The California Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign

“We have the techniques and resources to get rid of poverty.  The real question is whether we have the will.”
-Martin Luther King Jr.

RECLAIMING THE RIGHT TO HOUSING

In the first eight months of 2008, more than 180,000 properties were foreclosed in California.   This comes in a state that already has an estimated 361,000 homeless people.  These harrowing facts around poverty and housing in the Golden State are just the beginning of what San Jose’s Community Homeless Alliance Ministry (CHAM) fights against daily.  On October 25, 2008, CHAM hosted a diverse array of community organizations and low-income and poor people from the greater Bay Area to discuss, rally, and create solutions around “Reclaiming the Right to Housing”.  CHAM is a prominent member of the California arm of the national Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign (PPEHRC) and focuses their energy on lifting the smothering blanket of silence around homelessness and extreme poverty.

After inspirational songs and opening comments from Pastor Scott Wagers, several people testified about how a lack of affordable and quality housing has harshly affected their lives, including a young undocumented college student who explained how her family lost their housing in order to pay for her education. Others discussed how they work two full time jobs but still cannot afford a home for their family, how a broken marriage can lead to homelessness, and numerous other horror stories.  The audience then broke up into small groups to discuss active solutions, including building the housing movement, becoming a legislative advocate, and inclusionary zoning. 

The event ended with a panel discussion of community housing and homelessness experts, who connected the dialogue throughout the day together with the same root cause: the profit of big business being put over the well being of the individual and community.  Everyone agreed that the rampant commodification of housing is behind the recent economic crisis and that we must come to view housing as a basic human right along with water, food, health care, living wage jobs, and education.  People left knowing that in order to guarantee housing as a human right for ALL, we must fight for housing to be socially, rather than privately, owned in the interest of the people.


WHAT IS THE CA PPEHRC?

The Reclaiming the Right to Housing event is just one example of what the CA PPEHRC is all about: uniting across color and class lines in order to build a broad movement to abolish poverty. Over the last decade, the Women’s Economic Agenda Project (WEAP) has worked alongside CHAM, St. Mary's, Journey for Justice, organized labor, and others in building local Poor People's Economic Human Rights Committees throughout California. PPEHRC’s vision of a world without poverty, where people are valued for their contributions regardless of their income, has touched the imagination of political activists, students, working people, unions, and churches alike in this unique campaign led by poor people.

March

March for our Lives – Sacramento 2004- CHAM leaders, including Sister Adrienne Lawton and Pastor Scott Wages.

Examples of other CA PPEHRC events include organized Freedom Bus Tours, marches, economic human rights tribunals, and Just Health Care trainings.  The primary goal is always to create spaces that enable people to come together for dialogue and action. The statewide Freedom Bus Tour (2000), the March for Compassion and Spiritual Renewal (2001), the March for Our Lives (2004), and the Truth Commissions on the Health Care Crisis (2006 & 2008) are just a few specific examples of how WEAP, and CA PPEHRC affiliates, have provided special opportunities to teach about our economic human rights and to establish human rights monitors throughout California. The CA PPEHRC has also collected the documentation of human rights violations of thousands throughout California.  You can document health care violations to your human rights right now by taking our new on-line health care survey here.


PPEHRC’S HUMAN RIGHTS HISTORY

PPEHRC was launched in 1998 after U.S. politicians began destroying social safety net services under the pretense of “welfare reform”. The Pennsylvania-based Kensington Welfare Rights Union brought together more than 50 organizations from around the country to form the national Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign.  The Campaign picks up where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. left off when he shifted his focus from civil rights to economic rights the year before his Poor People's Campaign of 1968.  PPEHRC’s Economic Human Rights Campaign is also rooted in the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights, particularly articles 19, 23, 25 and 26.  Article 25 is one of the most comprehensive, stating:

Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.

These documents, endorsed by the United States, set international human rights guidelines for meeting basic needs.  PPEHRC is always striving to advance people’s economic human rights, including food, housing, health care, education, communication, and a living wage job.  In 1998, PPEHRC conducted the first New Freedom Bus Tour: Freedom from Unemployment, Hunger and Homelessness.  In October 1999, PPEHRC joined with poor and homeless people from across the Americas and marched from Washington, D.C. to the United Nations in New York City and submitted a petition to the United Nations charging that welfare reform is a violation of our human rights.  Since then, dozens of organizations have joined.  We encourage you to join by embracing the PPEHRC mission and endorsing or forming a committee in your home town.

United we can win the hearts and minds of the American people, so that no man, woman, or child ever goes without food, shelter, clothing, medical care, treatment for addiction, education, or a living wage.

WEAP and CHAM members leading a teach-in on Health Care: A Human RIght at the 2008 March for our Lives' Bushville in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Credit: Heather McLaughlin


WHAT DOES A PPEHRC COMMITTEE DO?

  • Collect documentation of Economic Human Rights Violations.  This documentation is essential to the growth of our awareness that these rights are violated daily. Through documentation, we not only collect evidence of violations but we also educate those around us on their rights as spelled out in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
  • Frame your local battles in terms of economic human rights.  If you are engaged in local battles over housing, health care, a living wage, or any other economic human rights issue, link it to the broader movement to end poverty in the US. This wider vision keeps us clear on our long-term goals as we engage in our local battles. This way we can articulate what we are for not only what we are fighting against.
  • Protest that poverty is an economic human rights violation.  We need to let people know that they are not alone.  Protesting is a fundamental way to convey that message. We must join together because we know that we will only get what we are organized to take.
  • Get to know the Campaigns for Economic Justice.  Sponsor and organize a "Just Health Care" training or one on Free Higher Education, a Living Wage, or Housing as a Human Right. These campaigns not only assess the problem, but also offer workable solutions to poor and working people's problems.
  • Educate about economic human rights. We need to refocus our goal from managing poverty to eliminating poverty. The more we know about our world the more effective Freedom Fighters we will become. Form your own education group for internal and external education.

Keep up with these websites and contact members of the Campaign to learn more:

www.weap.org
www.cham-ministry.org
www.economichumanrights.org
www.universityofthepoor.org
www.un.org/Overview/rights.html