Mayor Kevin Johnson is the lowest form of life. Rev. Bookburn - Radio Volta

Disgusting.  Mayor Johnson is a former NBA player; these are some of the most overpaid individuals on the face of the earth.  Guess he doesn't have to worry about where to lay his head tonight.
If you'd like to tell him how you feel about this, here's his contact information:

Mayor Kevin Johnson
City of Sacramento

915 I Street, New City Hall, 5th Floor
Mail Code 09100
Sacramento, California 95814

916-808-5300 - Phone
916-264-7680 - FAX
E-Mail: mayor@cityofsacramento.org

Let's let him know that right-minded people will not tolerate this abuse of citizens!

Take this idea from Military.com a few steps further and involve more agencies.
VA Housing Program Offers Vets HopeApril 13, 2009Baltimore Sun

BALTIMORE, Md. -- Keith Church left the Navy in 1974 after a two-year stint, worked for years as a maintenance mechanic and never considered asking for veterans benefits.

But in December, Church, 54, was jobless, coping with health problems and on the brink of homelessness -- "couch surfing" with friends, he says -- when he turned to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for help. Within a few months, he moved into an apartment, thanks to a VA program that started in Maryland this year to help homeless veterans.

"I don't know how I would make it without the VA," he said. "I was at the bottom, health-wise and mentally. They are my only source now for everything. Slowly but surely, I am getting back on my feet." He is working with a VA case manager and is volunteering most weekdays at the VA hospital in Baltimore.

The Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing program uses vouchers to help homeless veterans move into rental units.

"The whole idea is to take these veterans from poverty and homelessness and give them the health and support they need," said Patricia Lane, the VA's coordinator for health care for homeless veterans in Maryland. "These housing vouchers are the blessing at the end of a long-walked road for these vets."

The VA hospitals in Baltimore and at Perry Point in Cecil County serve as the gateway to the assistance program and screen veterans to determine their eligibility. "This program is so well-received that landlords are actually calling and asking me for VASH folks," said David Mahaney, director of housing and community development for Cecil County.

Baltimore County is overseeing 105 vouchers worth about $750,000 annually, and Cecil County has 70 vouchers worth about $470,000, officials said.

Lois Cramer, administrator at Baltimore County's housing office, said she has assigned more than 80 vouchers and expects to use all 105 by summer's end. Cecil has issued more than 50, Mahaney said.

"Often, these men and women are just out of sync and need the stability of home and ongoing case management," Cramer said.

Typically, the veteran pays 30 percent of their income for rent, with the voucher picking up the remainder. The program has helped a 31-year-old single mother with a $7-an-hour job and $117 in monthly veterans benefits who has just leased an apartment, and a 25-year-old married father of two coping with a disability. He moved his family into a Sparrows Point home within 60 days of applying for a voucher. He pays $318 of the $1,048 monthly rent, with the voucher picking up the difference.

"The tenants usually choose a location close to employment, transportation and health care," Cramer said.

Census data shows that 71,627 veterans live in Baltimore County, with about 3.6 percent of them living below the poverty line. Nationwide, veterans make up a third of the homeless population, according to the VA.

"These vets don't want a handout, but they need help," Cramer said.

The need will continue, particularly as veterans return from Iraq and Afghanistan, officials said.

"The things we saw overseas come back and bother us later in life, especially the Vietnam vets," said Church, the Navy veteran. "When they start coming back from this war, look out."

The voucher program streamlines what can be a complicated housing process, said Meg Ferguson, who coordinates veterans affairs in Baltimore County. "Veterans are proud, and it's difficult getting them to accept help," she said. "The good news is that a lot will work their way out of a crisis, turn in the voucher and transition into another program. Then the voucher can go to another in crisis."

"Nationwide, veterans make up a third of the homeless population, according to the VA."

Sad.  Too bad our government doesn't take some of the money it pumps into killing people in other countries and put it into caring for those people who thought they were signing on to protect their country... or those drafted who didn't get a choice.

I like your idea, Bob.  I wonder if the VA could step in on behalf of perhaps up to a third of these people...

My father's family lived outdoors in a tent for close to a decade through no fault of their own.  They were law-abiding, hardworking people like many of today's homeless who found themselves without permanent housing.  It seems there has always been a huge gap between the haves and have-nots in a society that rewards some out of all proportion to their fellows and casts those fellows adrift to fend for themselves.  To then evict people who have nowhere else to go is ludicrous, unfeeling, and inhuman!  Do the powers that be think people ENJOY being homeless?

I would propose that all the derelict buildings and foreclosed properties be made available to families to occupy and that priority is given to ensuring that they have income sufficient to pay basic expenses.  LIVING BEINGS need to count more than dollar signs.

She has diabetes and she's drinking a beer?

The Government should help to provide housing for ANY Homeless Person!  Here we are watching AIG Executives get up to $6 Million Bonuses for BANKRUPTING a Company (Or it would have been other than the Government's intervention) and giving AIG over $200 Billion in "Aid"!  Aid which basically helps the RICH!
           
Yet, we now have Millions of people, most of whom formerly worked, or were in the Military trying to protect the rest of us, who are now homeless all over the U.S.

What is WRONG with this Country?  We have made it a Crime to become Homeless! Yet it's the fault of EVERY Person alive in the USA that Homelessness exists here.  But it's NOT the fault of the Homeless themselves.  It's the fault of the rest of us for not having a sufficient system that prevents Homelessness, before it happens.

And Rom is 100% correct! We are spending literally Trillions of dollars on the Iraq & Afghanistan "Military Actions" (There was no War legally declared since WWII), and about 80% of that money in going towards Corporate Profits, not to support the Troops! If we pulled out of both Countries, and had the U.N. send Peace Keeping Troops for a while, everyone would be better off long term.

All of the money being spent on getting Corporations and their top employees rich should be spent on well thought out programs to create Jobs and Affordable Housing. Instead, the Country is turning into two classes, the Super Rich top 5-10%, and the rest of us. And 300 million people fight for 25% of the Wealth, while Military, Energy and Medical & Pharmaceutical Companies, and their Top Executives (And Stockholders) get more & more Wealthy!

The Poor end up Homeless over in Overcrowded & Under maintained conditions, while what used to be the Middle Class People live now from month to month trying to just keep up with their bills ..... Then they fall into Poverty, as well!

We are headed into becoming another 3rd World Country, and it's NOT far off until it happens. Millions of Jobs are going to India, China, and a hand full of other Countries, while the U.S. sinks into s deeper & deeper abyss that is rapidly beginning to look like Hell!

But WHY don't 5 Million People March on Washington?  The Mayor of Sacramento isn't the ONLY one to blame for the Homeless being evicted. It's the People of California, as well! What has HAPPENED to their Values that they LET this happen to their fellow Human Beings? And it's not unique in California, either.

The Same "Baby Boomers" who I grew up with, and who were responsible for ending the Vietnam War, are now turning their backs of the Homeless, and instead seeking "A better quality of life" for themselves. But the Rich are out to get THEM, as well! And they will.

WHEN are we ALL going to Wake Up and realize that when there are ANY Homeless People in our Country, it is because we ALL are failing to do what's right?  Blaming it on those who are suffering is immoral, unethical and against ALL Values of any Religion or Society, yet it continues, and is getting worse.

And the Rich must STOP Taking and living with constant GREED as their main Motives, and Give Back to the rest of Society, and God! That IS the Key to this all. And if they don't, they should be forced to do so. Boycott their Products one by one, until they GET the Message where it hurts them.

Peace Pilgrim's philosophy is that anyone who has more than what they need just to survive on is hurting the rest of Society.  And if everyone Used only what they needed, then no one would EVER have to suffer, except under extreme conditions, like during natural disasters or when ill.  And it's NOT Communism, or Socialism, to want Everyone to have a Right to a Home, Food, an Education and a Job, as well as Health Care!  It's something that should be a God given RIGHT that we honor!

Peace,

Steve

December 2003. A social enterprenuer fasts from a tent in Chapel Hill NC. Having returned from Russia where he's leveraged a microfinance bank, he's calling for economic rights in the US.

I try to hel raise awareness and pitch a pastiche of Capra's Meet John Doe at an ABC News reporter. In the movie a journalist clings to her job by inventing John Doe, the activist calling for shared values and a common purpose. In my inversion the activist was real, the journalist imagined.

"Nice try" he wrote "but she'd probably lose her job for writing anything that might upset the wealthy ABC sponsors" 

That's the point at which we decided to work together on social enterprise in international development and shortly after John Edwards opened the Center for Poverty Work and Opportunity in the same town. As you may recall John was the One America advocate.

Jeff 

In the context of housing, what's also relevant in the story above is that the last project in Ukraine was a proposal for a repatried community with scant housing and opportunity for income generation supported through microfinance and transformational lending.

 http://www.p-ced.com/projects/ukraine/crimea/

In an interview with a diaspora leader, after we launched in London he describes the swords to ploughshares objectives and the more inclusive economic model we promote.

http://www.iccrimea.org/scholarly/economicdev.html   

Jeff

I'll try that link again. The one above fails: 

http://www.iccrimea.org/scholarly/economicdev.html

http://hexayurt.com is a real solution to these kinds of temporary housing crises. It's a fully open source design for a temporary house - not a tent - a temporary house. 
Inexpensive and easy to build, the local community could organize to help people into much better shelter for the duration of their homelessness.
Please give it a look.

In a city like Baltimore, where we have approximately 40,000 vacant homes and people who so desperately need housing, this issue is near and dear to us at BSLW.  Recently, the police cleared out a small "tent city" that was located in the shadows of M&T Stadium, home of the Baltimore Ravens -- this was done with little fanfare and we haven't seen any press coverage. 

Nothing about this country's economic policies regarding housing has made sense for 20+ years -- when is it going to change???

why can't they just target the troublemakers? i'll never understand how the government grants people the right to live and be free, and yet gives them no place to do it.

"Hooverville?"  That's so 1932.  The Sacramento encampment was a Bushville, plain and simple.  Call it what it is.

The Sacramento Mayor's action was what happens when Godlessness predominates our culture; namely, the current (I would hope very soon the ex-) Mayor is: a non-person, without mercy, compassion & humanity, and utterly void of all the qualities that make up a God-fearing and truly human being.  Hopefully, he'll pay for his overt action. 

they treat people like dogs. jjjeeezzz! leave them alone and give them food stamps so they can survive.

That prompted an old memory, Jack.

Lyrics first:

"And they´re African, Mexican, Caucasian, Indian,
hungry and hopeless Americans.
The orphans of wealth and of adequate health,
disowned by this nation they live in.

And with weather worn hands on bread lines they stand,
yet but one more degradation.
And they're treated like tramps while we sell them food stamps
this thriving and prosperous nation."

Then Don Mclean

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyFEXgpp2VY

I have been keeping informed about this situation for a number of months, now. I recently wrote to Mayor Kevin Johnson and told him that he was wrong on this issue. Here is a copy of my original e-mail to him and down below is his response to me (dated March 25, 2009):

Dear Mayor Johnson,

I recently read that you made certain comments about the homeless
people living in a tent city in your city. I have read most of that
transcript and wanted to comment. You obviously have made some very good
points, since you seem to be very much aware of the housing and job
situation in Sacramento. In your comments, you stated that there had to
be a balance being compassionate but also having zero tolerance (see
below):



"We have over 200 people that are, unfortunately, camping out along the
river. And I think what's happening in our city is we have to make sure
that we have tough love. We have to find a balance being compassionate
on one hand, and then also a zero tolerance. These are safety hazards,
not just for the homeless population, but for the people who want to
enjoy the river."



I understand that as mayor of a major American city, your first
responsibility is to the welfare of the people living in that city.
However, before you start talking about "zero tolerance" and "tough
love", perhaps you could see about getting these folks into some
affordable housing units. The great majority of these people have been
laid off due to the current recession, and most of them simply want to
work and get back on their feet. I know about this, because I went
through a period of homelessness as a result of the last recession. I
spent time living in a shelter and it was not the happiest experience.

My hope is that you do something to help these folks get through the
current economic crisis. Zero tolerance should only be used for people
who don't wish to work or to be part of a productive society, and not
for people who are down on their luck through no fault of their own.
Thanks for taking the time to read this e-mail.



Sincerely,



Matthew Cloner
Seattle, WA.


-----------------
matthew,

thank you for taking time to contact me. i appreciate your feedback.
i do not support a sweep of the tent city without compassionate,
responsible options.

i am convening a task force on homelessness and hope to have positive,
comprehensive solutions in the next two weeks.

best,
kevin

This is sad, the sprouting up of Bushvilles was sad enough but to see this displacement tactic to clean up the river so prosperous couples can go for romantic walks along the river without being bothered by the reality of the problems resulting from the current economic situation is even worse. Fuck you Kevin Johnson, fuck you.
Couldn't Obama use his book sales to give shelter to these Americans? 

Homelessness in America can be eliminated with the construction of low income housing and other solutions (pre-fab homes, etc). But this means that our national priorties need to be altered. Homelessness can happen to anyone. And what goes around comes around. Kevin Johnson is the mayor of Sacramento today, but 15 years from now he might be the one who is living in a tent somewhere.

Move Over Campers…. More Disabled Will Be Moving In….

Let me start by saying Mayor Johnson can not take all the blame alone.  Governor Schwarzenegger, as of January 2009 raised the co-pays on medicines for those on Medicare/Medicaid.  They did give the disabled/seniors a cost of living raise of 5.8% on January 1, 2009 (the largest raise we have ever received) but as of May 1, 2009 he is taking it back.  (By the way we only got a 2 week notice this was going to happen which will put some people in a bind because they committed that extra money to pay bills.)  President Obama is giving the disabled on SSI a one time stimulus payment of $250, due to arrive late May 2009. 

This is how it breaks down for me.  I got a $37 raise 1/1/09.  May 1, I loose the $37 raise.  Obama gives me $250 stimulus money in May.  Ok…  for the remainder of this year, May – Dec, = 8 months x $37 = $296 lost for the year.  So much for the $250 stimulus check.  Hmmm I wonder if Obama is aware of this or what he would say.   On top of all that, I still have an I.O.U. for my tax rebate from 2007 – 2008 taxes (which is what I depend on to tag my car) except they don’t call it an I.O.U….it says they “will pay IF the funds become available”.  Not holding by breath on that one.

They don’t care that the cost of living rose on us like everyone else, i.e. rent, utilities, food, vehicle registration, mandatory auto smog, medicine co-pays, gasoline, taxes, etc.  And the disabled are back to living on 2008 wages that were set by 2007 cost of living (COLA).  For me that is $7,284 a year.  Can you live on $7,284 a year?  So if anyone can not understand why there are so many disabled homeless living on the streets, there you go. 

I’m just really tired of hearing that the homeless are there because they have addiction problems because very few had them before they got there.  When you take away the ability for a person to have hope and dignity and then government treats them like cattle (move along little doggy… can’t graze on this land) of course they are going to drink and do what ever it takes to numb themselves to the fact that they are not cared about, their not wanted, they have lost everything they ever had and they have no hope of things ever changing for them.   Dogs in dog pounds get better treatment.  You can blame all of the government for this.

Fact is the RICH are getting Richer and the POOR are getting poorer and it is at an accelerated rate.  I suggest you all have a tent ready because you could be next.  All it takes is one thing to go wrong in your life i.e. an illness, an accident, loss of job… and you will be living in a tent too.  The government needs to quit giving the rich tax breaks and stop balancing budgets on the backs of the poor and middle class.

 One more thing….  Why don’t they just give them the FEMA trailers that they are selling off?

Got to the bottom of the comments.

Thank you Sharon, for stating the obvious.
I'm struggling to make enough to pay my property taxes.
Savings, will be gone, if this "recession" last more then two years!
Then I might be one of the Homeless along with my husband.
Luckily I have a trusted partner to keep me company. So we can watch each others back. Our Age will put us at a disadvantage, but our background will help us face the "adventure".

at least they're not roaming the streets.  If those who write laws can't help these people, then change the laws.  I like the idea of Yurts, but those are non-permanent structures and would probably be considered "camping" as well.

How bout just letting people live how they want or need?

This is a good example of why people want government out of the people's personal business. This is our land and we have every right to camp out on it, need be. If it makes the "authorities" uncomfortable maybe it will speed their solution to the situation. Home foreclosures need to be dealt with.

Three squares and a bed for people who have broken the law...We just can't help out the ones who haven't.  In the blink of an eye, everything can change for any on of us.  With all of the vacant buildings sitting on every other corner, I would think that there would be somewhere for these people to be.  What about the closed Military bases.  There has to be a solution to help those who are in need.

As if these people didn't have it hard enough already!  Mayor Johnson shuold be ashamed of himself.  How does he sleep at night afer tormenting the citizens he's supposed to be leading and protecting?

World leader’s religious leaders, none of them want to get on, all they want is to control everyone, all claim to have the right and the answer, and all make the people pay in some way shape or form.

People are individuals why do these political and religious leaders always want to lead them telling them how it is. Further to this, where is it that they lead the people? Repression, wars, dysfunction and the resulting environmental and human impact

The world and the life upon it cannot be owned, neither can God, no man or woman is given direct ownership on anything other than themselves, it is self accountability that is the answer to rules and regulations along with respect for another’s freedom, expression and individualism. All of these leaders tell you/us/me how it is, how they see it. This always seems to include their foolish greed and vast amounts of power and control, but not the people.

We/you/I the people, all beings of the Earth have sovereignty of the planet, so why are the governments, industry and the religious leaders allowed to continue in this fashion? Who gives them the right or the power of Rule?

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A questions on the world economy

Where is all the money? It doesn't seem to have been kept safe in the banks, so where has it gone?

Who has taken it?

Is it out of circulation?

With the up comming budget, what will they spend more of your money on whilst services are being cut?

Who are you helping, who are you bailing out?

What is the long term plan?

A legal undertaking has been entered into regarding the reduction of CO2 emmissions.

What plans do the goernment have regarding investment into green energy, where are the plans for the new drive of industry?

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As someone who has personally experienced homelessness, I have a very tough time finding anything funny or amusing concerning this subject. However, over the past week or so the comicstrip "Doonesbury" has been running a series of panels centered around this very issue. Leave it to Garry Trudeau to find humor in the most depressing of subjects. I'm still laughing!

http://www.doonesbury.com/strip/dailydose/

If we can maintain a sense of humor - even during the worst of times - then we can survive anything.

Matthew, you might enjoy this too then.

Above I'd writted about a homeless friend who fasted for economic rights in 2003 from a tent in Chapel Hill, NC. His protest was followed in the next year by the creation of the Center for Poverty Work and Opportunity.

When Trudeau drew the cartoon below he was not to know that a year earlier, the homeless protester had delivered just such a strategy proposal to the US Senate, advocating investment in microfinance and social enterprise weighed against the cost of war in Iraq.  

http://p-ced.com/forum/index.php?topic=34.0

http://www.p-ced.com/projects/ukraine/national/

The solution is to scale back the tax "relief" for the rich, and end the 30+ year chain of corporate welfare that has cost us billions of dollars per year, much of which has been used to export our jobs to foreign countries.  Use the savings to restore a legitimate social safety net, like the more modern (and successful) nations have today, and to create a new job market that actually (gasp!) puts responsibilities, rules and requirements on corporations.