Rated: NR    Runtime: 120 mins.
Monday, May 21st @ 6:30
A Dialogue on the Criminalization of Poverty
Admission is $5 to 10, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds.

Discussion moderated by judy b. and featured guests include; Public Defender Jeff Adachi, Ross Mirikarimi, Lisa Gray-Garcia aka Tiny, Leroy Moore, Renee Saucedo, James Garrett, and the welfareQUEENS. Co-sponsored by: POOR Magazine, the People of Color Caucus of the Green Party and the San Francisco People’s Organization

It is a crime to be poor in the U.S.. Sleeping outside or in a vehicle, soliciting employment, convening in a public space and/or suffering in public from a mental illness are citable offenses. This results in more and more poor families, youth, elders and adults in this country facing police harassment, abuse and even incarceration for living in poverty.
“Poverty is a violent crime; like thousands of unheard, unseen children, families and individuals living in poverty in America, I have been incarcerated for these crimes…I am a criminal of poverty,” says Lisa Gray-Garcia (aka Tiny), author of the recently released book; Criminal of Poverty; Growing up Homeless in America, who as a child and young adult of a homeless, mixed race mother in the US, was incarcerated and arrested numerous times for the sole act of living with her family without a residence, sleeping in a car and being poor.

She is just one of the many Bay Area community members struggling with poverty and racism that has been unfairly targeted by police, government officials and increasingly punitive legislations. This trend of punishing people for living in poverty has been increasing exponentially all over the country due to rampant gentrification, increased border fascism and racism as well as the “corporatization” of US cities based on Rudy Giuliani’s disastrous New York “clean-up” model which has just been highlighted in the mainstream media due to SF’s proposed “Community Courts”.

By bringing together an innovative and powerful mix of voices from poverty and race scholars (aka insiders who have felt these experiences first-hand), advocates, alternative/activist policy makers and organizers, ethnic studies scholars, poverty and civil rights attorneys, legal advocates, activists and community leaders POOR Magazine and the People of Color Caucus of The Green Party will explore short and long-term legislative and community based solutions to the problem, and launch an in-depth look at the harmful impacts of this dangerous trend on poor children and families, adults and elders of color in the US today.

“It is literally a crime to be poor in this country, the United States of America.”, said Rene Saucedo of La Raza Centro Legal, who has worked to stop the increasing criminalization and constant onslaught of “clean-up” efforts of working poor immigrants who have been increasingly targeted for arrest and harassment in cities across the US

Clean-up plans such as San Francisco’s Mayor Gavin Newsom’s latest plan to “eradicate homelessness” by setting up poverty courts that would immediately send people to jail for an overnight stay and/or other punishment for sitting on a sidewalk, vending, camping, sleeping outside etc. is just one plan of many that disproportionately targets poor people in the Bay Area.

“Although the Bay Area is know as the disability rights meca, class and race has split this movement with two different stories. Under Mayor Willie Brown I was on his Commission on Disability and witness city policies that gone against federal disability civil rights laws like the Elisa Act, Force treatment of people with mental health disabilities and the removal of benches in the civic center plaza. These and other new crops of discriminating policies (such as Poverty Courts) continue under the recent Mayor, Gavin Newsom. People with disabilities have lost their housing during the dot-com boom, have been abused by police and been turned away from inaccessible homeless shelters, rejected section eight vouchers and other city services, said Race and diability scholar with POOR Magazine.


With nearly 16 million people in the US living in deep or severe poverty, the highest in 32 years, this type of legislation and laws that as public defender Jeff Adachi says, “institutionally oppress people of color” threaten the very existence of nearly half of the US population.

“Punishing people will not stop them from being poor…” said, Juan Prada, executive director of The Coalition on Homelessness, in response to the increase in arrests and citations given to homeless San Franciscans.

The People of Color Caucus of the Green Party believes it is important to value cultural, ethnic, racial, sexual, religious and spiritual diversity, and to promote the development of respectful relationships across these lines. We believe the many diverse elements of society should be reflected in our organizations and decision-making bodies, and we support the leadership of people who have been traditionally closed out of leadership roles. We acknowledge and encourage respect for other life forms and the preservation of biodiversity. We have decided to form the People of Color Caucus within the Green Party of San Francisco in an attempt to educate the public about issues as the impact low income Communities and Communities of Color

POOR Magazine is a non-profit, grassroots, arts organization dedicated to providing media access, education and advocacy to communities of poverty struggling with poverty locally and globally.