Homelessness Documentary Promo Video and Fundraiser LIVE!

in #video5 years ago

Homelessness in America is an epidemic with no solution in sight. In fact, the issue is only growing—as seen recently in my home city of Minneapolis with the rise of its largest-ever tent city.

20181011_161435-1.jpg
Minneapolis Tent City, also known as "The Wall"

What's going on?

While experts offer some theories, rarely is there a comprehensive overview of this issue. So, I'm creating a documentary film offering just that.

With the story of the Minneapolis Tent City as its focus, this film will share the history, data, and stories around the issue of homelessness in America. This includes: the stories as told by the homeless themselves, the experiences and insights from those working with them, and various perspectives from the community.

YouTube Thumbnails (7).png
Some of the subjects I've interviewed

This project seeks to make sense of this issue, to uncover the causes and solutions while steering clear of the political sways so often affecting journalism today.

Would you contribute to help make this happen? (Click here)

Much of the filming and research is complete. Here's what's next:

  1. Hire help to edit the footage and design the graphical elements of the film
  2. Conduct surveys at the Tent City to learn more about the causes of these residents' situations
  3. Travel to Houston (Here's why: The Houston metropolitan area is the fifth-largest in the country. It's almost twice the size of Seattle (#15) as well as the Twin Cities (#16). And yet, the Twin Cities has more homeless people than Houston, while Seattle has almost TRIPLE what Houston has. What is Houston doing different? To what degree does policy affect homelessness? My visit to Houston will help me find out.)
  4. My time to work on, and oversee, all the aspects of this film.

20181103_154640-1.jpg
Me at my home office

My Goal:

Besides the trip to Houston and some follow-up interviews, I'm looking to have filming finished within a week or two. Then, for the remainder of November, December, and January, I'll be working with my editing team. And by the end of January (or February), I hope to premiere this film in Minneapolis—an event contributors will be given a ticket to. (For contributors unable to attend, I will release the documentary to you on my YouTube channel shortly thereafter.)

Speaking of social media, stay up to date with this project right here on Steemit.


By sharing the stories and lives of those caught up in this rising problem, and by offering clear analysis of this issue, my hope is this project illuminates the best way forward for addressing homelessness in America.

Thank you for your time, consideration, and contribution.

-Brandon

Sort:  

Hey Brandon! It's awesome to see someone taking this issue and trying to find out WHY it happens. I think that's gotta be the best way at preventing it from continuing on into the future.

Honestly I'm shocked it's such a big thing in the Minneapolis area. I've been in Minneapolis many times during the winter and its FREEZING cold. Not to say that people can't lose their home anywhere in the world. I'm more curious how they're able to survive in a tent city. It sounds pretty horrible.

I wish you luck in your fundraising and in your film. I hope it's able to bring about more awareness on this subject and come up with some viable solutions. I also like that you're not taking it to a political place. I think it's better not to alienate half of your potential audience. It affects everyone!

Hear, hear, jocqua! And thank for your interest.

This is a unique occurrence in Minneapolis. Yes, it does get cold (is cold now). Plus, the city hasn't, til now, taken such a lenient approach to tent cities. But the city is leaning toward the model of "harm reduction," as we see West Coast cities. So they allowed this tent city to stay, promised housing all in the city, and it ballooned to what we see today. There's never been anything like it here. Its size, and the tightness of the Native American community--who mostly inhabit this camp--are keeping it going strong despite the cold.

As far as why homelessness is growing across the U.S.? I'm still working on that one...

Crazy man. Can't even imagine what that would be like, to have to live in a tent city like that. Such a bummer. And with that cold. Unreal.

Well I wish you luck in your journey!

Hi fedoraonmyhead,

This post has been upvoted by the Curie community curation project and associated vote trail as exceptional content (human curated and reviewed). Have a great day :)

Visit curiesteem.com or join the Curie Discord community to learn more.

Congratulations @fedoraonmyhead! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :

You received more than 500 upvotes. Your next target is to reach 1000 upvotes.

Click here to view your Board of Honor
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word STOP

Do not miss the last post from @steemitboard:

SteemFest3 and SteemitBoard - Meet the Steemians Contest

Support SteemitBoard's project! Vote for its witness and get one more award!

Cool and great Brandon!
I guess in America if you're not very rich then you're very poor?
I don't know. There is no balance or fair distribution I guess so to speak?

Anyways, thanks for caring these people and I wish you all the best in your journey.
Good luck!
And more power!

The economy is becoming more polarized, @ronel, which is widely cited as contributing to the homeless issue. America has always been high risk-high reward, but the number of poor people is increasing. Thank you for the well-wishes! I'll continue to share updates.

@fedoraonmyhead hello!
I saw your post in the #homelessness trending section, next to my latest post also on the subject of homelessness, I liked your post, I was wondering if I could use your picture of that tent wall in my post, I will give you credit and link back to this post.

Cheers and thanks for sharing!

/FF

Sure thing. I'm happy to collaborate. I'll read your post, too:)

Thank you very much @fedoraonmyhead I put your photo of "The Wall" in the article and gave you credit and a backlink to this article, glad to collaborate with you and best wishes to you and your project! This is a most urgent issue and Im happy to see that people like you put energy into documenting this, it's a good way to shed light on this topic and sometimes one good documentary can be what triggers a solution to the problem, let hope so. Big thanks once again!

/FF

Resteemed, and promoted. Good luck my steemian friend.

/FF

I sent some promotion/resteeming service your way, should help get the message out there!

Maybe the force be with you!

/FF

I wish you luck on this journey dude. May you continue to shed light onto the subject and showing the real problem everyone else falls deaf to. These people have no voice and your project could give them that.

Thank you, @adamada, for the good wishes. Yes, the problem needs better solutions. I hope to find them!

This is a great promo video of your amazing project. It is important that somebody tackles the issue. I'm based in Switzerland but I've seen already some documentaries about homelessness in the US here, so it must be very bad if they show it to people in Europe. The one that I've seen last was about the Las Vegas and people living in some sort of canalization tunnels. This sounds so horrible and humiliating.

I am sorry to hear that this is an issue in the whole US. Oh, poor people living in those tents when the winter is coming. I must say I feel sorry for them and I hope that there will be some shelters built for them where they can warm up and get some good meals.

It's alarming to hear how many people actually can't affect their situation. They lost everything and they can't get up on their feet without help of others. We have also these issues in Switzerland and I'm supporting an organization helping homeless people here.

I wish you all the luck with the fundraising. I hope you will get as much help as you need so that you can spread the awareness and hopefully help to resolve this issue.

Thank you for sharing! Take care!

Thank you, @delishtreats! The U.S. has always had an issue with people "falling through the cracks." Many feel like they don't belong in a country so fragmented. So they drift and find themselves belonging with other drifters. This particular camp in Minneapolis is almost all Native Americans, but homelessness affects people of all races. Addiction is a big part of it, and then many I speak to don't want to go to treatment. So they live on the streets. Minnesota, where I lives, actually has generous welfare benefits (by American standards, anyway). So the issue seems to be helping the homeless get up and take advantage of them. We'll see if I can show this in my documentary.

I have been captivated by this publication, which surely for the corporate media in your country is not news.

i am from venezuela a country that is heavily attacked by the international media as a country with a dictatorial regime. i do not intend to go into details of what is wrong with this country but i can tell you that despite the economic crisis we are going through we have a solid government system of housing construction for disadvantaged sectors. the project is called great mission housing venezuela and has been in seven years, the government of venezuela has built two million homes as part of the social protection system of the people. here i leave you this link https://www.telesurtv.net/news/Venezuela-es-el-pais-que-mas-construye-viviendas-en-el-mundo-20171229-0003.html

for you to see one of the realities that despite all the bad things in government, this point in favor of one of the fundamental rights of every human being, housing, is seriously hidden.

Thank you for sharing this noble cause, I hope you succeed in solving this problem.

greetings peace and freedom

Nice to hear, Im glad homelessness is not a big problem in Venezuela, I guess all systems have their pro's and con's, actually the right to a home is a human right, according to the "Universal Declaration of Human Rights" I wrote this article about it: Not providing housing for the homeless is a human rights violation...

/FF

I think the problem is with the principles of the laws that are based on social democracy, and these clash with the dogma for example of liberalism... in his doctrine he prays to keep private property safe and what they most like to keep the freedoms of individuals intact and inviolable. which undoubtedly brings as a consequence that a state like USA that has two representative models in power, one republican and the other liberal .. attempt against their constitutional principles, on the one hand are under oath but on the other hand only care about trade and individuality, forgetting that they are a collective and when someone in the collective is wrong to help him, I continue to insist your mission is very noble brother. I wish I could help in activism to improve that situation.

Yeah, I understand it's all very complicated, I consider myself fairly liberal I don't like taxes and government control any more then most people.

But I believe most civilized countries could easily solve the problem of homelessness or at least provide tiny-houses or trailers with communal bathrooms and such, and probably by doing so creating some new jobs and save tax-money on the costs of prisons and law enforcement/police, who often end up "dealing" with the homeless people anyway sooner or later.

I also wish I could do more and be more active, and I think that supporting people who are involved in the "Tiny House Movement" is a very good thing to do even if you can't get directly involved yourself.

Cheers and thanks for the reply @arrozymangophoto!

Gracias, @arrozymangophoto! You are correct. I have not heard much positive news about Venezuela. So I appreciate you sharing that project in your country. It reminds me of Cuba, which is poorer than the U.S., but I didn't see any homeless people in Havana.

I never imagined that in the United States there are so many homeless people, it was touching to read your intentions to help these people and it seems great that you are documenting what you are doing in videos. I hope you can help them find solutions.

Many thanks, @iraidamatheus:) Yes, in the U.S. we have many rich people and many poor people. It is a problem.

That is a real hot topic and not only in America we face the same problem in Europe, the prices for home shooting up and the salaries staying hte same, recently in UK, we have a huge inflation due to coming Brexit that may cause a growth of poverty too. I do not know what could be done, the government has a good social system here, with that we spoil new generation, as they prefer to stay at home and get benefits. It is a sword with two edges. That was really interesting to see what is happening in America.

Thanks, @stef1. Yes, America in similar. Offering more benefits also increases the number of people who can exploit the benefit. It is indeed a double-edged sword. I think the answer is one-on-one work with the people who get benefits. Make sure they need the benefits and are not exploiting them.

It's hard to exploit a tiny-house and maybe a communal shower... Since it's not monetary aid.

/FF

Coin Marketplace

STEEM 0.36
TRX 0.12
JST 0.039
BTC 70112.96
ETH 3549.99
USDT 1.00
SBD 4.71