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# Charles E. Springer Jr.: Homeless, but a human being, not a vagrant
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/from-20021014/
- Published: 2002-10-14T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T00:47:30.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Opinion, Promenade, #archive-import, Homeless, Homelessness

*THE STREET Let’s be creative and find a solution to homelessness*

*By . By Charles E. Springer Jr.*

“Wake up!!! Wake up!!!” I opened my eyes at approximately 6 a.m. Tuesday morning to the police rousting me out of one of my spots in the rear doorway of City Hall. It’s a shame that SOME property owners and business owners do not respect those of us who live, work and/or go to school here in Santa Monica because we live on the streets. I have lived here for six going on seven years now. I have been attending Santa Monica Community College since 1998, have a 2.76 G.P.A. and 35 units accumulated. I also, along with three to five other homeless men, move the vending carts on and off the Third Street Promenade for a living. So I am not a panhandler or a vagrant or transient. I am a human being!

A human being who sometimes struggles, on a daily basis, to maintain my dignity and humanity. I keep myself as clean as possible, my cloths are washed, my teeth brushed and I do not smell. If you look at me, you would not even think I am homeless at all. And I am not on the streets by choice, nor did I mess up in a shelter to wind up out here as have others I have met. I do not use heroin, speed, coke, crack or alcohol. And I do not deal drugs to supplement my living. I try not to act anti-social nor do I insult tourists or locals or destroy public property. I have more important things to do, positive things.

And I am not alone in this endeavor. There are other men and women who are doing the same thing. They work and/or go to school to better their lives and strive to move forward off the streets. Some of us have been put out of shelters for things as simple as not reporting a chore or speaking out against rules that have nothing to do with making it to housing. So the trust we put in the system “designed” to help us is shattered, sometimes along with our hopes, dreams and aspirations. So we do it from the streets! And anyone who thinks it is always easy or always fun out here, my challenge stands, come out here for a month with no money, credit cards and only what you can carry with you. I guarantee you will believe what is written about all homeless people will change.

Since I have been on the street, I have known people who seemed strong to snap, having been reduced to mental illness and/or drug and alcohol addiction, from what I call sensory overload. (Imagine NEVER being able to be alone.) I have known and watched people die slowly of alcohol poisoning, drug overdoses or just beat or raped or murdered outright for whatever reason. And Santa Monica is far safer than, say, Skid Row. (I spent seven months down there, and there was a dead body found almost on a daily basis.) Then there are the business owners and property owners. While I know drug and alcohol addictions are prevalent on the streets. Those who practice this behavior are ALL you seem to focus on. I know some of you who frequent Starbuck’s know me and know I am not like that, yet people of my ilk are lumped together with those who cause problems for you. So we are sometimes punished along with those who do what I have read about in the newspaper and see out here all the time. Why focus on the worst aspect of a people, then lump that on all who are of the same ilk regardless of any positive accomplishments that are achieved by those of us who do not fit that mold?

And what about those who read all of what has been written about the homeless and homeless issues? Do you think an elderly or handicapped or responsible homeless person would defecate, urinate, rob or destroy property where we sleep? Would any of you, if you wound up out here? If you were out here and could not find work, would you ask for money or food to exist? Would you appreciate the food lines and the restaurant owners who DO feed out here?

Now to those of you who own businesses and property who have “profiled” all homeless as alcoholic, drug addicted, lazy vagrants and transients. What makes you better? Your money, you power, your influence? How long will that last in these hard post-9/11, King George II economic times? I have walked north of Wilshire and see how many apartments are vacant, I see “office space for lease” signs all over. You are pricing YOURSELVES out of the market. And you are probably the same ones who lobbied for rent control to be phased out. Now, with the economy going sour, you are feeling the pinch. Can you REALLY blame all the homeless for your loss of money? Or are we just a “whipping post” for the mistakes you have made and cannot rectify without losing face? The solution to the situation of homelessness has to start with co-operation on ALL fronts!!

This city that I have come to love and call home has to potential to be UNIQUE among its neighbors. This is a city where rich and poor (homeless ARE poor) live side by side. This is a city that boasts to the world of being progressive, yet I have seen it become less so. It has become more and more corporate and less and less unique than its neighbors. I have a lot of stickers on the back of my sketch board. One quotes Albert Einstein: “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” Being creative is what I do best as an artist. It is also the CORE of brainstorming.

There are creative ways to solve the homeless dilemma, which is what a progressive city WOULD do, rather than outlaw a symptom of a failing economy. Another sticker says, “You laugh at me because I'm different. I laugh at you because you are all the same.” Why be the same as our neighbors who play “shuffle the homeless?” Why not be different and find a working (not workable) solution to help us who want help, but, because of the overburdening of the homeless agencies, can’t get the immediate help we need? It all starts with dialogue with ALL parties both housed and unhoused alike coming together. It starts with understanding and compassion, a smile for those of us who are trying to be MORE than homeless in a homeless situation. Not with these ordinances trying to ban food and sleep for those who are making an effort against already insurmountable odds to better themselves, who cannot do for themselves at all, or who do not cause trouble for the community AS A WHOLE. To quote Mr. Steve Miller, “There's a solution!”

Charles E. Springer Jr. is homeless and a freelance writer and artist.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 14, 2002.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/101402.pdf?ref=smdp.com)