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Washington Post:

Small but Vocal Groups Try to Revive '80s Activism for Homeless

By Sewell Chan and Yolanda Woodlee
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, January 24, 2002; Page DZ02

Young activists, many of them students or recent graduates, have been trying
during the past year to revive a rich but long-dormant tradition of District
activism on behalf of the homeless. Although few in number, they have become a
thorn in the side of top city officials, holding public demonstrations and
interrupting public events with renegade tactics.

Activists from Homes Not Jails, a grass-roots group that seizes abandoned
properties in the hope of renovating them for the homeless, set the pattern with
an occupation last summer of a historic vacant firehouse, at 438 Massachusetts
Ave. NW.

The firehouse was slated to shelter homeless women until economic development
officials, realizing that the parcel was in the middle of a luxury housing
development, nixed the plan. Police evicted the activists.

Last Thursday, another group, the Olive Branch Community, took its cause to
Mayor Anthony A. Williams's home turf. The mayor had convened members of the
media in the soaring lobby of the Frank D. Reeves Center to announce a major
effort to combat "poster graffiti," the illegal signs that crowd visible city
intersections.

Flanking Williams (D) were Charles H. Ramsey, chief of police; Leslie A.
Hotaling, director of the Department of Public Works; Mark Buscaino, the city's
newly appointed chief forester; and Vincent M. Spaulding, coordinator of the
mayor's Clean City initiative.

Suddenly, activists standing on the municipal building's third-floor balcony
unfurled a 40-foot white cloth banner with the handwritten slogan: "Emergency
Shelter Needed in Ward 1. If not here, where?"

At first, Williams did not appear to notice the sign directly behind him. Then
the activists started chanting. "You're not even worried about the people
freezing to death on the streets!" shouted Deirdre Farrell, 19, a Ward 1
resident.

The activists, who have been joined by D.C. Council member Jim Graham (D-Ward
1), want the city to reopen the Reeves Center as an emergency overflow shelter
for homeless men during freezing weather, as it was used until two winters ago.

The current hypothermia center for men is in a former school building at 65
Massachusetts Ave. NW near Union Station. City officials plan to use that
building for other social service programs, so it, too, is likely to be
unavailable for the homeless next winter.

Responding to the protest, Ramsey went to the balcony, where he and two other
police officers wrested the sign from the protesters. The chief restrained Dell
MacLean, 21, who said her rights were being violated. "Ma'am, that's why we have
courts, and this ain't one of them," Ramsey replied gruffly before escorting her
out of the building.

Outside, Thomas Gomez, 38, a periodically homeless man who formerly lived in
California and is staying with the activists, said services for the homeless are
fragmented. "The city needs a master plan," said Gomez, one of the few homeless
persons taking part in the action.

Three members of the Olive Branch group were arrested this month at the John A.
Wilson Building and charged with unlawful entry after seeking to speak with the
mayor about the issue. Deputy Mayor Carolyn N. Graham met with some of the
activists the same day.

Although they appear to have struck a chord with residents who have long
questioned the mayor's empathy for the vulnerable and needy, the protesters are
a far cry from their activist predecessors of the 1980s.

That was the era when District voters approved a law, later repealed,
guaranteeing the right to shelter on demand, and when activist Mitch Snyder
pressured a reluctant President Ronald Reagan to turn over a federal building to
house the homeless.