A Tiny Plot: "Burned" EP 5

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Snap Judgment – "A Tiny Plot: Burned" (EP 5)

Release Date: September 4, 2025
Host: Shayna Shealy (Snap Studios/KQED)

Overview

This episode—the final chapter in the five-part series "A Tiny Plot"—narrates the aftermath of a fire that swept through a co-governed tiny home village in Oakland, East 12th Street. The episode explores the emotional and structural devastation caused by the fire, the displacement and dissolution of the community's hard-fought autonomy, the city's response, and the complex realities of temporary housing for unsheltered people. It follows residents as they grapple with loss, systemic failures, and the ongoing fight for dignity and permanent housing.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Fire and Immediate Aftermath

[01:43–06:24]

• The community at East 12th Street, after a year of organizing, is struck by disaster when one of the pallet shelters catches fire.
• Mama Dee describes the destruction:
  “Within seconds it was gone like that.” (03:10)
• The fire moves rapidly, melting plastic walls and consuming three homes in six minutes, highlighting the vulnerability of the shelter materials.
• Residents—particularly Tammy—barely escape, some saving dogs and essential belongings in the chaos.
• Matt, a resident leader ("President Matt"), points out the problem with pallet shelters:
  “The material that these units are built out of is fiber reinforced plastic with polystyrene core and Styrofoam—just like burns.” (06:11)
• An architectural expert confirms the materials would not meet standard residential codes except for emergency use, equating the shelters to "glorified tents."

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2. Systemic Failures: Material & Management

[06:24–12:15]

• Residents never chose pallet shelters; these were provided by city contract, with little say from the occupants.
• The day of the fire, several other encampments also experienced fires, stretching emergency services thin.
• Tammy criticizes the shelter materials and enforced choices:
  “We didn’t want these pallet shelters, especially when we found out they were made of styrofoam. They melted.” (11:13)
• Pallet CEO Amy King states the fire wasn’t due to shelter construction, but a lack of management and oversight, shifting blame to site handlers and city policy.

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3. Loss of Autonomy and Community Reaction

[12:19–13:31]

• Residents express devastation, not just at lost possessions but at the shattering of community efforts:
  • “I wouldn’t think I could go through this two times in a lifetime...I feel like everybody’s neglect because they don’t give a F and it’s not fair.” – Tammy (12:52–13:08)
• President Matt suspects the city intended to find an excuse to remove resident autonomy:
  “Now they have an excuse to come down and completely dissolve all of our autonomy... which we’re gonna lose all of the decisions that we’ve voted on and worked so hard for.” (09:33)
• No one attends the nonprofit’s community meeting—resistance is palpable.

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4. Site Takeover and Continued Resistance

[16:33–21:59]

• The city and nonprofit managers designate the site a fire hazard and assume more control. The fence dividing Union Point from Lakeview Village is removed, symbolizing the loss of autonomy.
• Residents rebuild the fence with scavenged materials.
  • James protests with a sign:
    “City of Oakland using dictator enforcement against our rights as Americans in a free nation.” (21:11)
• Mama Dee voices frustration at new constraints and points to the continuing lack of safety and support:
  • “Bitch, you can’t come and tell us we still co-govern, but you making all the rules and that we gotta go… We ain’t supposed to have nobody tell us what to do. We’re supposed to be running this.” (17:41)
  • “I’m done.” (18:04)

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5. Reflection, Outcomes, and Broader Impact

[24:06–35:03]

• The community’s vision began as a hope for self-governed, stable housing. The episode traces how the fire and city response left behind only remnants of that dream.
  “I feel proud of us as a community, sticking together and getting through what people didn’t think we could do. We’re still gonna stay at it, going until the end.” – Mama Dee (24:06)
• The city eventually merges the two sites into "Lake Point," prompting mixed responses—some mourn lost autonomy, others adapt, and improvements like running water and real toilets are introduced.
• A developer is approved to build 185 units of 100% affordable housing at the site.
• Former city council president Nikky Fortunato Bas contextualizes the crisis as rooted in systemic inequality:
  “Homelessness is a symptom of the problem.” (29:38)
• Activist Nita B. laments lost lessons from the brief experiment in autonomy:
  “They were really allowed to be human. And it’s a shame that the city, rather than extend all those things that Union Point fought for, that Union Point got stripped of all of that in the name of being fair...” (30:45)

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6. Fates of the Residents and Aftermath

[31:35–35:40]

• President Matt is back on the streets.
• Tammy and others move to new (trailer-based) shelters.
• Adam works in affordable real estate.
• Mama Dee wins a spot in new permanent housing:
  “It’s a one bedroom, living room, kitchen…I got all my little stickers for the wall…this is my house.” (32:08)
• Wedo is found dead after returning to the streets. Others remain unaccounted for or still homeless.
• Mama Dee offers blunt policy advice:
  “I would put the money towards building housing instead of shelters and temporary non profits...What do people need? They need the housing.” (32:33)
• The show closes on a moving reunion between Mama Dee and Papa Eddie at their old encampment, illustrating the enduring struggle and resilience of Oakland’s homeless residents.

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Notable Quotes and Moments

• Mama Dee (03:10, 24:06): “Within seconds it was gone like that.” “Being homeless is the worst. But on the other hand, I feel proud of us as a community, sticking together and getting through what people didn’t think we could do.”
• President Matt (06:11, 09:33): “The material that these units are built out of...just like burns.” “Now they have an excuse to come down and completely dissolve all of our autonomy.”
• Tammy (12:52–13:08): “I wouldn’t think I could go through this two times...I feel like everybody’s neglect because they don’t give a F and it’s not fair.”
• Activist Nita B. (30:45): “They were really allowed to be human…It’s a shame that the city, rather than extend all those things that Union Point fought for, that Union Point got stripped of all of that...”
• Mama Dee (32:33): “I would put the money towards building housing instead of shelters and temporary non profits.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Timestamp | Segment/Topic Summary | |------------|-----------------------------------------------------------| | 01:43–06:24 | Fire strikes East 12th Street tiny home village—chaos, loss, critique of shelter materials | | 07:43–09:48 | Residents process trauma, city begins to assert more control, community meeting called | | 13:48–16:33 | Residents resist city and nonprofit control, symbolic rebuilding of fence, protest | | 24:06–25:40 | Community sifts through losses, reflects on journey, expresses pride and sorrow | | 27:05–29:29 | City merges sites, later approves affordable housing construction | | 29:38–32:57 | Broader perspective—systemic roots of homelessness, residents’ fates, lessons unheeded | | 32:08–35:03 | Mama Dee in her new home, residents’ current statuses, poignant regrets, reunions |

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Tone and Style

The episode is deeply empathetic, occasionally raw and unfiltered, but always respectful, highlighting both the dignity and suffering of Oakland's unhoused community. Shayna Shealy’s narration weaves together moments of heartbreak, resilience, and hope. The residents speak candidly about their pain, frustration, and ambitions, often with humor and grit, in a way that keeps the storytelling engaging and profoundly human.

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For those who haven’t listened:
This finale offers a powerful, clear-eyed account of what it means to fight for home and self-governance amid a crisis—and what’s lost when the system prioritizes expediency over dignity and permanence. The collapse of Union Point's dream is not just about individual loss—it's a parable about America’s struggle to address homelessness for real.

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Transcript

[Snap Studios Host]

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[Shayna Shealy]

From KQED's Snap Studios. This is a Tiny Plot welcome back to A Tiny Plot, a story told in five. This is chapter five. When we left off, you know how.

[Mama Dee]

All little girls, they want that white house with the white picket pants she got. It may have taken a little longer, but she has it now.

[Shayna Shealy]

After an entire year of fighting and planning and building, the group from Union Point finally moved into their new co governed home on East 12th Street.

[Mama Dee]

It's kind of nice, you know. We feel comfortable and we feel safe.

[Shayna Shealy]

Until one morning I heard helicopters above my apartment near Lake Merritt and checked my phone. I saw a text from Adam. One of the tiny homes on East 12th caught fire. I gathered my gear and ran to the site. How are you guys? Are you okay? From KQED Snap Studios, I'm Shayna Sheeley. This is a Tiny Plot Chapter five Burned. You okay? This episode contains strong language and graphic imagery. Listeners, please take care. When I get to East 12th, Momma Dee is on the corner of the block trying to calm down her dogs that are tied up to a pole. Her face is smeared with black ash. She checks her phone, sees missed calls from her daughter, ignores them, answers questions from the group, looks back out through the fence. Matt's inside holding a hose, aiming water at a pile of ash. There's still heat coming from it.

[Mama Dee]

It's a disgrace. Look, they don't even have no frame to the home. It all melted. Within seconds it was gone like that.

[Shayna Shealy]

Early this morning, Momma Dee was washing dishes near the Water. And then she smelled smoke and heard yelling.

[Mama Dee]

And then I boom, boom, boom. Scared the shit out of me.

[Shayna Shealy]

Oh my God.

[Mama Dee]

The house inflamed and just melted. Within seconds it was gone. I'm thinking, oh, it ain't as bad as it looks. It could be all. It could be worse. Shit, you could have been right in that bed and all that shit melt on top of you. That's what scares me.

[Shayna Shealy]

Fire raced through the Lakeview Village tiny home development in Oakland Monday morning.

[Tammy]

This is citizen video of the thick black smoke shooting into the air.

[Shayna Shealy]

Security camera footage shows smoke seeping out of one of the Union Point pallet shelters at 8:57am the guy who lived there had left the site around 7 that morning. You can see the smoke actually drifting up from the tiny home for just seconds before the heat pressed against its ceiling and its walls and the front door burst open.

[Mama Dee]

It was like four or five blowouts or pops.

[Shayna Shealy]

Flames spilled out of the front door, engulfing the plastic walls of the pallet shelter.

[Mama Dee]

That flame is red, orange, red. That's like chemical.

[Shayna Shealy]

By 9:01, four minutes later, the plastic walls melted to the ground. The fire moved east, lashing through another shelter. In five minutes. It's like boom.

[James]

Yeah, the whole thing. So fast.

[Shayna Shealy]

Tammy was asleep next door. She slept through the yelling, but woke up from the intense heat radiating through her walls. Still in her PJs, she sprung up and ran outside with two dogs in her arms. Aww. Tammy's running, holding her dogs, and three.

[Mama Dee]

Of her dogs were on the ground. One of her dogs went running out.

[Shayna Shealy]

Flames charged up a wall of her tiny home and she threw the dogs out of her arms towards the fence. The footage shows Tammy then running back into her smoldering house to get her other two dogs still locked up in.

[President Matt]

And then by the time I saw that, there was maybe about a minute and 30 seconds before the whole place was completely engulfed in flames.

[Shayna Shealy]

Within six minutes, three houses had melted to the ground. They belonged to Tammy, Mustache Mike and Rachel, and a resident named Wedo. Momma Dee's husband's house was half burned.

[President Matt]

It happened so fast. I mean, the material that these units are built out of is fiber reinforced plastic with polystyrene core and Styrofoam just like burns.

[Shayna Shealy]

The walls are foam insulated panels made of fiberglass reinforced plastic with aluminum framing. These materials meet a class C fire rating, which implies a faster flame spread than class A materials like treated wood and concrete. When I spoke with California architect Naran Kadribgovich, he Told me that building code regulations would likely prohibit him from building a regular house solely with the materials pallet uses. There are just so many regulations around energy and environment and safety. Many of them are lifted for emergency housing. He also told me, I can't hold pallet shelter to the same standards as a regular house because it's not one. Emergency homes like pallet shelters, he said, are glorified tents. They're small spaces with a bed and an egress hatch in the back and a door. And if you start looking at these shelters as anything more than that, then you'll have to build a house. And then, he says, it'll take forever to build, which feels impossible when you're in a housing crisis. But the residents here at East 12th, they had no say whatsoever in using pallet shelters. The homes came from a contract with the city, and now people are just sort of hanging around the sidewalk, peering through the fence at their home, their promised land in rubble.

[James]

Now I know what traumatized means. Make you feel funny.

[Shayna Shealy]

One resident, James, is straddling a city bike outside the fence.

[James]

I just want to leave before another explosion. I ain't got nowhere to go. I don't got nowhere to leave to. I saw everything. And when I turned around to get the fire extinguisher, the whole. The cabin was engulfed.

[Shayna Shealy]

Tim walks by to tell people that the new management wants them at the pavilion on the other side of the fence at Lakeview Village.

[Mama Dee]

What, right now?

[James]

She said, when all this is, what.

[Nita B.]

Are they gonna do?

[Mama Dee]

Tell us they got some different housing for us right now?

[James]

They're gonna tell everybody that everything has to go.

[Mama Dee]

I can't even think straight right now.

[Shayna Shealy]

The site manager from the nonprofit has arrived and tries to gather people.

[President Matt]

We need to have a community meeting today, okay? I mean, it's. People are a little traumatized right now. You realize that.

[Shayna Shealy]

This is a very.

[James]

Unsafe environment over here. So now the city's coming down and all this shit.

[Snap Studios Host]

So we got to figure out how.

[Shayna Shealy]

We can live in a safe environment.

[President Matt]

It's not unsafe because of our doing well.

[Shayna Shealy]

It's too much stuff right here for sure. There is a lot of stuff on the ground inside and outside the pallet shelters. But President Matt points to the plastic and styrofoam pallet shelters that melted in the fire.

[President Matt]

Yeah, but look, look, none of that would have mattered. It had everything to do with the construction materials of the structures.

[James]

Okay?

[Shayna Shealy]

I'm not saying it wasn't. I'm saying this is way too much.

[James]

Material and too many supplies and belongings here.

[President Matt]

Now they have an excuse to come down and completely dissolve all of our autonomy and take down the fence and absorb us into the place next door, which we're gonna lose all of the decisions that we've voted on and worked so hard for.

[Shayna Shealy]

Matt feels this was the city's plan from the beginning to find any reason to prove that homeless people are incapable of being in charge of their own lives.

[President Matt]

They can't have homeless people standing up for themselves and getting autonomy, because then more people are going to keep doing that.

[Shayna Shealy]

And now their experiment is in literal ashes.

[President Matt]

Now they have an excuse.

[Shayna Shealy]

No one goes to that meeting. Led by the nonprofit managers. Instead, Momma Dee piles extra blankets into a sort of bed on the floor of the security shed for Tammy. Do you think this is the end of this project?

[Tammy]

Probably. Because if we gotta fight for anything or stand up for ourselves, it's gonna be against them and they're not gonna like it. Yeah. And it's gonna hurt us at the same time.

[Shayna Shealy]

Tammy can barely talk because of the smoke, the fumes, the lack of sleep. The air smells like burnt tires. The official report deemed the East 12th fire an accident of unknown cause. The day of the fire, the Oakland Fire Department had already responded to three other incidents in homeless encampments, all before they got the call about East 12.

[Tammy]

We didn't want these pallet shelters, especially when we found out they were made of styrofoam. They melted.

[Shayna Shealy]

I spoke with pallet CEO Amy King, and she was clear the fire was not related to the pallet materials. She reminded me that each shelter passes a safety inspection by a local fire marshal before anyone moves in, and that the materials used to build pallet shelters are specifically selected for safety, ease of use, and cost efficiency. In a letter to the city of Oakland, she attributed the fire to the lack of management and oversight of this village, a factor that Pallett has no responsibility for. End quote. In response to the fire, Pallet now requires cities to show proof that they've hired trained service providers to manage and oversee safety at pallet shelter sites.

[Tammy]

They're trying to emphasize on the fact that we had too much stuff or whatever. That stuff didn't even burn. It's still on the ground. All the fucking outside burned.

[Shayna Shealy]

What do you want now?

[Tammy]

I don't want to be here. I don't want to be part of this, because I didn't. That wasn't what I signed up for.

[Shayna Shealy]

Do you think you're gonna leave? Yeah.

[Tammy]

I just have time. I don't know when, because I just, I'm totally set back by everything.

[Mama Dee]

Do you have a place to go?

[Tammy]

Thousands of dollars of stuff I lost.

[Shayna Shealy]

Just. I'm so sorry. It's awful.

[Tammy]

I wouldn't think I could go through this two times in a lifetime. I have to look at that stuff. I have to wake up to that today and feel like.

[Mama Dee]

This just wasn't the thing.

[Tammy]

What I we've been doing for the last year getting ready for this. I feel like everybody's neglect because they don't give a F and it's not fair.

[Shayna Shealy]

What's going to happen to the dream of a co governed home? Stay tuned to find out.

[President Matt]

I'm Peter Sagal.

[Shayna Shealy]

NPR is very serious.

[President Matt]

Mostly it treats newsmakers with all due respect almost all the time. It brings you the most important information.

[Shayna Shealy]

About the issues that really matter usually. And it never asks famous people about.

[President Matt]

Things they don't know anything about except.

[Shayna Shealy]

Once in a while. Join us for the great exception.

[President Matt]

Listen to Wait, wait, Don't tell me.

[Shayna Shealy]

The news quiz from npr.

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[Shayna Shealy]

You're listening to a tiny plot. I'm your host, Shayna Shealy. When we left off, a fire had swept through the plot, leaving Holmes in ashes. The night after the fire, Tammy slept on the floor of the security shed and someone else slept on the floor of the kitchen. Others bunked up in pallet shelters that went unscathed in the fire. In the following days, the city designated Union Point on the rise a fire hazard. They said the houses are too close together. There's too much stuff outside and inside them. The non profit managers from Nextdoor came onto the site and took over security. They instructed the residents to clear the grounds around their pallet shelters and they made an announcement. The fence separating the two sites. It was a safety hazard and would have to come down.

[Mama Dee]

Shit ain't legal. That they doing us.

[Shayna Shealy]

What happened?

[Mama Dee]

Bitch, you can't come and tell us we still co govern, but you making all the rules and that we gotta go. Bye bye here we are co government. We ain't supposed to have nobody tell us what to do. We're supposed to be running this.

[Shayna Shealy]

Mama Dee is exhausted.

[Mama Dee]

None of this shit is safe for none of us. All they're doing is telling us that this has to go. That has to go. I'm sorry. I'm done.

[Shayna Shealy]

What?

[Mama Dee]

I'm done.

[Shayna Shealy]

She walks back to her pallet shelter and starts organizing her shoes into a bin, clearing the rocks by her front door into a dusty pathway. I'm talking to her when a safety inspector walks onto the site with some people from the city. The inspector surveys the shelter.

[Mama Dee]

I don't have no problem moving my stuff, but I was cleaning my shelter.

[Shayna Shealy]

I'm sorry. I really don't want media constantly on me saying, okay, like you really have to talk with HCB if you're going to be on the site. Okay. I guess I thought it was up to them. No. Okay. It's not.

[Nita B.]

It's up to the people that run.

[Shayna Shealy]

The site, which is the housing construction of these. Laura from the city turns to me and tells me, you need to leave all of our sites. We don't let media Just be up on this. Nobody should be here. Security shouldn't be letting anybody in except who lives here. This is the first time I've been asked to leave Union Point on the Rise. I walk away and Tammy follows me outside the fence.

[Tammy]

I just told you. Something to report on.

[Shayna Shealy]

Yeah. Can you tell me what just happened?

[Tammy]

Just like we assumed they were taking our co governorship away.

[Shayna Shealy]

Yeah, I mean, they just kicked me out of the site and. And I thought that was up to you guys to decide.

[Tammy]

Well, it's not anymore. Cause I knew they were gonna take it. Yeah, but you know why they're taking it?

[Shayna Shealy]

Why are they taking it?

[Tammy]

You know why? Because we're homeless. That's the bottom line.

[Shayna Shealy]

A few hours after I was asked to leave, I walk back to the site. The sun is glaring.

[Mama Dee]

They took our fence down.

[Shayna Shealy]

There's a work crew with helmets and neon vests. They're digging up the chain link fence between Union Point on the Rise and Lakeview Village.

[President Matt]

They're tearing it down right now.

[Mama Dee]

I'll show you.

[Shayna Shealy]

The city's crew dismantles the fence and the Union Point residents are right behind them, nailing together scraps of building material to build it right back up. Mike, what are you doing?

[Mama Dee]

Putting the fence up. How come? So they took our fence out. The city took the fence, so we.

[Shayna Shealy]

Gotta put them in. They are not letting that fence come down. Everyone has a role. Lucy carries planks of wood to the fence line. Mustache Mike handles the drill. Others steady the pieces. Mama Dee takes a sledgehammer to the scorched pallet wall and knocks it down. James is on the sidewalk holding a poster in protest. What does your sign say? City of Oakland using dictator enforcement against our rights as Americans in a free nation. What does that mean to you?

[James]

It means that they're running us. You know, they. They coerced us into a. There was a false sense of security. I was coerced into a bad position. You know, it's.

[Shayna Shealy]

It's.

[James]

We want what was agreed upon, you know? What do you want? I. I want. I don't want to be. I don't want to live here. I want to live in a regular home, you know, I've been living here all my life. They jack the prices. The whole Bay Area since it's the land of milk and honey and they making it unaffordable for anybody to live, especially me, on a fixed income. You know, I just want to be okay. That's all. You know?

[Shayna Shealy]

What's left is a patchwork of plywood and picket fence held together with nails and screws. Tied onto the plywood is a beige tarp stretched along the line that separates Union Point's experiment and co governance from the land allotted to Lakeview Village. This story started on a mountain of trash at Union Point Park, a barricade that Momma Dee and President Matt and the others built to protect their community. On that trash pile, this group of people came together to fight for a piece of land they could make their own, where they could stay for three to five years with toilets and running water and electricity and autonomy to make their own choices about how the place would run. It was a dream. And when this group of people was placed on the same block, Momma Dee's son was shot when the city told them their new homes would actually be 8x8 plastic sheds. When they got stuck with porta potties and plastic pump sinks, Momma Dee and President Matt and the others still showed up again and again to pull together scraps of say so over what would happen next in their lives. They always returned to their dream. It honestly felt like kind of an extraordinary thing to witness. And now, 12 months after they made a deal with the city on a pile of trash, they are picking up pieces of their lives from another pile, this one mostly ashes. Mama Dee digs up a blackened jewelry box that belongs to Tammy. President Matt finds a binder of baseball cards warped and charred. They throw the items back into this growing mountain of trash and save what they can to carry forward.

[Mama Dee]

I'm not gonna lie and I'm not gonna sugarcoat nothing for nobody. Being homeless is the worst. But on the other hand, I feel proud of us as a community, sticking together and getting through what people didn't think we could do. We're still gonna stay at it, going until the end. And it's not.

[Shayna Shealy]

What happened to the group from Union Point. Stay tuned to find out At Radiolab, we love nothing more than nerding out about science, neuroscience, chemistry, but.

[Nita B.]

But we do also like to get.

[Shayna Shealy]

Into other kinds of stories, stories, policing or politics, country music, hockey, sex of bugs. Regardless of whether we're looking at science or not science, we bring a rigorous curiosity to get you the answers and.

[Nita B.]

Hopefully make you see the world anew.

[Shayna Shealy]

Radiolab Adventures on the Edge of what We Think We Know Wherever you get your podcasts.

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[Mama Dee]

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[Shayna Shealy]

Welcome back. This is a tiny plot. I'm your host Shayna Shealy. The city's public works crews eventually dismantled what was left of the fence and Union Point on the rise was dissolved into Lakeview Village. Later that spring, the city called the combined sites Lake Point. This didn't go over well at first. Some saw it as a loss of their hard fought for autonomy, but over time others accepted it and signed on to Lake Point's program. When the summer came around, those who remained installed AC units to cool their common space. They set it up with chairs and tables and a chest freezer filled with popsicles and beer. It was open to the entire site. They also built five garden beds facing the lake. As for big winds, well, the entire site got access to spigots with running water. A defunct city bus was brought to the site and turned into a functioning bathroom with hot water showers. Since then, other temporary city homelessness sites in Oakland used this model to also get running water and real toilets that flush. And then shortly after the merge, Oakland City Council voted to hand the whole East 12th parcel over to a developer with a new plan to build 100% affordable housing. On the plot. There will be 185 units, all reserved for low income people, which means you have to be making between 20 and 60% of Oakland's medium income to live there. It's actually pretty interesting if you look at the calculation. Someone making $60,000 a year qualifies. All the folks living at Lake Point eventually relocated. Some went to other transitional housing sites. Others chose to go back to the streets. The old city bus with hot water, showers and toilets now lives at a transitional city housing site in East Oakland. The 12th street development project is under construction. I recently went back with Mama Dee to check it out. So we're driving past East 12th, the East 12th parcel right now.

[Mama Dee]

There's three garbage junctures here.

[Shayna Shealy]

Yeah, that 100% affordable housing coming soon on a sign.

[Mama Dee]

That's what the sign says.

[Shayna Shealy]

But you think it's a good idea?

[Mama Dee]

I think it's the best.

[Shayna Shealy]

But the city is still building temporary sites to address the homelessness crisis, though they no longer use pallet shelters. And still, according to an audit on the city of Oakland's homelessness services, there's evidence that these shorter term programs do not succeed at getting people off the streets permanently. Former council president Nikki Fortunato, Boss is now the Alameda county Supervisor for District 5. The real problem that I think I'm personally trying to solve is poverty. And ultimately I think it's about economic inequality. And so a lot of times we are just putting band aids on problems like housing is the solution to homelessness, certainly. But there's also the problem that housing is incredibly expensive. And it's incredibly expensive because of our capitalist system and the inequality it's created. Homelessness is a symptom of the problem. Nita B. The housing activist, believes that for a moment, there was actually a huge opportunity here to learn from this experiment and from the people who used to live at Union Point Park.

[Nita B.]

Through their organizing power, they were also able to negotiate all their basic needs of food, shelter, water and sanitation. Met at the tiny house pallet site. Now curfews, showers on site, freedom to move, freedom of speech. They just. They were allowed to be human. They were really allowed to be human. And it's a shame that the city, rather than extend all those things that Union Point fought for, that Union Point got stripped of all of that in the name of being fair and equitable to all the other unhoused folks in city funded interventions. What the city should have done was extend those basic rights and basic needs to everyone that they were housing in their city interventions.

[Shayna Shealy]

As for the other characters in this story, President Matt is back living on the streets in Oakland. Tammy and a few others are living in a Different kind of temporary shelter site where this time the city has provided trailers. Adam is selling real estate in Stockton, specializing in affordable adus. Mama Dee entered the lottery for a spot in a deeply affordable housing project and won. She was the only one in the group to get a spot in permanent housing.

[Mama Dee]

It's a one bedroom living room, kitchen. And then now I got all my little stickers for the wall and stuff. But yeah, this is my house.

[Shayna Shealy]

She lives there in downtown Oakland with her son Dupree. And if you were in charge, like if you worked, if you were the homelessness administrator for the city of Oakland, what would your plan be?

[Mama Dee]

I would put the money towards building housing instead of shelters and temporary non profits.

[Shayna Shealy]

What about all the temporary programs, like even the co governance program?

[Mama Dee]

It don't help. It don't help.

[Shayna Shealy]

What do people need?

[Mama Dee]

They need the housing. And I feel that some we have.

[Shayna Shealy]

Bringing this up.

[Mama Dee]

Weddell was murdered.

[Shayna Shealy]

Oh, really?

[Mama Dee]

Yeah.

[Shayna Shealy]

What happened?

[Mama Dee]

I don't know. They never placed him nowhere. They just sent him back on the street.

[Shayna Shealy]

One member of the Union Point group, who people called Wedo, was found dead in the summer outside of a 711 in Oakland. Momady also worried that Papa Eddy had died somewhere on the street after the group was kicked out of the East 12th site. She said the last she heard was that his son found him sleeping in a puddle back at Union Point park and that he had caught pneumonia. She and I went back to the park to try to find him.

[Mama Dee]

Hey, you think Papa Eddie? Last I heard he went to the hospital.

[James]

Papa said, husband, what happened?

[Mama Dee]

I don't know where he's at now.

[Shayna Shealy]

Years after the city cleanup crews mass evicted homeless people from Union Point park, there are still people living there. When I was there recently with Mama Dee, we saw around 10 tents in the grass, A fort made of found materials, laundry lines tied to poles and elevated footbridges. The parking lot was nearly full of trucks and sedans and people living out of them. Momedy called for Papa Eddie over and over again inside tents and underneath bridges. We found him.

[Mama Dee]

What the heck?

[Tammy]

I've been looking for you forever, Papa Eddie.

[Shayna Shealy]

Forever.

[James]

I thought I heard somebody calling.

[Shayna Shealy]

We found him on a grassy lawn at Union Point Park. He says he comes here most days to enjoy the view and the fresh air.

[James]

I'm just enjoying the fresh air and having lunch.

[Shayna Shealy]

He had a hospital sticker on his shirt. He asked me to take a picture of him standing in front of the anchor he painted back when he first started sleeping.

[James]

Here, take a picture of me standing in Burnley.

[Mama Dee]

Oh, yes.

[Shayna Shealy]

Okay.

[James]

I love that. And then all the people from the music industry and all the people from.

[Shayna Shealy]

The movie industry.

[James]

Be a member of more than one union.

[Tammy]

You know.

[Shayna Shealy]

That'S it for A Tiny Plot. I'm your host, Shayna Shealy, and I want to thank everyone who worked on this show. First, the entire union point cast. Thank you for letting me into your world. And second, the whole team at SNAP Studios. A Tiny Plot is a production of kqed SNAP Studios, hosted and produced by Shayna Shealy. Edited by Anna Sussman. Original music by Renzo Gorio. Extra special thanks to Jen Chen, Catherine Winter, the city of Oakland, Sweetie at the Travel Inn, Ryan Finnegan, Will Craft, JP Dobrin, Thomas Browns, Suki Lewis, Alastair Boone and the Street Spirit. And KQED legal engineering by Pat Mesiti Miller director of production, Marissa Dodge. Our executive producers are Glenn Washington and Mark Ristich. On Team snap, the union represented producers, artists, editors and engineers are members of the national association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, Communications workers of America, AFL CIO Local 51. And this is not the news. No way is this the news, because this is snap judgment. Get your ears ready and keep your hearts open because this is prx.

[Snap Studios Host]

Sam.