On Tuesday afternoon, a group of unhoused people and activists pitched tents in front of Oakland City Hall. They planned to spend the longest night of the year, plus a few more nights, on the plaza.
Similar camps popped up at other city halls up and down the West Coast, in opposition to encampment sweeps that have ramped up in the aftermath of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision.
But Oakland’s self-described “sanctuary community” was short-lived. Reportedly told to leave by the city administrator a few hours after arriving, the campers packed up and relocated to the old Greyhound station parking lot about half a mile north on San Pablo Avenue.
“We knew that following his words would be a police call,” said Lisa “Tiny” Gray-Garcia, founder of POOR Magazine, an arts, media, and education organization.
It was a disappointment to pack up so soon, she said: “It always brings love and joy to take a break from this endless removal process that rains down on our heads as poor people.”
POOR Magazine organized the occupation along with the Wood Street Commons. The crew had plans to stay outside City Hall until Saturday, engaged in a program of art, meals, and readings. They say they’ll do the same at the Greyhound lot.
The event, which drew a few dozen people, began with an Indigenous ceremony and prayer.
“We didn’t have a concept of homelessness on our lands…prior to colonization,” said Corrina Gould, spokesperson for Confederated Villages of Lisjan.
Over the next hour, speakers took turns with the microphone, while advocates offered massages and tea.
Inside the regal building towering behind them, the Oakland City Council was voting on budget cuts, including a reduction in money for affordable housing. The anti-sweeps event was not the only action on the plaza that afternoon; it was preceded by another rally of older residents protesting cuts to Oakland’s senior centers.
342 people died homeless last year in Alameda County
Earlier in the day, dozens gathered virtually for more somber event highlighting the plight of people living on the streets and in shelters.
Each year around the winter solstice, Alameda County Health Care for the Homeless hosts a memorial honoring those who’ve died while experiencing homelessness. In 2023, the most recent year analyzed by the agency, 342 people died while unhoused in the county — at a rate of over five times that of the general population. Acute and chronic medical conditions were the most common causes, followed by drug overdoses, but unhoused people have a greater risk of death from virtually all causes.
“I’ve lost so many young friends throughout the years, over drugs or not being able to eat,” said a woman named Nicole, who just secured housing after six years of homelessness. She wiped away tears as she spoke.
Glenn Turner, whose daughter Hazel died in 2019, lamented a privatized health care system that fails even the “loved ones we cared for and did everything we could for.” Turner’s daughter had schizoaffective disorder and a related methamphetamine addiction, and the mother described a “revolving door of 5150s and being told to call the police,” while Hazel cycled through park benches and countless apartments.
Turner is a member of Families Advocating for the Seriously Mentally IIl, but she sang a song she wrote from the perspective of an unhoused person.
Now the camp has shut down, it’s the only life I know / Tell me where can I go, where can I go.
The Supreme Court’s decision in the Grants Pass case had immediate impacts
The City of Grants Pass v. Johnson case, decided by the Supreme Court earlier this year, found anti-camping laws and penalties like fines and jail time are constitutional even when no alternative shelter is available.
Following the court’s decision, cities like San Francisco and Berkeley passed new policies and orders ushering in an era of more aggressive encampment closures. Homeless people and advocates have decried the ruling as criminalizing the homeless and have searched for ways to push back. The group Where Do We Go Berkeley set up a months-long protest camp at City Hall, but it was closed last week.
In September, Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao issued an executive order to close more encampments. But Oakland still has a policy in place requiring the city to offer shelter to all of the residents of any homeless camp it closes. The city also must give advance notice and store belongings of unsheltered people when it closes a camp. It’s unclear how or whether the policy applies to the community set up Tuesday on the plaza.
City spokespeople did not provide answers by publication time to questions about why they told the campers to leave and what happened Tuesday evening.
Gray-Garcia said her group left right after the order because they weren’t in a position to risk arrest. Past camps outside of City Hall have been forcibly shut down with the help of the police.
“We said, why wait, put people at risk, and trigger folks into more sorrow?” said Gray-Garcia, who wears an orange jumpsuit in recognition of the time she spent at Santa Rita Jail for a homelessness-related arrest.
But she emphasized that this week’s action is not only about problems, but also solutions. She launched the Homefulness Project, a free housing and education program in Oakland that just welcomed its 22nd resident.
