'They think we're scum: Inside Silicon Valley's 'jungle camp'

 

 

 

 

 

'They think we're scum: Inside Silicon Valley's 'jungle camp' where hundreds of homeless live in tents, caves and tree huts just a short walk from rows of digital millionaire's mansions Sillicon Valley might be home to Google, Apple and Facebook, but a short distance from the leading tech companies sits a jungle camp where several hundred of San Jose's homeless live in squalled conditions. Housed in shacks, caves and tree houses, the residents spend their days and nights in various states of mental confusion and intoxication. The city has a seven-year, 20,000-person waiting list for housing support.

'They think we're scum.com': Inside Silicon Valley's 'jungle camp' where hundreds of homeless live in tents, caves and tree huts - just a short walk from rows of digital millionaire's mansions Several hundred homeless people live in shacks, caves and tree houses San Jose has a seven-year, 20,000-person waiting list for housing support A homeless person is estimated to cost £35,000 every year A few short miles from multi-million pound homes and the booming Silicon Valley, several hundred homeless people live in squalor in a make-shift jungle camp. At the camp, believed to be San Jose's largest homeless encampment, some 350 of the city's forgotten live in tents, makeshift shacks, caves and tree houses along polluted Coyote Creek. The camp is a melting-pot of illness, addiction and disorder with residents spending their days and nights in various states of mental confusion and intoxication. +6 A man cooks a meal over a make-shift fire in the jungle camp which is home to several hundred of San Jose's homeless and is just a few miles from the booming Silicon Valley +6 The jungle residents live in tents, makeshift shacks, caves and tree houses along polluted Coyote Creek +6 Children enjoy the good-life at the luxurious Villa Veneto apartments in the Silicon Valley +6 The futuristic-looking Oracle building, one of dozens of plush corporate offices in the Silicon Valley San Jose, the 10th largest city in the US, is at the heart of the Silicon Valley, home to Google, Apple, Facebook and many more, but it also has a seven-year 20,000-person waiting list for housing support. As the technology sector has boomed, so has the housing market. An average home sells for £583,000 and two bedroom apartments rent for £1166. The widening gap between rich and poor is clear to see. Residents of the Jungle are well aware of the world that lies nearby. They call it 'going up,' walking the dirt path up to busy Story Road, where minivans of families heading to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo across the street never notice the despair below. +6 The jungle residents are all to aware that just miles away from their rubbish filled compound is Silicon Valley +6 San Jose, the 10th largest city in the US, has a seven-year 20,000-person waiting list for housing support In the Jungle, trails wind through trees and bushes, and there are neighborhoods like Little Saigon, where Vietnamese residents have dug large rooms into steep hillsides and squat by the creek to wash dishes and get water. Their bathrooms are hand-dug holes or buckets. Mentally ill people burst from tents screaming and punching at unseen terrors. A man staggers by, bleeding from his ear after being hit with a shovel. A pregnant woman calls for help, her legs too swollen to get up. In the jungle, trails wind through trees and bushes, and there are neighborhoods like Little Saigon, where Vietnamese residents have dug large rooms into steep hillsides One morning, residents found a corpse in a tent. 'We're like the scum of the earth,' said jungle resident Maria Esther Salazar. 'We're like nobody.' Ms Salazar's life fell apart at 11 when she was kidnapped and gang raped. The 50-year-old has been arrested dozens of times, convicted of 17 felonies, almost all drug related and has had four children, none of which she has raised. Jennifer Loving, executive director of the nonprofit housing agency Destination: Home, is spearheading a new, concerted effort in San Jose to house people and keep them housed, not just out of compassion, but to save money. A homeless person can cost an estimated £35,000 a year, including trips to the emergency room and jail. The cost of housing someone can be just £9,300 annually. In a 24-month pilot, they've housed 630 people, 76 per cent of whom were still in their home a year after moving in. New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta have seen similar success with Housing First initiatives.

They were dubbed the 'forgotten souls' - the cremated remains of thousands of people who came through the doors of Oregon's state mental hospital, died there and whose ashes were abandoned inside 3,500 copper urns. Discovered a decade ago at the decrepit Oregon State Hospital, where One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was filmed, the remains became a symbol of the state's - and the nation's - dark history of treating the mentally ill. A research effort to unearth the stories of those who moved through the hospital's halls, and to reunite the remains with surviving relatives, takes center stage Monday as officials dedicate a memorial to those once-forgotten patients. +8 'Unclaimed souls': Building 60 on the Oregon State Hospital grounds is where the cremated remains of thousands of mentally ill patients +8 Memorial: The building has been transformed into a memorial for the thousands of 'forgotten souls' who died at the hospital +8 Hollywood: The Oregon State Hospital was used in the filming of the Jack Nicholson classic One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest 'No one wants to be laid to rest without some kind of acknowledgement that they were here, that they contributed, that they lived,' said state Senate President Peter Courtney, who led a successful effort to replace the hospital and build the memorial. Between 1913 and 1971, more than 5,300 people were cremated at the hospital. Most were patients at the mental institution, but some died at local hospitals, the state tuberculosis hospital, a state penitentiary or the Fairview Training Center, where people with developmental disabilities were institutionalized. Hospital officials have been working for years to reunite the remains of their former patients with surviving relatives. Since the urns were found by lawmakers on a tour of the hospital in 2005, 183 have been claimed. The 3,409 that remain and have been identified are listed in a searchable online database. Thirty-eight urns will likely never be identified; they're unmarked, have duplicate numbers or aren't listed in ledgers of people cremated at the hospital. +8 Patients: The remains of S. Erickson is one of more than 3,000 'forgotten souls' found at the hospital +8 Alone: Many of the remains that were discovered were unclaimed, like those of Nencel Devorak +8 History: The hospital tells the tale of the tragic history of how mental illness has often been treated in America They came from different backgrounds, for different reasons. Some stayed just days before they died, others for nearly their entire lives. They came from every state except Alaska and Hawaii. Nearly 1,000 were born in 44 countries. Five were born at sea. Twenty-two were Native Americans. Their remains won't be part of the memorial; they'll be returned to their tribe for a proper ceremony. Members of the local Sikh community are working to claim the remains of two people. Many of the 110 veterans still there will eventually receive proper military burials, though some are ineligible due to dishonorable discharges or insufficient information available. Some patients spent a lifetime at the hospital for conditions like depression and bipolar disorder that, in modern times, are treated on an outpatient basis. 'At the time, they just put them in a safe place and treated them with what they knew to treat them,' said Sharon Tucker, who led the two-year research project. +8 Canisters: The remains of thousands of patients sat in canisters on shelves at the hospital Records are sparse, even for people who lived for decades inside the walls. Some suffered from severe delusions, others from physical deformities. Some seemed to be institutionalized because their families just didn't know what to do with them. But what does survive is a window not only into who they were, but the time in which they lived. - Mr. S. Erickson was committed on Feb. 2, 1929, at age 78. A doctor who examined him wrote that he 'wanders around naked at night' and suffers from senility. A laborer, 5-foot-5, 125 pounds with gray hair and blue eyes, he arrived in New York from Norway on the steamship Norstatter on Aug. 22, 1883, according to the doctor's report. - Wencel Devorak, a saddler born in Bohemia, was 33 when he was committed on Jan. 31, 1890 struggling with delusions that others on the road to Portland were following him and teasing him about his wife. The handful of notes in his file show his delusions continued throughout his 40-year stay at the hospital. - Susanna Weber arrived at Dammasch State Hospital, a now-closed mental institution, on July 26, 1962 at age 82. A widower, she was committed by her sister and a friend, who had cared for her for three years, but couldn't keep going. She'd been sent to a nursing home, but administrators kicked her out because she wouldn't stop wandering and rifling through other patients' possessions, according to a social worker's report written shortly after Weber arrived. +8 Old: Some of the canisters have been there since around the time the hospital opened its doors in 1896 The remains of Erickson, Devorak, Weber and thousands of others have been transferred from the copper canisters to ceramic urns that will better protect them. The old canisters will be preserved to give visitors to the memorial a sense for how they once were housed. 'I think it will be very difficult to forget them now,' said Jodie Jones, the state administrator leading the hospital replacement project.