This is a very interesting article in the San Francisco Public Press. When we regularly volunteer, donors drop off shampoo, conditioner and soap for us to distribute to anyone we see living on the street. Obviously the ones living by Great Highway, right at the Pacific, have the easiest time in maintaining hygiene. They just cross the road, gallop down the beach and enjoy the largest bath in California. But for the ones that can't get access to water since gyms are closed (many pay membership just to use the showers), it's been a literally stinking mess for them. So please read this article and then delve into your suitcase, travel bags and closets to find any shampoo bottles or soaps you don't use. And then offer these to the homeless when you're out and about today. Here's the article to share:
San Francisco plans to expand access to drinking water for people
living on the streets by adding permanent taps in three neighborhoods
and leaving in place — for now — the temporary taps it installed after
COVID-19 hit.
This month, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission plans to
begin installing the permanent taps in the Tenderloin, Mission and
Bayview-Hunters Point. They are slated to be mounted near most of the 10
temporary water pipes with multiple spouts the commission put in place
last year. The spigots were installed to address concerns from homeless
residents and advocates about dwindling water access as restaurants and
public spaces began shutting down.
For many homeless residents, water access represents a hurdle
between them and a job, a home — even survival. The demand for fresh
water has been so great since March that several organizations began
buying bottled water for distribution to homeless people at a cost of
thousands of dollars.
“When we think about it as water being a human right, especially in a
city as wealthy as San Francisco, there’s an expectation that that
would be a service provided by the city,” said Calder Lorenz, a program
manager at St. Anthony’s, a Tenderloin homeless services group.
An essential resource
Before he had heard of the coronavirus, 59-year-old Eric Coler would
lug six gallon jugs a mile and a half from his tent on Willow Street
past City Hall and the San Francisco Chronicle’s clock tower to Yerba
Buena Gardens. The park there had the closest public fountains he knew
of where he could fill his bottles in peace.
Coler avoided the library on his route because staff there
discouraged him from filling his bottles, he said. Gas stations were a
similar story.
“They’ll try to run you out, they don’t care,” Coler said of gas station employees.
Each trek took more than an hour, and he often made two a day. The
return trips were always hardest. Coler described his bulging backpack
loaded with heavy jugs “digging in my back.” He often returned to find
his tent ransacked, its contents stolen. Even his water wasn’t safe.
“You have to watch out, people will take it from you,” he said.
By the time the pandemic hit San Francisco, Coler had moved his tent
closer to the gardens. But he still got robbed while on water runs;
people still stole his jugs when he wasn’t looking. Leaving his tent was
never safe.
It wasn’t until the city placed him in one of its emergency hotel rooms in November that Coler could turn on his own tap.
“Access to water isn’t something that people think about,” said Sam
Dennison, co-director of the Tenderloin homelessness services agency,
Faithful Fools. “Everybody needs to drink something every day. How do
you wash your hands? Wash your body? Keep your wounds clean?”
Water access has become critical during the pandemic, prompting some
to take desperate measures. Three informal surveys of homeless
Tenderloin residents conducted by Faithful Fools in September, October
and November found that half of respondents drank non-potable water from
broken faucets or the city’s emergency hygiene stations, Dennison said.
A quarter of respondents said they stole their water from corner
stores, and another quarter said they relied on service providers for
drinking water. This limited water access prevents people from staying
clean, which can be dehumanizing, Dennison said.
“I used to wear the same clothes every day, back to back,” Coler said
of his time on the streets. “I went three to four weeks at a time
without washing my clothes.”
Lack of water access presents practical hurdles, too.
“It’s a hidden barrier to people recovering from homelessness,”
Dennison said. “When we think about things like, ‘Why don’t people just
go out and get jobs?’ — they’re seeking out basic resources, food,
shelter. You can’t show up to a job interview or look for housing
without having bathed first.”
The cost of water
At the urging of homeless activists and service providers, the city
created several programs to address diminished water access. In March,
the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing — and later, the
Department of Public Works — began rolling out dozens of handwashing
stations and toilets in neighborhoods with large homeless populations.
When they are usable, the stations give homeless residents a more
dignified place than the street to use the restroom and wash themselves,
but the water in the stations is unsafe to drink. To meet the need for
potable water, soup kitchens that had previously provided tap water to
unhoused people in their dining halls began buying it in bottles to hand
out on the streets.
“We were spending about $360 to $400 per day” on bottled water, said
Lorenz of St. Anthony’s. From March to August, the nonprofit spent about
$70,000 on bottled water for homeless residents. St. Anthony’s relies
on donations and does not receive city funding, Lorenz said.
Glide, another Tenderloin homeless services group, has spent more
than $48,000 on bottled water since March, said George Gundry, director
of Glide’s meals program, which is partially funded by the city.
The nonprofit also receives occasional water donations — including several pallets of Aquaman star Jason Momoa’s signature canned water that the actor donated — which helps with costs, Gundry said.
While the cost of water alone is manageable, the bottles are just one
of many added expenses Glide has taken on so it can serve food safely
during the pandemic. “It certainly is putting a financial strain on
Glide,” Gundry said.
Homeless outreach and advocacy groups in the Bayview and
Haight-Ashbury said they, too, have had to buy water for their homeless
neighbors.
“It’s almost to a point where I’m telling them they need to start
buying their own,” said Gwendolyn Westbrook, the executive director of
the United Council of Human Services. The Bayview homeless resource
center spends $300-$400 each week on bottled water, money it could put
to work elsewhere, Westbrook said.
“We would be spending that money on food,” she said, adding that she
is worried her organization will not be able to meet people’s growing
food needs.
After homeless services groups urged the city to help, the utilities
commission rolled out the first pipes with multiple spouts in the
Tenderloin last May, including one in front of St. Anthony’s and another
near Glide. There are four spouts in the neighborhood. Two more were
later placed in the Mission, and four are in the India
Basin/Bayview/Hunters Point area.
The commission plans to finish the first seven permanent stations by
the end of the month in the Tenderloin and Mission. Five more will be
installed in the Bayview area in February. The stations are part of a 2010 Public Utilities Commission program that built 165 of the stations across the city, most of them in schools and parks.
The fountains at Yerba Buena Gardens, where Coler used to fill his
water jugs, are part of the program. There is already one station in the
Tenderloin, at Boeddeker Park. Coler avoided the park because he had
conflicts with unhoused people who lived nearby, he said.
The commission plans to eventually remove the temporary spigots after
the fountains are installed, commission spokesperson Will Reisman said.
“We’re not going to immediately take the manifolds down,” he said. “We’re going to evaluate the situation.”
Only three new, permanent fountains are slated to ultimately replace
the four pipes with multiple spouts in the Tenderloin, where service
providers say need is greatest, but the commission is “committed to
working with community members on future locations,” Reisman said.
Thanks to the nearby spouts, St. Anthony’s stopped buying bottled
water in August, Lorenz said, suggesting makeshift spouts have made a
dent in the neighborhood’s needs. He is hopeful the permanent fountains
will provide dignity to those who use them. But Lorenz is hesitant to
call the program a success.
“While it’s a start, I just don’t see it as enough,” Lorenz said.
“Right now, in the Mid-Market and Tenderloin area, the need is very
large. It looks a lot like where we started.”
Enjoying unlimited water
When the city placed Coler in his hotel room in November, one of his
first priorities was to take advantage of the bathroom. “I spent at
least 45 minutes in the shower,” he said. “I wasn’t used to it.”
Coler still marvels at having water access. He can wash his face, use the toilet and do his laundry whenever he wants.
“You can put clean clothes on when you wake up,” he said. “Man, how sweet that is.”
