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The Street Slip is distributed by and for the Homeless and Disadvantaged

of St. Louis, MissouriHomeless people in California, face harassment and victimisation at the hands of the authorities. In this report from the Homeward Street Journal we

see how state policies and police harassment are further marginalising the homeless community. Erica Fonseca reveals how homeless people are targeted for petty fines, such as ‘jay-walking’, which force poor people further into poverty.

On the average day at The Tommy Clinkenbeard Legal Clinic (TCLC) it is not uncommon to assist 10 to 15 people with their tickets. Occasionally, they come in flustered and incredulous by the exorbitant fine they will shortly have to pay, unless they are willing to have their license suspended, additional fines attached, and potentially go to jail. Most often, however, they come in resigned to the fact that, yet again, they were ticketed simply for existing.

What is most problematic about the tickets brought in to TCLC is the overt prejudice with which they are issued. To be sure, our clients are issued tickets that the “average” person would never be subjected to. These tickets range from: jaywalking, biking on the sidewalk, fix it tickets (for bikes!), riding without a bike light, loitering, etc. If you are not homeless and reading this, can you think of a time you were even given even a “stern warning” for jaywalking? Undoubtedly, the Sacramento Police Department, in conjunction with the Park Rangers, systematically target homeless and no/low income folks, not only further perpetuating people’s dire circumstances, but clogging the court system with tickets that will almost never be rectified.

At TCLC, most tickets range from “illegal” camping to light rail tickets to the arbitrary enforcement of vague laws that criminalize various forms of sitting, resting, laying, eating, etc. While we daily see multiple ticket offenses, or one person with multiple tickets, at TCLC it is most likely that we will assist clients with Light-rail or camping tickets. Like me (before I started working at TCLC) most people are unaware of the detrimental path a simple infraction ticket can lead a homeless or low/no income person down. I’ll use an actual example from a client at TCLC to fully illustrate the point. What started as an infraction ticket for jaywalking (an offense that seems to be only applicable to homeless people) quickly became a barrier to this client finding employment.

Unfortunately, this client failed to appear at his court date and subsequently a Failure to Appear Warrant was issued. This is extremely common, however, court dates are scheduled for months after the tickets are issued, giving clients ample time to lose their tickets, forget their court dates, or completely forget about their ticket altogether. After realizing he had an FTA warrant the client made another court date and appeared before a judge. Unknowing of our community service alternative to paying the entirety of his fine, he agreed to pay a fine he could not afford. Now, within a couple of months he will be charged with a Failure to Pay, and, even worse, his ticket will be sent to a collection agency where exorbitant penalty fines will be attached to the original fine and a hold will be put on his license until he pays his debt in full.

Just like that, within the course of a couple months, this client has lost the privilege to drive, which completely hinders his ability to find work, therefore allowing him to make payments on his fine. Caught within this Catch 22 cycle, he went from having a simple jaywalking ticket with a nominal fine, to having a suspended driver’s license and a five hundred dollar fine.

At TCLC we attempt to halt this vicious and impossible cycle by providing our clients with a letter to bring with them to court requesting community service in lieu of paying their infraction fines. The conversion rate usually translates to 4-6 hours for every hundred dollars, making most infractions clearable within one day’s work (4 hours) of community service at Loaves & Fishes. Additionally, we are usually capable of clearing Failure to Appear warrants, by signing clients up to attend our “Homeless Court” date, which we hold monthly in Department 2 of the downtown court house.

All of us at TCLC are passionate about alleviating the consequences of unjust policies and the direct targeting of homeless people that greatly encumbers their ability to exist in peace and eventually escape poverty.

Photo by Andrea Waldrop

TICKETING THE HOMELESS

TICKETING THE HOMELESSwhy infraction tickets are perpetuating poverty

WHY INFRACTION TICKETING IS PERPETUATING POVERTY

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Words: ERICA FONSECA

Words: Erica Fonseca, www.street-papers.org / Homeward Street Journal - USA

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WHATS UP MAGAZINE MISSION STATEMENTTo empower men and women who are homeless or at risk of becoming so, as they work toward gainful employment and self-sufficiency. Whats Up organizes, educates, and alliances to connect community-based solutions to the problems of hunger and homelessness leading readers to understanding and activism. The paper’s mission aims to alleviate miscommunication between communities by educating the public about housing and poverty issues, and by giving the homeless a voice in the public forum. Whats Up also informs the homeless of shelter and occupational assistance, and acts as a creative self-help opportunity for those individuals who wish to participate.

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If global carbon emissions continue to rise at their current rate, humanity will eventually be left with no other option than a costly, world war-like mobilisation, scientists warned this week. “It’s blindingly obvious that our economic system is failing us,” said economist Tim Jackson, a professor of sustainable development at the University of Surrey in the UK.

Climate change, pollution, damaged ecosystems, record species extinctions, and unsustainable resource use are all clear symptoms of a dysfunctional economic system, Jackson, author of the report and book “Prosperity Without Growth”, told IPS. “It is a travesty of what economy should be. It has absolutely failed to create social well-being and has hurt people and communities around the world,” he said.

Emissions need to peak and decline by 2020 to have a chance at keeping global temperature rise to less than 2.0 degrees C, according to the Emissions Gap Report 2013, involving 44 scientific groups in 17 countries and coordinated by the U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP). Carbon dioxide (CO2) from burning fossil fuels has raised the global average temperature only 0.85C so far, but even that has produced a wide range of impacts.

Despite years of negotiations, countries’ commitments to reducing emissions remain far short of what’s needed, said Merlyn van Voore, UNEP climate change coordinator. Even if nations meet their current climate pledges under the Copenhagen Accord, CO2 emissions in 2020 are likely to be eight to 12 billion tonnes higher than what is needed to stay below 2C at a reasonable cost, the report concluded. Failure to close this “emissions gap” by 2020 will require an unprecedented global effort to crash carbon emissions.

“Waiting brings huge additional costs,” van Voore said in a press conference.No country has offered to do anything beyond their 2009 Copenhagen

commitments. Nor is anyone expecting new offers at next week’s UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP 19) in Warsaw. Very few country leaders will attend COP 19, making this a technical negotiation on the shape of new climate treaty that will only come into force in 2020. In the six years remaining before 2020, not only do countries need to increase their reduction commitments, some countries have to actually put policies in place to meet their Copenhagen commitments. China, India, Russia and the European Union are on track, but the U.S. and Canada are not, the report found. In recent months, however, the U.S. has introduced some new policies and plans, including emissions caps on power plants. Canada is going in the opposite direction.

A government report recently acknowledged its emissions will be at least 20 percent higher than its Copenhagen reduction target. This was considered “good progress” given the skyrocketing emissions from its rapidly expanding tar sands oil operations, the Canadian government report said.

“Canada is a wealthy country. It could easily meet its target,” said Jennifer Morgan, director of the Climate & Energy Programme at the World Resources Institute. “It’s very important for Canada to meet its target. That sends a very important message to the world,” Morgan, lead author of the UNEP report, told IPS. However, economics is getting in the way of action. Canada has become very rich as the biggest supplier of foreign oil to the U.S. In less than 20 years, Canada’s GDP has tripled to 1.8 trillion dollars, with ambitious plans to grow even more. Politicians in Canada, and all over the world, reject anything they

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believe would hurt their countries’ economic growth. Jackson and number of ecological economists say the current self-destructive economy must be transformed into one that delivers a shared and lasting prosperity. This kind of Green Economy is far beyond business as usual with some clean technology thrown in. It is what Jackson calls a “fit-for-purpose economy” that is stable, based on equity and provides decent, satisfying livelihoods while treading lightly on the earth.

The current growth-worshiping consumption economy is “perverse” and at odds with human nature and our real needs, he said. “Prosperity isn’t just about having more stuff,” he said. “Prosperity is the art of living well on a finite planet.” With powerful vested interests in the current economy, making this transformation will be difficult but it is already starting to happen at the community level. Jackson and co-author Peter Victor of Canada’s York University lay all this out in a new report “ Green Economy at Community Scale”.

They see the roots of a transformational Green Economy in community banks, credit unions and cooperative investment schemes that enhance local communities. The Transition Town movement, creating local currencies, community-owned energy projects, global Ecocity movement are all part a response to an economy that does not work for most people and has created an environmental crisis, said Victor in a press release.

“Using GDP as measure of success is like riding a bike while only paying attention to how fast you are pedaling,” Jackson said. “It is wrong in so many ways.”

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Climate change effects, such as extreme weather events, drive up environmental remediation costs. Photo: Jorge Luis Baños/IPS