In 1972, the Community for Creative Non-Violence (CCNV), a small group of peace and social justice activists began a soup kitchen to serve people on the streets of Washington. A few years later, the group began to address the then- “invisible” issue of homelessness with political rallies, Congressional hearings, protests, prayer, civil disobedience, and fasting.
In 1984, members of CCNV and other activists, along with hundreds of people who were homeless, moved into a run-down and abandoned federal college building at 2nd and D streets NW. Led by CCNV founder Mitch Synder, activists began protests and fasts to get the building renovated as a homeless shelter. After 51 days, President Ronald Reagan, signing an order on Air Force One, finally agreed to renovate the building to serve as a model homeless shelter.
Another lengthy CNNV fast with political goals was held in 1988, the year that renovations were completed at 2nd and D. This is an expert’s look back from a night during the end of that fast.
B.J. and I are schmoozing between phone calls, and patient requests for aspirin. A towel? Any empty beds? Did B.J. talk to the ministers about the group home plan? He didn’t have the time. Did I bring in our Red Cross certificates? I forgot. Where’s Allen? In the kitchen? Delousing room? He’s here, in the back.
“Carolyn, my life is not going to be worth anything if the staff doesn’t get those Red Cross certificates.”
“I will,” I tell B.J., “I will.”
The infirmary is a funny place. Original, valuable art on the walls, homemade patchwork quilts on all the beds. We run out of soap, boil used toothbrushes, run out of towels (the guests steal them — it’s just like the Hilton). Some guests have AIDS.
A very sober young man appears. “Is there a medical person here?”
B.J. and I look at each other. We’re it. The doctor is gone, the nurse is gone. I am a writer, Allen an administrator and B.J. — rotund, competent, and nonmedical — is permanent shelter staff.
B.J., Allen and I have just completed a one-day first-aid course. CPR. How to deal with broken legs, gunshot wounds and seizures. What to do if someone has an object protruding from an eye (you put a foam cup around it and stuff the cup).
“What can we do for you?”
“One of the fasters, Steve, has chest pains. Somebody better look at him.”
Allen will watch the desk. B.J. and I trail down halls to a big basement room. A sign announces, “NO FOOD OR DRINK BEYOND THIS POINT!” There are pictures of Gandhi on the walls, putty-colored room dividers, rows of beds, tables, pallets. Scattered newspapers.
Kidney-shaped pans — throw-up tins —sit on the tables.
We go over to Steve’s bed.
He’s pale, lying on his side, his crutches against the wall. B.J. reaches for his arm: “Here, Steve, let me take your pulse.” B.J. pokes me with his elbow, whispering, “Your watch!” He doesn’t have one.
I hold up my arm.
“Hmm,” says B.J. frowning, “Hmm, a bit fast.”
I go in close, solicitous. I try to sound like I know what I’m doing. “How long have you been having these chest pains? Where do you feel them?”
B.J. and I confer. Fasting results in low potassium, which can cause heart failure. We agree to call an ambulance and ask the serious young man to do it. He disappears, returns. And hovers.
He’s afraid Steve will be force-fed at the hospital, given an IV, which will break the fast. He hassles him about getting into an ambulance — “You’ll have more control if I take you over” — and talks about legal rights.
Steve is very pale, looks confused. The serious young man goes on. I’m exasperated. I wish he would leave Steve alone, stop it.
Mitch appears, goes over to Steve, takes his hand, hugs him. He’s fasting too.
Another faster appears, joking, in shorts. “I used to have great legs,” he says. Steve heaves, spits into one of the little pans.
Mitch turns around. “Did you tell them to bring EKG equipment?” he asks me.
“We told them it was a heart problem.”
This is not the right answer. They’ve had nothing but water for what? 42 days?
When the ambulance arrives, B.J. and I trail back to the infirmary.
Allen, at the desk, announces my pumpkin cookies on the paging system: “Carrot-prune health cookies are being served in the day room. Better hurry — these will go fast!” Somebody wants a towel. Where are they? They’re gone. We’re out of towels. You press one-one on the phone to page. It echoes.
“Anyone who has more than one towel, please turn it in to the desk. If you have more than one towel, please turn it in.”
I am in the day room now, putting cookies out on napkins. The ones who can walk, line up. Allen gets on the paging system again. “Last call for tonight’s delicious snack! There may be a FEW of those wheat-germ cookies left.” B.J., on duty since early morning, goes to his room in back. Permanent staff in fact, are on call 24 hours a day.
Allen looks at the bed chart and goes to do the count, kicks the block out of the door, locks us in. It never comes out even, the bed count. We have to go find a guest who’s been around a while, who knows that the guy in bed B6 is working a night shift, A5 is back in the hospital, D3 was barred for drinking and can’t come back in.
Allen calls upstairs to the front desk, reports, “We have 27 in the infirmary and two staff.” I go to turn out the lights. There’s a special key you push into the wall. A lot of times it doesn’t work.
When I get back, it’s quiet, the door shut on a card game in the day room. Allen puts his feet up and starts to talk about the Dukakis, the CCNV homeless rally at the Capitol next Monday. Cher should be there.
Will I be there?
CCNV’s high visibility, aggressive tactics and spiritual commitment helped create the passage of federal and local legislation addressing homelessness, along with activist infighting and controversies over tactics. CCNV activities and charismatic Snyder were profiled on CBS’s “60 Minutes” and in many newspapers across the country. They also became the subject of a Hollywood film called “Samaritan,” starring Martin Sheen, who played Snyder.
In 1990, beset by depression, personal problems, activist infighting, and the rollback of homeless legislation in the District, Snyder hanged himself in his room at 2nd and D. But in various ways, CCNV activists continued the mission, the ministry, and the political and practical work of sheltering people and working to end homelessness.
