THE “SAFE PARKING” site established by San Francisco’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing for people living in their vehicles has generated intense controversy since its opening in January 2022, and drama at the site continues unabated.
The latest episode came Tuesday when Urban Alchemy, the controversial nonprofit that operates the Bayview Vehicle Triage Center under contract with HSH, convened a hearing to “deny service” for 30 days to a resident who was written-up for making audio and video recordings of staff without their consent.
The resident, Ramona Mayon, has lived at the VTC for the last 21 months in her 27-foot 1996 Gulfstream RV. She is a writer and blogger and has written extensively — usually critically — about conditions at the site.
She was given a total of six warnings between May 8 and 17 that said she violated site Rule 2e that forbids “Use of photography, video or audio recording on site that includes other clients or staff without their permission.” The penalty was that she would have to leave the site for 30 days, though how that would work given that her RV is not operable, was not explained.
She requested a hearing under the city’s shelter grievance policy so she could explain that she has been gathering evidence that Urban Alchemy and the others involved with the site have violated federal, state, and city laws. She intended to present her argument that the First Amendment overrides Rule 2e and allows her to record staff members as a way to gather evidence of their wrongdoing at the site.
As provided in the grievance policy, Mayon requested the assistance of a “Shelter Advocate,” a city-provided independent who can speak for a shelter resident who is being denied service. Because denials of service “may result in an unhoused individual losing the individual’s place in the shelter, often exiting back to the street,” the grievance policy looks to remedy a violation in a way that that will allow a resident to remain at the site.
The hearing was to be held at the VTC but when the time came to begin, staff members of Urban Alchemy refused to let the shelter advocate into the site and insisted that the hearing had to be held outside of the shelter entrance gates.
Meanwhile Mayon waited in the main part of the site near a picnic table in the sun with her principal witness, Kelly Hughs, and a number of site residents who were there to observe the hearing.
Both Mayon, 63, and Hughs, 54, are disabled. Hughs uses a wheelchair for mobility. Mayon has cancer and was on hospice care for a year.
Urban Alchemy staff proposed to drive Mayon and Hughs in the staff golf cart to the other side of the entrance gate where they would conduct the hearing in the asphalt driveway in the sun, presumably with Mayon and Hughs sitting in the golf cart.
Mayon insisted that the hearing be held on the site. She was worried that if she and Hughs left the facility, they would be locked out and could not get back to their RVs.
For more than 30 minutes, Urban Alchemy personnel conferred at the front gate with the advocate. Finally, Urban Alchemy said the hearing could be on site but insisted it had to be in a tiny trailer space that could only accommodate Mayon, Hughs and the advocate.
Mayon did not want to go into the trailer where the other residents could not observe the hearing. She wanted witnesses and she had previously been advised that media could not attend. (Bay City News unsuccessfully requested access to the site to observe.)
Urban Alchemy staff told Mayon that if she did not agree to the trailer, they would list her as a “no-show,” which would mean that the denial of service would be resolved against her and she would have no right to appeal.
She relented.
The trailer had a small conference table that accommodated 4 people. Mayon and the advocate sat on one side of the table.
Two people from Urban Academy sat at the table. One identified himself as Dwight and said he was a “director” from 711 Post. He introduced Danielle as a “co-director” at 711 Post. 711 Post is another shelter operated by Urban Alchemy under contract with HSH. The grievance policy requires “impartial hearing officer.”
Hughs could not get all the way into the room in her wheelchair, so she stayed in the doorway.
The hearing lasted less than 10 minutes. According to Mayon, she began to make a statement about how the conditions of the site violate the law and city policy. After she spoke for a few minutes the Urban Alchemy staff cut her off and rose to leave the room to make their decision. Hughs asked if she could speak. They said she could only discuss the issue of recording on site.
Hughs began to speak. “I went on to tell (them) about why she’s filming, why we don’t feel safe here. And then they said, oh, it has nothing to do with that. And they just walked out so they wouldn’t even hear my side or hear anything that had to do with their reasoning for (the filming).”
The Urban Alchemy people left the trailer and returned in a few minutes to say that they would uphold the denial of service.
Mayon then requested an arbitration proceeding as provided in the grievance policy.
Mayon hopes that a neutral arbitrator — not an employee of the people she believes to be violating the law — will recognize that she has a constitutional right to gather evidence. She also plans to show that the denial of service is in retaliation for her advocacy for improved conditions at the site. She says that she is protected by the city’s anti-retaliation laws.
The reluctant rabble-rouser
Mayon has lived in a vehicle — either a school bus or RV — for most of her adult life. Her RV is her home and she loves it with a passion.
She is the author of several books on the nomadic lifestyle. Her life as a vehicle dweller and writer was profiled in May 2023 in Local News Matters.
She is not a lawyer, but reads the law and she is the author of The Vehicle Dwellers’ Legal Primer.
If the VTC were a jail, she would be a jailhouse lawyer.
While San Francisco considers living in a vehicle to be “unsheltered homelessness,” Mayon never considered herself homeless during the many years that she lived in her RV. However, when her RV broke and she could not afford the repairs, everything changed.
In August 2022, her immobile RV was out at Ocean Beach. During a city “sweep” of an encampment, city workers said that if she would agree to let them tow her RV to the VTC, the city would repair her vehicle and get her back on the road.
She did not trust the officials but she was fearful that if she said no, the city would impound her RV (in other words, take away her home and all her belongings) and she would never be able to get it back. She ultimately agreed to be towed, but vowed she would document whether the city followed through on their promises.
Mayon would say that even though she is a rabble-rouser, she is a reluctant rabble-rouser. Her default mode is calm, friendly and logical. But when she is provoked, she has a sharp tongue. And if her tongue is sharp, her pen is sharper.
Her favorite quote is from the French philosopher Voltaire, “To hold a pen is to be at war.”
She started to write about the site conditions.
She created a website that greets the visitor with the words “Welcome to Camp Dismal.” The website documents the city’s failures and mismanagement in 17 separate sections including, “Bleak, Toxic Location” (describing proximity to a superfund site and violations of Maher Ordinance), “No Electricity” (covering the city’s 2-year failure to arrange promised electric service), and “Rat Problem” (documenting rat infestation throughout the site).
Mayon describes herself as a reluctant rabble-rouser. Her default mode is calm, friendly and logical. But when provoked, she has a sharp tongue. And if her tongue is sharp, her pen is sharper.
Mayon considers herself to be a documentarian, and the website is chock-a-block with photos, official documents, maps, screen shots, and videos that illustrate her points.
But in January 2024 — 16 months after being towed to the VTC — Mayon’s exasperation with the city’s management of the site and its ongoing failure to fulfill its promises (especially the promise to repair her vehicle), boiled over. She decided to organize the VTC residents into forming a union to negotiate with the city over site conditions.
She obtained signatures from a majority of VTC residents and prepared a petition for the group to be recognized as a tenants’ union or association under a provision in the San Francisco Code. Anticipating that the city would not accept the union’s legitimacy, she filed a lawsuit on Jan. 26 in the San Francisco Superior Court requesting the court declare residents had the rights of tenants under the state Welfare and Institutions Code.
In the petition, the group — called the “Candlestick 35” in reference to the number of approved slots for parking at the site — presented a list of 19 issues that it sought to address followed by 31 specific “demands.” Most of the demands were concrete and practical, for example, that the staff wear nametags so they could be identified, and that the VTC provide Wi-Fi and arrange an address where they can receive mail. Others are more far-reaching (“Stop digging and any industrial level disturbance of the air in this toxic location.”)
Mayon said that she hoped the organizing efforts would make the city understand residents of the VTC have the same rights that other tenants are given under California law.
HSH quickly brushed off the organizing activity saying that the residents of the VTC were not tenants and did not have any housing rights. The city’s lawyers moved to dismiss her lawsuit. (The matter is pending.)
But the formation of a union empowered residents who had not spoken up before to become advocates for change.
While Mayon was blogging about the site conditions, Hughs was also challenging the way the site was being operated.
Hughs was in a car accident a few years ago and broke her leg. Surgery wasn’t fully successful, and she cannot walk or stand for extended periods. She needs to use a wheelchair for mobility.
Like Mayon, Hughs never considered herself homeless. She had given up her apartment and was living in her RV in San Francisco while finishing the medical treatments she needed for her leg. She viewed herself lucky to get into the VTC where she would not have to worry about getting towed or getting tickets.
Once she arrived she found the conditions abysmal. The showers she had been told would be at the site were not ADA compliant so she could not use them. There was no electricity and no heat. She did not feel safe. There was an Urban Alchemy staff member who she said was “verbally abusing people, physically abusing people.”
She filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Affairs and, according to Hughs, in January a HUD investigator began to evaluate the site. Hughs says the ongoing investigation is focused on ADA issues.
Site improvements
Between the union organizing and the HUD investigation, it seemed to Mayon and Hughs as if progress was being made.
The city rented large portable batteries that provided power for 8 hours a day. A pilot program was initiated at the VTC to provide repairs to people living in their vehicles and give assistance with delinquent registration and unpaid tickets. (Both of these things had been underway for months, but their arrival seemed to create positive momentum.)
The city pumped out the floodwaters that closed Hunters Point Expressway and cleaned the accumulated trash at the entrance to the facility.
A long promised “dog park” was opened.
Notwithstanding the improvements, Mayon, Hughs, and other residents continued to advocate for better site conditions. They challenged the slow pace and inconsistency of the rolling out of the vehicle repair pilot. They raised ADA violations. They called out the rat infestation.
What caused the blizzard of warning notices that staff gave Mayon between May 8th and 17th is not clear.
According to Ramon, it was an incorrect statement made at a community meeting at the site on May 8 by an HHS representative.
The meeting was held in an area of the VTC that was not accessible to a person in a wheelchair. Mayon told the representative that Hughs could not attend because she couldn’t get over the curb and she did not want to be carried. Mayon said that the ADA required the site be accessible.
The representative allegedly said that the ADA does not apply because the VTC is not on federal land.
Mayon recorded the statement and, according to Mayon, the recording ultimately made its way to the HUD inspector.
Thereafter, Mayon began to be written-up.
The fact that she was making tapes before that point was no secret. She taped an interaction on Feb. 9, 2024, with an Urban Alchemy staff member where she explicitly explained that she was making recordings of public official visiting the site and was entitled to do so.
Mayon has not yet received the written denial of service but she is committed to pressing her case forward in arbitration. Under the grievance policy she is entitled to remain at the site while the case moves ahead.
She notes that a number of federal appeals courts have recognized that both reporters and members of the public have the right to video public officials performing their duties on public property. She points out that citizens routinely use their phones to record police and other officials interacting with the public.
She argues that contractors like Urban Alchemy work on behalf of the city and are subject to the same rules as would apply to HSH if it performed the services itself. Her recording was on public property and outdoors.
Mayon notes that overhead “video surveillance cameras” are trained on the VTC. She says that the surveillance cameras show there is no expectation of privacy in the outdoor areas where she has taped.
She has done research on Urban Alchemy and the large contracts it has obtained in San Francisco and elsewhere. She collects information about complaints against its operation of other sites.
She has posted a large sign on her RV that warns staff she is recording.
She thinks recording is “what breaks the chain … of how they put this abuse on top of people.”
“If people like me … can film, they will have to change this.”