06 14 2017

Volume 14: Issue 16 June 14 - 27, 2017

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A CO M GRIE MUNITY V Mich ES: ae & his l Stoops fi home ght to end lessn ess pgs 4 -7, 16

Street Sense is the street media center of our nation’s capital. We aim to serve as a vehicle for elevating voices and public debate on issues relating to poverty while also creating economic opportunities for people who are facing homelessness in our community.

ONLINE EXCLUSIVES The next edition of Street Sense will be part of a multioutlet local media blitz on solutions to homelessness, occurring June 29. Learn who’s participating and how you can take par t: http://DCHomelessCrisis.press

COVER ART

Ronald Dudley, a.k.a. Pookanu, at Listen Vision recording studio. After years performing in D.C. clubs and open mics, D u d l ey b e c a m e a St r e e t Sense artist and vendor three years ago.His fifth album is dedicated to what’s most important to him: fatherhood.

PHOTO BY RODNEY CHOICE

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OUR STORY Street Sense began in August 2003 after Laura Thompson Osuri and Ted Henson approached the National Coalition for the Homeless on separate occasions with the idea to start a street paper in Washington, D.C. Through the work of dedicated volunteers, Street Sense published its first issue in November 2003. In 2005, Street Sense achieved 501 ( c ) 3 status as a nonprofit organization, formed a board of directors and hired a full-time executive director.

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BOARD OF DIRECTORS Jeremy Bratt, Max Gaujean, Margaret Jenny, Jennifer Park, Reed Sandridge, Dan Schwartz, Jeremy Scott, John Senn, Kate Sheppard, Annika Toenniessen, Martin Totaro EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Brian Carome EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Eric Falquero COMMUNICATIONS & SALES MANAGER Jeff Gray VENDOR PROGRAM MANAGER Mysa Elsarag EVENTS & ADMINISTRATION MANAGER Dani Gilmour CASE MANAGER Colleen Cosgriff EDITORIAL INTERNS Maren Adler, Justine Coleman, Tom Coulter, Dorothy Hastings, Zachariah Tollison WRITERS GROUP ARTISTS IN RESIDENCE Donna Daniels, Willie Schatz OPINION EDITORS (VOLUNTEER) Rachel Brody, Arthur Delaney, Britt Peterson EDITORIAL VOLUNTEERS Justin Benedict, Lenika Cruz, Roberta Haber, Jesse Helfrich, Laura Osuri, Andrew Siddons, Jackie Thompson, Marian Wiseman VENDORS Shuhratjon Ahamadjonov, Gerald Anderson, Charles Armstrong, Lawrence Autry, Daniel Ball, Aida Basnight, Phillip Black, Reginald Black, Melanie Black, Phillip Black Jr., Maryann Blackmon, Viktor Blokhine, Debora Brantley, Andre Brinson, Donald Brown, Joan Bryant, Elizabeth Bryant, Brianna Butler, Melody Byrd, Conrad Cheek, Aaron Colbert, Anthony Crawford, Walter Crawley, Kwayera Dakari, James Davis, Clifton Davis, Charles Davis, David Denny, Reginald Denny, James DeVaughn, Ricardo Dickerson, Dennis Diggs, Alvin Dixon-El, Ronald Dudley, Charles Eatmon, Deana Elder, Julie Ellis, Jemel Fleming, Chon Gotti, Marcus Green, Barron Hall, Tyrone Hall, Richard Hart Lorrie Hayes, Patricia Henry, Jerry Hickerson, Ray Hicks, Sol Hicks, Rachel Higdon, Ibn Hipps, Leonard Hyater, Joseph Jackson, Carlton Johnson, Donald Johnson, Harold Johnson, Allen Jones, Mark Jones, Morgan Jones, Linda Jones, Darlesha Joyner, Juliene Kengnie, Kathlene Kilpatrick, Hope Lassiter, John Littlejohn, James Lott, Scott Lovell, Michael Lyons, Jimmy M. Ken Martin, Joseph Martin, Kina Mathis, Michael Lee Matthew, Authertimer Matthews, Charlie Mayfield, Jermale McKnight, Jeffery McNeil, Ricardo Meriedy, Cynthia Mewborn, Kenneth Middleton, Cecil More, L. Morrow, Evelyn Nnam, Moyo Onibuje, Earl Parkin, Jacquelyn Portee, Lucifer Potter, Ash-Shaheed Rabil, Henrieese Roberts, Anthony Robinson, Doris Robinson, Raquel Rodriquez, Lawrence Rogers, Joseph Sam, Chris Shaw, Patty Smith, Smith Smith, Gwynette Smith, Ronald Smoot, Franklin Sterling, Warren Stevens James Stewart, Beverly Sutton, Sybil Taylor, Archie Thomas, Shernell Thomas, Craig Thompson, Eric ThompsonBey, Sarah Turley-Colin, Carl Turner, Jacqueline Turner, Leon Valentine, Grayla Vereen, Ron Verquer, Martin Walker, Michael Warner, Robert Warren, Angelyn Whitehurst, William Whitsett, Wendell Williams, Sasha Williams, Judson Williams III, Ivory Wilson, Denise Wilson, Charles Woods

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STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

3

NEWS Council Considers Converting Office Space to Affordable Housing

By Mark Rose Volunteer

Ward 8 Residents Outraged by Low Funding for Housing and NEAR Act in $13.8 Budget

By Justine Coleman justine.coleman@streetsense.org The D.C. Council unanimously approved the $13.8 fiscal year 2018 budget at a final vote on June 13, including allocations of funding for Ward 8 initiatives like a community-owned and a nonprofit grocery store, grants for local entrepreneurs and a new recreation center.

On May 30, the council voted to approve the mayor’s proposal to provide $15 million for a recreation center in Congress Heights and accelerate allocation for $11.9 million to modernize the Anacostia Recreation Center over six years.

The center will empower residents and offer job training, said Ward 8 Councilmember Trayon White, Sr. at a June 8 community meeting. The emergency meeting was organized to address Ward 8 residents’ disappointment in the D.C. Council’s budget, before the second and final vote occurred.

Councilmember White and Chairman Phil Mendelson hosted the meeting at the RISE Demonstration Center in Southeast D.C. Ward 8 residents in attendance said the budget did not supply enough money to fund programs such as the Neighborhood Engagement Achieves Results Act and housing initiatives like vouchers and rapid rehousing, a time-limited subsidized housing lease.

The council’s budget dedicated almost $2.1 million for the NEAR Act to establish the Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement with 11 employees and a Community Crime Prevention team. The budget does not mention the office’s stipend-intervention program designed to incentivize participants or provide funding for the 36 total employees suggested for the office in the mayor’s proposed budget amendments.

Black Lives Matter D.C. sent a petition signed by 74 coalitions to D.C. Council members the next day demanding for the NEAR Act to be fully funded.

In the legislative meeting for the final vote, Chairman Phil Mendelson said that after working with the Office of Revenue Analysis, he thinks the NEAR Act will be able to be fully funded after a subject for appropriation is removed. In general, subjects of appropriations are removed once the council and mayor find funding for the legislated program, according to David Umansky, a spokesman for the Office of the Chief Financial Officer.

Erik Salmi, the communications director for Judiciary and Public Safety Committee Chairman Charles Allen, said in an interview after the meeting that the NEAR Act is fully funded aside from providing money for positions connecting behavioral health specialists to police officers that exist elsewhere and a community survey that was

already conducted by a separate group. He said the subject of appropriations was removed with the funding in the budget and Mayor Muriel Bowser requested that the funding for the stipend-intervention program go toward the Career Connections job readiness program.

Tensions ran high throughout the Ward 8 meeting after residents said they felt the Councilmembers were avoiding answering questions and after dealing for years with unsolved issues, including voucher funding.

“Starting to talk about all of this, literally avoiding questions about vouchers – 40,000 people on vouchers – they shouldn’t be able to sleep at night,” April Goggans said in an interview after the meeting. Goggans is a co-organizer of Black Lives Matter D.C. The council previously re-allocated $3 million Bowser had proposed for the rapid rehousing program to be used for affordable housing vouchers and permanent supportive housing instead. This was in large part due to testimony about the rapid rehousing program’s lack of success. The Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless released a report “Set Up To Fail” in May that found only 40 percent of families in rapid rehousing are able to stay their housing by the end of the program.

“I think housing is a crisis right now, and the more … people we have advocating for housing the better outcomes we get,” White said in an interview.

Before the first vote, the Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development held their annual advocacy day on May 15 and asked the council to allocate $125 million to the housing production trust fund, $8.5 million for local rent supplement program vouchers and $16 million for the homeowners purchase assistance program.

Mendelson met with the coalition that day but expressed his concerns for a property deal where the Department of Housing and Community Development gave land that was set aside for a nonprofit to two other nonprofit developers.

“As long as we are leaving dollars on the table we are not going to get there,” he said. “We’ve got to be spending every dollar we’ve got.”

The council passed various amendments with the budget, which included restoration of $6.6 million for the streetcar project, Mendelson said.

Some councilmembers praised the budget’s overall efforts to address the housing crisis. But others said funding for rapid rehousing should not have decreased and that funneling money into housing services was just the beginning of fighting a larger problem. ■ Reginald Black contributed reporting.

A bill introduced by At-Large Councilmember Robert White, Jr. would begin converting the many underused or vacant D.C. office buildings into affordable housing. The Office to Affordable Housing Task Force Establishment Act of 2017 was introduced in May. If passed, a taskforce of experts, affordable housing advocates, local government officials and a low-income renter would be appointed by Mayor Muriel Bowser to investigate the feasibility of converting commercial space into subsidized low-income housing.

The taskforce would make recommendations to the mayor and the D.C. Council about how to locate, zone, fund and convert available properties, according to a press release from Councilmember White’s office.

The taskforce would be appointed within 60 days of the measure’s enactment and would have another two months to present their findings, Councilmember White told Street Sense.

The need for government sponsored public housing has grown dire, White added.

Meanwhile, 11 percent of the commercial office buildings are vacant.

The Downtown D.C. Business Improvement District’s State of Downtown report for 2016 shows that the 138-block business “core” area of the District, has nearly 5 million square feet of vacant office space. The rest of the city has 8.3 million square feet of empty office space, according to an assessment by the Washington Business Journal.

“The District has tons of older office buildings that are sitting mostly vacant because businesses are moving to our newer developments, like City Center and the Wharf, while at the same time we have a severe shortage of affordable housing. We need to connect the dots.” the release also said.

White, who has a background in economic development policy and has focused on affordable housing since being elected to D.C. Council last year, thinks building owners struggling to find commercial tenants would be eager to work with the government to put their buildings to some use.

“We need to look for the quickest, most sustainable path to affordable housing,” White said. “We know this can work because buildings have been converted [to residential], just not to affordable housing.”

This bill has gotten positive attention from business advocates and housing experts alike, according to White.

Asked why this hasn’t been tried before, given the increasingly critical need for more affordable housing options, White cautioned that, “We’ve been trying a lot of different approaches.”

Five to 10 years ago the business community wouldn’t have been ready for this. The commercial leasing community didn’t have incentive because they could make more money leasing to businesses. Now those businesses have fled, and landlords left high and dry are looking to salvage as much income from those vacant buildings as they can, according to White.

At-Large Councilmember Anita Bonds, who chairs the Committee on Housing and Neighbor-hood Revitalization, is looking for room to schedule a meeting to discuss the bill which was sponsored by most councilmembers, with the exception of Brianne Nadeau, Kenyan McDuffie and Trayon White Sr. ■

High School

By Lenna Jo Dugle Herzog

Tireless Warrior to End Homelessness Michael Stoops Has Died

By Zachariah Tollison zachariah.tollison@streetsense.org

I grew up in Lawrenceburg Indiana and graduated Lawrenceburg Consolidated High School with Mike in 1968.

The class was small, around 130 classmates, so everyone knew each other and their families. Mike moved away, college plus job, you might say. He left the Burg and didn't look back.

I had a note from Mike several years ago saying he was going to retire and come back to the Burg. He would look me up when he returned and asked me about the next class reunion.

Mike, you will be missed. Our 50th will be next summer.

I am happy to find out that Mike found a way to help so many people in his lifetime. A man of his word, he did what he said he would.

The LCHS class of 1968, your classmates, are very proud of all you have accomplished in your lifetime. We wish you peace and hope you had a nice, deserving funeral.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE NATIONAL COALITION FOR THE HOMELESS

I

t was the longest night of the year.

Michael Stoops had intended it that way. On Dec. 21 of 2016, Stoops attended the 26th Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day. It would be his last.

That morning he maneuvered his wheelchair around signs bearing the names of homeless people who had passed away. As the day progressed, he lobbied, mourned and demonstrated alongside unhoused citizens. It was symbolic of who Stoops was: A minimalist who was a relentless advocate for the rights of homeless Americans everywhere and who strategized to empower people to overcome income inequality.

Michael Stoops grew up in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, a small town next to the Ohio River where he earned a degree in social work from Ball State in 1972. It was at the university that Stoops became a Quaker and developed a minimalist outlook on life. He adopted this not only in his philosophy but in his daily routines, including a dedication to walking everywhere.

Michael Stoops died after complications from a stroke in May of 2015. Julie Turner, a local social worker in D.C., recounted Stoops’ energetic walking in the eulogy she gave. “If you had the pleasure of walking with Michael — you had better be prepared to go 20 or 30 city blocks.” He could walk for miles. It allowed him to see the world as the homeless do. This Quaker-inspired approach to life made Michael Stoops a tireless advocate for the homeless.

Stoops’ fight for a living wage,

affordable health care and an end to homelessness began in Portland, Oregon, in the 1970s, when his Quaker work called him there to serve. There was a need and Stoops was there to fill it. He worked with the Burnside Community Council to improve the Baloney Joe’s shelter, a center assisting young homeless patrons with food, shelter and employment assistance.

During this time Stoops was traveling between Portland and D.C. frequently to work on national advocacy initiatives. He worked with Mitch Snyder, creator of the Community for Creative Non-Violence, a major D.C. shelter. Snyder was the largest national figure in advocacy for the homeless. The two worked together throughout the 80s in their fight to end homelessness. Mitch was the face and Stoops the brains.

Behind the scenes, Stoops also helped develop the National Coalition for th e Homeless from 1982 1983.

In 1986, he and Snyder fasted and slept on street grates, and were instrumental in pressuring Congress to pass the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act. The legislation funds Section 8 housing, food stamps and other assistance for homeless residents.

Stoops was forced to resign from the Baloney Joe’s staff in November of 1987 after being accused of sexual involvement with teenage shelter residents. Despite these allegations leading to Stoops leaving town there were no charges were made.

“A small number of people in Portland who control the downtown area set out

to get him,’ Mitch Snyder claimed in a 1988 Dallas Morning News article. He felt Stoops was attacked by the Portland city government, which wanted to remove Baloney Joes. Snyder recounted, “Those people recognized what was happening and believed ... that the only way to stop it was to stop Michael Stoops.”

Stoops chose to relocate to Washington, D.C. permanently in 1988, where he continued his crusade with Snyder.

They pushed the standards of living for homeless people with the “End Homelessness” rally in 1989.

In 1990, Mitch Snyder committed suicide, and Michael Stoops took up the baton of homeless advocacy. In 2001, he was instrumental in ending sales of “Bum Fights” videos, in which homeless people were paid to get into fist fights and do other dehumanizing acts.

Stoops spent the last twenty-seven years of his life testifying in state houses, supporting street papers that would attract attention to homeless issues (including Street Sense), attempting to classify assaults on homeless people as a hate crime and instituting the national observance of Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day. Stoops suffered a stroke in 2015, which he struggled to recover from for the past two years. Yet, that didn’t stop him from railing against the criminalization of homelessness.

And the stroke didn’t stop him from attending Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day in 2016. The longest day of the year. He wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Michael Stoops, national leader in the fight to end homelessness, died on May Day, May 1, 2017 at the age of 67. ■ The following testimonials have been collected and curated from those who knew him.

Thank You

By Cheryl K. Barnes

I will always say thank you Michael Stoops — thank you, thank you, thank you for asking me to be a part of the NCH board and then the Speakers Bureau. It was the 90s when you gave me so much acceptance, being a woman formerly homeless for thirty years. I had been part of the drug and alcohol scene too. You gave me caring and wanting to change the outlook about how we can end homelessness.

Today, I am a freelance homeless advocate. I have learned to consistently use my voice and understanding that homelessness can end. As national and local advocates, we are now working together to house homeless families, children, women, men, seniors and disabled folks; and bring them back into their communities. I know it can work, because it worked for me.

I have come from the streets, to a shelter, to a program that took me on as a new resident of my own one bedroom apartment. My brother, I am going to miss you so very much. Your work and your caring will always be with me, especially how you trained me to understand that homelessness can end I’m going to miss you, truly, so much.

1950: Stoops born in Indiana.

Social Worker

American Mother Teresa

I first met Michael nearly 30 years ago when I was registering people who are homeless to vote. We had a lot in common in terms of social work practice; we both believed that empowerment begins at the first point of contact.

To me, Michael was the best social worker I have ever met. His work defines what it means to be a social worker: to change the system that perpetuates poverty while simultaneously helping someone find or take back their power through resources, advocacy and brokering a menu of services.

Michael worked a lifetime changing broken systems and giving others a voice.

For someone who worked nationally and was well known in his own right, he always had time for people needing help. He listened patiently to their stories and helped each person sort out whatever appeared to be in their way. He was empathic and kind. He helped people search for solutions based on their needs and encouraged self advocacy and creativity.

I will always remember Michael's essence, his commitment to tackling underlying issues of poverty and the ways in which he worked with the poorest of the poor. Michael is a credit to the profession.

He is who all social workers should aspire to be. I miss you every day, Michael.

Michael Stoops, known as the American Mother Teresa, was a beloved advisory board member of the Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism for over a decade. While his work sometimes involved interactions with powerful folks like senators, Pulitzer Prize winners or actors, he was most at home with those who had none, who revered him for his indefatigable love and dedication to them. He wasn’t simply an aimless pied piper, but rather a blessed figure who intertwined his boundless energy with a hardened resolve to forge specific policies that literally meant life or death to those who others would just as soon forget.

For someone who lived so simply and who worked out of a church, he arranged incredible opportunities for those of us, like me, who wanted to protect homeless people but didn’t quite know how to go about it. I would get calls from him saying “I helped arrange for you to go to Texas next week to testify at their statehouse and I know you’ll do great!” or “come right away to D.C. to present our data to the Senate.” Whether it be those of us who simply didn’t have his exceptional grassroots organizing skills or those without shelter, he was always there to elevate all of us in his orbit, without even a drop of pretense.

By Julie Turner

STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

MEMORIAL

By Brian Levin

I’ll never forget how after I testified before legislators I would be surrounded by homeless people, clergy and their advocates, who would tell me horrible stories of their abuse while on the streets.

Then they would tell me about how this unassuming, yet tenacious fellow in Washington would come to their aid with his network of local angels. When I’d say I was friends with him, the response was as if I knew a rock star, albeit an extraordinarily humble one.

In my faith, Judaism, there is a belief that “whoever saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world” and Michael, along with his surviving dedicated colleagues, has done that many times over. Mother Teresa once remarked, that to her, the homeless and poor were to be viewed as “Jesus in disguise,” as all G-d’s children were entitled to love and dignity having been made in the Lord’s image. And that is exactly how Michael Stoops lived every day of his life. Indeed, his life’s mission could be summed up by how Jesus counseled his flock, “[W]hatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.”

And while he has now been passed to G-d’s hand, his work has been passed to ours, who loved and admired him so very much.

G-dspeed Michael, G-dspeed.

Michael

By Chris Shaw

Angels Are Watching

By Patty Smith Dedicated to Michael Stoops

It Started With Housing, Now!

By Paula Dyan Soon after moving to D.C. in 1986, I volunteered with organizing the Housing Now! demonstration coordinated by Donna Brazile and Mitch Snyder. More than 100,000 people were there! And I met Michael Stoops at the NCH meetings during the aftermath.

He truly gave homeless people a voice and a face, when some people would rather sweep it under the carpet. Michael is a hero.

Michael Stoops, may the bright light of the Holy Spirit surround you, protect you, guide you and comfort you.

The angels are watching, The birds are watching, To see you make it through.

All people was a watching, The world stood still.

What a watchful night that was.

They said the CIA is watching everyone.

Our love will hold.

I want to be sure, I see you through this.

Climbing up hills and mountains, Just to get to your love, Since everyone is watching us.

Michael Stoops is dragged away in one of his many non-violent protests in the 80s.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE NATIONAL COALITION FOR THE HOMELESS

1972: Graduated Ball State with degree in social work.

5

1982-83: Helped found the National Coalition for the Homeless.

1970s: Moved to Oregon, began work for Burnside Community Council.

Michael.

We hardly knew... ardly knew, how kind— How caring, could One soul be.

My eyes have shut, And I behold, In the cold...

'Twas back in 1987' 'Twas tweed cap, 'Twas you, Michael— Your head cocked to one side, Listening.

Listening to Mickey, to Mitch.

And to the words of Mareth.

Such urge-filled words: "Do not let them freeze, Do not them starve.; Nor be upon the shroud.

As if they are dead!"

And Michael, you did not Allow for suffering, Helplessness, nor Homelessness.

Ever again on your watch.

And then, when your Walking was stilled, Your resonant Voice silenced, Your eyes stayed clear— Always on watch.

Michael, God reached out To you, but we have yet To find your match!

1986: Slept out in winter to pass McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act.

A Champion for Street Papers

He Was [a] Present

By Brian Davis

Michael Stoops loved street newspapers. He was the community organizer for the National Coalition for the Homeless (NCH), the founder of the North American Street Newspaper Association (NASNA), and helped to foster the development of many papers, including the one I edit in Cleveland, Ohio.

For a guy who organized homeless people for a living, the street newspaper is the ultimate expression of success for those struggling with poverty. Just as the pamphleteers did at the founding of our country, street papers amplify the voice of those who have a hard time finding housing, while also putting some money in their pockets.

Michael believed there is no better tool than one that can provide income and be a venue for progressive causes.

Michael was so proud of the paper in D.C. that he helped get started. When the National Coalition for the Homeless was facing economic struggles and Michael was acting Executive Director, he always found time for Street Sense. He made sure that the office was available for the vendors to buy papers, even on the weekend. He would attend meetings with the vendors, because the paper was so important to his work.

I believe that Street Sense is the finest street newspaper in the country and a wonderful tribute to Michael Stoops. D.C. has a big pedestrian population that can support many more vendors than we can do in a market like Cleveland, which is facing population decline, or Phoenix, where no one walks, or Los Angeles, where even the few pedestrians are too snooty to talk to poor people. Street Sense has committed

to keeping the content focused on poverty and not sold out by presenting only happy news like some others.

I helped Michael with starting NASNA back in the 1990s in an attempt to spread this wonderful concept throughout the U.S. and Canada. Cleveland advocates had begun publishing a street newspaper in 1993, one of the few papers in America at the time. Michael was always willing to comment on stories that we were writing to give our volunteer writers a national spin.

We held summer conferences that I helped organize to bring together editors and vendors from around the country in order to exchange information and learn from each other.

We met in Chicago, Boston, Edmonton, Montreal, Seattle, San Francisco, and Cleveland. Michael had to deal with headaches at the Canadian border for the conferences when our vendors with criminal backgrounds were hassled through the process of obtaining an extra temporary permit ($350 each). It essentially meant that they would not be welcome in Canada for more than five days. Michael always made sure that homeless people were a part of the street newspaper movement and the conferences. He often paid for vendors’ airfare — including when our vendor Marcia dressed up as a cow on the plane to San Francisco in order to win the vending competition that we always had as part of the conference. And he made

By Patty Fugere sure that they were represented on the executive committee of NASNA. At our conference in Cleveland, Michael taught advocates about civil rights struggles across the country, including the lawsuit we fought against the City of Cleveland to allow our vendors to sell on the streets without getting a cityissued license ($200 each) before they could start selling the paper. Stoops was always working to give a hand to homeless people. He wanted the people who were drafting laws to hear from those who have to live with the effects. Stoops wanted those living in poverty to be at the forefront in deciding how to govern themselves. This is why he loved NCH, which has always had current or formerly homeless people on the board and had at least three executive directors with previous experience of homelessness. He liked partnering with self-governing groups like the Community for Creative Non-Violence shelter, the vendors at Street Sense and Food Not Bombs.

Michael voraciously read everything he could about homelessness, including every street newspaper. The street newspaper movement that Stoops fostered had the added benefit of being able to end someone’s homelessness. A vendor can earn money to pay rent or pay off a utility bill and educate the public about eliminating poverty. He will be missed, and the loss of his voice on the national stage will leave a huge hole to fill. ■

Michael truly gave his life to the movement to end homelessness.

He combined strategic thinking and passionate advocacy with extraordinary humility and deep respect for the community members whom our organizations serve. He was creative. He was tireless. Perhaps most important of all, he was present. He was Michael.

We shared decades working on parallel paths that I wish had intersected more regularly. It was an honor when our paths did cross, especially to work with him on D.C.’s Homeless Memorial Day vigil. While those days are now gone, I will continue to draw inspiration from Michael’s unyielding commitment to housing justice.

Lessons Big & Small

By Patricia Jefferson

I was sad to hear about Michael Stoops’s death. I remember Michael from my work for the Speakers Bureau of the National Coalition for the Homeless. I didn’t know him that well, but I recall him being mildmannered and available when employees had questions about the program.

Michael Stoops provided the necessary tips and suggestions to be successful.

I now know that a certain style and demeanor of presentation is required when making speeches to an audience or group of people. His advice was very helpful, and I took it to practice.

My condolences to his family.

Our White House

By Sean Cononie

Michael Stoops was a great man, a legend. He was the “Head of State” to all of us who are homeless and those of us who serve the homeless. He worked like I did: 24-hours a day and taking naps at his desk. After a stroke about two years ago he never was able to regain the life he had in the past. This man devoted every waking hour to the United States of America, to the people who suffer from poverty and mental illness, to the veterans, to the chronically homeless and to every single child who was homeless.

This man got all us advocates on the same page and never hushed those of us who thought outside of the box. He

1987: McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act becomes law.

Living Legacy

By Jesse Rabinowitz Michael Stoops (right) at the 1999 NASNA Conference in Cleveland. | BRIAN DAVIS. kept us able to keep up the good fight.

He was my mentor.

We love you and we thank you Michael, for all of the work you did, over four decades. You kept your office close to the White House and when I called you, it was like calling our White House. You never

took credit for the work you did, but this is the time we give you credit for helping to save mankind.

Your work started so many new agencies, and you likely are the best community organizer in our history. Goodbye my friend and thank you for everything. ■

1989: Helped organize 100,000+ person End Homelessness Now! rally.

1987: Baloney Joe’s scandal. Stoops moves to D.C.

Michael was an inspiration for me and so many others. He was kind, gentle and inspiring in word, deed and action.

Without his influence, I would not be in this line of work today. He will be missed, but his memory will live on in the inspiring work being done to end homelessness across D.C. and the country.

1997: Helped found North American Street Newspaper Association

1990: Organized first Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day.

STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

What You Could Do For Michael

MEMORIAL

By Chuck Currie

It was with grand sadness that I was unable to join in the celebration of the life of Michael Stoops. I was honored to have been invited to officiate at the service, lifting up the gifts Michael brought to our nation in the long and on-going struggle to end homelessness.

The story of our first meeting has often been retold in speeches and by the media. Michael came to my high school when I was a junior in 1986 to give a presentation on homelessness in Portland.

At the conclusion, he asked for students to volunteer at Baloney Joe's. I raised my hand and offered to help, but a busy high school life got in the way.

Michael returned to my high school the following year and noted that homelessness had increased since his last visit. There was a reason, he said. Pointing at me, Michael said it was because people don't keep their commitments to help. He had somehow remembered me from the year before and my unfulfilled promise to volunteer.

I went to volunteer at Baloney Joe's the next weekend.

Our lives would be professionally and personally connected for the next thirty years. I knew him in my role as a board member with Burnside Community Council and later as a board member with the National Coalition for the Homeless. We would join forces at protests across the country, speaking wherever asked.

When he discovered that I had never seen the Grand Canyon, Michael insisted we drive the 12 hours round-trip, because we were “so close” while in Arizona for a speaking gig.

Knowing Michael was never easy. He built up thick layers to keep himself safely distanced from others so that he would not be hurt as he had been before.

Long after I married and had children, Michael still sent me a birthday card each year with a check inside. He didn't like to acknowledge his birthday, but I would call him every year on that day with some made-up excuse to talk about one policy issue or another.

Beverly "Ma" Curtis, Rev. Spencer Marsh, Gene Ediger, Sister Mary Kay Lampert.

These are just a few of the heroes of Baloney Joe's and Burnside Community Council that we have lost over the last thirty years. Now we add the name of Michael Stoops to this Great Cloud of Witnesses whose spirits continue to surround us with love.

Michael, my friend, I will miss you.

To those who read this, please write a postcard or send an email to your member of Congress urging the policies proposed in the president's budget be rejected and that a moral budget be adopted that works to end homelessness and poverty. ■

Stoops’ Wish

By Gwynette Smith

I met Michael Stoops when I went to work for the Faces of Homelessness Speakers’ Bureau in 2014 for a year or so.

At the Bureau, high school and college students are given the opportunity to meet people who are or have been homeless, to listen to their stories about how they became homeless and to ask them questions. The students come from out-of-town and often get a chance to do something a homeless person might do, like panhandling. Some take the homeless challenge and live on the street as a homeless person for 48 hours. The students were interested and excited about the activities.

Mr. Stoops was a friendly, down-to-earth person who put me at ease. When I called to find out about Mr. Stoops, who had been

sick for nearly a year, I was asked if I would be returning to speak with the group again.

I have had family developments come up and I could not at the time. But I’m grateful for the welcoming community.

I am really happy about the work NCH did on the Homeless Bill of Rights that has passed in several states. It mandates that homeless people must receive the same rights as anyone else from the police and others. It includes the right to vote, privacy rights and the right to emergency medical care. It also protects people from being wrongfully denied employment.

I t i s m y h o p e t h a t M r. S t o o p s ' wishes — that people get a living wage, affordable housing, a safety net from homelessness and an end to homelessness — will occur soon. ■

1999: Edited the first of 13 reports concerning hate crimes/violence against homeless people.

Street Sense Vendor and Artist Cynthia Mewborn sings “Amazing Grace” at the May 25 memorial service for Michael Stoops. | PHOTO BY KEN MARTIN

Something to Live By

By Colleen Cosgriff

When I first met Michael Stoops in December 2015, the entrance to the Wilson Building was crowded, full of advocates and reporters making their way through the metal detectors. Julie Turner, Street Sense’s social worker, wheeled him up to us.

“Here’s Michael!” she said.

“Michael Stoops!” someone else shouted in excitement.

I knew of Michael through news articles and word of mouth stories. I knew he was one of the most influential advocates for people experiencing homelessness, unyielding since the days of the Reagan Administration. I heard he had a stroke, but didn’t know what that entailed. I would learn that day that Michael couldn’t speak or walk. But I had only begun to learn that his mind was still present, along with his tireless work ethic.

When I returned home from college for the summer, I shifted gears from journalism to social work and started my internship with Julie. After work, we would often drive to Maryland to visit Michael. Rarely did a week go by without a visit to him. Julie’s primary goal was to keep Michael engaged, so we read him his mail and issues of Street Sense.

In this vein, Julie asked me to interview Michael for Street Sense. I wasn’t sure how that would work. He had a lifetime of stories and knowledge to give, but no way to verbally express himself. After some brainstorming, we devised a system:

a list of questions, each one capable of being answered with a nod or shake of the head. For more complicated questions, I listed all the possible answers we thought he may have, based on past interviews.

During our interview, I truly got to see the side of Michael everyone had told me about. I saw the man who never stopped working, who was the last to leave the office, and who refused to give up. When he had difficulty communicating the answer to one question, he gestured for me to come closer. He was determined to write "no" next to one of the questions on the sheet, to make sure I understood what he meant, even if writing the word meant using all the energy he had. Despite his physical limitations, Michael never stopped trying to advocate for people experiencing homeless.

At Michael's service, Julie said something that I had not been able to articulate until then: “Michael is you and you are Michael,” she told the crowd.

And it is true. Michael’s impact on the D.C. community and nationally made knowing him, without ever having a verbal conversation with him, possible.

In many ways, his work spoke for itself.

I believe Michael will live on through the people whose lives he changed, which makes his memory more than just a memory: it makes Michael's life an example of how to live ours. ■

2003: Street Sense founded.

2017: Michael Stoops dies in D.C. *Additional memorials pg 16

2001: Helped end “Bum Fights” video sales.

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2015: Suffers severe stroke.

“Father’s Day:” Pookanu provides a peek into his world on brand new album

By Tom Coulter tom.coulter@streetsense.org

Ron Dudley stands outside Listen Vision Studio, where he recorded his upcoming album, “Father’s Day.” Dudley, a Street Sense vendor and artist the last three years, said he recognizes around 500 names and faces in the area where he sells papers. | PHOTOS BY RODNEY CHOICE / CHOICEPHOTOGRAPHY.COM

“H

ey cuz, call me when you get this. I’ve been waiting to hear from you.”

That was the text Ron Dudley sent his cousin Keisha Walters on a Thursday night last October. He had warned her multiple times about the man she was living with. Unable to shake his bad feeling about the guy, Dudley stopped visiting their apartment.

The cousins made plans to see each other Friday night, but Dudley still couldn’t bring himself to go over there.

The next morning, his father called with shocking news: Walters, her daughter Shaneka and their friend had been shot dead by the man living with them.

Stunned by the shootings, Dudley turned to his music to cope. A longtime hip-hop artist, Dudley said Walters was his biggest fan.

On his song “God’s Work,” Dudley raps about the incident: “I just wanna thank the Lord I’m still here / ‘Cause I could’ve died with my cousins last year.”

Even before the killings, there was a lot of chaos — and intermittent joy — in Dudley’s life. Three years ago, he lost his home.

Ron’s son Ricardo was born a few months later. With Ricardo’s mother struggling through drug addiction, her parents allow Dudley to stay with them while they help look after his son.

L o r n a R i c e - L u c a s , R i c a r d o ’s

grandmother, is 64 years old, and she said the family’s situation is especially stressful given her old age. Yet, she plays Dudley’s music to Ricardo almost every day.

“Everybody hits up and down points in life,” Rice-Lucas said. “His music covers all that.”

“Father’s Day,” Dudley’s new album released on June 14, details his search for God and peace of mind through these ups and downs.

“I always dove into my personal life in my music, but this was the hardest one to do,” said Dudley, who raps using the name Pookanu.

Dudley has been involved in the D.C. music scene for years, performing at locations such as the Pure Lounge, State of the Union Nightclub, Busboys and Poets, and Street Sense’s annual gala.

His performances were met with praise, inspiring Dudley to make “Father’s Day,” his first album for online sale.

He recorded it at Listen Vision Studios, a well-known rap studio founded by Jeremy Beaver in 1998. Beaver, who first collaborated with Dudley in 2000, said the rapper’s talent was evident the first day he came to the studio.

“He’s polished his sound,” Beaver said. “In terms of having a unique voice, his writing, his delivery, he’s really set himself apart.”

Dudley said his music is always borne out of life experiences. Amid his unstable living situation, the mantra “homeless, not

helpless” keeps life in perspective for Dudley.

“When you’re homeless, you have kids, you have bills, you have family, friends, responsibilities,” Dudley said. “The only thing separating you from the rest of the world is a lease.”

With his album dropping just in time for Father’s Day, Dudley, a Street Sense vendor and artist, agreed to an interview: When did you fall in love with rap?

At a young age. I was real young when I first started liking rap. I think it was already in me. I’ve been doing it for so long, like since I was a kid. Even before I listened to it, seeing old videos on TV like when your mother or grandmother leave, they leave the TV on, and I’m like, ‘I can do that!’ As long as I could remember, I had music in my brain. First it was in my head, like I would listen to songs but I would make songs in my head to their songs.

Your daughter Brooke has been featured on a few of your songs. When did you discover her talent?

She’s 12 now, but she did an album with me when she was five or six years old. She was with me so much when I was writing, she knew songs before I even recorded them. So that was amazing.

She has the touch. Even though I wrote most of the songs, she did them in the studio. I know adults who haven’t even done that. Like, they didn’t come as far

as to the studio, but I have a six-yearold in the studio doing 10, 12 songs? That was amazing. Another reason that she ended up in the studio with me so much, because the people that’s supposed to be on the song didn’t show up. So I was like, ‘Alright, boom.’ I put her on the song… it was crazy. I just had a beat playing one day, and she did a speech. I didn’t even know it was a Malcolm X speech until somebody told me. It was a speech she did in school in front of the whole school.

It went with the beat. That was her first one, and after that, she was in the studio with me all the time.

The only thing separating you from the rest of the world is a lease.

Does she still rap with you?

No, but she could. Her mother’s a teacher, her grandmother’s a teacher, so she’s really into school — an honor roll student. She still don’t know how we did that. I don’t know if I was spiritually guided when we did all that, but sometimes I think, “How did we do this?”

She knows every song that we wrote, so if somebody was to tell her to come on and do this, she’d be ready.

STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

Father’s Day

COVER STORY

By Pookanu, Artist/Vendor I dedicate this song To all the father’s that’s in jail That pay they child support Baby momma go to hell

I love my kids more than life Got ‘em baptized in the name of Christ Got ‘em baptized in the name of Jesus Gave my kids the Bible, told ‘em to read it!

Cause I’m just tryin’ to see my son Learn to walk. learn to run Learn to talk, learn to smile You look like your daddy now

I dedicate this verse to all the deadbeat moms Baby momma drama — love’s supposed to be strong My momma told me after marriage then come the kids My baby momma actin’ like a triflin’ bitch

I need you to understand Things don’t always go as planned Things ain’t always what they seem How could an angel be so mean?

But I can never hate her She the mother of my seed I used to love this lady And she used to love me!

Don’t be fooled by what you see Cause even a blind man can look at me And see I try my very best My God I am truly blessed

What happened to that wish?

We started with a kiss Then we started fightin’ And ended with a fist!

But no one knows how hard it is Tryin’ to be a dad in a fatherless World where the women want to suck you dry Help me live, don’t help me die

Momma told me never put my hands on a woman But momma, she on drugs and neglectin’ the children And momma, if she lies, she steals, she cheats Goin’ in my pocket at night while I’m asleep

I got places I need to be People and places I need to see I just need my kids to know Daddy’ll always love ‘em so

Ain’t no good ending if you women keep sinnin’ The devil got her soul and they tryin’ to take me with them But I ain’t goin’ nowhere, cause I am a man Through the good and the bad times, I still understand!

And even when I’m not around I’m gonna always hold you down I’m just one phone call away You can call me every day

RIGHT: Ron Dudley flashes a smile outside Listen Vision Studio in his signature Washington Nationals baseball cap. A D.C. native, Dudley can usually be found wearing gear from one of the city’s teams.

How do you think you’ve developed over the years as a rapper?

I think mainly experience is just going through life, going through so many trials and tribulations, good, bad, life, death, everything. It kinda shapes you. I always had songs about life in my head, so I always wrote about life experience: something that I’m going through, something a female might be going through, anybody. Just life.

What kind of message are you trying to send with your music? Who are you making your music for?

I make my music for everybody. I don’t care who you are, what color, where you’re from, what religion, if you’re tall, short, skinny, fat. It doesn’t matter. I just make it for you, because it’s life. True or false, A or B, up or down. My music, it’s really to make you think, and when you think, hopefully it can change your life for the better.

Several of your songs and poems focus on your mom. What kind of influence did she have throughout your life?

My mother, she died when I was young.

And I remember when she died: where I was, my situation. I was from D.C. Me and my sister got taken away and put in a foster home because she was addicted

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to drugs, so we got sent to Southern Maryland, St. Mary’s County. When she died, I was in the country, a young guy.

PHOTO BY CHOICEPHOTOGRAPHY.COM

I might be dead or locked up. In the country, I worked for everything. I did things you wouldn’t believe: cut tobacco, bailed hay, used to get up in the morning to catch crabs. I always had a good work ethic, that’s what the country taught me.

I make my music for everybody. I don’t care who you are, what color, where you’re from, what religion, if you’re tall, short, skinny, fat.

It doesn’t matter. I just make it for you, because it’s life.

I remember I had Chicken Pox, and there was so much snow that the school was shut down. My little sister, she’s sitting there, and when the phone rings, I knew it was my mother. I don’t know how I knew it, the same way I don’t know how I remember 500 names and faces of customers I sell my paper to. But I knew it was her. When it rang, they were like, ‘Your mother dead.’ My mom had just came down to the country that summer to see us. At least she tried to get help before she died, but drugs are a strong thing.

Moving was a good thing, too, because I figure if I was raised all my life in D.C.,

How did you get the name “Pookanu?”

My grandmother gave it to me when I was a baby. People think I’m part-Indian or something, but nah, it was just a name my grandmother gave me. When I first started rapping, I was everything, had so many different rap names, but they just didn’t fit me. I was like, ‘I’m just gonna go with the name everyone calls me: Pookanu.’

In the country growing up, I was Ron, but in the city, I was Pookanu. When the people in the country heard the name, they laughed, like ‘What is a Pookanu?!’

All my life, I was embarrassed as Pookanu, but once I started doing music, I realized that’s why I got this name. When people hear it, they talk about it. I know they’re gonna be curious.

When did you get involved with Street Sense? What kind of impact has it had on your life since then?

I started about three years ago. I had lost my place. I was going through things in life. Walking one day, I was real upset and went past a Street Sense vendor I always support. She said she felt my pain and that she just saw a look on me. Then she stopped and talked to me for about 45 minutes. In 45 minutes to about an hour, she made 75 bucks. She said I should get with Street Sense to get back on my feet.

A month later, I was a permanent vendor.

Once I started, I never looked back, because I said once I do it, I’m gonna do it. It helped me a lot. I haven’t gotten housing yet but it kept me motivated mentally and spiritually. I always said I would [distribute Street Sense] for free.

It just showed me that most people in this world are good. It changed my life and kept my dream alive just by being in the paper every two weeks, writing a poem, writing a verse, writing a story. ■ This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. More information about Dudley and his music is available at Pookanu.com.

Sounds From the Street Returns! Check out the brand new accompanying podcast delving deeper into the story of Pookanu! StreetSense.org/audio

OPINION

Have an opinion about how homelessness is being handled in our community? Street Sense maintains an open submission policy to elevate all voices and foster dialogue from many perspectives. Please send your thoughts to opinion@streetsense.org.

Kids Lending a Hand

By Ken Martin

It has been said many times (unfortunately often ignored or misinterpreted), that the "homeless need a hand up, not a handout!" Well, here is a heads up about the hands out. Most homeless folks are seen as valueless, and the domiciled seem to abhor their very existence. You might say they would gladly wash their hands of the inconvenience of this human obstruction.

Many American adults played a hand in making the mess that is known as "Homelessness." Yet rather than lend a hand to build legitimately affordable housing, American adults condone and create barriers to basic needs such as rest, cleanliness and elimination. They then point fingers and make fists at the result.

Selfishness, greed, vanity and fear lead to slaps in the face of people in survival mode who could use a helping hand.

Relatively few want to get their hands dirty. The adults seem to have their hands

busy with other projects. So the children package toiletries for distribution. They are rolling up their sleeves, cracking their take the first steps out of innocence knuckles and taking a hands-on approach! that adults tend to take based upon They marched with Michael guilt. Guilt because their hands Stoops Alice Deal and aren't always clean, or have drew dream houses not been raised enough in on a bus. They are town meetings! taught hope, then How about a hand for they demonstrate some great and unsung it in the recent young community performance of leaders!

“Devising Hope,” a collaboration Ken Martin is an between Street artist and Street Sense Sense artists and vendor. high school students a t H . B . Wo o d l a w n .

They interviewed a d v o c a t e s a n d O n M a y 5 t h e Tenleytown branch s h a r e d t h e i r of D.C. Library hosted students from the conclusions. They National Presbyterian School to create f e e d t h e h u n g r y toiletry packages for Friendship Place. and displaced and They are intended to be given to people

in need through the nonprofit’s Outreach and Welcome Center. PHOTO BY KEN MARTIN

D.C. middle and high school students regularly write and perform theater with Street Sense vendors A member of the Street Sense family, Artist/Vendor Sheila In 2015, Alice Deal sixth graders about the common White’s granddaughter, engages with our homeless advocacy rallied at the Wilson Building for a D.C. ground they find art bus. PHOTO BY KEN MARTIN homeless bill of rights. PHOTO BY ALEX ZIELINSKI together. BY KEN MARTIN

On Being Black and Homeless in the Gym

By Tanya Bibbs

I just signed up for a gym membership.

I’m losing the figure I had at the age of 25 and my body’s headed in the wrong direction.

My thighs look like big fat potatoes.

I always desired membership in a gym. Unfortunately, there are hidden barriers embedded in the gym lifestyle.

I ran into two of my gym-mates while shopping for a robe at Marshall’s.

The black woman made rude remarks about my hips and thighs — while her white girlfriend joined the ride. “You’re playing the race card,” I yelled.

I also dealt with a fear of undressing around white women in the locker room because of my skin color. The good news is that the white women are starting to speak to me.

All this pressure and weight came after I got the money together for a membership. That’s a barrier in itself when you’re homeless. But I need to get into shape so I can jump these barriers.

I want to look 25 when I’m 50!

Tanya Bibbs is an artist and Street Sense vendor.

Something Democrats Never Considered: Reality

By Jeffery McNeil

Sometimes I get depressed seeing what's happened t o Wa s h i n g t o n , D.C. It’s no secret that many are demoralized and heartbroken. Washington residents gave Hillary Clinton 90 percent of their vote. I wish I could say something reassuring.

However, many are upset that I don't know my role of being subservient to my betters.

Reality is hard. Despite the nightly Fake News not one Trump supporter has any regrets voting for him. The Democrats are still in disarray, unable to come to grips on why Queen Hillary lost. Their egos won't allow them to admit that President Trump didn't cheat or collude, he just flat out whipped her.

The Democratic Party has lost touch with ordinary people and became the party of Thurston Howell III. They couldn't beat a person that had a 64

percent disapproval rating on Election Day. Many Democratic operatives still believe they’re the smartest people in the room. They're doubling down on the same failed strategies that lost more than 1,000 legislative seats since Obama was elected.

It remains to be seen whether Hillary will do the right thing and exit the political scene. I bet she won't. Like her husband, she'll manipulate whine and weasel her way back into a possible run in 2020. I wonder whether Washingtonians, particularly African Americans, will be gullible enough to enable Hillary to manipulate them back to shilling for her. I’m disillusioned by how many Washingtonians have sold their souls to a party as corrupt as the Democrats.

Shouldn't honor and integrity be more important than pursuit of material goals?

I watched the left go from being a social movement to becoming an unruly mob.

It’s like watching the French Revolution in real time. The cause was cannibalized

by a faction that has contempt for the people they claim to be fighting for. Their arrogance and contempt for everyday Americans shows no limits or bounds.

It’s sad to watch how mean-spirited and vulgar liberals have become. I remember being young and admiring the oratory of Adam Clayton Powell, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. Comedians and entertainers such as George Carlin, Robin Williams, and Richard Pryor were provocative but not disgusting and vile.

They didn't have to resort to staging assassinations, beheadings or using the N-word to get laughter.

There is an arrogance of the Washington establishment that needs to be broken.

The social movements of the sixties sought to change stereotypes, not confirm what right-wing extremists thought of us. During the period of Civil Rights, we showed the best that the left had to offer. Today idiots speaking Ebonics, men wearing orange jumpsuits, and our Black women walking

the streets only in a thong and see through blouse. This isn't liberation. It’s vile and disgusting and reinforces what racists already think of us.

I say this not with malice but with only the best intentions of my heart. I voted for Trump because The Democratic Party has become the party that promotes debauchery, vulgarity and sickness. The Democratic Party is imploding and their intra-squabbling is embarrassing the nation as well as the world. Liberals need to pull it together.

They are embarrassing our country.

For those living with liberals -- don't be hard on them, pray for them. Give them a Bible, take them to church, inject them with love and let them receive the spirit.

Although America is in our darkest hour, our nation has been through worse. The way to defeat leftism is through love not scorn, derision and contempt.

Jeffery McNeil is a Street Sense vendor and columnist.

On My Way Back

Money Will Never Be More Valuable Than Life, pt 1

By Melanie Scott Artist/Vendor

By Marcellus Phillips, Artist/Vendor

I am a domestic violence survivor.

I was in a relationship that started out well, then became abusive. Then it became MORE abusive; we were fighting all the time and arguing in public every day.

He abused me mentally and physically. I was really tired of it. I thought I could handle it by myself, but I couldn’t.

So in 2015, I tried to leave. That’s when my “boyfriend” hit me on the sly, when my back was turned, and left me for dead. By the grace of God I was able to get back up and make to the Community for Creative Non-Violence shelter. A staff person then called the police, who came and arrested my former boyfriend. They took him to jail because he had violated his parole by hitting me and abusing me.

He gave me a herniated disk. I walked around with the pain for about a month. Then it became so agonizing my doctor sent me to a specialist. After reading the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), he said my disk was ready to explode and I needed to go to the hospital immediately.

Fortunately, I recovered completely and made it back to the shelter. One day my name came up for a housing voucher. I went out to search for an apartment and quickly found two. I took the first, a two-bedroom (even though I had a one-bedroom voucher) in Southeast.

So even though I was abused and hospitalized, I have been extremely blessed. I am finding my stride again. And I really am on my way back!

My family taught me respect and my background was solid growing up.

But things change. I have been up and above — just as been down to the ground. But I have learned how to make the best out of bad situations, which is a strong trait that I get from my mother. I was raised by my mother and have one full sister.

Never judge a book by its cover. Every book is not the same, and every book teaches a different lesson. That wisdom is worth more than any amount of money.

My father wasn’t in my life as a child — I didn’t meet him until I was a preteen. And then he disappeared, and I left it at that.

I later found out about his alcohol and drug addictions, so I feel he actually did me a favor by disappearing.

As years went by I learned a little too much about this firsthand. Just one day of it showed me how bad things can it. You can hang around the right crowd and try to be positive. Or you can hand around the wrong crowd and quickly become negative. And I’ve done a little bit of both.

By the age of 17I developed a seizure disorder while struggling to graduate from high school. At the same time, I was watching my grandmother die of cancer, which was incredibly painful.. I was up at 4 a.m. and would not get home until 9 p.m.

Some past decisions caught up to me in my senior year jeopardized my entire education. I was forced to pass every single class in order to graduate high school on time. In my mind I couldn’t let my grandmother died thinking I didn’t graduate from high school. My mother and sister were unable to do the same, so I made it a priority to get it done. (to be continued)

Surviving ART The Coming Financial Crisis

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By Joseph Walker, Artist/Vendor

REVIEW: “I of the Storm”

By Reginald Denny, Artist/Vendor

“I of the Storm” is a mustsee show which expresses and depicts an honest, open-minded and true look at life’s lessons, and how one could sometimes complicate it to the point where one can miss the real essence of living life simplistically. We should not always be so critical of our lives, to the point that we cause ourselves unwarranted heartache, drama and hardship.

Richard Hoehler, magnificent in this one man play/recital, had a captive audience from start to finish when he brought the Off-Broadway show to D.C. If there were words to describe his delivery, only these three could define it, “Intoxicating, Exasperating, but Invigorating!”

My name is Reginald Denny, I’m a Street Sense vendor, and I was mesmerized while in attendance on May 4 for “I of the Storm.” Bravo! Bravo! Superb!

STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

Street Sense was truly honored to have hosted “I of the Storm,” written

by RJ Bartholomew, directed by Janice L. Goldberg and performed by Richard Hoehler, here at The Church of the Epiphany. I was enthralled with the delivery of his heart-flinching performance.

This production showed one man’s struggle with homelessness. Our hero, Richard (the actor), loses his wealth but finds himself. I came away understanding, “now is the time to stop wasting time on a frivolous lifestyle of looking outside of self for things that will never truly satisfy the human spirit fully.” Richard shows us in this intoxicating and exasperating display that self-righteousness and pursuit for gain only end in dissatisfaction.

He closes with the fact that life is meant to be lived, not ignoring. He encourages us to LIVE, LOVE, LAUGH and enjoy the fruits of thy labor. K.I.S.S—keep it simple simply. Allow the creator in you to create!!! Take the time, sometimes, to stop, breathe and be still. Take the time to slow your mind.

PHOTO COURTESY OF RICHARD HOEHLER

In today’s economic crisis that’s in front of us, what will happen when the economy crashes and the country collapses? Where are we going to turn as the future looks more dim and there is little optimism?

What if a collapse happens very soon? What will we use for money, what will replace the dollar? No one really seems to know. In my opinion we will turn to a digital banking system. If that happens, we need some type of collateral to back up that system. Which type of commodities can help us get through a financial crisis and create stability?

We also need some type of cash flow. To bring this about I believe we need to invest in ourselves, our people. If the country is in crisis mode, we will face wars and violence. But, with any luck, eventually the outcome will lead us into a new, more stable economic system.

Hopefully one that is less vulnerable to manipulation.

But there is another matter that will become apparent once we enter this crisis. What will happen to the poor and the homeless? They will suffer the most.

So, in the meantime, I’m improving my financial situation by investing in myself and saving more wisely.

I’ve been interested in investments since I was a kid. I recently made my own 5-minute video about how I became homeless and what I invest in with my money today. With this video I would like to develop my own speaking gig so that I can talk to people about my ideas on surviving a financial crisis. I also would like to pass on some spiritual advice that I have learned along my journey.

I hope to see you all soon.

The Street Sense Writers’ Group is led by writing professionals and meets every Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. The group’s goal is to develop ideas and collaborate on the next great issue of Street Sense.

! e r e h T t u O s r e h t a F e h t l l A r o F Black Fathers on Father’s Day

What is a Father?

By Marcus Green Artist/Vendor There is my Heavenly Father. I choose to call him Allah. When all else is gone, you always can depend on God. Now, my biological father is a whole other story. He was a provider, but quality time with him was never there.

My mother died when I was one year old.

So, everything I learned — how to cook, clean, iron — came from my father. As a result of this, my kids and I are not close.

By Robert Warren Artist/Vendor I wasn't there, and that’s something I can't get back, because time has moved on.

All of us should cherish the time we have with a mother and father, as well as grandparents.

My goal is to get better with my kids before it's too late. I can tell you something funny: when I was a baby, my father changed diapers. When he got older, I had to change his diapers. What that taught me was that being humbled is all right. He loved me, and I loved him, and that’s really all that matters.

Happy Father's Day.

Father's Day in Heaven

I guess I am like many Black men; I get a funny feeling when Father’s Day comes around.

Too many of us have issues when it comes to our fathers because of our relationships with them, or lack thereof.

When it comes to being a Black father outside of a marriage or home, there is little support to help us succeed. Most of the help has gone to single Black mothers with no thoughts about the Black man who has been removed from the home by government policies and lack of income.

Historically Black men have been discriminated against when it comes to support with housing, jobs and business startups. Too many fathers never get to

Father’s Day Prayer

By Chon Gotti, Artist/Vendor

keep Darlene for the weekends. You would be cooking and enjoying a fish dinner, having a cold drink and watching all your sports games and the news. I knew our last view of you two years ago was the end. But we see you in our dreams and you look good, happy and healthy. The Lord gave you a new body and health.

You are not suffering anymore, and your smiling face cries tears of joy. I know you must rejoice being cancer-free.

You and the heavenly Father as well as other fathers are all celebrating Father's Day in Heaven, looking down on us. You are special, loved and honored.

This Father's Day, we will visit your grave and lay flowers and spend time enjoying you as we cry. We’ll have balloons and gifts and cake and ice cream to celebrate you.

We love you always, Dad. As you are in spirit, enjoy your special day, take our smiles along with you, on your way.

Fond Memories

By Patty Smith Artist/Vendor

By Sybil Taylor, Artist/Vendor

To a s p e c i a l father and grandfather: I am missing you this Father's Day. It is not the same without you, Dad. It is very empty for all of us. You are greatly missed by family and friends. You are missed every day. Your spirit will always be around us, and you will live forever.

Dad — Sean, Darlene, Mom, Dorian, Tracey, Bridget, and I cry each day with sadness, especially Mom. She and Bridget would love to see you again. They miss you not being home with them, doing your everyday routine: going to the store, walking, doing the garden, reading your Washington Post newspaper, watching TV and movies, doing tax papers, going downtown, spending time with your granddaughter Darlene.

I remember when you and Mom would

enjoy a Father’s Day with the kids and grandkids who they love and work for day-in and day-out. A lot of our days are spent listening to criticism from women and children we love.

We try to overcome barriers in this country that have put Black men in a subservient state, all the time working hard, medicating oneself, or feeling less than. Black fathers, To be a father is our only hope. To give of ourselves, as a Black father, is to strive for our children to not become a part of another lost generation. Too many generations have already been lost to racism, jail, drugs and violence against each other in our communities.

Every day can be a happy Father’s Day if we find the time to be a father no matter what. Black fathers matter, too.

So, happy Father’s Day, brothers

Fond memories, In the corners of my mind, so many memories of distant times.

Let’s take a moment of silence and pray: Father, God, I come to you today asking that you give us our streets back. We are tired of hurting. Tired of losing our loved ones. Tired of crying, struggling and not being able to make it back home.

God, I just ask that you put an end to the violence, so our kids can play freely again and not fear being killed.

Let’s return to a time when we can enjoy being outside and not have to run from bullets. We come on bended knees, oh Lord, pleading. Please give us peace and safety in our streets.

In the blessed name of Jesus Christ, let the church and the people say, Amen.

Happy Father’s Day Everyone!

Wishing you were here Because a world with you Is not the same.

You were my whole world.

From the times of the tiny steps I've taken, To the big moments in my life You have been there.

So, God bless a child Who still has you around To see them through so many Fantastic times in her life.

Here's saying "God bless you forever" Ever more, you forever, evermore.

One day I'll see you again, And I love you always, Dad.

STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

ART

CE BRANCH AND DORIS

ILLUSTRATION BY CLAREN

ROBINSON

Fathers

By Shana Holmes,Artist/Vendor Fathers are the best!

Without them, we would not be here. Just like mothers, some of our fathers wear many hats. There are some single fathers out there who do just as much as what our mothers do for us. They make a lot of sacrifices to provide for their children or families.

We don't honor our fathers as often as we do our mothers, but our fathers work just as hard. For some people it is hard to celebrate their fathers, because they don't have one in their family.

Father Figures

By Letishia Graham, Artist/Vendor

I have a birth father.

I also have a stepfather, Michael, who has been in my life since I was a teenager. He is my stepsister's father. He works the night shift at Wal-Mart.

Michael loves to fish and tell jokes. He is a great father figure for his grandson. And — this was a secret, but now you know — he loves to eat pretzels!

The Difference Between a Father and a Dad

By Evelyn Nnam Artist/Vendor The meaning of a father is very pure.

In each lesson they teach their child — the difference between good and bad, the meaning of how things are in life — they are molding their children to become strong sculptures.

Discipline for them to be respectful and responsible.

Enlightenment to their mind. The strength to strive. Fathers are that hedge, protecting their children from the dangers outside. They proved hands to work and lead, letting their child make those steps, so that if they fall he can catch them and let them start fresh.

Having a heart and being kind,

that’s all there is to it, to be a father. But it takes a special man to become a dad.

Dad’s go out of their way to make sure their family has things they need. They sacrifice themselves to be there. Sometimes fathers can have rough patches in their life, but dads make sure that what's going on personally doesn’t affect their child growing to become something in life.

D a d ’s t r y t h e i r b e s t t o g e t everything under control. And sometimes they make mistakes — no one is perfect in life. But that is what makes a father dad: trying hard, so that his family sees that he’s trying to keep it together and be strong for them.

So, whenever you get the chance, wish your dad a Happy Father’s Day! Thank you.

A Letter to Dad Yo u we re th er e fo r me fro m bi rth un til ag e 10 . Wh happened, to the po at int that you had to lea ve?

You removed me fro m your life. My child hood growing up wa good. Mommy did th s e best she could, rai sin g one daughter and five sons. I used to wish and pray you would come back. have missed so mu You ch.

My bad days were when I graduated from school and yo weren’t there. Ne u xt was when I got ma rri ed and you weren’ there to walk me do t wn the aisle. So I elo ped.Then I had your first grandchild. Ag ain, you weren’t th ere.

I missed how you us ed to take us fishin g. My children gre up without a grand w dad. I told them so me th ings about you. But they didn’t see or hear from you. I wa s hurt.

How do you tell your daughters and son to love on a man they do not know? By th e time you came ba ck int o my life, my kids had kids of their ow n. You left a big void in my life and in theirs.

Mother always said you would come ba ck on e day. I didn’t know it would be 30 years later.

But Daddy, I am no t bitter. I grew up with a loving moth and five brothers. I er wish you had the ch an ce to watch me gro up to be the person w I am today. But I’m grateful you came into my life and that ba ck I have the chance to know your hopes an dreams now. d We got a second ch ance to get to know each other as adult You have a great gra s. ndson that has part of your name. We can go fishing togeth er again and share your favorite — tea honey — together. and If th er e is an yt hin g I ha ve lea rn ed wh ile gr ow ing up is things happen fo , it r reason. Some th ing s don’t need to be explained. My mo ther used to say, “t hings happen — so over them.” So I did get .

If I could say anyth ing to fathers, it wo uld be to “be ther for the life you cre e ated, no matter wh at .”

In this world today, we need both pare nts to raise up a ch ild.

I love my dad!

Sheila White Artist/Vendor

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sudoku!

last edition’s solutions

COUTESY OF KRAYDAD.COM

Holding My Temper Being a Vendor

By Joe Jackson, Artist/Vendor

By Dwayne Butler, Artist/Vendor

I'm going through this homeless thing and trying to manage my anger. I'm tired of people lying to my face about helping me. That makes selling the paper difficult. It is also hard when people slander your name to other customers.

I also have to deal with my family. We don't see eye-to-eye. So many times I want to get away from everything and take a vacation, somewhere nice.

In that place, no one will set you up for failure or tell lies about you. And they won't get a leak on you about how you carry yourself on the street.

Despite all these feelings I have many customers who care about me. I want to thank them for being on my corner and I will stay close to God when people say I'm no good.

Being a vendor gives me a great chance in life. It opens the door for my other dreams like getting an LLC Business License and permit. It gives me something to do that's positive. I love the time I spend meeting new people. I enjoy writing articles and talking to customers about cooking or the weather.

In my spare time, I travel to Maryland and Virginia using public transportation. I go to malls where I can walk to exercise and eat healthy foods. Without being a vendor I wouldn't be able to stay healthy, improve myself, or have the opportunity to help other homeless people, help themselves. This makes me feel great.

STREET SENSE June 14 - 27, 2017

15

COMMUNITY SERVICES Housing/Shelter

Food

Clothing

Showers

Case Management

Health Care

Transportation

Laundry

Education

Employment Assistance

Legal Assistance

Vivienda/alojamiento

Comida

Coordinación de Servicios

Seguro

Educación

Assitencia con Empleo

Academy of Hope Public Charter School: 269-6623 | 601 Edgewood St, NE aohdc.org

Bread for the City: 265-2400 (NW) | 561-8587 (SE) 1525 7th St, NW | 1640 Good Hope Rd, SE breadforthecity.org

Calvary Women’s Services: 678-2341 1217 Good Hope Road, SE calvaryservices.org

Ropa

Lavandería

D.C. Coalition for the Homeless: 347-8870 1234 Massachusetts Ave, NW dccfh.org

Línea de juventud

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HOTLINE: (202) 749-8000 Línea directa de Violencia doméstica

BEHAVIORAL HEALTH HOTLINE: 1-888-793-4357

Assistencia Legal

Covenant House Washington: 610-9600 2001 Mississippi Avenue, SE covenanthousedc.org

Línea directa de alojamiento YOUTH HOTLINE: (202) 547-7777

Duchas

Transportación

Community of Hope: 232-7356 communityofhopedc.org

SHELTER HOTLINE: (202) 399-7093

Línea de Salud del Comportamiento Jubilee Jobs: 667-8970 2712 Ontario Rd NW | 2419 Minnesota Ave SE jubileejobs.org

Samaritan Ministry: 1516 Hamilton Street NW | 722-2280 1345 U Street SE | 889-7702 samaritanministry.org

Loaves & Fishes: 232-0900 1525 Newton St. NW loavesandfishesdc.org

Sasha Bruce Youthwork: 675-9340 741 8th St, SE sashabruce.org

Martha’s Table: 328-6608 2114 14th St, NW marthastable.org

So Others Might Eat (SOME) 71 O St, NW | 797-8806 some.org

Catholic Charities: 772-4300 catholiccharitiesdc.org/gethelp

Central Union Mission: 745-7118 65 Massachusetts Avenue, NW missiondc.org

Charlie’s Place: 232-3066 1830 Connecticut Ave, NW charliesplacedc.org

Christ House: 328-1100 1717 Columbia Rd, NW christhouse.org

Church of the Pilgrims: 387-6612 2201 P St, NW churchofthepilgrims.org/outreach food (1 - 1:30 on Sundays only) Community Family Life Services: 347-0511 | 305 E St, NW cflsdc.org

Vagrancy Comics #6: Old Habits

By Justin Benedict Former Vendor

Father McKenna Center: 842-1112 19 Eye St, NW fathermckennacenter.org

Food and Friends: 269-2277 219 Riggs Rd, NE foodandfriends.org

Miriam’s Kitchen: 452-8926 2401 Virginia Ave, NW miriamskitchen.org

St. Luke’s Mission Center: 333-4949 3655 Calvert St. NW stlukesmissioncenter.org

My Sister’s Place: 529-5991 (24-hour hotline) mysistersplacedc.org

Thrive DC: 737-9311 1525 Newton St, NW thrivedc.org

Foundry Methodist Church: 332-4010 1500 16th St, NW foundryumc.org/ministry-opportunities

N Street Village: 939-2060 1333 N Street, NW nstreetvillage.org

Unity Health Care: 745-4300 3020 14th St, NW unityhealthcare.org

Friendship Place: 364-1419 4713 Wisconsin Ave, NW friendshipplace.org

New York Ave Shelter: 832-2359 1355-57 New York Ave, NE

Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless 1200 U St NW | 328-5500 legalclinic.org

Georgetown Ministry Center: 338-8301 1041 Wisconsin Ave, NW georgetownministrycenter.org

Jobs Have Priority: 544-9128 425 Snd St, NW jobshavepriority.org

Patricia Handy Place for Women: 810 5th Street, NW, NW | 733-5378

Samaritan Inns: 667-8831 2523 14th St, NW samaritaninns.org

The Welcome Table: 347-2635 1317 G St, NW epiphanydc.org/thewelcometable

Whitman-Walker Health 1701 14th St, NW | 745-7000 2301 MLK Jr. Ave, SE | 797-3567 whitman-walker.org

Mike and Me: Road Warriors

My Michael Moment

By Richard R. Troxell

I can recall every single time I traveled to different colleges, universities and organizations with Mike. It seemed like everywhere we went, Mike was in a hurry to get back to the hotel to work on the next project.

One time, on our way to Villanova University, we stopped at a fast food restaurant to get lunch. The line of cars was long. Mike became very impatient and tried to back up and get out of the drive-thru. He hit the car behind us in the process. But we just laughed because being stuck there was the only way to slow Mike down.

I always would tell Mike, “If we go somewhere with a nearby tourist attraction or memorial we should go and see it. It’s called a working vacation.”

When we went to a silent auction at Erie Community College in New York, we were so close to Niagara Falls that I was able to convince him to go the next morning on our way back.

Even though it was

My favorite Michael moment was when he’d seemingly interrupt the world’s din in a crowded auditorium with a gentle penetrating comment or observation and share a secret with you.

He’d turn his shoulders into you, his body slightly sideways, and place his hand over his mouth with two fingers barely tapping his lips. His voice would go low and he’d look you in the eye, speak in a slightly raspy voice, that emphasized the importance of his thought. He’d tuck his head down, and in almost a whisper that drew you in and made you listen even harder, he’d make some off-thecuff remark about events, speakers, or activities happening at that very moment.

In those moments, you felt like he’d raised his invisibility cloak, shrouding us both in secrecy. Then you’d make an acknowledging comment in kind.

His eyes would light up with real joy, and he’d quickly respond with, “Yeah, yeah…” while emphatically nodding his head in affirmation and pointing the two bent fingers in the air for emphasis. In that instant, just the two of you bonded

By James Davis

about 20 miles north of our route, eventually he caved. We took pictures and he told me he was glad I had talked him into coming.

A strong work ethic drives some people.

I understood where Mike was coming from, because I too have that strong ethic. But sometimes I have to stop and smell the roses along the way, and I wanted Mike to feel that necessity too.

There were many other places we saw together, such as Hershey Park, the Flight 93 Memorial and Paul Revere’s home.

Once I got him indoctrinated to the idea, Mike learned to love stopping along the way to “smell the roses.”

I am going to miss him a lot, but I will always have these memories to smile at.

over that seemingly critical comment that birthed some newfound mutual perspective. For just an instant, the moment would seem to transcend time.

Then suddenly, the sounds of the external room would accelerate and catch up to your frozen moment and things fastforwarded and raced to reach their normal speed once more. In an instant, the words were gone. They simply evaporated into insignificance, unable to be captured. Not needing to be captured. However, the moment that you had shared with Michael lingered with you like a wisp of magic.

You suddenly felt a loss. Indeed, you felt a pang of hunger, hoping for the moment’s return. But in its place, you felt good — really, really good. You felt special, even enriched. Michael gave you the feeling that you and your opinion really mattered.

He made you feel important enough to share with you some special secret because you matter.

I can’t think of a greater gift that one person can give to another. Thank you, Michael.

He Kindly Stopped For Me

By Pender McCarter

James Davis and Michael Stoops discuss homelessness with a group of students at Elon University in the early 2000s. | PHOTO COURTESY OF JAMES DAVIS

June 14 - 27, 2017 • Volume 14 • Issue 16

Street Sense 1317 G Street, NW

Washington, DC 20005

Mail To:

Two years ago on the first Sunday in April, I was volunteering with the Friends Meeting of Washington at the Church of the Pilgrims when Michael Stoops was taken from his office there to the emergency room.

FMW volunteers were accustomed to seeing Michael at work during our monthly Sunday Open Table shifts at the church. I later learned that he often spent the night in his National Coalition for the Homeless basement office without going home.

Michael enjoyed telling me about NCH's latest efforts to combat homelessness through lobbying and public outreach. I would pass on to him an extra sandwich or a cup of soup left over from our meal service. He would

decline our invitation to join a group lunch at a nearby restaurant after we finished our volunteer duties, because from his standpoint, there was much more to be accomplished in the office.

I was moved to see the ovations he received at the annual winter solstice recognition for the homeless people who died on the streets. I was also touched to observe the many participants — perhaps with "the least among us," in terms of worldly possessions — who attended Michael's memorial. How that would have pleased him.

Emily Dickinson's words are apropos for Michael: "Because I could not stop for Death/He kindly stopped for me/ The Carriage held but just Ourselves/ And Immortality."

Nonprofit Org US Postage Paid Washington, DC Permit #568

Patty Smith has been in housing for 2 years!

June 16 Thank you for reading Street Sense!

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Ken Martin has been sober for 37 years!

June 14 Ron Dudley recently celebrated his birthday!

May 30