Hi everyone
As
you know, homeless issues are affecting the gardens very negatively. Many of the
agencies who spoke at our recent community meeting support Prop C in the
November elections.
Proposition C
will will increase gross receipts taxes by slightly more than 0.5
percent on companies with more than $50 million in annual revenue and
use the money to fund homeless services in the city, potentially raising
hundreds of millions of dollars for city initiatives.
As such, we're asking you to vote for Prop C: a big step for us, as we have avoided being political in the past!
My
father died homeless at 1st and Mission streets in 1984. A couple of
years later, I was briefly homeless myself. So I won’t sit and watch as
more and more of our neighbors have to sleep in the rain.
A
couple of months ago, I spent a night at Mother Brown’s Dining Room at
the United Council of Human Services to see what it is like to be
homeless in District 10. I wrote about it here:
https://medium.com/@tonykelly_27321/i-spent-last-night-sleeping-in-a-chair-at-mother-browns-98258103279e
Too many people are living on the streets all over the district, in
conditions that are unsafe for both the homeless and the housed. Systematic racism also means
that Bayview, despite having more than 1,200 of our homeless residents, has
no shelter with beds for people to sleep on. I have worked for years with the Coalition on Homelessness to end family homelessness and with Mother Brown’s to fight for Beds for Bayview.
We
must pass Proposition C. It will provide REAL, and cheaper, solutions
to homelessness by getting thousands of unhoused people off the streets
and into permanent housing in its first year, and providing public
bathrooms, mental health and substance abuse services; and it does that
by taxing large corporations making over $50 million a year, so
residents or small businesses won’t be affected.
Whatever you do, just get out and vote, and encourage others to do the same.
Best wishes,
Annie