Speak Compassion

“I’m proud to go to jail for housing the homeless”

by Joe Brummer @ 4:01 pm. Filed under Joe's Rants

A California man has been arrested for refusing to kick out homeless clients who have been living in tents and trailers on his ranch. Change.org is reporting:

For eight years, Dan de Vaul has operated a residential sobriety program on his sprawling 72-acre ranch in San Luis Obispo. While many formerly homeless addicts credit de Vaul with their sobriety, he was arrested today for building code violations that violated the terms of his probation. Should de Vaul be praised for his efforts to house the homeless or punished for doing so illegally?

Pictured after the jump, the residential facilities on de Vaul’s ranch were a mix of trailers, tents, garden sheds, and old converted houses and barns. The LA Times reported that De Vaul has received numerous orders to shut down the center, kick out the residents, and clean up his property. Yet, as soon as the authorities go away, he lets the sober-living clients back in.

Call it a blatant disregard for the law? Or an unapologetic desire to do what he believes is right?

Either way, de Vaul’s defiance has landed him in prison. Two months ago, a jury convicted him of two misdemeanor building code violations. He was sentenced to probation, under which he could not break any laws. Since he again refused to displace the residents of his sobriety program, he was arrested and sentenced to prison for 90 days.

“I’m proud to go to jail for housing the homeless,” he told reporters.

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2 Responses to ““I’m proud to go to jail for housing the homeless””

Xan Says:
December 15th, 2009 at 10:29 am
I’m very interested in your thoughts analyzing how Gandhi / Satyagraha’s concept of nonviolent action / protest applies to this situation? Before resorting to civil disobedience, I think we must first be blameless and I’m not sure that he is: (1) I wonder if he could achieve his objective within the bounds of the law? (a) I first wonder if he may be “grandfathered” in legally and thus have legal grounds to appeal; namely, if his use of his property pre-dates the date of the ordinance; (b) he’s in violation of safety / health ordinances, and the article says he has refused offers to bring the buildings up to safety standards; do we have a right to remain out of compliance with law just because we “want” to, or do we have a duty to do our part to stay within the bounds of the law if at all possible, in this case by accepting improvements to property? (2) Does the harm from going to jail outweigh the benefit, for instance if now there is no alternative at all for the people who formerly lived there and will be evicted as a result of his action? In other words, what does he hope to accomplish by going to jail? In King’s case, he called attention to a widespread injustice. In this case, not sure the injustice is widespread enough to benefit thousands by sacrifice of a few? … Curious about your thoughts?
Joe Brummer Says:
December 15th, 2009 at 10:39 am
Much like King, he is bringing light to widespread injustice. They are asking this man to bring tents and trailers up to code which they know full well he is not capable of doing and more importantly, I am not sure it is his responsibility to do so. That is the injustice I see here. Rather than the state coming in and helping this man take care of those less fortunate, they are preventing him from doing and they are not willing to do it.

So where is the injustice is what I think Gandhi would ask. Is the injustice that this man is ignoring the law by doing what he is doing or is the law ignoring him by doing what it is doing. I believe the latter of the two to be true. The state is ignoring the humanity of the situation in favor of paper laws. I would like to believe we as humans, when prompted by appropriate circumstances, will work to serve humans over laws.