SGV Connect 124: Damien Newton Interviews the Reclaimers
SPEAKERS
Roberto, Sandra, Fanny, Benito, Damien Newton
Damien Newton
I'm Damien Newton with SGV Connect. We're here with Roberto Flores and we're going to be talking about some of the issues around the 710 homes. It's been an ongoing story for us for I don't know...as long as Streetsblog. LA's existed and well before that. But why don't we just start out with a quick introduction as who you are and what your involvement with this with this issue is?
Roberto
First of all, thank you, thank you, Damien. And thank you, Streetsblog, the news agency, for all the work you've done, and all the information you've been giving out. My name is Roberto Flores, and I'm a co-founder of the Eastside Cafe. I'm also on the Coordinating Committee of the United Caltrans Tenants Union. And I was an adjunct professor at Cal State LA for about 15 years. And I'm currently a ESL instructor here at the Eastside Cafe for PCC. So my role in terms of reclaiming our homes, was providing a base providing an organizing space for us to be able to address the issue of 170 empty houses Caltrans left empty through a policy of depopulating the corridor to make it easier for them to either knock them down, or deal with the least number of residents, If they had to sell the houses. So they don't like dealing with tenants. And they also want to want to minimize the number of tenants that would be buying their houses through the affordable rent program, because Caltrans would have to fix their houses, after years and years of neglect. Those houses are in poor conditions, and Caltrans would have to invest on the average $300,000 per house, before they sell them at an affordable rate, which could be for many of the tenants here, the original price. And that's the Roberti Law. And in other words, you it's selling the houses at an affordable rate means 30% of your income. If you are a person that's on a fixed income, and you're getting $1,500 a month, your rent would be about $500 a month. And so and your house won't need to be fixed. So instead of having to deal with that, they started to depopulate the corridor, the entire corridor, not just El Sereno, Pasadena and South Pasadena. What ended up you know, the result of that is at least 100, the empty houses while we had on the median, that is right across from the Eastside Cafe proximately 150 to 200 homeless people camping out there. And so we felt there is a crime here. And it's not going to be us taking the houses. It's a crime perpetuated by Caltrans by contributing to the homeless situation, while they could be contributing to solving it. So we decided to take the houses. And so that's where ROH comes in. And so the main components of organizing to reclaim the house. we call it reclaiming because this is our community. Little by little, they took the community. In the 60s, they bought all these houses through the threat of eminent domain. And a lot of people just thought, "there's nothing we can do." And so these were a lot of vets had just come back from the war and bought their houses here. A lot of families integrated, still very tight family structures. And here comes Caltrans and takes out a good chunk of the community. And that's a destruction of the social fabric which occurred at the initial stage. And then, little by little, because they were challenged on the freeway by South Pasadena. And, and then we joined El Sereno, joined South Pasadena and Pasadena. And so then they neglected the houses. When they were challenged with court challenges, there were delays on the freeway. And, you know, the delays became like a decade or two decades of challenges and delays. And so meanwhile, they were ordered to rent the houses. So they brought in a whole new community through the rentals. And then they started destroying that as well, by neglecting the houses. So immediately, we have records of early 1970s of people signing petitions. They were fighting for the houses to be repaired, for maintenance to be done in a manner that was dignified and legal. And unfortunately, all three cities cave into Caltrans and the state and gave them a pass in terms of not having to comply with health and safety laws, state laws, and with city ordinances. LA has a city ordinance exempting Caltrans from health and safety laws, and fixing the houses. And that's hard to believe. But they do. And then Pasadena and South Pasadena don't have those ordinances, however, they allow Caltrans to do whatever. So they don't inspect Caltrans houses. We're still trying to pressure the cities to carry out what their obligation and their responsibility and to support the health and safety of tenants. So with 170, empty houses, and so many people becoming homeless, we felt an obligation, human obligation, to house these folks, and do whatever we needed to do to get them into houses. So we broke into the houses,
Damien Newton
In 2020, the Reclaimer movement occupied a number of houses in El Sereno and Pasadena. I don't remember if they're running in South Pasadena also. But there's several two dozen houses. The last time we checked in the Reclaimers were still in those houses for the most part. Some of them have been moved to different houses, but they were all there, they had leases that were expiring. I wanted to cover what's happened sort of in the past year, year and a half, to the people that have been in those houses. Some of whom we're going to talk to in a little bit. I know Pasadena is working pretty hard on trying to figure out a way forward with with Caltrans, and they purchase some properties, but not all of the properties and they're trying to go back in this history books and all these different things. But where are we right now as far as getting held Caltrans to finally relinquish these houses almost a decade after the 710 project has been put to sleep?
Roberto
Okay, so the Reclaimers have been... you're correct 2020. We took 24 houses, but we lost eight. And we kept 16 The governor ordered for the police to back down. We sent a letter to the governor's wife, and to make sure that the governor saw the letter and we basically told the governor that we were obeying his two directives to shelter in place and to utilize all buildings, to be repurposed for the for housing. And so we did that and the letter got through and the governor gave the order to stand down and gave the order to protect and to allow them to stay... the Reclaimers to stay...but to protect all the houses that had not been taken. Okay, so then two years pass and their contract their their user agreement is over. And the the Reclaimers then begin a process of getting HACLA, which is the the agency that made a contract with Caltrans to create a program that would house these Reclaimers. Officially, however, Caltrans forgot to take out regulations. Every state agency carrying out either a major project or a new law has to explain to the most people that are going to get affected, how they're going to carry out their rules and procedures and carrying up that law or that new project. They did not. They did not take out regulations. But they did do a master lease with HACLA, which is the housing authority of the County of Los Angeles. And that master lease instructs HACLA to evict the tenants to hand them over an empty house in two years time. And so the Reclaimers themselves are not about just reclaiming for a two year period, the reclaiming was a liberation and liberating houses that had been thrown away by Caltrans and salvaged and by the community, and we were not about to just give them up to hochland. And so Reclaimers stood in the houses and fought the evictions. They've won the evictions, the different attempts eviction attempts for two years so far. And now what we are claiming, there is a new lawsuit. And that lawsuit is for, for Caltrans to understand that they have that the that the occupants see the Roberti Law, never mentioned tenants. The Roberti law only mentions occupants, and the Reclaimers or occupants, and they've been there for more than two years. So the requirement for the tenants to receive Roberti Bill rights is a two year period. And so the they've already made their two year requirement. And so they're eligible to have Roberti Bill rights and to purchase the houses because of that. So, we are arguing that and we are arguing that the entire master lease, the agreement between HACLA and Caltrans is null and void because Caltrans never took out regulations. And without regulations, they have no permission to carry out a project like that. And so the master lease and null and void the user agreement that they made them sign is null and void and the evictions should be vacated. So we're going through the process of getting a TRO at this point to Wednesday, we go argue for the TRO, for the temporary restraining order, which will then create a status quo, which means that the evictions won't go forward. This will allow us time to prove that the evictions the User Agreement, the master lease are all null and void. And that, in fact, the contrary to getting evicted, the tenants have a right to the Roberti Bill. And they the Reclaimers have a right to the Roberti Bill, which means a for them one in single family homes, they have a right to purchase the house at the affordable rate. And for those living in multifamily homes, they have a right to stay there and rent from the HRV that buys the units, multiple family units. Okay, so that's where we're at at this point, but I'm not sure I covered everything. No, I You got the most important part as to where we are. We'll talk to the people that live in the houses now about what's going on in their lives. But I wanted to the listeners to get an idea of the framework of where they are in the process because last last time we had checked in for a podcast or a story and I know a lot has happened since. I know a lots going on. So just wanted to start to fill some of that in in case people Streetsblog people that are interested in the freeway stories that have picked this up as something they're interested in, but maybe don't follow up regularly. Just have an idea as to where we are at the moment. One important distinction is Is that the long term tenants and their process to purchase houses is different from the Reclaimer process. The long term tenants are in a process right now of buying their houses, both the market renters as well as the affordable renters have filled out applications, most of them and are requesting to buy their houses at affordable rates. Perhaps maybe as many as 150 of them, and then the rest of them at the market rate. So that is happening. However, it's very, very slow. Caltrans has come up with draconian type of regulations. Okay, they had what's called emergency regulations to carry out the first part. And that's only good for six months. So now the renewing the regulations to make them permanent, but you would think that they were just be the same regulations. Okay, let's make them permanent. They rewrote the regulations. And they added, there was the original emergency regulations were 22 pages. Now, he, the permanent regulations are now 42 pages. So they added a lot of restrictions, a lot of they, for instance, there's a lot more language now on disqualifying tenants for providing false information. So there's a lot of threats. There's a lot of psychological harassment of tenants. There's a lot of illegal asks, from the tenants in their application. So Caltrans doesn't stop.
Damien Newton
Alright, I think I have what we need. And then we can we can bring in the Reclaimers and go from there.
Roberto
They're here.
Damien Newton
We're still here at the Eastside Cafe recording. And we're moving on from our interview with Roberto to one with two people that actually are Reclaimers and have been living in Caltrans property since March of 2020. And also Fannie, who has been working with them, organizing and helping to sort of keep the movement going over the years. Last time we checked in was the winter of 2022. At that moment in time, everyone was still fighting evictions that you're still fighting, but you've been in the homes for two more years. So I guess if I go back to that 2022 podcast and was talking to you then I could say well mixed success. Two more years in but the evictions are still still pending, there's still legal action. Let's start with just a quick introduction with everyone at the table. And then we can talk a little bit about everything that's maybe transpired in the past two plus years.
Sandra
I'll I'll go first. My name is Sandra Saucedo. I am currently staying at one of the Caltrans homes. And I lived in El Sereno for many years when I first came to the states. The point of reclaiming would be to find permanent housing, stable permanent housing. That's different from basically everything that all agencies offer out there. It's either if you are in the streets, then you go to a hotel, and then if you if you're in a hotel, then you go to maybe a section eight voucher, but none of those options really feel like a sense of permanency...like not stable. Once I decided to not be homeless anymore and not live in my car anymore, it just happened. It translates to, "Let's do everything to stay housed, even if that's that means civil disobedience." And yeah, let's become part of the community because when you are homeless, you basically have no community. You have nobody to talk to. Basically you're disconnected you are your own. And so the opposite happened when when I became housed with this movement here. It opened up so many doors that it became personal. Now I have to show myself what what what is my true potential even if that means civil disobedience and going against politicians and elected officials. This is one thing I always say, "Where was Melina and where was Kevin de Leon when I was really trying to look for a place to defecate and wash my face?" Then suddenly when we took action, they found out that people actually organized to do this. And families are empowered. Now they say, "Yeah, let's, let's see what other options there is". And so we say, "No, that's not that's not sustainable and not realistice." In this area, I could barely afford rent before with a full time job, and three children, so there is no way there's nowhere else to go for affordable housing and community spaces like here.
Fanny
Hi, everybody gets us off Fannie Guzma., I am the facilitator of network building and people's policy initiatives. So part of my duties is working with the Reclaiming our Homes Campaign, along with other tenants throughout the Northeast LA, geographic area. Yeah, it's it's heartening to hear how community has to consistently advocate and fight to remain house. I myself also fought my own unlawful detainer several times. But you know, the type of housing that the Reclaimers are looking for is permanent housing, that is autonomous. These houses were left abandoned for over 60 years. And the state wasn't doing anything with them, while we have families sleeping in the streets with kids, families sleeping in cars. And that response from our elected official from KDL, was to put a fence around the green space where a lot of the Reclaimers were staying, and sleeping in the past. And now that they took over these homes and made homes and created a community and created a sustainable way of helping each other and bringing life back to the corridor and El Serrano. Now they want to take it away by saying that they want to bring more homeless folks into these homes, when in fact, they never did that. They never took action until Reclaiming Our Homes took action. And just because "it's not legal," they act according to the system. But it is legal for them to maintain them empty. Right. And I love for the families and folks who sleep in the streets. I also question How, how is that being equitable to the most vulnerable population in our communities. As we continue seeing the same pattern over where they have this revolving door of bringing folks into a house program that's going to be only for a temporary one or two, three years, and then they put them back into the streets. A month ago HACLA put out one other tenants into the streets, a single mother of four with her four children. And this is a black woman, a black single woman, and the majority of the impact on people are the tenants, the black tenants, I believe that if I'm not mistaken, they're like 70% of renters, but in numbers, statistically speaking, 35% of them are being served with unlawful detainers. And those numbers are growing as we speak. And then we asked our question, "Is that the same response that they're going to do to the rest of the tenants that HACLA has in their in their master lease agreement with Caltrans knowing that they have all these resources, knowing that they're spending $26 million to patrol and and keep people from entering these homes when they can be using those funds to holistically housed the Reclaimers permanently?" And then some, these are public fundings that are there and should be used. And I'm more yeah in a more holistic framework, they need to be innovative, they can work with the lab trust, but they refuse to sit down and work with us.
Benito
My name is Benito Flores. I am a Reclaimer I used to live 14 years in my van being homeless, and then I decided to come and take the houses: civil disobedience act. I have a message for these people who are victimizingus. So, they say that they are only doing their jobs. They say that, "We are a nation of laws and we need to comply with the law. The law needs to be carried out." When Law and Order implies means to evict families to the street, like the mother who was evicted to the streets with four children aged 10 years to nine years. When law and order means evicting victim families to the street, that means Law and Order is corrupt, period. So, we need to find where the corruption is. The corruption is Caltrans refusing to comply with Roberti Law since 2019. The freeway was there, and Caltrans was ordered to sell the the houses. Roberti Law says they need to sell the houses to the occupants in a very, very, very low prices. So, Caltrans is refusing and refusing to comply the law in open contempt with of the law. So that is where the collusion begins. So when we see many homeless, we are in a COVID pandemic; we see a lot of empty houses, we took action. We said, "We need to go and reclaim our houses. And that was a big moment. We had many people supporting us. And then Caltrans came with the Highway Patrol to evict us. And the governor says, "No, no, no, no stop. Let the Reclaimers stay in homes." And when the governor said that he was meaning permanent housing. We stay as long as we pay the rent, the low income rent. We are going to be a stay in permanent housing. That was the solution for the government. The government says put Caltrans don't want to follow orders, don't want to comply. They said. "Oh no. We set the requirements, then we are going to have permanently leaving. So they call HACLA and HACLA came with the two years contract. This is a very, very good to in two years go out. So this is the corruption. They they make the arrangements they planned that we were a out in two years. And now they are carrying out they are evicting us because they had to comply with a law. The two years two years you're out. And then the same law who is telling that the contract is for two years. In the second paragraph. They say that the ultimate go goal is to give permanent housing as as quickly as possible. And then they ignore that part of the law. This is corruption. They take only the part of the two years and they ignored the goal to give us permanent housing. So taking the part of the lawr ignoring our part is corruption. That is corruption. So, when you see the big picture, you see if the rLas and Orderder means throwing people, families to the street, then Law and Order is corrupt. Thank you.
Damien Newton
So as we, the last time we got together and spoke again, it was it was over zoom. It was, it was a very different experience than sitting here at the cafe together. Caltrans was beginning to push, or I guess HACLA was beginning to push for the eviction process to move forward. Two years later, they're still pushing for it.. But for the most part, this is still all being fought in court, how has How has life at if at all changed for you over the past two years, like how is your day to day life been impacted by the change in status from under contract with HACLA, to this ongoing eviction battle? Maybe it hasn't changed? Maybe, maybe, as the courts have, sort of kept kicking the can down the road, you've just been able to have a somewhat normal life, or maybe it's maybe it's been an extra stress, or maybe something I haven't thought of?
Sandra
Before I became unhoused, I used to work at LACUC in the OR, and that was basically, all my life. I had kids to take to,school and practices and all of that. And so I didn't know that there was another world where people organize against government agencies. So when I sign this lease, and I started getting familiar with, with, mainly the community, you know, everybody here that comes to the side, people. I can say, this is my life, you, I don't see anything else, more important than my housing. And so from the very beginning, my priority was, is to mainly to have sanity. But staying housed meant being a parent again. So I wanted to be a mom. I wanted to cook a meal again. Just having normal days with your kids. When I was separated from them, we, it was very hard to be in the same space. But, but, but we did it. And so, each time each day, I just thought, "If I have hope, like, that's the only thing that drives me. if I have hope in not going back to the streets, and having community support, then I think the sky's the limit." We don't have to listen to for example, the people who were the neighbors literally here. When we first took the homes, they were a little hostile. They didn't want us to be there. I guess they rather had empty homes than people being housed, but they were very mean. And they were very aggressive. So I just thought, "this is a lot of this is going to be a lot of work. And that was work finding out that, you know, like Fanny said: Where did the resources come? How are people really, you know, how are people communicating about this movement? How was Kevin DeLeon talking to people from Caltrans about us in the very beginning, which I'm sure was not in our favor. So that, to me is like Benito saying, you know, they did nothing to help the community and now, when the community took action, they're actually doing the opposite. They're doing everything possible, so that we don't get Roberti right. So that so that this program which means people have to like be housed for a little bit and then go and housed again and then go. That will drive you crazy that will drive anybody crazy. So um, yeah, it was hard in the beginning. But I knew that I had a bunch of help. I knew that everything that I needed was available. And all I had to do was do the work. So it's been hard, but very interesting.
Fanny
Yeah, I just wanted to add that Delma was the lady that was removed from her home last month. She's not a Reclaimer. However, she's a neighbor of both Sandra and Benito, and Tina. And so when Sandra found out what was going on, Sandra called and she's like, "we need to set up the emergency call." And so it was done. But it did make an impact. 12 of us got arrested, including myself. And just after I was released 12 hours later, I came back because I had left a vehicle parked in front of Sandra's yard. It made an impact to hear and see her and also hear from the other Reclaimers that witness, "is this what's going to happen to me?" And that was heartbreaking to hear their voices. And asking me that question. I'm like, "No, it's not gonna happen, we're gonna make sure it doesn't happen." But we're fighting against agencies that are so bureaucratic, and embedded into this framework that they have to follow the law in the guidelines. In the meantime, internally, they're creating their own guidelines to prevent and block the Reclaimers from becoming permanent residents, whether it's as tenants, or having the opportunity to become homeowners. And like I said, they have all those resources that they access all these public resources, and it's wasted. And then we wonder, we question, why do we have such a tremendous crisis when it comes to housing and homelessness, when we have all these funds. They're not being used in innovative ways, by working with local community based organizations like the land trust, who has proven that we can do the work, who has proven that we're working directly with the community to meet their needs, and their wants? It's really difficult to, to swallow that they have to follow their bureaucratic processes, and ignore the fact that they have to work with the community. You know, they have it in writing, it looks really beautiful, that they have equity values. But then the reality: they don't practice it. It's not real. It's not tangible. And here it is the opportunity, the perfect opportunity for everybody to sit down and mediate with the Reclaiming Our homes campaign, mediate with the land trust to secure permanent housing for them. the houses are there, they're available there, there's more empty houses than there is people reclaiming them. Right. let me step back a little bit, but I'll let Benito to talk a little bit more about his experience.
Benito
Okay, we have the right price to purchase. And they are working on eviction, because they think they would they when they beat us. We are going to lose the Roberti right to purchase. And that is actually very dangerous for us. So we are we are investigating...our attorneys are investigating. And it happens that the master lease they the contract law is illegal, illegal and invalid. So hopefully our attorneys are going to prove that, and they can prove that the master list was invalid because some technical things that they didn't do, right. So so the master list is going to get invalidated. And the agreement, the user agreement, from from the master lease, the user agreement that it is asking for two years, and then evicting us is also to be invalidated. And then HACLA is going to say that we are occupants for more than four years and then we have the right purchase. That is what is your hope that we are going to win in court? Because I am questioning myself. Where are these weakness come from? Because the Roberti Law is not asking Caltrans to evict people. The law is, on the contrary, the Robertu Las is asking Caltrans to sell the houses to the occupants, to rent the houses to the occupants. Never, never. The Roberti Law is not asking Caltrans to evict people, no law is obligating Caltrans to evict people. Why? Why? Why is Caltrans trying to evict people. Why they put in a master lease the condition that HACLA need to return the property empty,, that HACLA need to do the eviction? The model is family to go to the three children that doesn't matter. So whether that comes nothing like government, nor from the Governor, nor from the LAO. These things come from from the bureaucratize bureaucratize, who who work into Caltrans, they do change, they make manipulation. To to us. To HACLA to obligate HACLA, "you need to beat these people because he's in the contract." why is in the contract. Why is in the contract? So, that is where the weakness come from, from the from the, from the staff, from the brokers, from Caltrans. Thank you.
Damien Newton
Kevin De Leone's name has come up a lot. He's, of course up for reelection right now. And he finished second in the primary, but his opponent did not get enough votes so that they are moving on to a general election. Do you think that if there's a change in who the city council member is in November, that that will lead to any sort of change? As far as the politics that had been impacting Caltrans and HACLA and other agencies that have all sort of been involved in this bureaucratic mess that's been created?
Fanny
I think there will be a shift and change, definitely. Because none of the other political figures want to step in unless CD 14 leads the way...which is shameful because he hides, right? He hides and says that he's helping the community but in reality, he doesn't. I've approached him at City Hall, face to face. I had a guard call him over. Not feel uncomfortable talking to him, after all everything he's done, but I'm doing what I think it's best for the Reclaimer. So I said, Let's me. He's like, "Yeah, let's do it, like tell them I said so.". So I show up and nothing, no response whatsoever from Kevin de Leon. So I don't even know why he bothers to run, if he's not going to face his community and support us when we're asking for help. Including Maria Elena Durazo, she already rewrote the Roberti Law through SB 51, which actually prevents families in multifamily homes from being able to bid on their homes, because they are have to create a housing cooperative in order to do it. Both South Pasadena and Pasadena, they don't have that cost. Right. So that's kind of in a sense, also, discriminatory towards the community, and it's targeting the working class people. Right? So, the resources are there, right? Let's put one plus one makes two, but they refuse, they refuse to let go. They refuse to continue to let go of the power that they have. They want to continue controlling. And the community, ROH is asking to be autonomous, to be able to make those decisions for themselves. You haven't done anything with this resources. We're taking control now. But again, it's always going on "what's the law?" but even if the law is wrong, then what do we have to do? What do we have to do? We have to sit down and mediate with the police, political figures and the community. There's no other way of doing it. And I hope that it does happen, Kevin deLeon does not win, because he's not doing anything for us. Hasn't been doing it. I doubt it, he'll do anything if he were to be reelected. And I was wanting to bring that episode that happened when the 12 of us got arrested. The energy that they invest the money that they invest with CHP showing up at 11 o'clock. They had dozens of officers. To me that night, it looked like it was 200 officers, because there were the whole street was invaded by CHP officers. And then on top of that, they put those zip ties tight, so tight, that I had to request for them to remove them. And I ended up getting stabbed by the officer that night, on my wrist. And on top of that, we were handcuffed for over three, four hours. To the point that when they took them off, my arms couldn't even move, my hands were swollen. And it was just degrading. To be put through that process. Because they rather put profit over people. And where's the human dignity for the Reclaimers? Where is their dignity when they have to think about? Am I going to be pulled out of the house like they did tell me when they have the resources? Right? Let's let's be innovative, let's break out of that bureaucracy and sit down and negotiate and plan out something that we can do that it's tangible because the fundings are there. The public fundings are there, the resources are there, the Reclaiming Our house Campaign, make sure that they put those resources to work. And if it wasn't for them, HACLA would not be signing a contract with Caltrans, and then doing the same carousel that's bringing people from the streets to put them out into the streets again.
Sandra
Yeah, I believe Kevin de Leon has really no intention of helping any of the Reclaimers even though some people do believe that he's still good guy. I don't know why. But, um, yeah, I believe he has self serving intentions. I believe that everything that has happened up until now. I feel like they're, they are looking for their benefit. I know, that he was involved in the proposal for rezoning, and he didn't even consult any of the community members. Maybe a few but not, you know, not the people who are involved where I feel like he's not, yeah, he's only there for a picture and not really for community. I feel Isabel on the other hand, she does come, with open arms to this model that is there is sustainable. I feel like we have a chance to...community also deserves is the opportunity to these products and models that have been used in other places. Why does Maria Elena Durazo come up with SB 51, right after the Reclaimers take action, you know, why didn't she do anything before that? When literally, like, nobody spoke up? Nobody said, Hey, like, what's up with these homes? I can't believe really, like these homes are perfectly habitable, and nobody did anything. How come they like why? Why? How come now they are so offended?
Fanny
I just wanted to add that Caltrans directly and indirectly impacted the entire El Sereno corridor by taking the homes where the 710 extension. And the project was defunct. It stopped, But now it's the opportunity for them to mitigate the past harms. But of course, they continue with this racist bureaucracies that continue implementing the land theft, right. They continue colonizing through legal means and taking ownership of the land and and displacing families from their community. In some of the families like we're tenants from some of the some of the homes that they were able to reclaim. But instead of working with them, they're causing more harm. And so that we're asking for them, we've we've been asking for them to sit down and mediate and negotiate and work with us. They have the resources. It's public resources at that. But we need our political people to sit down and also push them to do the right thing. We need the governor to step in again, and hold on to that message that he sent four years ago to allow the Reclaimers to remain housed. You need to step in and say, based on equity, to protect the most vulnerable, allow them to be housed permanently. The other options that HACLA and Caltrans are offering are not permanent. And there is the Roberti Act. That is there telling them the occupants have the right to become owners. But instead they're trying to avoid being accountable to the community that they have impacted, directly and indirectly by displacing them.
Sandra
Can I Can I add one thing? Maybe about a half a year and a half ago, we went to somebody's home. And we went there really, really early. This was the boss of Tina Booth and Jenny Scanlon. Benito. Do you remember his name?
Fanny
Was it Doug?
Sandra
Doug, Doug Guthrie? Yeah. We went, you know, we went to his door, and we said, "We are from El Sereno. We want to speak to you and we want to meet so can we set up a meeting?" And so he said, "I cannot call off any evictions because this is the process. And the only thing I can say to you is that go through the court system, go through the legal system, legal system, so that if you think this is unfair, then go through the court system. And that's the only way you're going to find any resolution." And so I took that as nobody's gonna move finger. Because they are paid to, like Benito said, do a job. And so this is what I plan to, you know, I'm going to take every measure to go all the way and expose them. Expose how, how all of these people are doing exactly the opposite of what, you know, the they, they say they're doing.
Damien Newton
Thank you all for being with us today, for sharing these extremely personal stories. Obviously, best of luck in everything that you guys are trying to accomplish. Hopefully, next time we get together, it can be in one of the houses that one of you own, and everything will have just gone smoothly. I know it's it's been a rough go. But I think anyone that's been following our coverage of this story, which has been intermittent, but I said has gone back well over a decade as I'm sure rooting for a fair outcome for everyone. Thank you for sharing your stories with us again, and I hope we can talk again under happier circumstances.
Fanny
Thank you for thank you for giving the space for the Reclaiming Our Homes campaign to be able to share the the internal struggles that they carry. It's it's not easy. When it's being impacted when they see things happening to their neighbors. It's the weight that they have to carry with. And they have to, emotionally and mentally prepare themselves like, is this gonna happen to me? And what do I need to do to make sure it doesn't happen? And it's like talking to walls to these people in this power hubs who are holding on to their power dynamics of not working with community even though they say they do. And so yeah, thank you for allowing that to be for their voices to be heard for the stories to be shared.
Sandra
One more thing, a viva Palestina,
Fanny
Viva Palestina.