Homeless Bill of Rights falls short for houseless

While supporters of HB1889 believe that it would help extend compassion and aloha to houseless Honolulu citizens, some of those very citizens that showed up at Tuesday’s Senate Committee on Human Services (HMS) hearing believe that, in fact, it is too little, too late.

“A homeless bill of rights is demeaning, in-and-of-itself, and disgusting,” said Michael Daly, a Waikiki street artist and houseless advocate who was, himself, houseless at one point. “A bill on homeless rights shouldn’t just reiterate human rights. It should identify what makes homeless people special and unusual as a group and give them particular rights and protections that address their situation properly.”

“I think it’s sad that we even feel we need this bill,” agreed Daniel Bishop, a veteran who is currently homeless. “How did I become a second-class citizen? How did I go from being born in this country with rights given to me at birth, to suddenly having to do this? I think it’s insulting in so many ways, to serve this country and have this happen. I have to have this? Really?”

The committee, chaired by Sen. Suzanne Chun Oakland, passed the bill (3-0, Sen. Chun Oakland, Josh Green and Brian Taniguchi present; Sens. Sam Slom, Michelle Kidani excused), despite the negative testimony.

“I have serious reservations about this bill,” said D’Angelo McIntyre. “I don’t think it goes far enough in protecting people from the current draconian [City] Bill 7. I believe there needs to be a freedom from laws financially punishing people for being homeless … I’m already poor. The last thing I need you to do is take money from me, especially if I’m trying to save up to get off the streets.”

Most of those who testified in opposition expressed that the bill is at least a step in the right direction, but Daly believes the bill is both “dangerous” and “too slow.”

“Once a bill like this gets passed, I think it becomes more of a problem than a solution,” Daly told the Independent after the hearing. “It becomes an institutional block that never changes. It’s like what happened with health care, nationally. It was supposed to be universal, but it was slowly whittled away to just being another instrument that actually prevents true change. Here was a real opportunity to take the city on, but it was missed.”

Daly said he also believes the bill should include the text from the Kānāwai Māmalahoe, or Law of the Splintered Paddle, along with protections for free speech and expression, freedom from unlawful search and seizure, the right to “habitat” and the right of “stay.” Instead, he says, it coincides much too nicely with the city’s policy toward the houseless.

“The bill doesn’t protect your things from being taken,” Daly said. “The whole point is that homeless people are in a special category, yet the bill doesn’t include anything about Kānāwai Māmalahoe, which makes me feel like they’re deliberately trying to bury it. Here is the perfect opportunity to bring it up. It would fit perfectly. So when that’s not in there, alarm bells start to ring for me.

Laulani Teale, the director of the Ho`opaipono Peace Project, supported the bill, but agreed that Kānāwai Māmalahoe and other indigenous people’s rights should be included in the bill.

“While there should be constitutional protections for these rights already, what we’ve seen in practice is that they’re not being upheld in the field, simply because the situation is so difficult,” she said. “The establishment of specific criteria that protect those human rights should align with our deeper principles, such as Kānāwai Māmalahoe … And with the great number of Kanaka Maoli that are among the houseless population, a measure like this is very, very important to native Hawaiians too.”

H. Doug Matsuoka, the leader of Hawaii Guerilla Video Hui, which has been documenting the deOccupy movement and houseless community for several years, was hopeful about the bill.

“Because this is an election year, I think this bill has the potential to point both political policy and candidates toward finding a solution that accommodates civil rights rather than erodes them,” he said.

Congressional hopeful Kathryn Xian also testified in support of the bill. The Independent asked what she thought about the criticism the bill received from houseless people. Kris Coffield, Xian’s Campaign Manager sent the Independent a prepared statement in response:

“Kathryn agrees that more must be done to protect the houseless. This bill marks a groundbreaking first step, however, in remedying broader concerns by establishing a baseline against which policies addressing homelessness can be judged. At the Senate Committee on Judiciary and Labor hearing, Kathryn and other advocates will request amendments to enact civil remedies for homeless persons whose rights are violated and an expanded right to use public space. Future actions, including legislative proposals, will increase protections for the houseless against illegal search and seizure, property rights violations, law enforcement abuses and anti-homeless violence.”

The committee, along with Sen. Green’s Committee on Health and Sen. Clarence Nishihara’s Committee on Agriculture, heard a number of other bills related to housing, aging, foster care services, allowing child day care homes on ag land, and a tax credit for businesses that hire people with disabilities.

Michael Tada, a frequent testifier at hearings related to deOccupy, the houseless, and people with disabilities, and who is, himself, disabled, made a similar argument against the tax credit bill (HB2478) as Daly’s argument against HB1889.

“I don’t want people to hire me because they’d get a tax credit,” he said. “I want people to hire me because they believe in me; because they believe that I can do a job. It’s simply human decency.”

Most of the bills were passed with minor amendments or deferred until this Thursday at 1:15 p.m. to allow Sen. Chun Oakland’s committee to work on problematic sections of language. HB1889 goes before the Senate Committee on Judiciary and Labor, chaired by Sen. Clayton Hee, next.

“We need to recognize that there is an epidemic of homelessness and that this is an emergency situation,” Daly concluded. “The people who are homeless are in a state of emergency. It’s time we started treating the situation accordingly.”