Update

Why WE left

This is a personal project. It has grown out of many conversations with those that I am close to about the brutal rental market and displacement of most of my friends in the Bay Area, especially in San Francisco, as they try to make ends meet in the tech boom.

Katherine and Dizzy -Alice St. 

Downtown Oakland. After being priced out of San Francisco's Mission District she and her dog are on the hunt for a place to live in the East Bay, Oakland specifically, but the boom across the Bay has made this increasingly hard and the average cost for a 1 bedroom near BART is $1800.

In San Francisco the average rent hit $3,392 in the the last quarter of 2014, that is a increase of 11% from the same quarter a year ago, according to the San Jose Mercury News in January. 

Josh and Gina - Fell Street

San Francisco - When the maintenance man's key broke in their three bedroom apartment door, the landlord demanded that they produce the original tenant, who was cited on a over 10 year-old lease in order to receive a new key to their home. Even though the rental agency had been accepting money orders from Josh for years. They went to the San Francisco Tenants Union for help and even though Josh and Gina won their rent board appeal the rental agency that operates the building raised the rent from $900 to $4000 per month. Unable to afford the rental increase in addition to the cost of taking their landlord to court, to produce the receipts of payment, Josh and Gina where forced to move into her parents home in San Jose.

Would you like to get involved and share your story? Do you know someone who's struggling with similar rental issues? Email me at ckcphoto@gmail.com

Looking forward to sharing your stories!

Kenya - Harrison Street 

Oakland - Kenya works in San Francisco and moved to Oakland after rents began to raise. Frustrated by what she saw around her in the rental market she started the Facebook group San Francisco Affordable Housing.  She advocates for education of rental and tenant law in her group by linking together folks on Facebook who have rental issues or are looking for affordable rentals in the current Bay Area market.

Chris- Indiana Street

San Francisco -  Chris, a film student at San Francisco Academy of Art, had been sharing a room in Bernal Heights with his good friend he moved to San Francisco with a couple years ago. A full time student with a part time job he knew that he would never be able to have his own space in the current market and choose instead to buy himself a van. Chris built himself a plywood bed frame and moved his world into the van. He has a YMCA membership and uses their facilitates when he needs to shower and freshen-up.

Nick and Michelle -Virginia Street
Vallejo- Musicians and members of Dinner with the Kids had lived in San Francisco's Richmond district. Nick and Michelle, who are newly engaged, wanted a home of their own and they knew that they'd never be able to afford their own space without having roommates in the City. They both work in San Francisco and found that they would rather commute from Vallejo then pay an astronomical amount in rent just for the convince of being close to work.

Why WE left

Here's a sneak peek of a portrait project I've been working on here in the Bay called "Why WE left".

This is a personal project that has grown out of many conversations with my close friends about the brutal rental market and displacement of many of my friends in  the Bay Area especially in San Francisco as the try to make ends meet in the Non-Tech World.

Katherine and Dizzy -Alice St. 

Downtown Oakland. After being priced out of San Francisco's Mission District she and her dog are on the hunt for a place to live in the East Bay, Oakland specifically, but the boom across the Bay has made this increasingly hard and the average cost for a 1 bedroom near BART is $1800.

Would you like to get involved and share your story? or know someone who's struggling with similar rental issues? Email me at ckcphoto@gmail.com

Looking forward to sharing your stories!

AVAILIBLE NOW! GET YOUR COPY TODAY!

Commuters Issue 1 Vol. 1

By Colleen Cummins in Commuters

42 pages

Urban exploring along the Bay

Trayvon Martin, Oakland and the night I got mugged... AGAIN!

On July 13, 2013, a Floridian jury declared that George Zimmerman was not guilty of second-degree murder and of manslaughter charges in the shooting death of an unarmed, black teenager, Trayvon Martin upholding the state's stand your ground law.

This is the only frame I have shot of the protests that followed for several days here in Oakland and it has taken me sometime to post this image which was shot last Monday due to circumstances that were out of my control and the emotional impact of them.

The story is as follows: Shortly after taking this photograph I was mugged with two other of my  fellow photographers by six people along Lakeshore Avenue on the east side of Lake Merritt here in Oakland.

As we walked along the east side of the lake, ironically we were discussing the horrific amount of violence we have been witness to as residents of Oakland, when we passed a group of six young men all in their early twenties.  All three of us continued our conversation and as we approached the corner of Wayne  and Lakeshore Avenues, two of the young men stepped directly in front of me and  blocked the sidewalk. This is when it clicked.  I have been mugged before. I knew it. We were all going to be mugged.  "RUN" I yelled and tried to scramble up into the bushes and out of reach, but I slipped and by the time I regained my balance one of the young men was standing over me. " Give me your camera. Give me your camera " he yelled.

"NO"! I yelled back it is at this point I remember that I have pepper spray in my pocket. (purchased after my previous mugging ) I tried to reason with my assailant. "Come on we're nice people. We just came from the Trayvon protest. You don't want to do this" I said. 

"Well then give me your phone" he said. 

All this mind you, happened in a matter of minutes, but it felt like an eternity. As I fished around in my pocket for the pepper spray  I told myself. "Colleen just don't drop it. Don't drop the pepper spray. You can do this"! I pulled the small black canister out of my pocket and aimed it at the mugger and was filled with an incredible amount of angry and my fear towards this man who was trying to steal my camera began to disappear. 

"She's got pepper spray" he yelled.  All six of the men ran. We gave chase. I don't know why. 

But we chased them for over a quarter mile. They ditched my friend bike they had taken and hopped into a car. We lost them, but not before a random stranger took down their license plate and helped us call the police. 

I was able to keep my equipment but my friends lost a Nikon film camera, several lenses, filters,  money, house keys, drivers license, a backpack with unopened birthday cards and a mac book pro in it. 

Oh yeah and we all lost our sense of being safe in our own community. I know, we all know it IS not safe to walk around Oakland by yourself at night but now I can not even feel safe in a group of people. Oakland, Oakland, Oakland. Where to begin with the issues that plague Oakland? In fact I was surprised that Oakland even had the police available to respond in the first place.  Tell me again about how we live in a post-racial America that doesn't practice class warfare on the poorest of its citizens, please.

New work : Da Bottom Boys

I live in Oakland to be more precise West Oakland in a neighborhood informally called Lower Bottoms or The Bottoms.The area was originally part of Oakland Point. It's a residential area made up of Victorian homes just a ten minute BART ride from flourishing San Francisco. The neighborhood earned its nickname after the construction of the Cypress Freeway in the 1950s that split the West Oakland neighborhood in two and isolated The Bottoms and Campbell Village Court from the remainder of West Oakland. The Cypress Freeway fell in the 1989 earthquake.  Making the neighborhood boundaries Mandela Parkway to the east, 7th Street to the south, West Grand Avenue to the north, and the former Oakland Army Base to the west. This is a ongoing documentary project.  Check back for more updates.

 Marquis B-eazi Johnson.

Solar eclipse at chimney rock , point reyes

Afternoon bike ride

Ready for spring

The West

We have a problem with illegal dumping here in the West, but there is now a easier way to report it with an app for yr phone called click fix. So Oaklanders do you have a giant pothole or trash lot near yr house. let the city know here http://www.seeclickfix.com/oakland/

Beautiful Rebels

One of the things I've always loved about SF is the underground drag scene. It has always amazed & inspired me creatively. Friday night the Deyoung Museum hosted a retrospective fashion show of Peaches Christ, Mrs. Vera, & Mr.David's collections as part of the Jean Paul Gaultier. Thanks for the inspiration once more.

If you want to achieve greatness stop asking for permission.

Snapped this Friday night at the oakland art murmur from Sausage's patio.

Seattle 1999 W.T.O

After years of many negatives piling up in black boxes and shelved away I've finally decided that it's time to bond with the scanner and breath life into some of these old frames. Here's a mixture of prints and film scans from the World Trade Organization protest in Seattle in 1999.

San Diego. Black. White and Color.

The pain of loss

Been combing through old pics and came across these 2 frames from when I worked for the AD. Grief is a funny thing which at first seems like it will never stop being painful and the truth is that it never really does. It just somehow becomes more dull over time. I still can feel these folks pain and when I look at these and I hope at least it has dulled somewhat now for them. The first frame is of Norm Sanders, left, who lost his stepson Jack Martin when he was brutally murdered along with his wife Susan Martin in their home in Sutter in July 2010. The second frame is Debbie Campbell, left,is comforted by Kelly Schumacher while friends erect a 9-foot cross at the intersection of Highway 20 and Acacia Avenue in memory of her boyfriend Paul John Hendrickson on Friday, Oct. 22, 2010. Debbie Campbell was injured in the fatal motorcycle accident that killed Hendrickson in May 2010.