On Tuesday June 14 at 3:00 pm, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors will be holding a hearing on proposed cuts to public health programs.  Cuts have been proposed to substance abuse treatment and mental health services as well as to support services in supportive housing.  Drop-in center services for homeless people in the Tenderloin and for 6th Street SRO residents provided by our neighbors at Central City Hospitality House are also proposed to be cut.

Although St. Anthony Foundation receives no government funding, we are concerned about these proposed cuts and the negative effects that they will have on our community and on the clients of our dining room, social work center, substance abuse treatment program, free clothing program, free medical clinic, tech lab, and senior residence.

In the words of our Executive Director Shari Roeseler, whose take on budget season was featured in the San Francisco Chronicle’s Open Forum, “we must come together to find solutions that truly will increase our common good.”

We can not truly increase the common good unless all members of our community are heard.  That’s why we urge our guests, staff, volunteers, supporters, and YOU to contact the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and tell them what you think.   Go to the Board of Supervisors website to find the supervisor who represents you and send him or her an email.  If you don’t live in San Francisco, send a message to Budget Committee Chair Carmen Chu.  (We know that many of our volunteers and supporters live outside the City of San Francisco but still care deeply about health and social services in the City.  Please explain this to Supervisor Chu when you write to her.)

Special thanks to our Advocacy Intern, Kendra (pictured below) for doing outreach to let St. Anthony’s Staff know about the budget proposals and how to get involved.   She’ll be doing outreach to guests in our dining room line on Monday.  Won’t you join us in making your voice heard?

Click here to read the article and leave your message in the comment forum below.

Two of advocates had travelled to Sacramento last month to help advocate for a fair budget.  The other advocate, who grew up in Sacramento and whose mother lives only blocks from the Capitol, had never been to the Capitol before.

Our advocates spoke about the  increased numbers of people we’ve seen in our free dining room, medical clinic, and our Tenderloin Technology Lab.  They also talked about the experiences of their brothers in recovery at FAC who are trying very hard to find work but are facing the challenges of being unemployed in a weak economy.  They talked about the importance of having a safety net to help people when times are tough.

After one of our meetings with legislative staff, one of the FAC residents asked me, “do you think those people knew that we’re in a drug and alcohol rehab?”  He was concerned that the legislator’s staff might have written them off because they’re in recovery.  One of the other guys responded, “I’m proud of being in recovery and I don’t care who knows it.  Being in recovery is hard work and it’s something to be proud of.”

It was a pleasure for me to see our advocates supporting each other as they supported a California budget that will help California’s working families, seniors, people with disabilities, and people who have fallen through the cracks in the safety net. I’ve learned from them that one important component of recovery is giving back to the community. Our advocates did a wonderful job of giving back by speaking up on Wednesday.

On Wednesday August 11th, State Legislators & other politicians in Sacramento met with everyday people to discuss alternative ways to balance the CA budget with out cutting money from vital social programs. Residents at Father Alfred Center, St. Anthony’s inpatient drug and alcohol rehabilitation program, residents went there with the Jusice Education, Volunteer and Advocacy program and The Health and Human Services Network to show the face of those in treatment.

HHS Came to the talks with three stated goals.
• “To Invest in and protect the health and human services vital to California’s economy and families.”
• “To champion alternatives to dismantling our health care and human services including targeted state revenues and federal recovery funds.”
• And finally, “To reform and re-invent the states broken budget process.”

Father Alfred Center Residents who attended spoke on a number of issues related to these goals.

For example, California currently imposes a lifetime ban on food stamps for individuals who are convicted of drug related felonies (even those in recovery). One resident who spoke at the event told me, “Food Stamps help Stimulate the economy among other things. By keeping them from those seeking treatment, the economy is denied that stimulation effect.”

Other ideas proposed were a nickel tax on all alcoholic beverages sold in CA, and a tax on imported oil.

When I asked her to comment Colleen Rivecca of St. Anthony Foundation’s Jusice Education, Volunteer and Advocacy program told me:

“One of the budget balancing strategies in the Governor’s Budget Proposal is to cut the benefit levels for people receiving SSI/SSP grants. SSI/SSP recipients are low-income blind, elderly and disabled people, and they are ineligible for Food Stamps. People receiving SSI/SSP have already received 3 grant level reductions within the past year. The guys talked about the growing numbers of seniors and people with disabilities that they see every day while working in at St. Anthony Dining Room – they said that these people are already struggling to make ends meet, and a further reduction in their benefits would make it even more difficult for them to survive.”

A lot of good ideas were exchanged at the meeting, and as always Father Alfred Center Residents and St Anthony Foundation was there to do their part.

“Making budget priorities is essential in tough economic times. But we need to remember that although closing a park may be inconvenient, closing down programs like CalWORKS hurts children and destroys families.” This quote from an editorial piece in Monday’s San Francisco Chronicle written by George Niederauer, archbishop of the San Francisco Catholic diocese.

These sentiments are echoed by many low-income and struggling Californians and those who advocate for them.  A $19 billion deficit is in no way going to be balanced strictly by cutting services to public parks, nor is it possible to raise taxes to cover that large of a gap.  There must be a compromise, there must be deliberate and well-thought out decisions made.   They must be made not from a brash crisis mindset but from one of responsibility and solidarity with those most vulnerable, that we as Californians can stand behind, accountable and with clear conscious.

“Now is the time for our legislators and the governor, many of whom are not facing re-election, to show real courage and imagination. Families are suffering because of a devastating – but curable – budget crisis. Lawmakers and the governor have the tools and the ability to solve these problems, but it requires leadership. They need to stop giving in to special interests and start looking after the future of California. They need to stop the partisanship and the bickering.”

Health and Human Services Network of California is a coalition of advocates, health and social service providers, low-income families, seniors, people with disabilities, and people who believe in a California that cares for all of its residents have joined together in a Summer of Action for a fair California budget. Anyone can be a part of the budget justice movement by making a simple phone call to their legislators and telling them to support a Family Recovery Budget for California that:

1) Creates and maintains jobs,

2) Protects our state’s vital health and human services, and

3) Includes targeted revenue solutions at the State and Federal levels, to get our economy, our State, and all families back on track.

Not sure who your legislators are? Enter your zip code at the Official California Legislative Information site to find out.

The California Employment Development Department reports that as of June 22, 2010, there are 205,000 Californians who are in danger of running out of Unemployment Insurance benefits or who have already received their last check.

Not only do we need to advocate for the extension of Unemployment Insurance, medical care, and affordable housing funding, we have to tell Congress not to pay for these programs by cutting other vital services, like anti-hunger programs!  (One of the ideas floating through the Senate last week was to pay for the Unemployment Insurance extension by cutting $9.5 billion from the Food Stamp program!)  It’s unbelievable to me that the Senate would consider making this type of “Sophie’s Choice”, but I guess I feel that way because I work here at St. Anthony’s, where we take a holistic approach to helping people through rough times by offering free meals, employment assistance, medical care, free clothing, and more.

The Senate is expected to take up H.R. 4213 again after the Fourth of July recess.  Once again, we have the opportunity to tell our Senators that we need to take action to promote the common good and help our struggling friends, neighbors, and community members.

Our friends at NETWORK: A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby have an email form here that makes it easy to contact your Senators and ask them to support H.R. 4213.

A little over a year ago, I wrote a blog post on San Francisco’s budget cuts creating make shift drop-in centers for the homeless. General Hospital’s waiting room becomes a warm and dry place to be with a television to watch, the 24 hour Safway at Church and Marked provides a bathroom and a place to be, and the San Francisco Main Library subsititues for a quiet place to nap for those unable to obtain a shelter bed the night before.

Over the past year San Francisco’s main library branch, located at Civic Center Plaza, has employed a social worker to talk directly to patrons in order to link them with social services.

“What we found out is that a lot of the homeless people who come here, they come to get away from being homeless and we found that a lot of folks we spoke with didn’t really want to engage with an outreach worker at that point,” Dr. Raj Parekh, a psychiatrist without the city’s health department, told KTVU2 News yesterday.

The need for such services is not just limited to San Francisco. Libraries in major cities across the country have called San Francisco in hopes creating their own similar programs.

This is the day I’ve been dreading since January: the day that Governor Schwarzenegger releases his revised budget proposal for the 2010-11 fiscal year.

The “May Revise”, as it’s called, just went live about an hour ago.  With only an hour of analysis under my belt so far, I can simply tell you this: it’s bad!

The Governor proposes the following:

When I read through this list of cuts, I don’t just think about dollars and programs, I think about the people who will be affected.  When I think about the people who will be hurt, I think about St. Anthony Dining Room.  Who are the people we provide free nutritious meals to on a daily basis?  They are the same people who are represented in the cuts list above: the elderly, the disabled, low-wage workers, immigrants, people with mental illness, and struggling families.

All of us, rich and poor, housed and homeless, old and young, suffer when the most vulnerable people in our community suffer.  We at St. Anthony’s will continue to analyze the May Revise and will continue to advocate for fair budgets!  Watch this space for further updates.

As my two months at St. Anthonys come to a close I find myself doing a lot of reflecting. There are many things I’m going to miss: my morning chats with Indian Joe, serving trays, handing out milk, and even folding countless tiny plastic bags at the ToGo station in the dining room. However, I’ve also been contemplating some of the important things I’ve learned.

One of the primary realizations that has dawned upon me is that none of us, including myself, is that far from being in a position to need a meal in the Dining Room. By putting together statistics I’ve learned in the grantwriting department, trips to Sacramento with Colleen (the amazing advocacy coordinator) to sit in on Senate hearings, and my experiences in the dining room I’ve come to a holistic understanding of just how easy it is to have the rug pulled out from under you, so to speak. Between the economic recession, budget cuts at the city and state level that target homeless and underprivileged populations, and insufficient healthcare, many people in San Francisco (and the country) are just one cavity, one fender bender, or one unplanned pregnancy away from homelessness.

Before I came to St. Anthonys I always had a vague assumption that I would never be in such a position, that people who worked hard would be able to stay solvent. However, I’ve come to see just how much (like rent, transportation, medical care, the ability to hold a job) can be out of our of personal control. This realization has allowed me to see that the guests at St. Anthonys are not necessarily unlike myself, and has brought me renewed appreciation for their cheerfulness and kindness throughout the past two months. Although I hope one day San Francisco will no longer need St. Anthonys, for now I am thankful for the wonderful work the foundation does and for the opportunity is has given me to learn.