Isaac Rim

Izean “Isaac” Rim, 71, has been attending San Diego City Council meetings for so long he has a wealth of institutional knowledge stored in his memory. He remembers who spoke for or against what, who submitted what bill when, and whether it would hurt or help the quality of life for people experiencing homelessness.

A close friend of the late homeless advocate Waterman Dave, Isaac was in the room where it happened when the Waterman won his lawsuit against the city for unlawfully disposing of people’s personal belongings. The resulting funds went to creating the initial Transitional Storage Center, which used clean, empty waste bins in a secure, central location (at that time on 10th Avenue across from the downtown library) to provide individual storage spaces for unhoused individuals.

Soft-spoken with steel-blue eyes, Isaac has accrued respect on the street in East Village. He has seen, and endured, everything imaginable, and some things that are not. That respect he has earned is part of why he never plans to move away from East Village, even if he is offered a place of his own somewhere else. He has, however, made the leap from sleeping on the sidewalk to an actual mattress and readily available showers at the bridge shelter run by Alpha Project in Barrio Logan. He has been there for five years.

There is a difference between a street person and a homeless person, he said, and Isaac is the former. A street person chooses to live the way they do, surviving on odd jobs rather than having the goal of working to acquire possessions. Knowing the difference and being secure in his choice of lifestyle means he doesn’t get angry or depressed, he claimed. “Depression and anger lead to mental health issues,” he said. And that keeps him on the right side of law enforcement personnel. Isaac was chatting with a young police officer who couldn’t believe Isaac had no (criminal) record whatsoever. “You’ve been out here as long as I’ve been alive,” Isaac said the officer told him. “That makes me feels good,” he added.

Isaac is a realist and a deep thinker. This is why I seek him out when there are major policy decisions being made by housed people that will impact unhoused people.

Isaac has taken on Waterman Dave’s watchdog role on the city’s streets. One problem with the city’s sidewalk clean-ups, he said, is that even though signs say personal belongings will be kept for 90 days, that’s not happening. Belongings get tossed in the trash before people’s eyes. And for those who get out of jail and go looking for their stored belongings, more often than not, those belongings are gone or never were admitted to storage.

If the city wants people off the street they need a safe place to congregate, he said. “Families on the street need their own day center. Some place where kids can be safe when they are not in school, and that allows parents to do their business,” he added.

People with mental health issues are constantly misunderstood, he said. Many don’t do drugs or even smoke cigarettes. “They had a trauma in childhood or whatever, and that’s why they are out here,” Isaac said. He feels they need to be in housing, not institutions. “In a facility they are not treated as human beings so they act out and are asked to leave. They system isn’t set up for personal care or a sense of comfort,” he said.

He should know. He worked for many years in Fresno at a convalescent hospital as a nurse’s aid. From there he worked his way down California’s central valley doing odd jobs like picking fruit and construction. Los Angeles was too chaotic and crowded for him. One day in L.A. someone stole his hat, so he grabbed it back. The thief’s friend then stabbed Isaac. He woke up in the hospital to his mother, sister and aunt at his bedside. They gave him a bus ticket back to Fresno so he could rehab for two months. He returned to L.A. for a time, working odd jobs through a labor pool, but eventually kept moving south, landing in San Diego in 1991.

Up until the COVID-19 pandemic, Isaac attended city council meetings every Tuesday. The city clerk knew him by name. He felt it was his duty to speak up about things he sees and hears that need to be told, even if council member look at their phones or take bathroom breaks when he steps up to the microphone. He said he treats homeless acts of malfeasance the same as law enforcement might. “I look at the word ‘us’ as meaning coming together and getting things done,” he said. “I treat homeless the same way (as police do). If they are doing something crazy, I’ll tell them.”

Isaac keeps a discerning eye on politicians as well. He has watched Todd Gloria since Gloria was a San Diego Councilmember. “Right now he’s doing what he feels is right for the business community,” Isaac said.

The day before the city council’s marathon near-midnight session to decide the fate of the proposed ban on camping in certain public spaces, Isaac didn’t skip a beat quoting the latest statistics on homelessness and why he thought the ban misses the mark entirely. “In April, 417 people got housing in San Diego while 1,141 became homeless for the first time. I support the business people, and the parks for everyone, but people need 30 days notice to downsize their belongings - their sleeping bags and personal things,” he said. “They (the city) need to bring back the 9 p.m.-5:30 a.m. (sleeping on the sidewalk) curfew. It forces you to stay compact.” He also said the ban will require a 24-hour enforcement team to make sure the homeless respect it, if it is to have any meaningful impact.

In lieu of jail for multiple infractions, he suggests having people do community service with the Downtown Partnership. He feels people need to be in treatment, not jail. “Taking people to jail is not an option,” he said. “Give people options. There need to be alternatives. Also there needs to be a shelter with trained staff for the medically fragile and mentally ill, and people too old to work. You need case managers for people with physical and mental disabilities.”

Existing shelters are not designed for people who can’t care for themselves, Isaac said. He has seen people pee on themselves because they couldn’t get to the outside toilets in time, or they pee on the floor trying to get there. Someone who is not prescribed the right medications might act out or hurt themselves. In both these cases, the shelter staff are forced to tell these people to leave. They have nowhere to send these individuals, so the people end up even worse off: back out on the street.

“Their minds are gone, or their physical state is gone,” Isaac said. “Some shelters are not fit to care for them, or don’t take the time to find a way to care for their personal trauma. Anger, depression, after a few years their mind is just gone, like a soldier who has been to war.”

Oftentimes, Isaac said, just listening to people tell what is on their mind is calming for them. “It makes my day when I get that smile from them,” he said. “You don’t know what people are capable of. I need to show them they have value and they should believe in themselves.”