“What are we going to do?” Daniel asks when talking about the city of Los Angeles doing homeless sweeps. He continues, “Just imagine you’d have to move out of your apartment. Take everything you own. Move it across the street. Then at the end of the day, move everything back.” Daniel says homelessness is hard, and it makes it harder when every few weeks, police and sanitation crews come in demolishing everything you have. Taking everything that you own. And making you start from scratch.
Daniel says when from the time he sees that two days notice, he starts packing up everything. He moves everything he owns across the street. Daniel has to move the structure he lives in. Food. Clothes. Everything.
Daniel once “slept on the clock,” and they destroyed or confiscated all his stuff. Sanitation workers say they give receipts for what they take, but Daniel says he’s never received one. Homeless people’s belongings are taken to downtown Los Angeles, yet homeless people do not have transportation to pick up their stuff, so everything is eventually thrown away.
Daniel has lived homeless in Los Angeles for three years. He was working, yet they couldn’t afford rent. Daniel lived in a small car with three children and the baby’s mother. Life got worse, and Daniel snowballed into homelessness.
Daniel survives by the goodness of others and working odd jobs as a handyman. He helps his homeless neighbors build a better shack or fix their bikes. I know some of you are thinking, why doesn’t he get a job. Well, Daniel doesn’t have an ID, which is a serious barrier for many homeless people trying to get their life back.
Daniel is a good guy who just needs some help. The longer someone like Daniel lives on the streets, the most at risk they become. We need to get homeless people housing and support to end their homelessness.
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