SUBALTERN ADVOCACY
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As we provide a platform for the small voices of history, we revisit the advocates for homeless support in Berkeley, CA through a photo collection.
Woman in 1969,
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Advocating for the continued existence of People’s Park,
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"Destroy this lovely, creative thing."
50 years later,
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Protest from 2019,
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"Preserve & Protect People's Park."
“The history of locational conflict in Berkeley shows that the conflict is more fundamental than determining the appropriate location for the appropriate use. Battles over free speech and property rights are waged symbolically through contestations over the use of particular spaces. And both the political and spatial outcome of each battle becomes a symbolic plank in widening the conflict, in unsettling notions of appropriate means for redressing grievance. People’s Park is a symbol of conflict, repression and the yearning for
an extension and redefinition of basic rights during the Vietnam era.”
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-Don Mitchell, Professor of Geography at Syracuse University
March 1992
The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the birth of many organizations and the expansion of previous efforts aimed to help the homeless population.
Aid Through the Ages
Ebony,
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Eight years without a home,
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Women's Daytime Drop-In Center.
On the right is Jim Reagan, who lived on the streets for 2 years.
He now stands in front of U.A. homes, where he was given a room after waiting for eight months on the list.
On the left is a Berkeley Cares Voucher, given to those in need to be put towards various daily necessities.
Pictured here is JC Orton, who is in charge of Night on the Streets, and Betsy Edwards, an organizer from the Alameda County Food Bank. She helps JC get the food required to feed those in places like People’s Park. (2019)
Jim Reagan in his
new home. (2019)
Berkeley NEED (Needle Exchange Emergency Distribution) providing those in People’s Park with personal care necessities. (2017)
In 1971, civil rights activist Ursula Sherman began taking in mentally ill individuals who had been released to the streets by state hospital closures when Ronald Reagan was the governor of California. Sherman, along with a group of volunteers from the Hillel Streetwork Project, founded BOSS (Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency) and provided street outreach, crisis intervention, and benefits advocacy to the emerging homeless population.
Photo of clients at Pacheco Court, one of Boss’s supported independent living locations, a collection of small bungalows on a quiet cul-de-sac in Hayward that provides housing to both homeless individuals and families.
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BOSS has continued fighting for the mission to help homeless, poor, and disabled people achieve health and self-sufficiency, and battle the root causes of poverty and homelessness. The organization provides pathways to affordable housing, assists justice-involved individuals successfully reintegrate into the community, and facilitates community building activities along with life-changing resources to violence-impacted individuals and communities.
Executive director Leslie Berkler stands on the front porch of the Women’s Daytime Drop-in Center on Acton Street.
Women's Daytime Drop-In Center
In 1987, a core group of 6 women committed themselves to offering services to homeless women and children who had no place to go during the day. Elizabeth Shaunessy, a School Board member, provided access to a school classroom during holiday break where the women offered coffee, snacks and a warm, safe place for homeless women and children.
When school resumed, the group searched for a permanent location. Through Mary Rubach, they identified the current location on 2218 Acton Street, and recruited volunteers to staff the Center. The Women’ Daytime Drop-In Center is still open today in order to empower homeless women with housing resources based on individual case management, parenting resources, warm meals, hygiene products, and a sanctuary away from the streets.
Our group member Shayna had the opportunity to intern at the shelter and assist the clients with their resumes, finding jobs, and work under the administrative staff. She emphasizes the warm feeling of home provided by the shelter not only because of its location in a charming house, but because of the powerful energy of strong women lifting up other strong women.
The Berkeley Food and Housing Project
In 1991, the Berkeley Food and Housing Project obtained the use of the historic 2140 Dwight Way building that serves as the permanent home of its women’s and children’s emergency shelter.
Only 7 years after opening the building, it was stretched beyond capacity and a third floor was added to accommodate the emergent expansion of services. The Berkeley Food and Housing Project began as a free meal program for those in need in 1970, but evolved as the crisis grew.
BFHP works with people who are homeless to move them into affordable permanent housing, and provides services to help them remain housed including an extensive range of food, housing, and social support services. The organization spans over 5 counties – Alameda, Solano, Contra Costa, Sacramento, and Amador in order to aid the vulnerable populations of the chronically homeless, those with disabilities and serious mental illness, and veterans.
Operation Dignity
This photo captures a young boy comforting his father as they moved into Operation Dignity’s housing after being homeless, saying “It’s going to be okay. It’s going to be okay. Thank you!”
In 1993, Operation Dignity opened in order to house vulnerable populations. Operation Dignity serves the homeless population and at risk veterans, their families, and the communities they live in. The organization helps their clients immediate and long-term needs by providing emergency, transitional, and permanent housing; comprehensive outreach and support services; and a strong peer community, inclusive of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, and disability.
In 2015, the Berkeley City Council installed 10 donation boxes across downtown in order to encourage donations of money for homeless services. More importantly, however, the City Council saved the $82,642 budget dedicated to Berkeley’s drop-in services that had been planned on being cut. The funding has been distributed among three agencies — the Berkeley Drop-In Center, Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency, and the Women’s Daytime Drop-In Center — to continue their crucial current services. The council also made the decision to open the Housing Crisis Resolution Center, a new integrated service to improve efficiency in housing the homeless.