So, one of our members reached out to the @CityofSanJose in order to get some green bags and trash picker uppers for our community Clean Up!

At first, the woman who spoke to her was incredibly kind & willing to drop off the necessary items next week.

However, once our member mentioned that we were cleaning up around & for unhoused communities, the woman’s attitude completely changed. She became rude, & said she could no longer help us with providing FREE materials bc “the homeless will want the green bags for themselves.”

Mind you, the @CityofSanJose has claimed to care about our unhoused people and has claimed that they do everything possible to uplift them.

But when community members are stepping up themselves to do this work, all of a sudden it’s “we can’t help.”

She further asked us where we’ve been cleaning trash up, but we chose not to disclose that information in fear that they would force our community members to move.

The reality is that we can’t trust the city to have the best interests of the people we serve. They don’t care.

Instead, we’ll be finding ways to fund trash disposals at local dumpsters & we’ve already started buying some trash picker uppers ourselves (and have already been buying our own bags, however, the green bags are the ones picked up by the city).

Again, only we got us.