SCU Unhoused Initiative

UI Student Researcher Featured in KQED Article

UI Student Researcher, Kaylee Jensen, ’27

This week, KQED published an article highlighting food insecurity among college students. The article, titled “Food Insecurity on Campus: How SNAP is a ‘Lifeline’ For Many Students,” features Unhoused Initiative Student Researcher, Kaylee Jensen. In the article, Kaylee reflects on her experience accessing and utilizing SNAP benefits (also known as CalFRESH) while attending SCU. Kaylee describes having to balance affording rent, food and other basic needs all while keeping up with her coursework. Staff from SCU’s Basic Needs Office assisted Kaylee with filing for SNAP benefits and, according to Kaylee, the difference was like “‘night and day.'”

Kaylee is not alone. According to the article over 400,000 public college and university students access CalFRESH benefits; however, college students are often overlooked in the discussion of public benefit recipients and those facing deficits in their basic needs. It can also be a hidden issue or source of shame for those needing help. SCU is no different. According to the annual Assessment of Food Security and Basic Needs at Santa Clara University study, SCU students face food insecurity and struggle to meet other basic needs like housing, The most recent survey results found that nearly 30% of respondents faced food insecurity and one-quarter faced housing insecurity.

SCU’s Basic Needs Program is available to help students access resources and help them meet their needs. The Basic Needs Office hosts a food pantry, benefits application assistance, emergency financial assistance, and connection to other resources. Marlene Bennett, Project Director of the Unhoused Initiative is proud to serve on the Basic Needs Committee and support its work, particularly around issues of student housing insecurity. If you are an SCU student and need assistance with food, rent, health insurance, technology access or transportation, please visit the Basic Needs website and complete the linked intake form.

No one should go hungry. Everyone deserves to have their basic needs met. We applaud Kaylee for sharing her experience with KQED and shining a light on an issue that need not remain in the shadows.

SCU Unhoused Initiative

Honoring Our Unhoused Neighbors

On November 18 and 19, the Unhoused Initiative hosted an outdoor art display of the Tombstone Memorial for our unhoused neighbors who died on the street in Santa Clara County this year. Each year, local activist, Shaunn Cartwright, makes a tombstone for each person who died while homeless in the County. A representative sample of the current 195 deaths this year (as of Nov. 18, 2024) were on the Kenna/Benson lawn to raise awareness on campus about homelessness and homeless mortality. It was also an opportunity to acknowledge the 10th anniversary of the sweep of The Jungle in San Jose – one of the largest encampments in the country at the time.

A noontime panel complemented the tombstone display. The panel discussed homeless mortality and the health and safety impacts of encampment sweeps. It was also a reflection on the sweep of the Jungle in 2014 and the community that resided there. Panelists included Shaunn Cartwright, creator of the Tombstone Memorial project, Robert Aguirre, member of the Gilroy Homeless Union, Todd Langton, Executive Director of Agape Silicon Valley, and Unhoused Initiative faculty member, Professor Boo Riley. The panel was the first in a year-long series examining encampment sweeps, past, present and future.

Click here for more information about the Tombstone Memorial, the Jungle, and our panelists.

SCU Unhoused Initiative

Challenge to Martin v. Boise heads to the Supreme Court

Since the 2018 Ninth Circuit decision in Martin v. Boise, west coast cities have been barred from prohibiting sleeping in public spaces when adequate shelter is not available for their unhoused residents. The Court found that criminalizing camping on public property is cruel and unusual punishment, in violation of the 8th Amendment, when there is nowhere for the people in question to legally sleep. Earlier in January, the Supreme Court of the United States agreed to hear City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Gloria Johnson, et. al. and is expected to provide opinion on whether cities can legally ban or limit camping in public spaces by people experiencing homelessness.

According to a recent CalMatters article, The Boise decision has frustrated lawmakers who claim the ruling prevents them from limiting the spread of encampments and from conducting sweeps they say are necessary for health and safety. Advocates for the unhoused, on the other hand, argue that legislators are overreacting and that the Boise case does not prevent them from regulating encampments. Advocates also feel that the Boise decision is clear and municipalities cannot ban sleeping outside when adequate shelter does not exist for people experiencing homelessness.

As reported by CalMatters, since the Boise decision, subsequent court decisions have resulted in “a patchwork of interpretation across [California] on what qualifies as the ‘adequate shelter’ cities must provide before sweeping homeless camps.” The Grants Pass case could provide some clarity on this issue as well as other questions about the limits of Boise. For example, can cities impose time or location restrictions on sleeping outside; whether a City must have adequate shelter available for every unhoused person no matter what or only on days of a sweep; and, whether cities can criminalize sleeping in public spaces for those who refuse to accept the shelter offered to them.

As quoted in CalMatters, Berkeley law professor Jeffrey Selbin predicts that the Supreme Court will not try to “micromanage” the situation. Instead, he predicts the conservative majority Court will overturn the 2018 Boise decision, thereby permitting cities to widely criminalize encampments.

The Unhoused Initiative will be monitoring this case as it progresses at the Supreme Court and will report any updates as they are released.

SCU Unhoused Initiative

The Unhoused Initiative’s David DeCosse publishes opinion piece for the National Catholic Reporter.

David DeCosse

Unhoused Initiative faculty, David DeCosse, published an opinion piece titled “Homelessness crisis shows our country needs a new national story” in the January 2, 2024 edition of the National Catholic Reporter. The article reflects upon the prayer of St. Vincent DePaul – “It is only for your love that the poor will forgive you the bread that you give them” – and its significance in our collective response to the homelessness crisis.

Examining data and stories from the recent California Statewide Study of People Experiencing Homelessness, the piece introduces readers to the realities of California’s homelessness crisis, and follows the prompt of Matthew Desmond’s recent article by challenging us to ask “Who benefits?” from the status quo of housing and homelessness in California. Rather than asking questions of why people experiencing homelessness don’t do something to change their station, we should ask ourselves who benefits from zoning laws or tax breaks that benefit single family homes and limit our supply of available affordable housing.

DeCosse suggests that we rewrite the stories that we tell ourselves to explain the homelessness crisis. Instead of stories of triumph despite adversity and looking for others to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, “we need a new story,” says DeCosse, “in which we are bound in love and justice to the tens of thousands of persons living and dying on our streets.”
Read the full article here.