Reportage: Living the American Nightmare
Living the American Nightmare is a collaborative project with residents of what was one of the largest homeless encampments in the US, before it was shut down in February 2018. I invited residents to write captions on the photos I made during the month-long legal battle over the fate of the encampment as a way of guiding the story's narrative. Other images feature text from interviews I did with them; other photos have no text.
The closure of the Santa Ana River Bed homeless encampment -- which sheltered an estimated 700 to 1,000 people along a a two- to three-mile stretch of river bed -- was the latest battleground in California’s ongoing struggle with homelessness and an unrelenting affordable housing crisis. Some 25 percent of the nation’s homeless – about 118,000 people – live in the Golden State.
Local government officials announced they would evict everyone from the camp in late January, 2018, as part of a plan to close the area for an “environmental remediation project.” Homeless advocates argued the county and city governments involved were “criminalizing” the homeless and sued to stay the eviction. A US District Court judge criticized local governments for essentially making it illegal to be homeless, and ordered them to work to find housing solutions. Under an agreement reached by the two sides, the cities and county had to offer temporary housing to river bed residents for at least a month through motel vouchers, and also had to create other spaces for the homeless to camp and to expand shelters. The case adds to an evolving body of case law as courts across the United States work to balance the constitutional rights of the homeless with the interests of government agencies in ensuring public health and safety.
![Tonya W., 41, has lived in the river bed for eight months. Before coming here, she says, “I was living in an apartment, with a job, and a life. I kind of blew it all up. Well, not kind of. I did. I blew it up.” Tonya had been working as a drug and alcohol counselor and describes herself as “the one who always cares for people.” But life got too stressful, and there was no one to help with her burdens, she says. She was fired from her job, and wound up here. She says she never expected to be homeless, that “I’m living a bad dream and I’m hoping I’ll wake up soon.” But Tonya also says she isn’t ready. “I need to want to be a grown up,” she says. “I am a grown up. I just don’t want to do anything.” If she could be anywhere else, she says she’d be sitting at home playing with her four-year-old grandson. “I think the American Dream is whatever you say it is. No one can define someone else’s dream. We are whoever we decide we want to be. I don’t know [what my dream is]. Somehow I feel like I’m doomed to be stuck here until I figure it out.”](http://cdn.lightgalleries.net/51e01d8b75b9a/images/ST2_Tonya-Final_thumb-1.jpg)
![Ashley Foster, 23, has lived in the Santa Ana River Bed encampment for three years. She had been in foster care since she was 6, living with multiple families. “I went to 11 different high schools,” she says. “That will give you an idea of how many families.” She came to the Santa Ana River Bed to find her biological mother, who lives in the encampment, as do extended family members. “I have epilepsy,” she says. “And trigger is my stress. This whole situation [with the camp being closed down] is not helping me. I had a seizure four days ago.” In fact, a few minutes after we spoke, Ashley went in to a nearby tent to visit friends and had a seizure. She has no medicine; when she has a seizure, her friends stay with her and make sure she doesn’t swallow her tongue. Ashley says a local support group, CityNet, has offered to help her find shelter, but that it’s hard because she has two large dogs she won’t give up. When asked what she thinks of the American Dream, she says, “What’s that? What’s the American Dream? My dream is to have family. I’ve never actually had a home. I don’t know any other lifestyle than this one. It’s all I know, other than the foster system.”](http://cdn.lightgalleries.net/51e01d8b75b9a/images/ST7_Ashley_thumb-1.jpg)
