Since our most recent victory in May 2020– passing an ordinance that will require the City of San Francisco permanently close County Jail 4 at 850 Bryant by November 1st, 2020— No New SF Jail Coalition has started to build a San Francisco movement to abolish all of SF’s cages and methods of criminalization, through a series of political education and skill-share events each month.
Through our Abolition In Action Series, we gather virtually once each month for a community workshop on our campaign to #ShutDown850 and discuss ways to build an abolitionist future for San Francisco, a future for us all.
Each month focuses on a new topic related to building a jail-free, police-free, criminalization-free San Francisco–from a People’s Assessment of the Ordinance to Close 850 (May), to Re-entry Support & Resources for folks recently released from SF jails (June), People’s Budgeting for the City budget (July), Harm Reduction & Decriminalization (August) and much more.
October’s Abolition in Action:
Whose Streets?!: Abolitionist Street Fair!
Support Mutual Aid FOR Abolition!
Donate here
After hosting five successful online political education sessions since May, No New SF Jail Coalition is wanting to prioritize off-line connections with folks who don’t have access to technology and who couldn’t participate in our online events. For this month’s Abolition in Action event, we’ll be hosting a resource fair for street-based folks in the Tenderloin. We’ll have tables with different resource information folks can access, along with resource specialists and organizations folks can speak directly with. We’ll also be distributing food, screen-printing free shirts with our “Care Not Cages” and “Libertad” stencils, sharing health and harm reduction supplies, talking about abolition, listening to people’s stories and visions for a jail-free city, and providing financial mutual aid in the form of gift cards.
While we’re prioritizing folks who are unhoused or street-based for in person presence at the event, we still need support from our housed community
If you want to support giving resources and money directly to our unhoused neighbors, please donate on gofundme or Venmo NoNewSFJail-Coalition! 100% of funds will go via gift cards directly to people who are unhoused or street-based in SF, most of whom are people of color and experience criminalization from SFPD. This continuous criminalization results in a jail population that is over 40% houseless.
Past Abolition in Action (AiA) Series Events:
AiA #5: Internal Political Education on Inside-Outside Organizing
For our September Abolition in Action, the No New SF Jail Coalition worked with some movement partners to provide some internal political education on their work inside and outside of jails and prisons to support people who are locked up. No New SF Jail Coalition is working to develop a tighter strategy for supporting more people inside of SF’s jails. We will share out some of our lessons with you after we do our political education soon!
AiA Event #4: August’s Care not Cages–Harm Reduction, Decriminalizing Survival & Liberating SF
August’s Abolition in Action Series event–Care Not Cages–featured an informative mini-training with the DOPE Project on how to respond to an opioid overdose along with a panel of grassroots experts on harm reduction & decriminalization. Speakers represented Rad Mission Neighbors, the SF AIDS Foundation, GLIDE, SF Drug Users Union, Do No Harm, DPH Must Divest and the DOPE Project of the Harm Reduction Coalition.
- Rewatch the event here (in English)
- Watch the event here (en Español). Para información en español, haga clic aquí.
AiA Event #3: July’s Funding Our Communities (Community Workshop on Budget Strategy for Abolition)
July’s Abolition in Action Series Event–Funding Our Communities–was an extensive workshop on how to use budget advocacy in fighting for abolition. Participants participated in a community envisioning exercise and developed collective plans for a city budget that supports a thriving, equitable and sustainable San Francisco for all of our communities. Participants then could opt-in to a training on how to give effective public comment on budget issues related to policing, imprisonment or criminalization in the city.
- Watch the workshop on our youtube channel here.
- Check out the community’s vision for SF’s budget here.
AiA Event #2: June’s Getting Out & Getting Free (Community Panel on Reentry Services, Experiences & Resources)
For June’s Abolition in Action Series Event–Getting Out & Getting Free–, we were joined by over 100 people, many of whom have family members currently imprisoned in prisons and jails, as well as a few former prisoners, service providers and community organizers–for a community panel of grassroots experts on ReEntry experiences, struggles, services & resources.
- You can read a full report back of the event for participants here
- A number of resources were mentioned at the end of the event, namely a new reentry resource guide feature we are developing on our website (with a Spanish-language version coming soon). You can find that resource feature of our website here.
- You can also re-watch a full recording of the event in English here. And you can read our responses to the questions mentioned at the event in the chat box on this document here.
AiA Event #1: May’s #ShutDown850 People’s Assessment of the Ordinance
You can view the presentation of the event in this video here:
View the information shared in the presentation here: #Shutdown850 People’s Assessment Slides.
No New SF Jails 