My name is Alexander.! And I’m not that educated and I’m not that smart, but I’m not dumb and I’m not stupid.!! If you catch my drift.! I don’t know if this is appropriate, I don’t know you guys talked some high-powered stuff.! Right?! And I’m just a real person.! I live on skid-row and I got a question.! I have been hearing you guys talking about the War on Drugs, this high-powered War on Drugs, and Prison, and the Schools and all this kind of stuff, right. But I got a question that I just wanted you to ask, right?! Now they’ve been talking about having a War on Drugs. I would like to know if you guys could answer the question, I don’t know if you guys are capable of answering the question or not, but it’s just a question that’s in my mind, but when I walk into the community that I live at, right around the corner from the Police Station is a known dope spot.! That’s two-blocks away. They have people over there selling dope on a non-stop basis- a known drug spot.! I mean, you can walk over there now, and they’ll try to sell you crack.! And they smoke crack, and you know, it’s like a Drug-Selling Immune Zone.!!

They got another spot on 5th Street, 5th and Gladys or 5th and one of them streets- Towne Street.! It’s another Drug Immune Zone.! You just come there and set up shop, start selling crack.! Police don’t come, but nobody bother you.! You sell all the crack you got, you sell all the crack you want to sell, and the Police ride up and down Towne Street all the time- and nobody, nobody does nothing!! And it’s baffling me likeand they talking about the War on Drugs- I know they know it, because they’re smarter than me, and I’m not that smart.! So, you know- I just want to know, I don’t know, I don’t know if you guys can explain it or not: But, how could that situation like that be going on year after year after year after year?! Right around the corner from the Police Department?!! Known drug spots.

JM:! Are there any windows- how many windows are in that Police Department?

Aud #2:! Can I add a little addendum to his story?! I lived at 4th and Wall, right by where he’s talking about and we had a loft with a garden on top of it.! And somebody had planted a couple of Marijuana seeds in the loft, the garden or something, and there was knock down on the door from a couple of Police: “We see you got some plants growing up there.”! “No.! No we don’t.! No, we don’t.”! “Yeah, you do. You got a couple little ones.! Blah, blah, blah.”! Nobody believed them and all that stuff.! And they said: “We’ll give you week”, and they came back and knocked and said: “If they’re still there, you know- we gotta pull them up”, and we went up and there were just a couple seedlings, like maybe three.! But the thing is, there’s a Heli-pad, um-

Aud #3:! What’s a ‘Heli-pad’?

Aud #2:! It’s where heli- there’s a uh- it’s where Helicopter’s land.

Aud #3:! Oh.

Aud #2:! And the Police Station, by where he’s talking 5th and Wall and we’re right there and the Police Station was right there, they would fly right ove with infra-red cameras, and spot these iddy-biddy things.! And uh, but allow this stuff to go on.! I thought that was funny.

JM:! You want to talk to Alexander’s question?

Sandra Alvarez:! I- if, if any of you’ve been to San Francisco, I work on 16th and Mission and you know, we’re sort of passing by and watching those, those things going on, too.! You know, so, you know- I see it all the time.! When I first got there, the San Francisco Chronicle said: “16th & Mission: Marketplace of Heroin.”! I had to hide it from my parents, you know. Because- but, I can’t answer that question.! I know that, we at Global Exchange aren’t calling the Police when we’re seeing those transactions happening, because we know the War on Drugs is, is ineffective, is racist, it’s not looking at the real reasons: why are people selling drugs?! Why are people buying drugs?! You know, there are a lot of economic and social reasons behind that, and that’s what, what is not happening.! So, I think the Police know that it’s going to happen, no matter what.! There’s too much profit in it for not to happen.! And so they kind of let it happen.! Every once on a while they go into a big show, maybe- you know.! I occasionally see the cops chilling at McDonalds, while people selling crack go down the street to Capp and 16th.

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