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Atmospheric Rivers of Cruelty in Santa Cruz
By KEITH MCHENRY - CO-FOUNDER OF FOOD NOT BOMBS
Left, Santa Cruz Police Officer Denise Cockrum hands a citation to Keith McHenry just before his arrest for feeding people in a covered parking lot out of the rain.
Photo by KEITH MCHENRY
I thought I had a good relationship with Santa Cruz Police Sgt. Carter Jones so when I greeted him during the 2018 New Year’s Parade I asked him about why the police had forced about twenty people sleeping in the Walnut Street Garage out into the driving rain at 3:00 am in the morning? He said it must have been people from First Alarm Private Security, noting that he was the duty officer in charge that evening claiming his officers would never do such a thing. I spoke with several of those who suffered the downpour to see if he might have been correct. No, they all said it was the Santa Cruz police.
I share this story because this cruel inhumane policy of forcing the homeless into the rain in the middle of the night has gone on for years. It is almost like city officials regard our homeless neighbors as rats and sit at home in their warm comfy million-dollar homes bubbling with glee at the suffering of those who are forced to stand soaking wet in the cold wind as all their meager belongings are drenched to ruin.
I also tell this story because two days after Food Not Bombs had prepared and shared the Santa Cruz Community Christmas Dinner, the annual atmospheric river crashed across the Bay Area for a second time this winter. We started to set up in a dark corner of Garage 10 near Wells Fargo Bank in an area marked “No Parking” when about ten police officers arrived and ordered us out of the protection from the storm.
I was arrested, charged with two misdemeanors and held for 11 hours in the holding cell at the County Jail. Not surprisingly several of my cell mates were friends who often eat with Food Not Bombs. They were happy to have been removed from the rain and expressed hope for a dry night or maybe more.
Dec. 10 marked the 1,000th day in a row that we had shared our afternoon meals filling the void created by the closing of the weekday food programs during the COVID lockdown. That morning we struggled to erect our red canopies at the Town Clock but the driving sea of rain and 25 mph gusts blew our equipment around the plaza. We never did recover the trash bin that tumbled out of sight. One E-Z Up portable shelter had to be retired to our parts collection in our Soquel shipping container.
As we struggled to save our canopies and equipment our dear friend Father Joel arrived with pillows. A second group also dropped off piles of clothing and blankets. We crammed the donations out of the rain into our trailer. The Food Not Bombs van was up at our Scotts Valley kitchen. I stuffed our six old folding tables and equipment into my car and rushed over to Garage 10 where we had often retreated to during past storms. It was an emergency.
Several police officers confronted us on Dec. 10 as we were unloading. They threatened to arrest us and tow our vehicles but we politely ignored them, set up and shared our meals. There is no way we could have let our friends stand in the elements eating swamped meals as sheets of rain cascaded over their already cold, soaked clothing.
So when the bomb cyclone returned on Dec. 27, we tried to set up in a secluded out of the way corner of Garage 10. While setting out our six serving tables, ten or more officers arrived and ordered us to move out into the driving rain and wind.
I informed Sgt. Denise Cockrum that we would not be moving out into the atmospheric river, invited her to join us for lunch at noon, and let her know we would be out of the covered lot at 3pm. When she continued to demand we leave, I suggested that if the city didn’t want Food Not Bombs to share food in the garage that they were free to provide meals themselves in an indoor location of their choosing. We wouldn’t stop them.
I thought if I continued to exert my right to feed the hungry in the safety of the garage that I might be issued a ticket. But instead, after I admitted I would return with the hot meal she clamped metal cuffs on my wrists. Her men confiscated our six new folding tables that we had bought for the Christmas meal, plus two garbage cans, several chairs and a collection of paper products.
We still shared food that day out in the torrents of rain using our last remaining table that we reserved for our clothing distribution. Once booked, I called my girlfriend Kathleen to let her know all was well with me and shared a report on that day’s events. It wasn’t long before she and our roommate, Commander X, were posting and Tweeting news of my arrest. Dennis Bernstein of KPFA interviewed them on his popular program Flashpoints. I am sure that denunciations flooded the inboxes at City Hall. One of the Food Not Bombs groups in Poland accused the city of being like Russia.
We were desperate to get more tables. I collected a couple of the least broken tables from storage and bought the last three six-foot tables at Home Depot. I made several calls to property and Police Chief Bernie Escalante. I also stopped by the property gate on Washington Street at the times listed on the department’s outgoing message. It was closed for the holidays.
Chief Escalante responded to my messages and after a couple of conversations we arranged to meet at the SCPD property gate at 11am on Thursday. He loaded our tables and other equipment into my car and we spoke of a possible solution to sharing meals during the high winds and heavy rains. He must have known that I am not able to lift tables due to my back injury because he didn’t hesitate to pack my vehicle himself.
I suggested he join me in gently encouraging St. Francis Soup Kitchen to lift their COVID restrictions and reopen their weekday indoor meals. Bernie also suggested we might use the Civic Auditorium or set up under the arcade at City Hall. We also discussed the possibility of our setting up at the edge of the garage near the blue parking attendant office to avoid violating the law restricting people to a 15-minute limit in city garages or parking lots.
We finally resolved the dispute and the city agreed to stop its interference at Garage 10. I really appreciate Chief Escalante and his willingness to work with us to find a solution.
While this crisis was resolved, we also need the city to discontinue all their city’s efforts to disrupt our work. They should drop the $400 ticket issued to our volunteer Joy Binah this fall, when a very rude police officer named Ross blocked her from making a delivery of food to the kitchens at the Benchlands. Her case is still pending. They could also drop my charges. I received an updated citation in the mail for being in a garage longer than 15 minutes and blocking a parking space on January 4 so it seems the city is intent on taking this case to trial. My first court appearance is set for Jan. 30.
But most importantly, the city needs to end its ugly campaign of driving the homeless out of the garages during the storms. That is the least that any government could do.
Some of the wealthiest executives of America’s largest military contractors like Google’s General Counsel, Halimah DeLaine Prado, call Santa Cruz home. They can afford to be good neighbors. People like them can afford to make sure everyone in Santa Cruz has a kitchen and flush toilet.
Instead, DeLaine Prado’s husband, Manuel, is the treasurer of the far right anti-homeless organization “Take Back Santa Cruz” and has been meeting with city officials demanding that homeless union president Alicia Kuhl’s RV and my car be towed, among other assaults on the homeless.
The least the city could do is provide several more vans and return to its twice an hour shuttle service to downtown from the Armory Shelter and Overlook camp. My friend, 70-year-old Nikki, complained that she had to walk to town in defiance of shelter staff so she could make it to her job on time. “I don’t care if they kick me out,” she told me as the wind whipped around us at the Town Clock. We also need to see an accounting of the $14 million the state gave the city to help the homeless because we are not seeing $14 million in services and housing.
It seems that the parking garage is emerging as a central struggle in the defense of our town from the property speculating vultures and their puppets at City Hall. This might account for the heavy-handed way they tried to force us into the storm.
After years of citizen resistance to the construction of a huge garage replacing our farmers market, and the killing of several heritage trees, the city plans to ignore the will of our community and go forward with plans to accommodate the wishes of global hedge funds. There is money to be made in parking the spoils of corporate plunder in luxury condominiums while providing their wealthy owners with city-financed parking.
Governments that refuse to feed its hungry are in no position to tell those of us who are providing meals for the community how we are to meet those needs.
Food Not Bombs is hosting Santa Cruz Prepares on Sunday, Jan.15 at 6pm at the Resource Center for Nonviolence, 612 Ocean St. in Santa Cruz. Our compassion will be required to navigate the difficulties ahead. We plan to discuss the logistics of survival as the economy crashes and we face cuts in electricity, food shortages, the possible transition into a cashless digital security state, and the increase in poverty. We need your participation.
The threat to our freedom is advancing at a startling pace. Small acts of defiance to the dystopian corporate state are essential if we have any hope of saving our humanity and dignity. I plan to live free even if it means I must be jailed to protect these last threads of liberty.
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