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street roots
June 22, 2012
First Homeless Bill of Rights sets
example for other states
BY JASON MCLURE
A report in April from the White House’s
Interagency Council on Homelessness noted
hode Island’s governor is expected to
a “proliferation of local measures to
sign into law the first “Homeless Bill
criminalize ‘acts of living’” such as sitting,
of Rights” in the United States as
standing or asking for money in public
early as next week, formally banning
places.
discrimination against homeless people and
“You’re just looked down on because
affirming their equal access to jobs, housing
you’re carrying your life on your back,” said
and services.
John Joyce of
The legislation,
Providence, who was
which won final
homeless for three
Supporters
say
it
was
approval by the state
years and now is
Senate on
necessary doe to widespread co-director of the
Wednesday, bucks a
Rhode Island
discrim ination.
national trend among
Homeless Advocacy
municipalities toward
Project.
outlawing behaviors
Portland has a
associated with homelessness such as
camping ban in place, and enforces a
eating, sleeping and panhandling in public
sidewalk management ordinance in place
spaces.
that prohibits people from sitting or lying on
Among other steps, the Rhode Island law
portions of downtown sidewalks.
would guarantee homeless people the right
Frank Nolan, 53, of Providence became
to use public sidewalks, parks and
homeless last year when a ruptured
appendix left him with $30,000 in hospital
transportation as well as public buildings,
like anyone else “without discrimination on
bills and he did not have medical insurance.
the basis of his or her housing status.”
Nolan said he used the addresses of
It guarantees a “reasonable expectation of friends on job applications because he knew
privacy” with respect to personal belongings he would not be hired if his address was a
similar to that of people who have homes.
homeless shelter.
While other laws already guarantee many
He said he was stunned when a bus driver
of the rights specified in this legislation,
failed to stop for him and three other
supporters say it was necessary due to
homeless men waiting near a shelter. “He
widespread discrimination.
pulled up and looked at us and he knew we
“I think we’ve set the bar high in the U.S.
were homeless,” said Nolan. He just waved
for homeless people, and I’m very proud of
and he drove off.”
In Philadelphia, an ordinance took effect
that,” said Senator John Tassoni, a sponsor
on June 1 banning charities from feeding
of the bill.
homeless people in public places such as
Roughly 643,000 people are homeless on
any given night in the United States, experts parks.
In St. Louis, Missouri, police evicted
say.
homeless people from a site leased for them
“It’s important as a standalone piece of
by a local minister after the city cleared out
legislation but also as it’s juxtaposed with
other communities that are in the process of three homeless encampments along the
Mississippi River.
criminalizing homelessness,” said Neil
Last year, San Francisco began enforcing
Donovan, executive director of the National
a ban on sitting and lying on sidewalks
Coalition for the Homeless.
“This just affirms the rights and existence between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m., with violators
facing tickets of up to $500. But San Jose
of the unhoused in America.”
recently said it would order police to stop
Cities including Philadelphia, San
throwing away the personal possessions of
Francisco and St. Louis recently passed
homeless people seized during sweeps of
ordinances targeting the homeless or have
homeless camps, amid criticism from
stepped up enforcement of existing
homeless advocates.
regulations.
“This affirms the rights and existence of
www. street-papers. org/Reuters
the unhoused in America.”
CHOMSKY, from page 1
attention and sympathetic concern for their
own priorities, and efforts to integrate
these into a broader movement of mutual
support. Like the kinds of efforts you
mention.
S TR E E T N E W S S E R V IC E
R
S.K.: Speaking of broader movements, in
some of your past talks you have been critical
of the overly narrow focus of social justice
organizing. I would imagine the Boston area
alone has dozens of little social justice
organizations. It could be, for example,
housing justice initiatives, promoting
solidarity with people in Latin America,
countering the influence of the military in
public schools, or any number of issues. But
how effective can they be on their own? Should
they be forming alliances with more broadly
based social change movements like OWS?
N.C.: I don’t recall being critical of the
narrow focus in itself. It is often well
justified. But the atomization that is so
prevalent in the society as a whole is
harmful to individual movements, which
could benefit greatly from participation in a
common enterprise with many
complementary facets. That is why for many
years — many decades in fact — there have
been efforts to create broader regional or
even national and international coalitions. It
hasn’t been easy, but it is clearly desirable.
There’s a good reason, for example, why
unions are called “internationals,” even
though the term is much more of an
aspiration than a functioning reality, as it
should be, for the benefit of all.
S.K.: Last month you went to Harvard to
address a gathering of Boston-area OWS
activists. Don’t you find it odd that the 99
percent movement gathered at the university of
the 1 percent?
N.C.: In most countries meetings can be
held at union halls — like when I talked in
London a few months ago. Not here. The
main functioning institutions are churches
and universities, so meetings are commonly
held there. I agree with you that there
could have been a better venue. I suppose
there were reasons for selecting that one.
S.K.: In the 1980s, Harvard was seen as a
sort of scholarly refuge by Indonesian and
Guatemalan generals. More recently,
Georgetown gave a faculty position -
Distinguished Scholar in the Practice of
Global Leadership - to former Colombian
president Alvaro Uribe, despite his horrendous
human rights record. What do universities
stand to gain or lose from such alliances?
N.C.: It was a refuge, as you say, and that
gave an opportunity to activists. I was
involved in both the Indonesian and
Guatemalan cases (Lumintang, Gramajo).
Harvard was keeping it secret, but I learned
about it from activists in Indonesia and
Guatemala, and groups here were able to
organize very effective protests that drove
Lumintang out of the country (one of my
favorite ever Boston Globe headlines was
“Indonesian general flees Boston”) and
properly shamed Harvard. Alan Nairn, a
wonderful person with a flair for the
dramatic, waited for the Harvard
commencement, and when Gramajo came
up for his diploma, raced down the aisle in
front of the TV cameras and handed him a
subpoena - the State Department quickly
got him out of the country. I was part of the
Uribe protest too, but that time the protest
didn’t prevent the appointment, though it
had its effects.
The U.S. supported all of these
gangsters, handsomely. So not surprising
that Harvard joins in to reward them in its
own way.
S.K.: Lawrence Woods, a political scientist,
conducted a survey a few years ago to see how
often your writings are cited in undergraduate
International Relations textbooks. From 1992
to 1999 only 8 percent of the texts contained
citations of your work (and that’s including
one extended footnote). A follow-up study
looking at texts published between 2001 and
2004 didn’t turn up a single citation. How
does this square with your reputation as the
“most-cited living author”?
N.C.: I’m amazed there it was even 8
percent. And I suspect if you checked,
you’d find it was mostly condemnations.
What else would you expect? How often do
you think H ow ard Zinn, o r o th e r c ritic s o f
U.S. foreign policy, are mentioned?
Sometimes, it’s truly scandalous. Gabriel
Kolko’s pioneering work on the early Cold
War is almost never cited in scholarly
journals, though plenty of scholars crib
from his insights. The “reputation” is based
on some survey of social science literature
put out by the MIT PR office. Maybe
accurate, maybe not, but not of the slightest
significance.
www.street-papers.org/ Spare Change News,
Boston, Mass.
W ife
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