Skid Row homelessness and community solutions

Homeboy Homeboy Homeboy Brothers, there's only one blood Cause there ain't no sense in us Traveling on the stones It's us down, down to the bone Blood is thick Waters were known well Cousins were kept apart Mothers were often memories Fathers were not favorites on the farm For he could do some harm He could wreck them after skiing For he, brothers, could dream Homeboy Your mama ain't no saint Your daddy died in a shallow stream But your uncle, Dr. King Did have a dream, my brother And what is your real excuse Why can't you study your lessons And stay in school Why can't you study your lessons And stay in school School Free love And sex ain't nothing but a game Don't never last Try hope Take a chance on love Register to vote Money ain't everything But you can buy her a ring Little blackbird Sing Buy you a record of a yardbird With wings Get into the swing of things Homeboy Buy some tenderness Homeboy by Sunchi Ali Where your history is Welcome to the Coon Brown Report May the peace and blessings of the life-giving creative spirit be upon you and upon your family My name is Melvin Ishmael Johnson Coming at you live from Skid Row Studios And I'm in the studio with my co-host Earlene Anthony Our call name number is 1-800-893-9562 Now this week on the Coon Brown Report Our topic is Skid Row And I'm going to be talking about the Koon Brown Report And the African American community And I'm delighted to have with us in the studio Kamal from Streetwise LA And also with Amos and Aston And later on we'll be joined by two other brothers Mualad Abdul Shahid and Muhammad Abdullah So welcome to the Coon Brown Report Thank you for having us Now can you introduce yourself And tell our listening audience about your organization Sure, I'm Kamal with Streetwise LA I'm here with Aston and Amos Basically Streetwise LA was started as kind of a grassroots movement To kind of capture some of the struggles going on downtown And the life of homeless people An in-depth look into the life of a homeless person So it kind of started a long time ago When Occupy LA was starting And I had gotten into the business of And I had gotten into the business of I became kind of really intrigued by the idea of Occupy LA And by some of the ideas that they were putting out there And so Amos was hanging out over there as well And so we got to know each other And at that time I was riding my bike pretty much religiously And so I was seeing a lot of crazy stuff Just riding my bike from the west side to downtown And I was seeing a lot of crazy stuff And I thought maybe it would be a good idea If we could give Amos a camera And get his kind of perspective It was just an idea I had I didn't know what it was going to materialize into So kind of the rest is history And we've been featured on KCRW We had a clip recently that was taken for Vice Media And they used it in one of their features So it's just been a really cool idea And it's been a really interesting trip Okay, so Amos, introduce yourself And tell us how you got involved And what your part is in the organization Well, my name is Amos I come from Chicago So when I met Kamal First when he gave me the camera At this time he said have fun So when I started videoing things I started noticing the security People being mistreated by being homeless They've been discriminatory towards them Because they're carrying bags Sleeping in the park So I noticed that more than me Trying to have some fun out here In downtown L.A. And so I informed Kamal And so Kamal, he said well film it And talk about it So basically it started off When he gave it to me To have fun and videotape stuff Then it got into a point To this point right now That I'm not going to do it We were trying to show someone That the humanitarian part Or the unjust part of society And it just blew up from there And my thing is that I started filming my homeless life And that's basically And I gave myself a name Which is Amos, a.k.a. Chicago So I can try to make you identify With me, what I'm seeing And you seeing My eyes on the screen And videotaping So it's like I was just a video speaker Behind something that you might see On the video camera So I tried to explain that So basically I start out Just with him, just a video guy Okay, how about you? How did you get involved? I just got my camera last week But I, that's when Kamal When Kamal was riding religiously I was riding bikes a lot With Kamal back then And came down to Occupy A few times with him And then just over the years We've been involved In a lot of the same chat groups Discussions And I recently moved Well, not recently now But I've been downtown Los Angeles For a while And I find myself In a lot of the same discussion groups With Kamal, with other residents In downtown Los Angeles And you get really Differing opinions Between two people That seem like they're bothered By the homeless population And another group That seems concerned And want them to be A part of the community Because they are And over those discussions Me and Kamal got into it a lot And he thought that I might offer A different perspective Than Amos does Who lives, you know Down on Skid Row And I'm living One, two blocks outside of it And it's still very much A part of our community And a concern within the community So Kamal brought me in To discuss those things And so I just joined them And I look forward to Bringing a different perspective Okay, now let me ask you this The use as a video You know, as a direct action tool In the community Seem to be important Now when you think about it With the Scott situation The situation in Baltimore The one in New York Do you see this as important too? And then you have to remember That one of the first community groups That started doing that Was the original Black Panthers Up in Oakland Before they changed a lot of the rules They used to follow the police around In video cameras What are your comments on The police? I think it's It's changing Changing the world really I mean Everyone has a video camera In their pocket And can turn it on Whenever they want So I mean You can capture Almost any instance That's coming up So it's been a powerful tool In helping to expose A lot of A lot of injustices going on Because it's so readily available You know I think that's the biggest asset People can just pull it out whenever And have it on them at all times So I mean That's pretty much What we're trying to do Is have a camera on the scene At any time So that if If something happens You know If something happens right now I can call Amos And he can be there At moment's notice You know He's living on San Julian Street So if something happens Within that community Then I can have Amos there Or tell him about what's going on And the same with Aston If something If there's a protest going on Or something downtown going on I can have Aston there too And if I can't make it So How quick can you get it up? Within an hour Within an hour If it needs to be up that fast You know Yeah Okay Before we get into an in-depth discussion Of Skid Row and the African American community I'd like to play a clip From two Skid Row residents Yes sir This is Juan Miguel Cummings Since I came to the city of Los Angeles In 2007 And I asked a young lady What's going on When I got off the Greyhound bus station Where are all the people hanging out at? She said down on Skid Row And it was 2007 on June the 19th When I got off the bus I never in my life A city like Los Angeles Seen this many homeless people That down on Skid Row Living on the street Living on the sidewalk And I gutted myself The things I was doing Is just like them And I thank God the Lord Delivered me from drugs and alcohol That I'm in a program That want to help you Get a roof on your head And you can move on Right next door It's a lot of resource A lot of people don't want to reach out But I'm here I'm willing To help somebody Every day I'm talking to somebody What's your name? Lloyd Thank you Lloyd Yes Hi I'm Valerian And I've heard of Skid Row And I had you know my opinions About I would come through But I never would I would come shopping But the apartment building I was living in Caught on fire And I got referred here To the Union Rescue Mission And I've seen all types of things On the streets And I said well Father God I'm sitting down here for a reason Maybe it's my fear But in this community I didn't see anything But all positive things Regardless to what the habits may be I've never seen anything I've never seen anything I've never seen anything I've never seen anything So many people in one community That had so much faith And trust in God And it really opened my eyes You know And so it's like I'm just a happy camper You know Jesus didn't have no address Valerie Okay yeah Valerie Yeah So I appreciate that You know And I've seen how The streets have been Cleaned up to some extent Okay What are your thoughts On the homeless In the Skid Row community? Let's start off Over here with Kamal And go around Well The Skid Row community Has been around for You know 125 years now It's It's not gonna go away You know And I don't think it should It has a very important history In Los Angeles I think that we just need to Approach it differently really Is the key to it You know It started out as kind of They opened a lot of residential hotels In the early About the turn of the century And so that's That brought a lot of You know Transient people And then Just your everyday worker That found affordable living there So they made that their home But Eventually You know With all the resources That came about down there There was a big Homeless population That came in And it's pretty much Since I think about 1930 There was Like about 10,000 people In the Skid Row area That were homeless Or Alcoholics Or just kind of The The society's margin Or the The The forgotten And so You know It's been around for a long time And that history's there I think I think we just need to kind of Look at it differently And approach it from a different way Than we're doing it right now Mm-hmm Mm-hmm Okay Okay we get down But you know It's sort of What we got down there Now it's a recent phenomenon Because when you look at I remember When I was in the military And the Marines down here And the first time I came to L.A. Was in I guess 69 Something like that When I was going to boot camp And when we would come to L.A. There was two hotels That Most of the Marines and stuff Stayed at The Cecil Hotel And the Clark Hotel But you didn't have The influx of people Living down there And then later on For a number of reasons Most of the people Lived in the They had the 99 cent movies They had about 10 99 cent movies That would open up At 12 noon And it would run all the way up Until 6 in the morning And they would rotate You still see most of the Big movies The Los Angeles And all these places Up and down Maine Broadway And all that kind of stuff like that That's what it was Most of your homeless Stayed there See and you didn't have that influx And then Uh Uh The thing that really changed That began to change Is when they began to close down Most of these Movies and stuff And then And then you had another A couple complex things That came together That really changed You had the The crack cocaine epidemic And the prison industrial complex See that's what Created the jam up There and changed Cause Prior to that You probably had 90% Of it was Was white Europeans Probably Guys that would be 50, 60, 70 The whole Wine old concept That they Talked about Sure But that Changed And led us into the direction We're heading into now What are your thoughts on Skid rowing the homeless Community What we're seeing happening Down in there Well I know It's been going on Before I got here From Chicago And I know And Where I come from I've been in Cabrini Green And it's a It was a big drug Epidemic And gangbanging Epidemic down there But here That's a big Drug Epidemic Mental illness That I have Witnessed And have been in I don't Say at the time When I was homeless Pitched my tent Down on Skid row I pitched my tent In front of CCA Which were Occupied by L.A. Occupied at that time With People I had noticed That they They They They become Enabled When people Is bringing Excess things to them If I had someone To bring me clothes And food And I received my GI check Or my SSI check Or my benefits Of course I'm going to get That to the drug man Because I know Every day Someone is coming Down there To feed me But you got Missions down there You got people That's got Sands there I'm hungry Oh okay If you hungry All these missions Down there And people Is bringing food So the drug epidemic Is people's They wants to get high You got to want To stop using drugs You got to want To do better If a person Is getting To the point That's enabled People Is enabled Them To the point That I don't have to work I don't have to Go out and pay rent I don't have to Do this and do that Of course I'm going to sleep In a tent You know Of course I'm going to have My tent up all day The time I don't think That the rule Of having the tent From 9pm To 6am Was designed For you to keep Your tent up all day Sleep all day And do nothing All day You know So My thing about And I was Blown out of proportion Now all of a sudden I got a problem Well the problem Been there Before I even got here But I'm seeing That it's Horrific The drug use The mental illness The killing And you know It's not Game bringing To me down there That's drug use I noticed that people That's in the tent Selling drugs You know And they probably Have somewhere to live But they come down here And use the homeless life To sell drugs To the people That's on drugs And then you have The mental illness Two factor Where people You know Need their medications But a lot of times They'll come to Skid Row They'll run out Of their medications Or lose their medications Etc Then they'll turn To the drug dealers For you know A way out You know So Yeah It's a problem Of having all of that In the same place Like that's where All the services are You can go there To get food You can go to the missions But also The dealers know that Alright that's where People are going to go So they're there too So it's really tough That you're offering The services In the same place That you're offering The dealers And there's not Really enough places To go out And get services So now we've got This problem That we're going to call Like you know The problem On Skid Row Yeah And it's more than just Not one to get off of drugs You need the services To get off of drugs Yeah you need the services Right The services Like there's services Down there as far as Food and housing But there's not enough Wrap around services There's not enough Individualized services There's not enough Just looking to Help people Out of that situation With more than just Housing Addressing any trauma That they've been through And services They need that way But you say that The people that Want to stop you Well the service is there I went to Through Wine God And I used The service To get off of drugs For the mission To get off the street So the service is there Now you got people That want to And you got people That don't want to That's be Whole Cotted Fat cold about it Then you got some people That's pretty much Probably mentally Is incapable Of trying to Help themselves So And that's That's the problem So them What he's talking about That individual In a one on one Basin That's what you You call That's what people Go out there And try to Offer these That kind of Recovering Into acting On the street Well let me ask this then Which one of the When you're talking about Because I hear people Talking about The drug dealers And all that kind of stuff In the Skid Row area Yes Well how about The legal drug dealers From what I see Right The pharmaceutical Company Is the fact that They take a little area Like Skid Row Which is nothing But a level one Facility The same way That they would have In the The joint When they have The halfway house And all that kind of stuff Right And at these Level one facilities Where they have A control Population The pharmaceutical Companies Push synthetic Push What do you call Those drugs When they got Another name for them Generic Generic drugs That they get free Down there So I see When I see the people Wobbling and all Like that I don't see them Wobbling from marijuana Or from cocaine Or crack I see them Wobbling from all These strong Legal drugs Yes You got people That abuse that Abuse the The mental And the drug factors Then you got people That would take the pain pill And don't actually Take them And sell the pain pill And for the money To get their crystal Or the crack Cocaine Or what We say They drug of choice Now I'm a recovering addict And I take pain pills But my pain pills Is none Narcotics Pain pills So there is A way out of that And I think But people Some people That you might see That's on that type of Self-medicated Prescription legal drugs Yeah Is that they They can't get it From the doctor They buy it From the people They get it And they'll sell it On the street Yeah And then Because from a lot of people That I talk to Especially a lot of veterans It seems The problem Is that All of these Prescribed drugs When they prescribe More than one Particular drug And they really Don't have an idea They may know The side effects Of one particular Type of drug But when they have A person on Three and four See they still Studying that That's why They be studying A lot of that And that's one Element That we For God When we was talking About the Skid Row area Is when Ronald Reagan Let out Dementally That really Brought in Made it a Complex Situation Down there And I think Why So when you look at Skid Row Especially the ones That's living in the tent African American Probably make up Nine They lucky We make up Ten percent Let's say we make up Ten percent Of the population Of Los Angeles Yet still We're about Eighty five Or ninety percent Of the ones Living in the tents And on the street What Can you You want to Come and talk about that The minute That's the thing Let's say this And I'm going to let them talk You got to realize Most people That's here In downtown LA In California Is not from California So they're from Different states around So And you got A lot of African American People that come From different states Or That live here too And probably got Kicked out Their neighborhood Family Disowned them So they had to move around And they heard so much And they got to win for Downtown LA Or have you can Sleep in the mission And sleep outside In the county of LA So they're going to Utilize this Instead of paying rent Or if you Have an argument With your significant other Oh right I'm not going to pay rent I'm going to sleep in the tent You dig what I'm saying So that's why How my thinking Would think I would think that way But I don't have to Pay no rent But it's I mean It's the I mean The Hispanic The European And Asians I mean They're not going to The same What I'm What I'm It's How come we had This huge You know The whole human What you just got Through talking about You know The Hispanic Go through it They deal with that The Europeans Deal with that The Asians Deal with that But yet and still We got 85-90% Of the African I think you nailed it Right at the top When you said it was The 80s With Ronald Reagan Letting out the Mental health Institute You know That's not just us But You had the crack epidemic And the crack minimums Industrial prison complex Once a week at least I'm talking to somebody Who just got Let out of jail They don't have anything On them And they're down In Skid Row Because they just got Put on the street With nothing That was geared Towards the African American community And it's not just The people that went Into jail That were affected by it It's the people That were left behind Their family members That short period In the 70s and 80s Pretty much broke The black community In a lot of ways And I think that's why You still see so many Black people out there It's because It's the carrying on Of that system And then you got L.A. County You know That's right there That pretty much Just feeds Into Skid Row And because You know The complex With the jail system You're going to Obviously get A huge population Of African Americans On Skid Row as well As soon as they're Getting let out They're going to go To their You know A place where it's cheap Where they can get Whatever they want They can get a meal They can get Anything they want There's some of them That would be paroled Down there too Which is called The AB1 program So in some of them They'd be paroled When they got probation Down there Some of them Was on an ankle bracelet And some of the programs They don't have Nowhere to stay So they used The mission for the address And they got The ankle bracelet there And once they Off the ankle bracelet Or all parole Or all probation They didn't do nothing So it's like You got to have Some type of Organization To direct Those type of People that's coming out Which is Ex-convicts Like myself You see I was locked up In a penitentiary You know And I went to school Up in there They don't even have School in no more And my crime When I first took They could have Let me go But by me being An African American At that time When I caught my case They weren't trying To let me go They were trying To put me in jail And get a number on me Now how much Do you do? I think it has to do With the fact That the African American Has no Clear Community Where they control The economic life Of their community Like right here In Los Angeles Our community Even Let's say The Let's look at Some of the Distinct Historical African American Communities here We know Leimert Park Probably Englewood Used to be Compton And Washington And Washington And Washington And Seattle And Seattle And Seattle And Seattle And Seattle Asian community. All of these communities around here have a clearly defined economic community in which they control the whole economic life of their community. And yet still, they also exist in the secondary community, which I call the shopping mall community. Two communities. But the African-American, we only exist in that secondary community. We spend money in that shopping mall community, but we don't own nothing in our own communities. And I think that's got a lot to do with the fact that you see so many African-American out-of-jobs, even the ones that come out of the system, need to be retrained. You know, because this is where I look. We're going to talk about that in a little while when we start talking about solutions, the obligation of the African-American leadership here in Los Angeles, especially the religious. Religious leadership should be at the forefront. You know, it's a shame when you got, it should be a shame on the African-American community here on what's happening in Skid Row to have 85 and 90% African-American living in these tents. See, and that's acceptable. That's a shame on the ones that call themselves leadership or religious people here in Los Angeles. Because this is a homeless capital. And I mean, you, you're just pointing to religious leadership. Dr. Dre just became a billionaire this year. He's from Compton. Yeah. You don't see enough presence of all sorts of people that probably should be deeper in the community than they are. It's not just religious leaders. There's people that could probably even today make a bigger difference because they've got a bigger name and they should be down there in the community. But even in things like, you know, and not just in Los Angeles, but Occupy and Ferguson and everything, you barely see all of these people. You know, you get people like Talib Kweli or Jay Cole, they're out there. But all these people that are making a ton of money off the black community and spinning this whole narrative of, you know, going out and balling and spinning and all that stuff. You don't see them anywhere in the community when it comes to things like this. So I think it's on more than just, you know, the religious leadership. We need to kind of put it on everyone. And I think that is a failure in the black community. It's a failure. And but see, the reason the religious community have to be up at the front, you know, Yeah. Yeah. At the forefront, because it's within the orbit of their religious doctrine. It's articulated right in there that they're supposed to be dealing with the homeless, the prisoners and all that kind of stuff. I mean, that's at the top point of it. The whole concept dealing with the Messiah in the Bible had to do with taking care of those coming out of prison, those who are poor and all that kind of stuff. Now, see, when I look at Dr. Dre, all these guys, the reason, the obligation on them, they just regular capitalists, you know, they, man, they out after profit. They doing what they supposed to do. That's true. That's net. You know, they, if they could have some concern, if we're going to say that they supposed to do anything from a religious nature, they supposed to tie, you know, give 10% or something like that. But the religious community, it is articulated that this is what they supposed to do, because that's what they say that they are believers. They are Christian. Muslim. Jews. It's right there in their scripture. It's on them first. See? And I could argue some of them are capitalists, too, though. I mean, you know, there's the guy who's trying to get his plane bought by his religion. They're just as motivated by the money. You know, they've got their book sales and everything like that. There's some capitalism going on there. But you're talking about the true faith, religion, people that got that faith. Now, you can say all type of, you're a Muslim, you're Jewish. You're a Jew, whatever. Whatever religion you may have be. But do you have a true giving and kindness of God in your heart towards humanity? You express this. Excuse me. Yeah. And for those who say they are Christian, Muslim, Jews, especially the Christian, the things that they must understand is that Messiah Jesus made a clear distinction between God and the Catholics, which he called the, you know, the money changers. All like that. He surrendered the things to God. That's God. The things to Rome. That's wrong. You're talking about the money makers and all that kind of stuff. They practice a communal type of system. They did not practice capitalism. They brought that on later on and attached that to the Messiah Jesus. That's not his doctrine. He didn't deal with that at all. Neither did the Prophet Muhammad. Neither did Moses. See, they brought all of these concepts on later on. But look, let's talk about what I want to know. I want to talk about. The tents. Those living in the tents. Can you give us an idea of the daily routine of the ones living in the tents? What's that like? Well, when I came here, I know the rules. So I'm kind of like a rule follower. And I pitched my tent. I pitched it at CCA at 9 p.m. or sometime a little later. Sometime I pitched it early. I depended if it was raining when I was living on the street. I didn't have to worry about the rain getting in there. I made sure that I tried to carry light things in my tent, my blanket, my sleeping bag. Since this is California, it don't get that cold at night. And I'm from Chicago. So if it get any time down below 40, 50, it still wouldn't bother me. It can get down to 30, it wouldn't bother me. But my main concern is living in the tent was night as people come in there and try to set my tent on fire, try to rob me. Every sound that I heard, every sound that I heard, I was like, oh, my God, I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. Every sound that come past me, I have jump up and see what it is. So, excuse me. That was my main concern, living in the tent. But I normally got up before six. That was my whole routine, to get up and try to do something different. get out of the tent. So I try not to carry food. I utilize my general assistant to feed me. Only time I will probably come down to the mission if I ran out of my food stamp. How about logistics? Are you going to be concerned with where you pitch your tent at? Yes, the security part about that part. So that's why I felt more comfortable at CCA, which is on 7th and Wishart. I put my tent up because it was more light and there was more people around, more security guards that were walking around would probably have some sense of decency if anybody tried to do anything by the hunt. They would probably call the police and help me. I chose not to pitch it down on skid row for the purpose of what I am, a recovering addict. And I know there's not a lot of narcotics down there, and I didn't want to get caught up in that. And I know there's a lot of people that's not trying to do... do the right thing. And by living in a tent, a lot of things occur, like robbery or, you know, so forth, fights, tension they bring out by living in a community of homelessness. Disparacy and mental illness, people do pitch tents too. But you never know. They're not taking their medicine or whatever drug they have use of. Send them all. So this is why I chose that I wanted to be single by myself, and I didn't want to pitch a tent not directly on skid row. Not saying I'm better than them, not saying I'm not... I wasn't homeless. I was homeless. It's just I wanted to do better when I got here. So to move up to be homeless was like a stepping stone for me. It taught me and it's still teaching me to appreciate where I'm at right now. Okay. Skid row housing. Let's play another clip from a young man that was homeless in the... Skid row area. Okay. This is Melvin Ishmael Johnson with the Coon Ram Report. And I'm out here in the Lafayette Park area across from the library. And I'm going to do an interview. And who am I speaking with here? Paul. Paul, can you tell us a little about your background, your home, and how you got out to Los Angeles? Well, I'm originally from the South Bronx in New York City. And once I lost all my parents and a lot of people in my family, I decided like I was on my own. I don't have children. I'm not married. So I said, hey, let me just do something different with my life. So I said, let me come out here. I had a cousin out here and he helped me get on my feet. And even though he left, once I got on my feet, and I've been here ever since for 20 years. Now, how long have you been homeless out here? Oh, I've been homeless for like almost two years now. What do you think is the biggest challenge out here that you've been homeless for? I've been homeless for like almost two years now. What's the biggest challenge out here that a person has to face when you're homeless? Safety. Safety? Yes, because I've never been hungry one day. Because there are so many kind people out here. When they see you're homeless, they will look out for you. A lot of kind people. And sometimes you don't see that until you are in that perspective or in that situation. Then you start seeing how many kind people are out here. Now, do you see a lot of homeless people that come from all over the United States? Out here? I've seen a lot of different ethnicities who come out here. I've seen people, I've met people all the way from Africa who come out here and are homeless. They're homeless. Do you find many people that live in Los Angeles that are homeless? Oh, many. The majority. The majority. Right in this area. This whole park is almost all homeless people. And a lot of them come here from Los Angeles. They grew up here in Los Angeles. They grew up in here in Los Angeles. A lot of them. And then you actually have a really kind of a nice, interesting mix of people here. How about female? What's the biggest challenge for the females out here that find themselves homeless? Avoiding to be abused. That's one of the main challenges. And one last question. What do you think, what can the city do to improve the quality of life? To improve the conditions of the homeless? To provide more homes for people to live in? Wow, that's an interesting question. I would think they don't. It's just about services. About services. People need more services and more people coming out to them. They're always waiting for people to come to them. They need the services to come out to the people. Be on the streets. Hey, oh, you're homeless? Let me help you. Let me look. I just information. They're there. They're there. But they don't do that. We have to always search for them. They need to search for us. Oh, okay. That's a good point. You mean more mobile units that can come out and really see what's going on. Okay. Because most people, when they think of the homeless, they just think it's just a skid row area. But it's more than that. It's more than that. There's so many people out here that are so homeless. There's so many people out here. And they've gotten to the point, because California is a warm weather state, and they've gotten to the point where they're like, homelessness has become a part of their lifestyle. And that's kind of sad. It's kind of sad. People are like, look at this. You see what you see here? Homelessness has become a lifestyle. And you can do it in California. You can do it and get away with it in California. Okay, then. Thank you very much. Tell us your name again. Paul. Okay. And then remember, Paul, you have an open invitation anytime you want to come. Okay. Let's take a break for our community calendar. We'll come back and discuss it a little bit more. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. This is the community calendar for upcoming events. This is for all skid row poets. There's going to be a Ron Allen Pride Poetry Contest. And this is sponsored by the Los Angeles Poverty Department. And it's going to be held at the Los Angeles Poverty Department Museum at 440 South Broadway. And they're on the second floor downtown Los Angeles. And you can take a look. And you can take a look. And you can take a look. And you can take a look. And you can take a look. Angeles. The zip code is 926. There have been two workshops that were already held for the poets to submit their work. One of the workshops was held by Melvin Ishmael Johnson, and another one was held by Carmen Vega. And it was on Friday, May the 8th, and Friday, May the 15th, will be the time for the poets to read their poetry. And on Friday, May the 22nd, it's going to be a selection of the work that have been submitted. And the times are 6.30 to 8 p.m. And there's going to be a first place prize of $100, second place prize of $50, and a third place prize of $25. And I know that all you poets, Skid Row poets, are interested in this. And for more information, please contact the Los Angeles Poverty Department at 213-413-1077 or lapddepartment.org. And the prizes, once again, will be given on the May the 22nd, and there's going to be a party and a celebration on the 22nd. On Wednesday, May the 6th, 2015, from 5.30 p.m., and this is held every Wednesday, May the 6th, 2015, from 5.30 p.m. And this is held every Wednesday, May the 6th, 2015, of the month, we have what we call Tech Talk. And this is for all the Skid Row Studio hosts and potential hosts. It's a workshop for engineers and interns, etc. And they come together to discuss ways and means to have high-quality shows here at the Skid Row Studio. Also talk about social media, Facebook, Twitter, and much more. The guest speaker this Wednesday will be Nestorius. He has a public radio show here, and he is Nestor Rodriguez. The musical guest will be Willis Boyd, and he has a show here called Positive Perspective. Refreshments will be served, I think, on the menu this week. We're going to have tacos and something else. Also, Jeremy Hansen, the co-founder of Skid Row Studios, will be on hand to answer questions. And the location of the Tech Talk is the Boyd Tech's 2340. 41 East Olympic Boulevard, Los Angeles 921. For more information on the Tech Talk, please call 213-479-1764 or DramaStage1 at yahoo.com. Also, Tuesday, this is May 12th and 13th. This is two days. And each May, hundreds of anti-hunger advocates from across the state. Meet in Sacramento to discuss their legislation about hunger and encouraging their supporters for anti-hunger legislation. Organizations of different kind will go up to Sacramento overnight and rally there. And there's also, if you're interested in going, you need to RSVP, and there will be departure dates. One will be the Los Angeles Can located downtown. But also, for more information, please contact Frank Tamburello. And his number is 213-388-8228 or frank at hungeractionla.org. Also, we're asking you to save the date. Saturday, May the 16th, 2015 at 6 p.m., DramaStage can run the SANA Play Reading Series present a stage play, Catch the Tiger. It's a play by Melvin Ishmael Johnson and directed by Bill White. This play is about J. Edgar Hoover's efforts to bring down black nationalist Marcus Garvey. The location is the United University Church on the campus of USC, 817 West 34th Street, Los Angeles, 989. And this is at the corner of Jefferson and Hoover. This is a free event, free parking, refreshments will be served. After the reading, there will be time for a little bit of a break. So, if you're interested in going, you can visit the SANA Play Reading Series at jdhover.org. And there will be departure dates. One will be after the reading, there will be time for a little bit of a break. So, if you're interested in going, you can catch the Tiger. And there will be departure dates. One will be after the reading, free parking, refreshments will be served. And there will be departure dates. One will be after the reading, there will be departure dates. And for more information, please contact 213-479-1764. If you have a community event that you would like announced on our show, send the information to dramastage1 at yahoo.com. Attention, Earlene Anthony. And the call-in number for the show is 800-893-9562. Now back to our host. Okay, thank you, Ms. Earlene Anthony. We're back with our in-studio guests, Kamal, Amos, and Aston, and also two of our other guests that's come in, Mualid Abdul-Shaheed and Muhammad Abdul-Ala. Welcome to the Qumran Report. Okay, let's open up the roundtable and talk about some solutions, what you see as solutions to what's happening down in the Skid Row area, the homeless in the Skid Row. Let's start over with you. So actually recently Amos was able to get a video with Officer Dion Joseph, and he outlined a lot of really good points. I'll touch on a couple and then pass it on. His major point was decentralization. There's really almost too many programs right now on Skid Row that offer services, and there's 88 cities in L.A. County, and of those 88 cities, we have only Long Beach, Santa Monica, and then downtown Los Angeles that really open their doors. So we're really looking at the potential for homeless. So if we could get some of these surrounding cities around downtown L.A. and the Skid Row area to be more accommodating, offer some low-income housing, some drug programs, some case management programs, then we could see a lot of the log jam kind of that is Skid Row spread out and go to those other communities and maybe alleviate some of the pressure that Skid Row faces. Okay. What do you think, Amos? Well, like Kamal said, he touched on a lot of, it's a lot of ways that you can have a solution. The main thing I think should attack the drugs and the drug dealers. So you run a drug dealer out, now they don't have nowhere to get their drugs. So those that want to get off drugs, they're not going to look for drugs. They're going to look for their solution. You know, recovering from being a recovering addict, it's not a destination. It's steady a journey. But you're constantly throwing drugs in that person's face and seeing it's so easy to get it. Of course, yes. The solution is to get rid of the drug dealers and offer more programs and teach people how to live again from being from this hopeless state of mind for being homeless because most people that you notice on the street is not on drugs. They have mental issues, too, I have noticed. Because they're living on the street, that don't mean they own drugs. Well, are we talking about? We like what we talked about earlier. I think it's more damage from the legal drug dealers. Yes, that prescribes the drugs than it is from anybody selling crack. Yeah. And I think just recently Rite Aid down on like, what is it, Broadway? And they just got busted for giving out too many prescription pills. I mean, these are the kinds of things that need to get cleaned up. That's the capital. Especially in that neighborhood. You know, it's really ridiculous. And it shut down to one on 5th and Spring, too. Yeah. Oh, wow. They shut that about six months ago. People lost it out there. They weren't happy. Oh, my goodness. Now, what we were talking about earlier is the like of, how can the Islamic community get more involved in the Skid Row area? Right now, they have a program called Humanitarian Day. I know Brother Umar runs that out of Damascus. Umar even have Qatir. And what it is, they run that one day during the Ramadan. But it's a 365, 66-day-a-week problem down there. How can we get the Islamic community more involved in what's happening in the Skid Row community? And also a presence for the brothers who come out of the system and find no vehicle down there to continue to practice their religion. Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim. By the grace and mercy of Allah, what I would say in regards to the involvement of the Muslim community is to emphasize to the imam of the different masjid, the masjid, the Muslims who are the imam and the emirate must get involved, as well as those who have been themselves came from that same background. Because as Brother spoke about it, in regards to Jerusalem, when we look at the reality of the political and socioeconomic system of America, it's manifested in oppression. And we have to attack oppression and colonization and neocolonization, that this is not just something haphazard. This is a reality. And by opening up, like if you take for instance like here in downtown, like when I was growing up, went to Metropolitan High School on 7th and Wilson. You have like Belmont High School. Like, you know, you have the Abraham Freeman Occupational Center. These facilities of education and vocation need to be opened up to where a person can see their self-worth by education and vocation. In regards also health, what is it that, well, makes a person self-destruct? It's a lack of knowledge of self. When you have a lack of knowledge of self, then you internalize that. And the availability of drugs is not haphazard. Like when we read the book Darker Lines by Gary Webb, the United States government brings in heroin, cocaine. Today, May 4th, Wall Street Journal has an outstanding article on what the brothers just said today. And the brothers are pointing out about pharmaceutical drugs. It's that high. And if it's being distributed to the extent where only the pharmacist loses their state license, but you and I are going to depend. You see what I'm saying? And also let me ask this. I know, we talked about a little earlier, probably one of the most successful drugs, most successful drug programs that we ever had in the country. And I consider success is to have over 50% rate. Was the original national Islam substance abuse program that were put in place where they had over a 90% success rate. And I know there's been a lot of transition in terms of the African American Muslim, you know, moving away from the nation to Orthodox where we at now. Why, why, why don't we, how, how come we, how did we lose that model? That, that should be at the forefront of the recovery zone that we have down there in Skid Row right now. How come the brothers in Islam is not pushing that, that model or something similar down there instead of, instead of all of these failed substance abuse models that they have in place. Again, I cannot, I can only overemphasize and reiterate is that the brothers that are, that who are the mom is the ones who are not from the ground down and, and through, you know, assimilation and, and acculturation, they have inculcating substitute culture. Again, I reiterate, you must have knowledge yourself. And if you have brothers and sisters that came like during the time of the nation of Islam, from the businessmen, gladiators, loss and body and et cetera, you must have knowledge of yourself. But then they went through the streets of hard rock as well as hard knock. Then those who came out of Tracy, juvenile camps, San Quentin, Folsom. But then they said, well, then I'm not returning to that way of life. And so, therefore, the manifestation is life experience. There is no substitute for experience. And those who have that knowledge, they must seize the time. And they must educate and institutionalize that by being a part of the people. If you're not a part of the people and a part of the solution, you're part of the problem. And another thing that we discussed a little earlier is that when you look at what's happening in Skid Row, it's about 85% African-Americans that's laying in the tent. You know, what is the obligation of the religious community? All three of them, not just the Christian, but the Christian Muslims and the Jews. How can we, because I look at that as an African-American problem first, you know, in terms of. And I think it's a big problem. A half an hour people clam up out of these tents. Right. And on Skid Row, when we in the area, we only make up 9% of Los Angeles, but yet and still 85% of people living all up and down the streets in these tents is African-American. Again, like I say, is that by going to prisons and jails and then people coming to actually be involved with the people. If you can't just articulate this and be at them at the memorandum. But the pulpit and talk about a problem without going to be actually hands on with the people. And when you see the people and then hear what they have to say, then what are you? What? What? How can we assist and then to be able to bring about the solution to the problem? Go get them and make them come because their scripture tells them, oh, you who believe. Why do you say that? What you will not do most hateful in the sight of a law? Is that what you say? You will not do so by the grace and mercy of love. The last prophet, the message of Allah, Muhammad Ibn Abdul, peace upon him, said, none of you truly believe to you love for your. Brother, what you love for yourself. So they must have that. They must inculcate that teaching and not just theoretically espouse it by just saying, OK, I hear and I understand. No, you must practically apply it. OK, let me let me let me let me let me catch a little bit of this subject before we get away from it. In regards to the Muslim community working downtown with the homeless community, traditionally has been a Christian responsibility. I think that the Christian community, I commend them for their work, but I think also they should pave a little bit more of the way and invite Muslims to work with them. I think since the 9-1-1 situation, a lot of the Christian community have distanced themselves from the Muslim community. And in response to that, the Muslim community has shied away from coming downtown to work in the area with the homeless. I think it's a responsibility of the Christian community to open the door. I think it's a responsibility of the Christian community to open the door of help to the Muslim community and tell them, come on down and help us. We are one spiritual community. We all believe in God. And this is all of our work. You know, I've assisted some of the brothers out of the community come down here and work with the homeless. And it's shallow on the Muslim side because it's so large of a Christian community down here working. So I'm just going to say before we get away from the subject that I believe that if the Christian community. Didn't distance themselves so much from the Muslim community, I think Muslims will come in with open arms and assist in the work. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Look, we wow. We got 47 seconds. We winding down. So I'd like to extend a special thanks to Kamal Amos Aston from Streetwise LA. Muwala Abdush Saheed. Muhammad Abdullah. And my co-host. Earlene Anthony. Please listen to past shows of the Qumran Report by Googling in Qumran Report. Thank you for tuning in to the Qumran Report. And from your host, Melvin Ishmael Johnson. May the peace and blessings of the life-giving creative spirit be upon you and upon your family. I leave you with a song that opened the show Homeboy by Sunji Ali. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Homeboy. Brothers, there's only one blood. Cuzs, there ain't no sense in us trampling on the stones. It's us down, down to the bone. Blood is thick. Waters were known well. Cousins were kept apart. Mothers were often memories. Fathers were not favorites on the farm. For he could do some harm. He could wreck the master scheme. Huh? For he, brothers could dream.