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Adapted from a story a friend told on Sunday
 

A couple of years ago, the homeless colonized a forgotten pile of concrete rubble and twisted steel girders extending into the San Francisco Bay near Albany. A community blossomed overnight. Cardboard, chipboard, plywood, plastic tarp, vinyl siding, and corrugated steel were stitched together into houses. They were flimsy and didn't entirely protect against the rain or fog, but they were homes at a time when $350,000 bought access to the bottom of the market.
 

It should have been a slum, the kind that forms in the hidden and forgotten places at the edge of any city: dangerous, decrepit, desperate. But by all accounts it was an artistic mecca where every possible surface bore paint, where driftwood and junk wire were woven into statues. A stable, self-regulating culture emerged in which it was understood that "we're in this together." While a far cry from utopia, this marginal city of the no-longer-homeless functioned apart from the rest of the Bay Area which surrounded it.
 

Like all urban fairy tales, this one comes to a crashing end. After a year or two, the police appeared and gave the 'residents' a week to disperse, citing among many things the concern for 'public safety' and the fact that the rubbled heap was technically part of the national park system, and therefore habitations were outlawed. A week later, bulldozers crushed the makeshift shelters and myriad works of art, once again rendering homeless the homeless.
 

It's a poignant story that neatly encapsulates so many of the tensions in the Bay Area. Impossibly beautiful and vibrant flare-ups of creativity and human expression are quenched by the need for order. Yet this multihued, shifting, unpredictable underbelly is what makes us special and better -- or so we fancy.
 

There was a recent documentary exploring and honoring this short-lived Albany bay community. An informal group formed to screen the video on Saturday night at the site where the community had been. They posted a few fliers and sent a few emails, one of which I received. I thought, "wow, that would be really amazing. ^[1] I'd love to see this powerful video with other people who feel the same way I do." I walked the mile and a half from my house towards the Bay as the sun was setting, marveling at the place where we live.
 

There were six squad cars lined up at the bottom of Buchannan St. "My God, has there been a chemical spill on 880?" I thought to myself. I ran up to an officer and asked what was happening. Meanwhile, cars kept pulling off the Buchannan off-ramp, only to roll towards the police line and do a U-turn.
 

"We're here to prevent a large-scale unpermitted gathering that will take place place this evening on National Park lands."
 

"Oh, my," I said, envisioning hooligans having a wild party. I hoped this wouldn't get in the way of the video screening. "What areas do you have blocked off?"
 

"We're focusing on the area of parkland that juts into the water."
 

Wait... this was about us? About a few people gathering to watch a movie on a slab of abandoned concrete, to honor a time when the slab of concrete meant something? It was just ridiculous.
 

"But, why? I mean, why do you care?"
 

"Public safety." Public safety. I've never liked that term. Whose safety, and why is there a threat?
 

"Er, how many people do you think would have come?"
 

"Well, we think we're going to turn away about 300 people tonight." I turned to stare at the line of cars which kept pulling up and turning around, only then noticing that the passengers were people a lot like me. There were lots of folks showing up on foot or bicycle, too. It was just beautiful to see the turnout, like a migration to the bay.
 

Well, I said goodbye to the officers and looped around, thinking that I could sneak up to the jetty and make the screening. But the police had sealed the area pretty tightly.
 

The announcement had said to come on May 24th, but in the event of rain to come the next night, and if it's still raining the night after that, and so on. Well, I plan on walking back tomorrow night. If the police are still there, I'll go again the next night. And I'll keep going until the day the police are no longer there.
 

mwirth: What an interesting story. Sounds like some more publicity would be good- hopefully the police provided some, actually. If the right people could find out about that documentary, I'm sure a legal venue could be found to show it. david_a: Thanks for posting this. In a former life, I worked with (young) homeless people -- street kids. I know the situation is complex, but this demolition of a tiny subculture seems like a tragedy, and you've expressed this without hyperbole or polemics. I really love the ending, quiet and resolved. Hissy fits no longer work in these situations (if they ever did). samira: Very interesting. I would be curious to see the documentary, and also to know what Sarah Scheckter thinks or knows about the group, because they remind me of the KWRU, with which she worked and about which I have always had a bunch of concerns. Supression of information aside, what do people think of squatting, creative or otherwise? Does the success of the community justify its existance? What if it had not been as successful? Does a sociaety who has largely created the problem of homelessness have the right to deprive people of the homes that they have found and created, abeit illegally? Add comment