"Starting in December 2018, the city has begun moving people from tent cities into Tuff Sheds, causing debate over what it means to solve the housing crisis." - Leila Mottley
Oaklanders have been holding the city accountable for the housing crisis and pushing for action since the homeless population began exploding in the last decade. While the city has claimed to be budgeting to acquire more affordable housing, many say there has been no visible difference in the landscape of the city. Instead, “tent cities” continue to be created and maintained as the over 2,700 people without homes in Oakland attempt to find shelter and stability within these communities. Starting in December 2018, the city has begun moving people from tent cities into Tuff Sheds, causing debate over what it means to solve the housing crisis.
The cultivation of Tuff Shed housing is known as the Northgate Project and costs private funders and the city government less than $1 million dollars per year. In December and January of 2018, the first two sets of Tuff Sheds were placed on Castro Street and Brush Street in West Oakland. The next set was put up in May 2018 and the most recent round of Tuff Sheds were constructed in September and October 2018.
Tuff Sheds are typically used to store tools and gardening equipment, not to house people. The city has assigned two people to each shed, separating them by a single curtain. Each shed is 120 square feet or “half the size of a one-car garage.”
The cultivation of Tuff Shed housing is known as the Northgate Project and costs private funders and the city government less than $1 million dollars per year. In December and January of 2018, the first two sets of Tuff Sheds were placed on Castro Street and Brush Street in West Oakland. The next set was put up in May 2018 and the most recent round of Tuff Sheds were constructed in September and October 2018.
Tuff Sheds are typically used to store tools and gardening equipment, not to house people. The city has assigned two people to each shed, separating them by a single curtain. Each shed is 120 square feet or “half the size of a one-car garage.”
Placement in the Tuff Sheds is voluntary, however tent cities were given notices of removal upon construction of the Tuff Sheds, making the sheds the only option besides complete displacement. Along with a place to sleep, each Tuff Shed site provides portable toilets, two meals a day, showers twice a week, addiction treatment, and access to resources that help them find permanent housing. There is no running water on site and most of the Tuff Shed villages are placed directly by loud freeways and BART tracks.
Most people who have entered the Tuff Sheds did so reluctantly, but felt that it was the better alternative to finding another street to sleep on after having their tent community dissipated. Some occupants report feeling a sense of security that the streets didn’t provide. Others are unsure this security is worth the surveillance and control that comes along with it. Ebony Reed, a resident at an Oakland Tuff Shed site said, “it kind of feels like being in jail. You have to sign in and out. You can only bring clothes.”
There are a lengthy set of rules within the Tuff Shed sites. These include:
While citywide Communications Director Karen Boyd says the rules and regulations are intended to “create a safer and healthier environment,” they have resulted in a large number of residents being kicked out of the community.
Most people who have entered the Tuff Sheds did so reluctantly, but felt that it was the better alternative to finding another street to sleep on after having their tent community dissipated. Some occupants report feeling a sense of security that the streets didn’t provide. Others are unsure this security is worth the surveillance and control that comes along with it. Ebony Reed, a resident at an Oakland Tuff Shed site said, “it kind of feels like being in jail. You have to sign in and out. You can only bring clothes.”
There are a lengthy set of rules within the Tuff Shed sites. These include:
- No violence
- No drugs or alcohol
- No cooking your own food
- Must sign in and out of the compound
- Must have a roommate
- No overnight guests
While citywide Communications Director Karen Boyd says the rules and regulations are intended to “create a safer and healthier environment,” they have resulted in a large number of residents being kicked out of the community.
Michael London, a homeless man who moved into the Northgate Avenue Tuff Shed camp in May 2018, lost his place in September after an altercation on the site. He was kicked out without a chance to collect his possessions and is now on the streets with even less security than he had before entering Northgate. London said, “I never shoulda moved into those sheds [...] I lost everything I had, and even though it wasn’t much, now it’s gone.” Unfortunately, this is not an uncommon occurrence since the birth of the Northgate Project.
Keysha Boyakins, a woman who was also kicked out of an Oakland Tuff Shed camp, said she doesn’t “think they gave [her] a fair chance.” She was evicted after pulling out a knife to defend herself against her roommate’s attempts to sexually assault her. Boyakins describes her time in the camp, saying that her problems began when she was assigned a random roommate, who assaulted her when she was getting dressed after a shower.
Image of Keysha Boyakins
Since they were first set up, between 39 to 41 of the 146 people who have resided in Oakland’s Tuff Sheds have gone on to “find more permanent housing.” The others have either been evicted from the sites, are still residing in them, or have moved back to the streets to escape the bureaucratic surveillance.
The Tuff Shed sites are fenced in, decreasing visibility, and adding to an illusion that the homelessness crisis in Oakland is not as real as it was before the sheds. The Homeless Advocacy Work Group said that, “while the site is useful as a Navigation Center to help expedite available social services and hopefully process the homeless toward permanent housing, this ‘safe’ site can also be viewed as a controlled incarceration of the homeless, removing them from around the area and clustering them together where they need to sign in and out at a singular entry/exit point of the gated and barbed wire enclosure.”
By removing tent cities and consolidating homeless people into Tuff Sheds, the city prioritizes the comfort of housed people in Oakland (many of whom file complaints about tent cities) over the support and nourishment of those on the streets. Nino Parker, a man living on the E. 12th Street Remainder Parcel camp says that "the Tuff Shed program [is] a "vehicle" to remove large homeless camps rather than an actual transitional housing program to address the city's shelter crisis."
Nino Parker [right] with sign protesting eviction of Lake Merritt camps
The residents are given little agency and are expected to not only follow rules without room for slip-ups, but to share their space with whomever they are placed with, give up personal belongings, and hope that perhaps they will stay long enough to receive some sliver of permanency or stability. This autonomy may just be the sacrifice for a comfortable, secure place to sleep and the possibility of shelter away from the streets.
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Mayor Libby Schaaf, a strong advocate of the Tuff Sheds, said that they “are an example of how we’re approaching homelessness with compassion but also effectiveness.” The Homeless Advocacy Work Group, on the other hand, disagrees, claiming that the Tuff Sheds are “inhumane, undignified and a terrible way to treat the disenfranchised who have come to expect nothing but grief from a gentrified society.” Both agree that the Tuff Sheds are not enough to solve the housing crisis and do not present a solution for the community as a whole, despite the impacts they may have on a select group of people.