TESTIMONIALS FROM NEIGHBORS
Dear Mary,
I'm sorry I wasn't able to make the meeting Wednesday. I wanted to let you know as your closest neighbor that I support the work the Homeless Youth Alliance does and have seen some of the positive results of the referrals you make for some of most needy clients you have. As your neighbor I have seen how the youth are given a safe and supportive place to be with friends and are near access to referral for detox and psychological services.
I admire the compassionate way the alliance is run and also the firm rules that are set to keep a safe and secure place for your clients. Please share this letter with your supporters and especially your detractors.
Sincerely,
Bill Wallage
As a resident of Belvedere Street in the Haight Ashbury district, I attended a meeting two months ago regarding the services of the Homeless Youth Alliance, a social services organization in the neighborhood. I went to this meeting because I wanted to learn more about this group, as my front porch had been bombarded with flyers from other neighbors concerned about their presence in the community. At the meeting, I realized most people were uninformed about what exactly HYA does and why, including myself. I decided to learn more about the program by approaching the director, Mary Howe, and offering to volunteer.
I had no prior experience or contact with HYA at this point. In the daily shuffle of life, I often don’t stop and look at what is in front of me long enough to separate fact from fiction. It’s a commitment that can take both time and research. Therefore, it is usually easier to make assumptions based on what something appears to be, as opposed to what it actually is. However, this time the issues seemed important and the contradictions presented at the meeting compelled me to further investigate the program.
Mary gladly accepted my offer and within a week I set up my first volunteer opportunity. The result has since transformed my understanding of both the neighborhood I live in and the situation of homelessness and drug addiction in San Francisco. It has also left me both a dedicated volunteer and a true believer in the charity, necessity, and absolute compassionate dedication of HYA. My first experience volunteering disproved every last negative perception one can make about these services, the people who run them, and the people they serve. Over the course of a few hours on a Wednesday evening, I discovered a caring, sympathetic, well-trained, and organized group doing a very difficult job with patriotic dedication. I say patriotic because these are people who take care of their own and do not judge other people. Everyone is welcome and no one is turned away.
The facilities at HYA proved to be clean, receptive, and stocked with much-needed necessities (socks, nutritional guides, pamphlets about everything from Hep C prevention to housing options) and plentiful resource materials. The participants were astonishingly orderly and respectful. Present to facilitate activities were: Mary volunteer certified nurse (as HYA has a fully functioning medical clinic, complete with medicine and injury supplies), and the three volunteers who were all friendly and experienced in handling the challenges of such work. I was impressed by their complete professionalism during my stay and nothing less.
Since then, I have signed on as a weekly volunteer and have come to understand, with both greater respect and appreciation, the absolute necessity of the Homeless Youth Alliance in the Haight Ashbury district of San Francisco. This is a positive, productive organization that helps youth in need and continues to do so with tireless enthusiasm and commitment. A visit on an average afternoon shows a real functioning community; visitors and staff together watch movies, share stories, cook food, email friends, ask for and receive help in finding housing, jobs, medical services, and much more. Familiar faces and total strangers are received with the same level of total acceptance. This is a place where people who have nowhere to go can have somewhere to go.
Learning about the Homeless Youth Alliance was a matter of getting my facts straight. Now I consider myself informed and invested in volunteering with them as long as I live in this neighborhood.
Jonathan Sajda
SWEEPS
By Richard Ivanhoe (A neighborhood resident)
At 8:15 am, the woman from CleanScapes
Uses a blower to move a piece of paper
Down Haight Street,
From one storefront to the next.
Seems that the police and the
“Homeless Outreach” crew
Learned the same technique
Moving people out of the Park
And into the neighborhoods.
These people weren’t “homeless”
Until now.
“Houseless” would be more accurate
They had homes-
Maybe not legal,
But homes, nonetheless.
Where some had lived for years.
I’m told that rousting these people
From their encampments
Was done to improve my
“Quality of Life.”
But I’m more concerned about People in the park.
Do we really need more shoestores
On Haight Street?
(When the stem cell people come,
Will the shoestores be replaced
By stores that sell feet?)
Posters on telephone poles
Can be informative.
Graffiti can be art.
I’ve often found the sidewalk blocked
By shoppers on their cell phones,
Or bar patrons smoking outside
Than by “street people” or their dogs.
Hey, if you really want to
Improve my quality of life,
Run more buses,
Set up storefronts as
Community spaces,
Bring back live music
To the upper Haight,
And lower rents,
So that displaced friends,
Poets, musicians,
And artists of all kinds,
Can move back.