THREAD. After weeks of receiving no support from the city of Minneapolis, the city council, or the parks department to address housing justice or health & safety for our unhoused neighbors, I am DONE and ready to call folks out.

Here’s what the Minneapolis Parks department told us for the past week while elderly, disabled, BIPOC folks went without bathrooms or hand washing stations during a pandemic. It only took the intervention of Londel French to get some placed. Shameful.

The Parks dept has been serving these permit applications directly to residents, who are being told they cannot have bathrooms/ services or will be kicked out unless the permits are signed. The permits make the signer criminally and financially liable for damages.

One elderly and vulnerable resident has already signed and delivered the permit, because parks people told him if he didn’t sign it they would clear his tent. He was very upset when I explained to him the implications. We are in touch with National Lawyers Guild to advocate.

Per other commissioners, the permit system and 20/25 rule is largely devised by Alondra Cano and Mayor Frey who want the sanctuaries to fail. Please contact them and demand that all parks are sanctuaries until they can provide permanent housing for all. This is not justice.

We are bracing for impact from the latest eviction set to happen today from Powderhorn, and scrambling to find camps for all of these people. Each community has specific needs, and the way we create sustainability for them in these transitional spaces is by honoring those needs.

This means that we can’t just throw them all together in the same camp like the parks board expects us to. We have to think about personalities, past traumas like domestic violence, whether they want a sober community or not. This takes time, which we are not given.

I camped out all night to hold space at a new park, because we are unable to take in all of the new people from Powderhorn at existing camps. This means we now have 20 different camps spread out all over the city, making daily food and ice distribution basically unsustainable.

Let’s talk about food. Our F12 people’s kitchen distributes over 2400 meals per week, completely operated by unpaid volunteers. With the camps expanding we no longer have enough volunteers or partner restaurant participation. Many people we serve have no other access to food.

There is an elderly gentleman at Boom Island who I found sleeping in a tarp. We set him up with a tent and have brought him food every day. He was hit by a car as well. He is out of a job at Pronto Pups because the state fair isn’t happening this year. Our state has failed him.

*If you have any availability to deliver food, or have a restaurant that could provide food, please please contact me.*

All of these issues affecting the health & safety of our unhoused neighbors in Minneapolis are completely within the capability of the city council to fix. There is plenty of housing in the city and money to go around. This should not be on our parks or UNPAID VOLUNTEERS to solve

Amidst all of this I have been making run after run to the suburbs for more tents and supplies for people affected by the evictions, and with more coming today we need all the help we can get. My Venmo is Lauren-Josephine. Thank you for supporting people who need our help.

My girl Gabriella who runs the F12 People’s Kitchen has been operating out of her own pocket all week. One of the best & hardest working womxn I know. Her Venmo is GFarias11.