"People Shouldn't Have to Live Like This": The Real Story Behind "Tent City" -- and How the Media Get It Wrong

By Rose Aguilar, AlterNet. Posted April 20, 2009.

"I listen to NPR all day. I know what's going on at AIG," he says. "If you're working class, you can't achieve the American Dream. I tried, and look where I am."  

Seven years ago, Kraintz had a hard time finding enough construction work to make ends meet. He lost his apartment and has been living in encampments ever since.

Today, he serves on Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson's homelessness task force. At emergency city meetings, he urges officials to make this area a permanent tent city for people who are tired of being forced to move from place to place: "It may look like anarchy out here, but it's peaceful and organic," he says. 

The people living in tent city have created what they call self-governed communities.

"Everybody shares the same problems. We are homeless," says 50-year old Frederick Williams. "We live in a field together, so you build camaraderie. As you can see, we've built clusters. Everybody out here knows everyone else. They know a stranger right off the bat."  

When I met Williams, he was throwing trash in a dumpster donated by Atlas Dumpster. He stopped what he was doing to show me the GPS bracelet around his ankle. After serving 84 days in jail for drug possession, he says his parole officer dropped him off at tent city because he had nowhere to go.

After an hour of discussing everything from the prison industrial complex and poverty to U.S. foreign policy in Iraq and Haiti, I asked him why he doesn't spend more time fighting for the issues he's clearly so passionate about. He's had construction and welding jobs over the years, but says he makes bad choices.

"Believe me. I would raise hell, but addiction is a motherfucker."  

While we were chatting, his girlfriend walked over with a plate of hot potatoes, rice, bread and a can of nuts donated by local volunteers. Local groups and individuals stop by throughout the day to donate meals, clothing, basic camping gear, firewood and toiletries.  

In the afternoon, Tracy, a 33-year-old who was just laid off from her job as a gourmet food product designer, pulled up in a white Saturn SUV with her 18-month-old baby in the back seat. She got out of the car to hand out two bags of aloe vera gel, sunscreen, lotion, shampoo and conditioner.

"This is disgusting," she says. "People shouldn't have to live like this." 

Tracy makes frequent trips to foreclosed homes to pick up items families no longer want. She finds them through Craig's List. She sells what she picks up and uses the money for toiletries. She also picks up donated toothbrushes and toothpaste from dental offices.

"So little goes so far," she says. "I just lost my job. If I can do it, anyone can." 

As Tracy drives off, Williams says: "We live in one of the most charitable countries in the world and one of the coldest." 

He says tent city would be fully operational if it had a water truck and Porta Potties: "I'd feel a whole lot better and a whole lot more human if I didn't have to go shit in the trees," he says.

Because tent city has no running water or portable toilets, most people walk a mile or so to Loaves & Fishes for a hot shower, a bathroom and a sit-down meal. Along the way, they pass people sleeping on the streets and in abandoned parking lots. 

Two volunteers from a local ministry who regularly hand out donated clothing and basic necessities to the area's homeless population say the city should turn this area into a KOA-like campground with running water, toilets and a centralized kitchen. They didn't want to give their names because they don't trust the media.

"The media treat these people like they're packs of wolves. They're people. Just like you and me. If you want to take photos, please ask first. We've seen reporters shove their cameras in tents without asking. I know Oprah had good in her heart, but she's created a problem. Because of the exposure, the city will shut this down. These people have no home. Look at this guy. He's building a community."   

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Rose Aguilar is the host of Your Call, a daily call-in radio show on KALW 91.7 FM in San Francisco, and author of Red Highways: A Liberal's Journey into the Heartland.

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