my first students were Serbians, and that was a very unique, interesting experience. And then I um moved back into because um into another adult uh Lithuanians because I was teaching in Chicago, and then I um wanted to get back into what my concentrations was middle school and high school. I would go and and and sub into different places, and then when I became here, um I was hired on as an educator and I educated uh at the middle school and high school. And unfortunately, um I got ill and I had to step down in the position because my illness was a bit severe and um and it required me to rehabilitate. And and it's very difficult because I have no wife or kids or or or or family um that could be able to put me up to be able to heal. I couldn't just go back to work just instantaneously and try to heal and do physical therapy and the like. So I eventually um chose medicine instead of rent. I chose uh to eat to survive, um, to medi uh regulate my diabetes because it was a bit off the off the charts, my blood pressure and all of the other things that goes along with it. And then um it came to a point uh during the recession I got evicted. And and that's where the the spiral led me to where um right now I'm where I'm at today.
SPEAKER_00Uh and where where'd you sleep last night?
SPEAKER_03I slept last night. I was fortunate. I had a little money saved. I stay stayed with at a pot chair, a place where I could stay and put my head for a few days and and to um then that's it's not always gonna be uh I'm able to do that all the time. And sometimes I stay in the street, and I am also a moving target because of the the criminalization of uh police officers. All it takes is a NIMBY Nancy or a NIMBY NO Nelson to call the police and then they are either uh uprooting you or making the situation very untenable to where to stay.
SPEAKER_00I I definitely want to get into that in in a few minutes. First, let me go back to Sage and and and ask if you could tell me or tell us uh where you were before you uh found yourself uh on the streets and and and what happened to get you there.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so this goes back to the 2008 recession. My mom was laid off, she was working since the age of 16, and all she could get pretty much was SSI. And with the increase in rent, this was 2008, with the increase in rent, everything that SSI barely, you know, paid the rent, but the rent was increasing every year. So then I had to um make some money in the house. I'm always an entrepreneur by here, by trade. So I was selling candy and things to help, you know, keep us afloat and what have you, and some other avenues. I'm not gonna get too deep involved with. And then it got to the point where my mom, she was, I became a primary caregiver. She was sick, um, super sick, high blood pressure. She already, um, in 2018, she already suffered strokes and heart attacks. So from that point on, from the age of 13 on to when I was twenty on to when I was 19, I was her primary caregiver. I was administering the medication, hospital stays, things of that nature. However, as sick as she was, she also had turned to many people at the time did alcoholism. So when it became unsafe for me in the to be in the home, I would leave. But since I was the primary family member to care for her, she always came back. So it was a vicious cycle. I had to leave school a lot of times, ended up being a truant and things of that nature. But that's not because I was over here doing ragtail things, I just had to maintain a home to the point where I could even still show up to school for the good as I did attempt. And then it got to the final point where I had to do for myself. We were staying barely head above water for many years, but it came to the point where it just wasn't enough. And I left home at the age of 19 because the 20 into the formal homeless system, first time the shelter and things like that as an overnight. Funny thing was, police took me there one night because I had to make a call on my mom because it it got into a really bad situation that evening. So I called them and they said, Well, you're 19, what are you doing here? I said, I am her primary caregiver. But as you can see, based on the shirt that's torn and all these other markings, that I was clearly in distress. I'm asking for help. Can y'all 5150 or can you assist her in some way? So all they did was penalize me to make it seem as though I'm causing issues and things like that. So that was actually my first night in a shelter. I said I can't stay here. There's nowhere else for me to stay at this point and at this time of night. So that was my first night in a shelter. And then from then on, I left home formally two weeks later, and that started my full shelter stay and things like that.
SPEAKER_00And and I've I've heard you speak before, Sage, and and and I believe you mentioned, I think it was when you were interviewing me on Hello Dog Town that you homelessness can sometimes be like dominoes, my expression, not yours, but that your homelessness wound up resulting in your mom also becoming homeless later, right?
SPEAKER_01Yes. So I my first night homeless was in January 2015. Or m systematically before was couch surfing and things of that nature. You know, get by to stay by before I actually ended up on the street. But my first night systematically homeless was January 2015. Three months later, my mom was evicted out of the apartment we had for 10 years into her car. And then she couldn't even park it at family members' house because they were so worried about the membiism of the neighborhood. She eventually went to downtown into the women's shelter. So we were both homeless. I was at a youth shelter in Hollywood. She was at the women's shelter in downtown and with health issues, bad health issues. Um she was getting elephantitis around her ankle. She has high blood pressure. Um, that shelter was one night in, one night out. So I was like, wait, but it was it was just so difficult to navigate. She was also experiencing advanced mental health issues to the point where she got lost a couple times. By grace of God, she found her way to me at a goodwill not far from the shelter I was staying. Grace of God, she had ended up in Eaglewood, but someone was able to call me to see where she was and get her place. But that was all in a very tight, catastrophic whirlwind before I was able to finally get her to a convalescent facility because that was all that could be cared for. A baseline bottom-tier convalescent facility. It wasn't home, she wasn't on the street no more, but it wasn't that it was better at the moment, but it wasn't the best for her. Because then years after being in that shelter, she she was sick, there was no actual help, there was barely any maintaining. And unfortunately, she passed away two years ago. Um all the complications of homelessness to when she passed.
SPEAKER_00Wow. And it's it that that's that's so heartbreaking and and and not atypical. I mean, in in Los Angeles now, I think we're up to four people unhoused dying every day.
SPEAKER_03We'll have over one thousand this year, which is a and to add a little fervor on that as well, is like it is very, very difficult to self-medicate or regulate your medication being on the street. Because like when she was she was saying some of the challenges that was going on, I have not, because I know I go through those things trying to make sure that you eat properly. How are you going to eat properly? And I injured uh myself um before uh around the pandemic times, and it was very difficult because I had to hobble around in a walker and to go like try to find a bathroom and food and things of that nature. So, and and what I have noticed and I want to uh this also put out too is the fact of uh the untold unhoused is the elderly population. I'm I'm finding more and more elderly people that are unhoused. And you know, they you know, and it's due to various health issues, dementia, um, you know, other uh you know, other things that it makes it very perilous for unhoused people, but also even more perilous for the elderly uh population that are becoming unhoused as well due to ballooning rules.
SPEAKER_01Yes, yeah, Alzheimer's, which is why she would end up lost from certain places, exactly, and just trying to get once she was in a convalescent home. Of course, you know, they would let me know she walked out and things like that. But from all these other temporary or emergency or urgent care places, it was very, oh, your mom left three hours ago. Well, why did y'all call me one minute two? And that's not to put any blame on them just saying this so that way they can take this and upgrade their systems if they have yet to choose to do so. But I also see an increase in older adults. I see people who look like my mom who look like grandparents. I see people like someone's great uncles, great aunties, great cousins on the streets. And it's like, where can we not have people on the streets? It's heartbreaking.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I when I started by asking to to give some perception or some context for people who feel that that they can't become homeless, that it can't happen to them. If if you start from that idea that it can't happen to you, I think it's very difficult to imagine what the experience of being unhoused does to someone. When when I was in my mid-20s and was fairly new to Los Angeles, uh I spent a few nights on the streets. First it was the the the the couch surfing, then it was a few nights in my car, then a couple nights on the beach. And the the experience, even I mean, for me was it was very brief, but I mean it affects you deeply in a in a very short period of time. Uh I I remember driving around in my car, I used to look for neighborhoods that were under construction in Santa Monica because I knew there wasn't anybody living in front, living in that building. So I would sleep in front of that building, but I couldn't sleep, so I would you know do a fifth of whiskey in order to fall asleep. I mean, and you sort of anesthesize yourself. Can can can you talk about a little bit about how the experience of being unhoused affects and changes people who are experiencing it?
SPEAKER_03Okay, sure. Um I I can remember exactly the time when I was after the couch commitment um had had expired and and and when uh the first night um I was unhoused. I went out on the bus to a far-flung place in the valley. And all that night I walked because I was trying to find a place of sleep that will still offer me a sense of psychological respectability. And the reason why I say that, because I think for me, um thinking like, you know, like this can't happen to me, other me, or this can't happen to you, I think I fell into that because I can say I cannot believe that here I am, a college-educated person, and I'm about to be out of the street. I don't have a house, I don't, you know, I don't, you know, it's just like it was like really uh I don't want to say humbling. I just think it was just more traumatic for me because I had to just I I walked pretty much all night. I was like dog tired until I happened to stumble upon the 720 bus. And then I see a whole array of people that's on the bus, unhoused, sleeping on the bus. And I figured the next night that's what I was gonna do, sleep on the bus. But it it takes a toll on people because for me, it's because of how a society looks at unhoused people. And I definitely had carried some of that that baggage with me. You know, I'm I'm not, you know, I'm talking to myself and my mind. I'm not on, I'm not on substance usage, I'm not mentally ill, I'm not any of these, I'm not a criminal, you know, these things. So I was basically doing NIMBYism to myself to try to understand, well, you know, how the hell am I, you know, in this situation? This shouldn't be happening to me. And then, you know, of course, it's as time goes on, after getting over the shock and then being uh uh um uh um realizing the difficulties to get out of the system and trying to find a shelter that will allow you to be in it, because some things have a day in or a weekend, or and then you have to deal with the the culture of living in the cycle of houselessness of with dealing with social uh service providers, which is another conversation. Um, but yes, that's that's was one of my my big fears too. Sage?
SPEAKER_01It's like a grieving process, it honestly is, because getting to um back to the main point of what you were saying of like, oh, this can't happen to me. I came from South Central, so it was kind of a matter of time of are we going to move to a place where the rent is lower, which was an option for us, or are we just gonna keep going until we can't know more? And when we couldn't know more, it was just a grieving process. It was the denial of wow, how could this happen to me? I have done A B C all the way through XYZ right. Like I paid my dues, I've done this, worked years, but yet I'm still falling into homelessness. And then you have the anger. What didn't I do? Right. Then you have going through it, acceptance. Like, okay, I'm in this situation, and the longer once your chronicity and your chronic homelessness really gets into play, there's acceptance. Like, okay, well, now this is the way it is. It's kind of the norm for the person going through it.
SPEAKER_00I can't remember who it was. I I heard recently talk about the that becoming unhoused was a trauma. Being unhoused was a series of traumas placed upon that trauma. Either a small indignity or you know, everything from a small indignity to an assault, just or or a systemic trauma from not being able to access services or finding frustrations. Um was that an experience that you found as well? That there's a continued series of traumas that happen when you're unhoused.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Yes, very much so. Um that first trauma of becoming housing insecure, becoming displaced, it's like no other. It's kind of like it's undescribable to people who won't ever understand it and may not ever go through it. I say may because it can happen to anyone. But it's undescribable, it's like, wow, this is it. Like you have a this is it moment, and that moment is like huh, we can either add to this and make it better, or we can sideways it so that way we don't um digress into something worse, but you have a this is it moment. My moment was my first night in the at the organization I stayed with during my housing during my homelessness, and that was the LGBT center. And it was a room, it was their emergency overnight bedding. It was a room that had about 14 bunk beds and two overflows. And I just looked around at everybody. I was like, my worst thing was please don't put me on the top bunk. I don't know how folks operate. I don't know if I'm an evergreen staff member, just caught on the bad day. But my biggest thing was don't put me on the top bunk. But so my little blessing was they didn't put me on the top bunk. I didn't sleep that night, but I was just God, I was not on climbing no ladders on top of nobody. And I looked around, there were some folks getting jiggy with them in the corner, and I was like, huh, this is it. It was it was and not just saying this is it, but it was like, wow, from this point on, I really just have to carry myself to the next point. That five-year plan, that three-year plan, that I want to do for Christmas plan, out of the question. If that this is it moment was my survival skills kicking in and then staying on, they're still on right now. So that's just because I'm scared to fall back into it. Um, because now I'm in the adult system age. But right there was like, wow, you either make or break this time you got shorty, you either make it work for you, or this is just gonna be a series of bouncing back and forth until hopefully you you find something that fits.
SPEAKER_00So are you saying that your sort of your your horizon of of of planning for the future, your for your horizon of of of looking forward or optimism was limited to a day?
SPEAKER_01Gone. All of that was gone, it no longer applied. I was just trying to make sure that my basic needs of eating, maybe catching a couple weeks of sleep and exit and living was it. That was it. And my mother. So other than that, that was all. Don't ask me about what I want to do for school, don't ask me about no job. How am I gonna make I can get a job? How am I gonna maintain that job? So I was just like I I'm not sure. Yes, I later got into school and things like that when I built up a little more routine at the center, but other than that, I was in full survival mode. I was trying to as soon as as hard and fast, although it was like a gradual slope down, but as hard as fast as that last moment that I got to where I was in that shelter bed, that's as quick as I want to get out.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And and Theo, how about you? I think yeah, optimism comes and goes. Uh, it went and came and went with me. Um, because again, I I I was still into the early stage, the infancy stages of the inner enemies of myself. And I and I thought that maybe that I would be the exception because I had skills and transferable skills that I would just magically just lift myself out of being unhoused. Um, but because I but I had uh things that was uh holding me down, like my health, you know, and I knew because I was in the school system and I had got ill, it would be even increasingly difficult for them to rehire you because, you know, what happens if I do this again? What happens if I go into a diabetic coma again? What happens now that I'm on a field trip with a bunch of kids and I can't supervise the kids? And when you have a credential, um it means you you you have gone through the background check, obviously, and you can also have a sense of a responsibility for maybe 20 or 30 students, underage kids. And if I'm always they're worried about me and my health, or my I didn't get the medication, or I didn't eat. So those things were um new experiences to me uh too, as well as the fact that uh it's just trying to look at other jobs, like understanding my limitations. And I think I was having a very hard time accepting the reality that I'm not the same person anymore. I wasn't the same person that physically could do the same things. And I had to, um, one of the case, uh, what are the the therapists that because I went through a funky uh depression about it, uh, to understand, you know, you you you're gonna have to face your new normal, you know, you you know, and it's very difficult for people to understand that if they are speak with me, because I don't have visible disability. I have an invisible one. And and it makes it, and then because then you got the the finger waggers to come out. Well, you could do this, why can't you do that? And that and then that that helped uh deepen my depression because I spent a uh countless times talking to my friends trying to educate them on it, but they were just basically resistant. And then that also compounds with my own inner nimbiism against myself. So it's like so it became very, very difficult to hold the flame of optimism, but when it did come, you know, I tried to hold on as much as I could.
SPEAKER_00I I think the fact that you mentioned the depression is is a is a really important point. Yes. I in addition to being in recovery, I also I I suffer from depression and and have for a number of years. So I I I I can relate. And one of the things that has always struck me, because in conversations about homelessness on social media, even among elected officials, yes, there's a lot of, well, they became homeless because they're a drug addict or because they are they're they're mentally ill. Yeah. And there's two things with that. One is it's it's sort of judging, g giving a value. Okay, well, this person deserves to be helped, this doesn't. But the other thing I think it it tends to miss is being unhoused is often not the result of a mental health issue or the result of substance abuse use, but uh the the cause of it. Yes that you know I I would drink more when I was trying to fall asleep. Or if I were back out on the streets now, you know, going untreated without uh uh any medical treatment at all, you know, my depression would manifest into something pretty bad. And that happens, right? Yes.
SPEAKER_03I think too what um I I have to say on the also substance usage and and and and and drinking, because people always have that negative feeling of it. And I I don't have like the issues, like the traditional issues of substance usage or the uh mental health, and which shouldn't be, which should be offering a sense of compassion for that population anyway, which should be helping them instead of demonizing them. But I I had a different uh insight. Um, like four years ago, I got stabbed and I almost lost my life and I was in intensive care for a few months. And one of the things that I wanted um to point out too is about substance usage is that it was very easily um that I could have become addicted to painkillers. And I think sometimes when we hear people always talking about people in the unhoused, there has been notable people that are celebrities that have died from substance usage. Michael Jackson, Prince, um Um, what's the guy's name? That uh River Phoenix. All of these people were uh were in successful by anybody's standards, but they had a health issue that they succumbed to. Um and the pain was so uh for me was so great in the evening hours, but then again, my threshold had I the hip was increasing at the point where I was trying to get that that the honestly that same high that I got, or the lack of that floating feeling I had with it gave me morphine, I believe. And I was trying to chase that same thing. And then I realized that I said, you know what, this is what substances, it's not like someone said, hey, I want to be addicted to substances, or I want to be addicted to mental health issues. This is an issue, a human, a human issue, a human uh condition that we should be meeting with compassion and sensitivity and understanding, basically. So I think that was uh I I would just say uh Oprah Winfrey's aha ha aha moment in reverse.
SPEAKER_00Well, and and you mentioned that you got that that you were stabbed. I mean, one of the reasons I was asking earlier about the the sort of traumas is a lot of people, particularly during the course of the pandemic when homelessness has become a lot more visible. What I've seen a lot on on social media is a lot of the they're homeless by choice. They're there because they they don't want to follow rules. And in the early stages of the pandemic, when there were the the the stricter stayer at home orders, I was I I was getting some some some calls, I was getting some some comments that I heard from people that who were saying, Well, they get to be outside, and I have to stay inside.
SPEAKER_03And um that's what we delight into going out and and facing braving winds and rains of heaven. Okay.
SPEAKER_01Let me get your backyard.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, like it's just such a luxury, everyday Disneyland experience.
SPEAKER_01Like you can have my path, you can have my lifetime path if you like.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So how uh you you mentioned the the the the stabbing. Um how how scary is it personally uh on a physical level to uh be living outdoors?
SPEAKER_03For me, um, I have to be um, you know, one of the the shocks that that really took me away was like this is not the first time I was in a violent encounter. But I think the shock, because you hear so much NIMBYism, and they're sitting from a perch of talking about how criminal criminality with unhoused people. I think I just was just surprised. Like the first time I was attacked by three housed people, um, vigilantes, that's coming out of the bar. And they, and I heard they pretty much hurt the conversation, um, them talking among themselves. They were drunk and they were holding a conversation. They happened upon me because I was sleeping on the sidewalk, and I heard, you know, and they says, you know what, look at this, you know, piece of trash and you know, all this kind of stuff, you know, this he's uh this home, you know. Then they said, you know, which we should blank blank likely blank blank him up. And then, you know, they said, you know, they were telling one of the guys to look out to see if anybody was looking, or so they were just planning on the spot, because, you know, I have we had no conversation or conflict, and they thought I was asleep, that they thought it was acceptable. Um, people that have homes, the ones that rail to city council members and make these all these kind of uh nimby uh ideas, they thought it was perfectly acceptable to inflict violence on someone that had nothing to do with them or was just always just trying to sleep into the elements. And when I got kicked in the head and stomped and things, and and and and I having to fend myself off, it opened up a new reality for me. I'm like, man, these are people that they have really no excuse to be committing violence on someone that has not no reason for them. And then what was also equally disappointing is that um the police response to it. Um now, if if the roles was reversed, you better believe the police would have searched down encampments and made sure that they would have found the perpetrator. But when I um attended the question of telling them that I was attacked, they asked me, did I have the people's license place numbers? Um, what was the name? You know, just basically dismissive information. They were just, it was a half-hearted attempt. They were not really committed to trying to seek justice for the violence that was committed against me. And I just, that really dawned on me. Um, that was um a really a sobering experience to me that's like, you know what, police are only for certain people. And the only time that the police are going to be interacting with you, because I've always been uh when they run you off, is that somebody complains about you, or someone wants you to get gone, or they want you to take collect your thing, but it's never uh, or they run and run your name for a warrant, or they have to try pulling guns on you. But it it's not for unhoused people, it is for the housed community. If they make a make a snit about something uh about an unhoused person near their home, they'll can all easily say, like they do, that this guy is armed or he's got a weapon or those kind of things. So I face a lot of sobering realities about true the true essence of uh the system and how we look at houselessness as well as how LAPD treats unhoused people.
SPEAKER_00So the whole experience is a dehumanizing one.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00And Sage, I I I've got to imagine, I mean, I've I've heard plenty of stats on it, but I've got to imagine it's even more frightening to be a woman uh on the streets.
SPEAKER_01Yes, it is. Um just yeah, sorry, I'm still digesting from Theo. Um being a woman on the streets is one of the worst things you can do. It's one of the worst things you can be. You're taken advantage of, you're automatically wanting to be trafficked in some sort of way. They want to get you dependable on them. So there's a lot of like um coerced relationships, which are actually just situationships. There is a lot of a mental and emotional abuse to make you dependent on someone who can supposedly be your protector. A lot of times when you see couples, it's not it's supposed to be under the guise of, oh, I'm the guy I can offer you security. In actuality, you taking out your present-day trauma on her, letting her know, like, you ain't gonna get no better than me. Where was you uh before I found you? You was doing XYZ to get to where you were that day. I found you, and then now she's stuck in a situation and can't get out of it other by death or discourse. She can't get out of it. Myself, I say it to myself, um, I was always very vigilant. Um, my South Central street skills always kicked in because I want to fight until I see red, not calling violence. Well, I'm just saying, you're not going to, my life is my life is priceless. I will pay the fine for kicking somebody's feet for trying to get at me. But for the stories I'm telling, there's a lot of people, there's a lot of women because being a woman on the street is scary. Being on a woman, being a woman on the street is deadly, especially if you do sex work to get by. You're not guaranteed um that we'll be you'll see another John after that. You're not guaranteed that that that that pimp right there is going to actually treat you right, not treat you like a way to make a dollar sign. Especially trans women right now, being killed left and right. It's disgusting. It's deadly, it's scary. That's what I always tell the girls. Tases, switch blades, pepper spray, anything within California law and things of that nature, but arm yourself because you're on borrowed time.
SPEAKER_03That's an excellent point. I uh I also like to piggyback on because say you did a good point. It is paramount for anybody that's living on the street, like she says, to have some kind of system or weapon. Uh, one of the things that I did notice, and I will say this, I noticed like 85% of the people that rode the 720 bus were women. And there was a reason for that. And then another thing that I do notice too, that they were doing is that they were looking, um, they had dressed themselves to make themselves less focused as a woman or very uh attracted to be picked out on or be harassed by sometimes people that were trying to do abuse the women. So I did notice that they would wear old work boots, uh several uh sizes of men's clothes or heavy raincoats and and heavy uh what do you call it, uh skull caps, and there was no makeup whatsoever, you know, but they had that kind of yes. So that way it was this, you know, that way that they could be uh seen and you know, they could be people could not look at them or focus on them. I I I learned that.
SPEAKER_01Well hide your curves, hide your absolutely hide your femininity because it will come back to bite you. Yes without even trying. Just be in one of the ways that people can release frustration on you, whether that's sexual frustration or just frustration they have, and you are supposed to leave the weaker set that makes you a target.
SPEAKER_00Wow. That that's a that's a that's a that's a lot to take in, and I it's a lot I think that so many of us don't hear and understand and and and appreciate about about the the experience. Um we've we've talked about a lot of the different stereotypes. Uh uh they're homeless by choice, or everybody's a drug addict, or everybody's mentally ill. Uh another big one is the the term you hear a lot is instead of you you Theo, you prefer to use the term unhoused as opposed to homeless. Uh a term that gets bandied about a lot now that I hear is instead of homeless, criminal transient.
SPEAKER_03Yes, yes. And there's another one that really, because they have used this one against me as well, vagrant. They love that one. They they love, you know, they may say criminal transient, but they definitely love vagrant too. That's one thing NIMBY Nancy and NIMBY NO Nelson love to do is to try to find a way to add a criminality element to your situation. Just the most innocuous thing for um at the park, they would twist it into a situation that you're going to launch yourself on children or old people or something, or you're some rabid individual that will hurt somebody. Or if you're just leaning or have an encampment near an apartment building, uh, one of the gentlemen that I interviewed, uh, the women don't feel safe because he has uh maybe he's may have mental health issues, but he's not focusing or thinking about them. And he they just feel that he's going to attack them. You know, the it's always a twist to uh uh to demonize the unhoused person so to devoid people of sympathy or uh people wanting to do something proactively to help the situation. They'll use that to get people to stay away.
SPEAKER_01It's fear-mongering.
SPEAKER_03Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Well, and not only is it dehumanizing, but it it it leads to the type of violence you described earlier, Theo. But I I also want to draw the the connection then to what that does to the development of policy. Yes. So, you know, the city, by the time we air this on the 24th, the city council will be debating again an ordinance that would prohibit uh uh sitting, lying, or or sleeping in in certain public spaces. And and a lot of it is sort of shaped by that perception. A lot of it is shaped by a a perception that uh we need to force people into accepting shelter. Uh I I wanted to talk about that uh uh a little bit. Um there's a lot to unpack there in that ordinance. There's the the the element of of the enforcement of of the criminalization. It it it it leads to you know what people call sweeps where people are are are are made to move. Have either of you encountered uh uh a s been part of a sweep or been subject to uh citation or being moved along by law enforcement?
SPEAKER_03Yes, multiple times. Yes. And unfortunately, and and the difficulty of it is that how it's the system, how it's created. Um, people do not like the unhoused community. They have that criminality that always lurks in the back of their mind. So being uh like reasonable people that detest something and feel like it's a criminal act, um, they will say that if you you know follow the law, then you know the things are just gonna magically happen. The unhoused will just magically float in the air. You can offer them uh non-existent shelters, and we can talk about why a lot of unhoused people don't like shelters in the in the in the avenue, but it's like they launch themselves, attach themselves to police officers. And police officers, uh and uh to be fair, uh to be fair, they create the the narrative that the unhoused is the issues that they want to deal with and they will do quality of life concerns. So they will make excessive swoops around where an unhoused person will. They will find reasons to, if you can create uh ordinances, they have a teeth to be able to find a reason to violate their civil rights. Um, for example, and like I had one unhoused person, I've said one police officer came to me and said, you know what, they're gonna just keep calling um because you're here. And I said they can call all they want, but the guest, you know, I'm not criminal, I'm not, I'm not breaking any law. And according to, and then I had to create a lawyer at the time, not have one. Uh my lawyer, they said, that you can't be harassing me. And then that kind of changed the t uh the tone a little bit, but then they still they tried different ways to to express the displeasure of being unhoused in the respect that they go to city council. Give me a case in point, uh, Mike, you were creating and talking about uh creating studies to investigate uh uh other alternative solutions to criminalization.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And the the the idea that you even had the temerity to even just to express that, the vitreol that you received for that idea of treating us as human beings, it's just like it boggles my mind. It's like you we we we did not crawl under the rock to just be a criminal, but I just never, I just understand, I just don't understand the just outright hatred or fear of the unknown that you don't know. And maybe they fear deep down that that may be them and they don't want to be reminded of suffering, or maybe they really truly believe that unhoused people should be uh cast in Old Testament times, you know, you know, stoned or whatever. But the reality is the houselessness, particularly in the COVID-19, is going to explode in the most negative uh um fashion because a lot of people that have been not able to pay their rent, that you know, where are they gonna go? There are no shelters, they're obviously gonna have to go to the streets. So those those those those ordinances are going to be a very uh futile exercise, in my estimation.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and what's gonna happen? I'm terrified about what's gonna happen over the next few months. I mean, when a lot of the tenant protections start to fade, and as the economy doesn't recover, I think homelessness is just gonna increase. Sage, your your your experience, both being unhoused and as an advocate, uh, has really been with younger people, what what what the industry calls TAI, transition-aged youth? And a lot of times people who are are younger are are more of an invisible segment of the homeless population. Um are the experiences for for younger people who are unhoused with uh law enforcement as as frequent and as perilous?
SPEAKER_01Yes, yes, yes, and yes to the third times coward. Being a young person on um, because there's different ways, being a young person on the street and having to have police interactions a lot of times are just uncalled for. You sit in your tent, you're minding your business, by this time and today, day and age, you are already building your own community of friends, so that way y'all can watch your own facts and things of that nature. But you're setting up your encampment, and then here you are, police coming by, doing imaginary sweeps, there's no care. All of a sudden, you put the profile of somebody in the neighborhood they're looking for, but you ain't never been through here before. You've probably seen them 11 many times, uh 11 50 times that you have been cruising around the street looking for nobody, wasting gas, wasting taxpayer money, and then you have the interactions with people in the shelter due to police involvement, which is why I always told people back in the day, do not just like your show, because the cops honestly can look like you are in trouble because of the conversation of how stuff young adult. Like, if you don't look like a YouTuber, if you don't look like somebody from the TV, they're gonna question like who are you doing or where you are, especially in Hollywood. It's like, oh, if you don't look like you have no bank, what are you doing walking these streets? So there's always a lot of police interactions. Yes, at times people well, to be honest, there's nothing wrong with asking, like, what are you questioning me for? Oh, it might be entertained or something, but it's always the fact that you know that part of your right is where Officer Nick Face comes in and just wants to start to bully you because you know your right. You're not gonna bully me. You're here to do your job. You are here to do your job, Officer Toluca Lake. Why are you over here in Hollywood have no competency of the area or the community or the numbers of people here, whether they're housed or unhoused, but you want to come over here and flash your badge?
SPEAKER_00So there's a there's a push and it's consistent. I mean, it it comes up at least once a year at the at the council level, where the idea is that people are service resistant. Oh, and and and we need to help them say yes to housing, shelter, or services uh by using law enforcement to to give them the push. Um, do you wanna who who wants to take that one? I'll take that. Okay, you both do. Let's start with the let's start with Sage and then I'll go to Field. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01I am a big believer in treating this housing crisis as holistic as possible. You need to treat people, the numbers that you get, remind remember that they are each individual people, so you want to have human-to-human interaction. Do not get someone with a pistol and a half-ass badge to come over here and regulate something you were just told to do. You do not work in the homeless sector, you are just the muscle. You are an overworking muscle, you are a muscle that likes to twit because you want to fill a dose of power. These officers do not add any comfort or safety with homelessness. It just adds to further criminalization of homelessness, it asks to further inside means that you're a criminal. This is where the criminal transit thing comes from. So I'm getting not only the fact that I don't have somewhere to lay my head at at night for a long while, me simply existing on the street is a cause for you to call this person who has the opportunity to end my life because you don't like me right here. That is one of the craziest things I don't understand why people are so controversial about. It's care if not sweet. What do you need the police to honestly do if you want to include them in the toolkit? They cannot be the face of that toolkit. There honestly needs to be mental health workers and social workers there with outreach teams. Stop having LAPD and the sheriffs lead these conversations because they don't know diddly squat about deadly squat about this.
SPEAKER_03Um, one of the things that I have to say, because that would I've noticed, and I want to be in my estimation, um, our whole issue with service resistance is tied into the criminality idea of houselessness. It is at the root of it. And anytime when you have council members that talk over that, like Joe Baschiano uh talking about that or or or trying to force people, that's not uh autonomy, that's not agency, and that's not humanity. The first thing that we need to really understand about houselessness is it could happen to anybody. But there's not a one-size-fits-all kind of thing. If we have limited housing, if we have limited resources available, for example, we've gotten to the point that we push social workers and other uh service providers to tack on with the police because that to make them seem like that they're doing something. That and we give them billions of dollars and we give a dearth of money. We don't have enough money for the adequate services that we can do something about of the unhousedness crisis. We could do a lot of uh uh creative things like creating uh it may be like a, I wouldn't say a paw chair, but I would say definitely places where there are small hubs where unhouse or people that have mental crises can check in and work themselves from one, a trauma-informed perspective, as well as getting them to a place where they are trusted and safe, that if they have a crisis and there's a number for a mental health worker, that they're not in fear that you get some uh local, a local Okie Dog officer that doesn't like this man didn't uh respond to his commands and shoot him dead or shoot him dead in a hospital, where service provides hospital uh staff are upset that they had sheriff that shoot a person that had a a psychotic episode. That needs to stop because you know how many training such as they are, they're not mental health providers. They're there to be uh to keep the law in order. But if you have people that have uh myriad traumas, myriad experiences, then we need to be able to be more creative in how we look at the unhoused person as a human being. And that is a very difficult thing for people that have uh the old-fashioned that you did something wrong, you should be penalized. If you don't be doing that, you don't do this, you don't get in that. Human reality and human people human beings are not automatons. And that is very, very difficult for a large segment of our society to really come to reconcile with themselves too.
SPEAKER_00Let me step back a bit on the the question of the term service resistant. Uh I think there's a perception both in the general public and uh and and even within government that okay we have empty shelter beds every night and we are offering them to people and the uh the that they are not accepting them. Yeah. Help people who are listening understand why people aren't accepting a a shelter bed and and and are staying in an encampment instead of accepting the shelter bed.
SPEAKER_03Because it's NIMBY inspired. It's carceral. It is designed to uh uh to criminalize the unhoused person indoors. No human being wants to have a trash bag and they're putting all their belongings and told to throw away the rest of their stuff. No one, like for example, when the pandemic arrived at the shelter in Chinatown, um, they had a mat, a little cot, and then what they had for the people to put their belongings in was a large garbage can. Now think of that psychologically, that what if you're facing constant police harassment, constant NIMBYism, living from day to day. And then when you try to get some help, they they go in, you go in, and then you get to put, you say you put your things in a garbage can. How is you know, I I I defy anybody that's saying these things to trade places for three months to live like an unhoused person. I guarantee you they will be an open eye-opening situation.
SPEAKER_00Let me play devil's advocate a bit on that, and then I want to go to Sage, but let me play devil's advocate with Theo for a second. Yes. Um you you you talked about the the indignity of of having to to be in the regimented system where you have to put your belongings in a trash bag. A lot of people would say, well, isn't that better than sleeping on a sidewalk?
SPEAKER_03You you have a very uh I I I could take it even there. I could take it uh play even a bigger devil's advocate. Well, beggars can't be choosers. They're offering you services. Why don't you just accept it? Let me put it to you this way. Let me suppose that you had a family member that you cared about, and they offered you that they you want to help them, and you tell them that they have to be, for example, would they put them into a uh convalescent care place where they throw their things away, they lose their luggage, they lose their things, the medication that they need. They're offered to go in the curfew like they're in jail, they're barked at, they're disrespected, they uh uh they have no autonomy, they have no choice in what services that they need that would like, for example, in healthcare, we have a right to choose our own treatment plan or figure out how we can have the treatment plan fit our needs, but we don't have that because we're dictated this is where we're going to be. And if you don't accept this treatment plan, then you're gonna go into jail. Now, is that much of a choice? Would you want to be forced to be uh uh forced to make those kind of choices out of fear? That no, no, I I I I just I don't think so. I I am a person that have reasonable faculties, reasonable mental faculties. I demand that you treat me with the same dignity that I would treat you. I understand that life happens to everybody. And if you really want us to tackle this houselessness really from the humane part of it, we're gonna have to put in human into and humane into the conversation instead of product efficiency or automatons.
SPEAKER_00Sage, you raised your hand really quickly when I when I mentioned the term service resistant, uh, people not accepting an offer to go into shelter. And you've spent some time in shelters. So what did you want to say in response?
SPEAKER_01The response to that, um, speaking from the perspective of a young person, the response to that is one, there aren't a lot of youth-based shelters. Um, young people don't want to be in shelters with people 30, 40s, 50s, 60s, and up because the care is so specific for young people, because you're either coming in from already being a system such as foster care or the juvenile justice system, or you were like me and just happened to fall into it to people to, you know, like either make or break your homelessness and give me just like it all back. But being source resistant is also like shelters have shelters are not always, they're not like churches. It's not like come as you are, is what I'm saying. They have their own regulations, they have their own requirements of who they want their participants to be, and a young person doesn't always fit those participants. I will say Project Roomkey. There was not a lot of Tay young adults within Project Roomkey, because tier one was older adults 55 and older with chronic health conditions, second tier was adults with health conditions, and then Tay, which is which is 18 to 24 years old, was put under tier three, you get in where you fit in at recreational parts. So we saw a lot of the young adults just stay within their encampments and be as safe as they can, because where was the space for them? They need adequacy when addressing young adult homelessness, because for an adult to be successful, you need to have those life skills and experiences in order to fall back on when things really get to push in as they have. But as a young person, you may not have those, and you're and there's a crucial time in your life to where you are building those up, but now you are stuck in survival mode. So, where can you go to where places can help you one build up your life skills, but also let you know, like, yes, you're in survival mode and you're living, you're not just simply existing. Because a lot of them is like, okay, you're gonna exist with a curfew, you're gonna exist and go see your psychiatrist or psychologist. You're going to exist and go do this workforce development program. But being but being resistant, it's also about shelter location, which nippyism is a crime itself. Like, y'all have to stop shelters. We need more shelter beds in order to put not even put people in where people will choose to go into. Because a shelter is like an apartment. What's the proximity to transportation? What's the proximity to grocery stores? Because you can't get no nutrients from eating a 7-Eleven day in and day out. It's there, but it's not nutrients, it's just consumption at that point. What's the proximity to my basic needs? Like a library, if the place that I'm at doesn't have internet or computer access. What about the laundromat for where I need to go wash clothes? What about the park for when there's so many people in this place? I just need to go take a walk and look at some trees. And the place that I was in in my transitional living program, um long-term state shelter, there was 24 of us to six weeks. And sometimes it could have been upwards to 28 if we had overflow. So there were many times where I felt like I couldn't escape. There was too many of us. I don't ever want to live with 24 grown people ever again, plus 24 hour staff. Love the staff, but it it was a different experience because those were the same staff that saw you in your jammy jams.
SPEAKER_03Also, can I can I ask too that NIMBYism also caused as a the shelters to be always in a far-flung place? That the most esoteric, when I uh like I was recovering from my surgery, uh, they gave me a choice to, well, actually, the first choice they were going to give me was to me to self- now I was stabbed and had uh a deep surgical incision. The stuff was very painful. And I had to have a treatment plan, I had to have me uh dressed twice a day, first in the morning at night, so the wound could heal. They were going to uh uh basically, unless I until I made us think about it, they were just gonna discharge me right after I um, you know, and and the wound was still open and wide to go out of the street and self-dress myself out here on the street without any kind of shelter or any aftercare. And then the second uh uh uh yeah, the second we have, you know, and I and I had a whole, I had to take a whole house of uh medicine and at a certain time and all that nonsense. I'm like, who the hell is gonna be able to do all that living out in the street in an encampment? Come on. You know, they already complain that they see you just sitting existing. Let me I have to take my shirt off and open up my wound and and and and do that's the infection. You know, I wouldn't have been able to last at least a week. The second thing they wanted to do is put me in an area that I didn't want to go in. I wanted to go into where I knew that I was gonna be able to recover, that was safe, it was not in a danger because I was on one, I had to relearn to walk correctly and be able to move uh on the walker because I was using a walker because I had to be laid up at a certain position uh when after the surgery. And then two, um, they sent me to the most far, you it the most remote place where I had to walk a literally a mile and a half to get to the shelter on a walker. You can imagine how long that takes. So, you know, those things. Yeah, yeah. I mean, the think of, I mean, and on a walker, it had barely learned how to walk, and having an open wound that I had to make sure that I had to go back to make sure the nurse has to check every day to make sure there's no infections because this was an abdominal surgery. So I was ripped, I was open from here to all the way to there um near my navel. So, you know, that that that anything could go wrong. So, you know, that slowed down your healing process as well. Yeah, and I and I have diabetes, which makes it very, very difficult to heal too if you have diabetes because it slow retards the healing process. So I mean, and you know, and and people don't understand when you keep make pushing for people to put shelters out in far flung places with medical issues or people like that. Unhouse people are not going to accept that. It just I'm I'm not. I I'm done with you know accepting the far-flung places. We're part of your community, get used to it. There's gotta be places where unhouse people could go to death. We are.
SPEAKER_01Point blank, period. Like, we're still your neighbors.
SPEAKER_00My conversation with Theo and Sage continued quite a bit longer, and we're gonna air more of that discussion on a future episode. I also want to encourage you to listen to Theo's podcast, We the Unhoused, and to Hello Dog Town, the other podcast I mentioned earlier, which is produced and hosted by people who are experiencing homelessness, young people who are experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles. Let me just thank both Theo and Sage for being here with me today for opening up and sharing very intimate and personal stories. I really honor and respect that they did that. It is very important that we who are housed, we who make policy, we who advocate for policy, listen to those voices. The voices of people who are unhoused, they have to, they have to guide how we craft policy and programs to address homelessness. We don't hear often enough from people who are homeless, and as a result, we don't know when programs fail to work as advertised, or when resources are misaligned, or even how new proposals might impact people who are homeless. That's one of the reasons I propose that the city create an official commission of people who are or who have recently been homeless. We're not gonna get the solutions right if we're not talking with the people they impact most. And just before we go, a few words about the proposed ordinance that Theo and Sage and I discussed. On November 24th, the City Council is scheduled to consider a new ordinance that would criminalize sleeping on our sidewalks in certain places. I'm gonna oppose that ordinance and I want to just share with you why. Like almost everybody else, I am frustrated and angry about our homelessness crisis. I am pissed that people are dying on our streets and that we have encampments everywhere. I'm angry that our sidewalks are impassable for kids and for seniors or for people in wheelchairs. It's sick, it's it's insane, and it's intolerable. But let's be clear, encampments are not going to disappear if they're outlawed. Homelessness is not gonna end if we rely on police and prosecutors. We can't legislate our way out of homelessness. We can only house our way out of it. Legislative fiats will just delay progress, it'll drain resources, it'll push encampments deeper into residential neighborhoods, and it'll make the problem worse by distracting us from the real solution. Housing. Shelter. Services. That's what we need. Housing, shelter, and services. And I've made a series of proposals to do just that. This ordinance and those proposals that I'm talking about will no doubt be subjects of future episodes of What's Next Los Angeles. But we are already in overtime for today, so that's all for this edition of What's Next Los Angeles. Please don't forget to subscribe on Apple or Spotify or Google Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you have questions or if you have suggestions for topics or guests, please email me at what's next lossangeles at gmail.com. Again, thank you for joining me. I'm Mike Bonin. That's been What's Next Los Angeles. Have a great week and take care.