H I S T O R Y
"We, today, stand on the shoulders of our predecessors who have gone before us. We, as their successors, must catch the torch of freedom and liberty passed on to us by our ancestors. We cannot lose this battle."
- Benjamin E. Mays
EARLY DAYS
Homies Organizing the Mission to Empower Youth (HOMEY) is an organization that has made various noteworthy contributions to San Francisco. Since its development, HOMEY has shaped ongoing violence prevention work in San Francisco. HOMEY is an illustration of a resilient and effective community empowerment organization. Our staff continue to shape local policy and conduct the daily work of training and inspiring the next generation of community leaders.
When HOMEY began in 1997-1999, it was formed by a group of youth mostly between the ages of 17 to 20 years old who were active gang members, formerly incarcerated youth, organizers, and community members interested in combating mass incarceration and youth violence. They forged a path of organizing in San Francisco’s Mission District to combat youth incarceration and anti-immigrant legislation that was being propelled at the Latinx community during that period. HOMEY immediately began organizing with many other groups around California to stop Proposition 21 (Treatment of Juvenile Offenders, 2001). HOMEY centered its work in locally, but built a statewide and a national network. HOMEY engaged in early anti-gentrification work and joined many campaigns that focused on juvenile justice and transformative change work for youth.
CREATING PEACE
Since that time, HOMEY fought to bring youth in rival gangs together and found ways to bridge peace. Many former gang members from different neighborhoods worked together at HOMEY and for the first time in a generation, small peace accords formed within the organization. A philosophy of serving any person who came to HOMEY, despite neighborhood affiliation, remains today. This is significant due to the fact that some violence prevention programs still do not serve all those who walk into their doors because of neighborhood divisions. HOMEY became well-known for its position of work with youth and young adults on all sides of barrio warfare. Our neutrality is what set HOMEY apart from other organizations in the Mission District and San Francisco.
NATIVE GRAPHIX
Since its launch in 2004, an integral part of HOMEY focused on business development by providing grants and micro-loans to community members who were having trouble getting loans from banks. The goal was to: 1) create community self-sufficiency, and 2) to fully fund HOMEY without need of government and foundation support. This initiative was able to help start several businesses many that are still running today including HOMEY’s own social enterprise Native Graphix, a screen printing shop that has employed and trained hundreds of youth over its 10 years in business. Our social enterprise became a local model. Today, people from around the country come to visit HOMEY and Native Graphix and use what has been created here as a model for their programs.
In 2005-06, HOMEY organizers were clearly aware of the school to prison pipeline, the achievement gap, and the correlation between school suspensions and expulsions and eventual incarceration and in some cases premature death. So, HOMEY began a controversial campaign on school suspensions and expulsions in 2007-09 at Mission High School. Accurate assessments early on by HOMEY leadership saw suspension and expulsions for young African-American and Latino youth as a critical issue for the community that still drives some of the organizations work to this day. In addition, HOMEY spearheaded a campaign against a civil gang injunction that also occurred during that period.
In 2007-09, HOMEY focus on the civil gang injunction issue garnered national attention and heavy criticism by local elected officials. HOMEY worked strongly on this campaign and had a tremendous impact on how gang injunctions were implemented in our city. The campaign was able to establish a comprehensive exit component to San Francisco’s civil injunction whereas other injunctions in other parts of the county were lifelong blacklists for being gang affiliated youth without any way of exiting these injunctions. Although, HOMEY did not win the campaign of not utilizing gang injunctions in San Francisco, its impact on the community was felt.
BACKLASH AND RECESSION
In 2010-11, HOMEY like many other organizations felt a strong backlash and challenges in the community in regard to funding for its advocacy work. In addition, HOMEY felt the sting of the recession as foundations shifted their focus from violence prevention and organizing to direct services and evidence-based practices. As a result, HOMEY lost almost 50% of its funding and was at risk of closing for the first time in a decade. Internally, the organization’s founders, staff, and stakeholders were conflicted as to HOMEY’s next steps. Many wanted to continue to organizing and close the organization entirely if necessary, yet others wanted to continue HOMEY and focus on direct service and programming. Many called for a name change because HOMEY was shifting its focus and changing its leadership. It was a difficult moment at the organization and there were more questions than answers at that time. Ultimately, many staff decided to leave HOMEY and others stayed to continue its work. Although, it was a hard period of time for many at the agency, HOMEY was steadfast and continued on.
CHANGE IN DIRECTION
In 2011, HOMEY had a programmatic shift and began to build major programs internally to primarily focus on educational achievement and cultural education. HOMEY focused on high dropout rates amongst Latino/a youth in San Francisco Unified School District as it was reported that almost 98% of youth who were victims of gun violence were high school dropouts at that time. Meanwhile, we began to see the first signs of a second dot-com boom and rapid gentrification in the Mission District, and in the midst of economic change HOMEY remained true to its mission and vision. It also began to focus efforts on how to prepare youth in the midst of changing community demographics, economy, and housing disparity that has tremendously impacted the Mission District in particular.
HOMEY continued to deliver direct service to youth and young adults in half a dozen high schools to ensure that youth began graduating. After several years working weekly in local high schools and building relationships with local colleges and universities HOMEY created its soft pipeline to college for its participants. In 2014, it received it first award by the Latino Community Foundation for its work assisting youth with educational success. HOMEY’s work shifted some of its focus from the street to schools. The goal was to use education as a tool to reduce violence and the rates of incarceration and premature death by youth.
In 2015, HOMEY did not slow down its pace. The agency began a new program called IMPACT, which was to teaching soft workforce skills out of San Francisco County Jail #1 to adult men who were re-entering the community from incarceration. To-date, HOMEY has already serve 90 men through the program and is working to expand this program in San Francisco County Jail #2 and return to juvenile hall.
During this period, Native Graphix also had a resurgence and became a union print shop signing with Service Employee International Union (SEIU), Local 87 Justice with Janitors. Our business began to grow and it doubled its customers over a year and is now preparing to open its first store on Mission Street.
TODAY
Today, San Francisco has seen an extraordinary number of housing displacements and evictions. Over 10,000 people have been displaced out of the Mission District and 8,000 of those were Latino/a residents. As a result, an influx of new residents came into the Mission District, and we were witness to incidents like the one that happened to Alex Nieto a young man shot 59 times by the San Francisco Police Department. Alex Nieto was part of HOMEY, only a few months prior to his death, he was scheduled to volunteer for our organization. Thus, HOMEY began to work with the Justice for Alex Nieto committee and then the Justice for Amilcar Perez Lopez committee to fight for justice for these men who were killed by the San Francisco Police Department. HOMEY, also re-established a volunteer program started in 1980 called CALLES (Streets) Program to begin doing street intervention and prevention work on the streets each month. We gave safe passage rides to 217 youth in 2016 and our goal is to build CALLES Case Management Program, returning HOMEY’s original focus on reaching homies in jail, prison, and the streets.
HOMEY’s IMPACT
HOMEY has unapologetically led or been part of some of the most significant initiatives or policies to reduce violence or decriminalize youth in our city over the last two decades. Since 2011, HOMEY has conducted over 13,995 hours of community service hours and supported over 586 youth through high school. In 2015, its return year, the CALLES program provided 405 safe passage (transportation) rides and conducted 160 hours of informational workshops to youth in schools and community-based organizations. From 2012-2015, HOMEY has taken 315 youth to 36 ceremonies, community events, colleges and universities and a wide variety of activities to expand their worldview. It has served youth in every sector of San Francisco with a yearly average of 82% youth being from the Mission District, Excelsior, Bayview/Hunter’s Point.
We look forward what lies ahead for the organization and look forward to working with our community in every capacity to support youth and their families.
Endnotes
[i] SF Examiner, 1/20/09, bethwinegarnernews.wordpress.com/2009/01/20/anti-gang-program-at-odds-with-school/
[ii] Public Counsel, 2/26/14 Press Release, Parents and Students Rally as SFUSD Board Votes on Landmark Resolution to Eliminate Suspension Gap for Students of Color, http://www.publiccounsel.org/press_releases?id=0078
[iii] Los Angeles Times, 2/21/11, Upscale culture and gang violence share a small space http://articles.latimes.com/2011/sep/21/local/la-me-mission-district-slayings-20110921
[iv] San Francisco Youth Face Violence, Deportation as Local Services Shrink, New American Media, 18 April 2012 http://newamericamedia.org/2012/04/san-francisco-youth-of-color-seen-negatively-as-local-services-shrink.php
[v] The story of Amilcar Perez-Lopez, the Guardian, 2 June 2015 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2015/jun/02/amilcar-perez-lopez-san-francisco-police-killing-video
- Benjamin E. Mays
EARLY DAYS
Homies Organizing the Mission to Empower Youth (HOMEY) is an organization that has made various noteworthy contributions to San Francisco. Since its development, HOMEY has shaped ongoing violence prevention work in San Francisco. HOMEY is an illustration of a resilient and effective community empowerment organization. Our staff continue to shape local policy and conduct the daily work of training and inspiring the next generation of community leaders.
When HOMEY began in 1997-1999, it was formed by a group of youth mostly between the ages of 17 to 20 years old who were active gang members, formerly incarcerated youth, organizers, and community members interested in combating mass incarceration and youth violence. They forged a path of organizing in San Francisco’s Mission District to combat youth incarceration and anti-immigrant legislation that was being propelled at the Latinx community during that period. HOMEY immediately began organizing with many other groups around California to stop Proposition 21 (Treatment of Juvenile Offenders, 2001). HOMEY centered its work in locally, but built a statewide and a national network. HOMEY engaged in early anti-gentrification work and joined many campaigns that focused on juvenile justice and transformative change work for youth.
CREATING PEACE
Since that time, HOMEY fought to bring youth in rival gangs together and found ways to bridge peace. Many former gang members from different neighborhoods worked together at HOMEY and for the first time in a generation, small peace accords formed within the organization. A philosophy of serving any person who came to HOMEY, despite neighborhood affiliation, remains today. This is significant due to the fact that some violence prevention programs still do not serve all those who walk into their doors because of neighborhood divisions. HOMEY became well-known for its position of work with youth and young adults on all sides of barrio warfare. Our neutrality is what set HOMEY apart from other organizations in the Mission District and San Francisco.
NATIVE GRAPHIX
Since its launch in 2004, an integral part of HOMEY focused on business development by providing grants and micro-loans to community members who were having trouble getting loans from banks. The goal was to: 1) create community self-sufficiency, and 2) to fully fund HOMEY without need of government and foundation support. This initiative was able to help start several businesses many that are still running today including HOMEY’s own social enterprise Native Graphix, a screen printing shop that has employed and trained hundreds of youth over its 10 years in business. Our social enterprise became a local model. Today, people from around the country come to visit HOMEY and Native Graphix and use what has been created here as a model for their programs.
In 2005-06, HOMEY organizers were clearly aware of the school to prison pipeline, the achievement gap, and the correlation between school suspensions and expulsions and eventual incarceration and in some cases premature death. So, HOMEY began a controversial campaign on school suspensions and expulsions in 2007-09 at Mission High School. Accurate assessments early on by HOMEY leadership saw suspension and expulsions for young African-American and Latino youth as a critical issue for the community that still drives some of the organizations work to this day. In addition, HOMEY spearheaded a campaign against a civil gang injunction that also occurred during that period.
In 2007-09, HOMEY focus on the civil gang injunction issue garnered national attention and heavy criticism by local elected officials. HOMEY worked strongly on this campaign and had a tremendous impact on how gang injunctions were implemented in our city. The campaign was able to establish a comprehensive exit component to San Francisco’s civil injunction whereas other injunctions in other parts of the county were lifelong blacklists for being gang affiliated youth without any way of exiting these injunctions. Although, HOMEY did not win the campaign of not utilizing gang injunctions in San Francisco, its impact on the community was felt.
BACKLASH AND RECESSION
In 2010-11, HOMEY like many other organizations felt a strong backlash and challenges in the community in regard to funding for its advocacy work. In addition, HOMEY felt the sting of the recession as foundations shifted their focus from violence prevention and organizing to direct services and evidence-based practices. As a result, HOMEY lost almost 50% of its funding and was at risk of closing for the first time in a decade. Internally, the organization’s founders, staff, and stakeholders were conflicted as to HOMEY’s next steps. Many wanted to continue to organizing and close the organization entirely if necessary, yet others wanted to continue HOMEY and focus on direct service and programming. Many called for a name change because HOMEY was shifting its focus and changing its leadership. It was a difficult moment at the organization and there were more questions than answers at that time. Ultimately, many staff decided to leave HOMEY and others stayed to continue its work. Although, it was a hard period of time for many at the agency, HOMEY was steadfast and continued on.
CHANGE IN DIRECTION
In 2011, HOMEY had a programmatic shift and began to build major programs internally to primarily focus on educational achievement and cultural education. HOMEY focused on high dropout rates amongst Latino/a youth in San Francisco Unified School District as it was reported that almost 98% of youth who were victims of gun violence were high school dropouts at that time. Meanwhile, we began to see the first signs of a second dot-com boom and rapid gentrification in the Mission District, and in the midst of economic change HOMEY remained true to its mission and vision. It also began to focus efforts on how to prepare youth in the midst of changing community demographics, economy, and housing disparity that has tremendously impacted the Mission District in particular.
HOMEY continued to deliver direct service to youth and young adults in half a dozen high schools to ensure that youth began graduating. After several years working weekly in local high schools and building relationships with local colleges and universities HOMEY created its soft pipeline to college for its participants. In 2014, it received it first award by the Latino Community Foundation for its work assisting youth with educational success. HOMEY’s work shifted some of its focus from the street to schools. The goal was to use education as a tool to reduce violence and the rates of incarceration and premature death by youth.
In 2015, HOMEY did not slow down its pace. The agency began a new program called IMPACT, which was to teaching soft workforce skills out of San Francisco County Jail #1 to adult men who were re-entering the community from incarceration. To-date, HOMEY has already serve 90 men through the program and is working to expand this program in San Francisco County Jail #2 and return to juvenile hall.
During this period, Native Graphix also had a resurgence and became a union print shop signing with Service Employee International Union (SEIU), Local 87 Justice with Janitors. Our business began to grow and it doubled its customers over a year and is now preparing to open its first store on Mission Street.
TODAY
Today, San Francisco has seen an extraordinary number of housing displacements and evictions. Over 10,000 people have been displaced out of the Mission District and 8,000 of those were Latino/a residents. As a result, an influx of new residents came into the Mission District, and we were witness to incidents like the one that happened to Alex Nieto a young man shot 59 times by the San Francisco Police Department. Alex Nieto was part of HOMEY, only a few months prior to his death, he was scheduled to volunteer for our organization. Thus, HOMEY began to work with the Justice for Alex Nieto committee and then the Justice for Amilcar Perez Lopez committee to fight for justice for these men who were killed by the San Francisco Police Department. HOMEY, also re-established a volunteer program started in 1980 called CALLES (Streets) Program to begin doing street intervention and prevention work on the streets each month. We gave safe passage rides to 217 youth in 2016 and our goal is to build CALLES Case Management Program, returning HOMEY’s original focus on reaching homies in jail, prison, and the streets.
HOMEY’s IMPACT
HOMEY has unapologetically led or been part of some of the most significant initiatives or policies to reduce violence or decriminalize youth in our city over the last two decades. Since 2011, HOMEY has conducted over 13,995 hours of community service hours and supported over 586 youth through high school. In 2015, its return year, the CALLES program provided 405 safe passage (transportation) rides and conducted 160 hours of informational workshops to youth in schools and community-based organizations. From 2012-2015, HOMEY has taken 315 youth to 36 ceremonies, community events, colleges and universities and a wide variety of activities to expand their worldview. It has served youth in every sector of San Francisco with a yearly average of 82% youth being from the Mission District, Excelsior, Bayview/Hunter’s Point.
We look forward what lies ahead for the organization and look forward to working with our community in every capacity to support youth and their families.
Endnotes
[i] SF Examiner, 1/20/09, bethwinegarnernews.wordpress.com/2009/01/20/anti-gang-program-at-odds-with-school/
[ii] Public Counsel, 2/26/14 Press Release, Parents and Students Rally as SFUSD Board Votes on Landmark Resolution to Eliminate Suspension Gap for Students of Color, http://www.publiccounsel.org/press_releases?id=0078
[iii] Los Angeles Times, 2/21/11, Upscale culture and gang violence share a small space http://articles.latimes.com/2011/sep/21/local/la-me-mission-district-slayings-20110921
[iv] San Francisco Youth Face Violence, Deportation as Local Services Shrink, New American Media, 18 April 2012 http://newamericamedia.org/2012/04/san-francisco-youth-of-color-seen-negatively-as-local-services-shrink.php
[v] The story of Amilcar Perez-Lopez, the Guardian, 2 June 2015 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2015/jun/02/amilcar-perez-lopez-san-francisco-police-killing-video