Where do we go?: The question hits the pavement

A local nonprofit goes on the offensive as the City of Berkeley prepares to sweep a number of long-standing encampments without guaranteed offers of shelter.

In October, Berkeley-based nonprofit and advocacy group Where Do We Go? (WDWG) established several protest encampments in response to the City of Berkeley’s newly adopted encampment resolution policy. The new policy allows the city to close encampments that are classified as hazardous, obstructive, or a public nuisance without first offering shelter to their residents. (Disclaimer: Street Spirit shares an office with WDWG, but the groups maintain organizational independence).

WDWG is also protesting the city’s imminent plans to sweep two West Berkeley encampments, and have issued a list of demands that includes the “immediate cessation of encampment sweeps,” “an accessible and non-carceral approach to mental health care,” and the creation of new laws similar to tenant protections “so that individuals who cannot afford to pay rent…are not victimized by a system that uses poverty as a vehicle for profit.”

The protest camps intend to absorb unhoused community members who are evicted from their current camps, provide access to basic necessities and services, and maintain presence in high-visibility areas.

“In Berkeley,” WDWG wrote in a press release on October 16, “we pledge that for every encampment that is swept, we will establish an occupation encampment in the most visible public spaces we can find. We are going to show the public and the world that when an encampment is destroyed, the people do not just disappear. If we are no longer allowed to exist in the shadows then we shall step into the light.”

So far, WDWG has made good on its promise. Starting as an occupation of the lawn in front of Old City Hall on September 28, the camps have grown to include the lawn on the north end of Berkeley’s Civic Center, the sidewalks of Fourth and Bancroft streets, and the east end of Ohlone Park, all in response to recent or upcoming encampment closures.

Each camp is equipped with a common area with free food and supplies, serviced porta-potties, and donated tents according to the needs of its residents. To establish itself as a network of protest encampments working in solidarity with one another, each camp adorns a set of two-person tents with the movement’s moniker, “Where Do We Go?,” painted on the outer shells and placed in clear view of passersby. The group aims to serve as a model for unhoused organizing beyond the streets of Berkeley, and announced a public call to action for cities across the United States to join them in setting up similar protest encampments.

“Today,” WDWG continued in their press release, “we call on every city within the Ninth Circuit…and every city where homelessness exists throughout the United States to create protest encampments that allow the unhoused to exercise their rights to freedom of speech and protest.”

How did we get here?

On the heels of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Grants Pass v. Johnson earlier this year, Governor Gavin Newsom signed Executive Order N-1-24 directing state agencies to begin clearing encampments on state-owned property. N-1-24 also encourages California cities to adopt similar policies if they wish to maintain state funding for homeless services and programs.

In an October 4 press conference announcing the latest dispersal of “Encampment Resolution Funds” (ERF), Newsom stated that if cities “play by the rules that are established, we want to provide carrots, not just sticks. But if you are unwilling to play by the rules, we’re not going to provide new funds, and we will claw back funds as well…If you’re out of compliance, we are no longer interested in funding failure.”

By way of providing carrots, the state is awarding $130.7 million to 12 cities, four counties, and two continuum of care programs that submitted applications for ERF funding earlier this year. These funds are intended to “assist local jurisdictions to provide services and supports to people experiencing homelessness,” according to the California Department of Housing and Community Development. Seven Bay Area jurisdictions received ERF funds, including San Francisco County, Contra Costa County, and the cities of Antioch, Petaluma, Richmond, San Jose, and Berkeley. 

According to documents obtained by Street Spirit, the City of Berkeley received roughly $5.4 million in ERF funding to clear a single, long-standing encampment on Second Street, between Cedar and Page streets. While the city will cover the cost of the encampment sweep itself, the $5.4 million in ERF funds will be used to pay for the following: a two-year lease for 27 units of transitional housing at the Howard Johnson motel on University Avenue, a staff team under contract with Dorothy Day House, and costs associated with meal services and site maintenance. The proposal also sets aside $150,000 for a pilot program to purchase RVs from unhoused vehicle dwellers, and $200,000 for an encampment resolution research study conducted by the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative. 

Andrea Henson, Executive Director of WDWG, believes the city’s plan to sweep Second Street exemplifies the larger inadequacies of Berkeley’s approach to the homelessness crisis.

“There’s way more than 27 people at Second Street,” Henson told Street Spirit, noting that the current plan for the Second Street sweep does not guarantee shelter beds for all encampment residents. “And I would say approximately two-thirds of all homeless people in Berkeley are going to get moved. But these folks are going to have to move somewhere. That’s why we are giving them a safe space.”

Street Spirit reached out to the City of Berkeley and asked for comment on the WDWG protests, including whether their Homeless Response Team (HRT) would be providing outreach to the new encampments. In a statement, the city’s public information officer said that the HRT “is dedicated to ending unsheltered homelessness in Berkeley, by connecting individuals to shelter, interim housing, or permanent housing solutions,” and noted that “our approach to addressing homelessness and managing encampments…is guided by three core principles [housing first, health and safety, and maintaining clean streets], reflecting our unchanged commitment to both compassion and public safety with our top priority being to connect individuals experiencing homelessness with available housing resources.”

According to the 2024 Alameda County Point-in-Time (PIT) count, at least 445 people currently live unsheltered within Berkeley city limits, a 45% reduction from the last PIT count in 2022, but there are still more unhoused people in Berkeley than available shelter beds. In another statement provided on October 23, Berkeley’s public information officer told Street Spirit that “the number of beds can fluctuate on any given day. We recommend that those who are seeking housing take advantage of available beds, including the 11 congregate beds that were available [today].”

‘Where do we go? Right here!’

This is not the first time in recent history that Old City Hall and the surrounding area has been occupied in response to the city’s efforts to criminalize the unhoused community’s use of public space. Back in November 2015, as the Berkeley City Council prepared to vote on a proposal that would limit personal possessions on city sidewalks to two square feet, advocates with First They Came for the Homeless established “Liberty City” on the lawn in front of the 115-year-old building. The camp was closed soon after in December 2015, but it laid the groundwork for the establishment of the Here/There camp just south of the Ashby BART station in 2017, which remained until early 2023. 

Homeless advocate Paul Kealoha-Blake remembers Liberty City well, and sees the WDWG camps as a testament to the importance of both advocacy and visibility when occupying public spaces.

“[The city was] still having city hall meetings here at that time,” he told Street Spirit, “so once a week the city council had to crawl over the encampment there and witness this. And personally, that’s what I want people to do. I want them to witness the results of [the encampment policy]. Where do we go? Right here! We aren’t going any further. This is it.”

But the needs of unhoused residents of Berkeley extend beyond its downtown radius. According to Henson, 25–30 people have set up tents at the Old City Hall encampment over the past few weeks, and she estimates close to 100 people are stopping by daily to take advantage of food distribution, the camp’s free store, or simply to use the porta-potties WDWG has placed at the site.

“At our protest encampment at Old City Hall, we’ve had so many people come through who don’t have tents, who are tucked away in spaces you would never know, that you don’t know are homeless. They are carrying a backpack and staying close to services downtown. There are so many people and so much need in downtown Berkeley right now.”

With encampment closures planned in the near future, WDWG has been spurred into further action. 

On October 23, organizers and a number of unhoused residents packed up a portion of the Old City Hall camp and moved to Ohlone Park at the corner of Hearst Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Way, stating on their Instagram account that the newest occupation is “a direct response to Berkeley city employees announcing an imminent sweep of 2nd and Page St. in approximately 3 weeks.” The statement ends with a warning to the city: if any of the protest encampments are met with “retaliation,” WDWG will “push further into the hills of North Berkeley.”

Henson believes that the continued occupation of new spaces will empower Berkeley’s unhoused residents to build community and solidarity in support of their rights through the post-Grants Pass era.

“We’re staying nomadic [because] that’s what experiencing homelessness is. If you can be nowhere legally, then you must be everywhere. It’s not a protest where we settle into one space. To provide access, to provide safety, to provide awareness, we move…People need to see there’s nowhere to go.”