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Join us on Thursday, November 13 at 7pm when we welcome Brian Barth for the release of his book, Front Street: Resistance and Rebirth in the Tent Cities of Techlandia, with Nuala Bishari and members of Wood Street Commons at 9th Ave!

Free to Attend, Please RSVP Mask Encouraged for In-Person Attendance Or Watch on YouTube Live/Link Available Soon

About the Event Author Brian Barth is joined by members of Wood Street Commons, a collective of unhoused activists featured in his book, Front Street. The conversation will be moderated by Nuala Bishari.

Praise for Front Street "Politics aside, you don’t have to agree with Barth to keep turning the pages. He provides a deeply moving account of people 'doing Front Street,' facing the world from where they are. Despite the escalating wave of sweeps, they have what often escapes their housed neighbors: community."—Katherine Seligman, The Believer

"In Front Street, Brian Barth peels back the tarps of America’s modern tent cities, immersing himself—and us—deep into the improvised lives of the unconventionally housed. Barth’s great achievement is not that he portrays society’s broken souls with empathy, though he extends uncommon grace to those typically looked on as a nuisance. It’s that he uncovers a weird sort of paradise in the chaos and discomfort of the encampments: a tolerance, a purpose, a togetherness scrubbed from so many of our tidier communities. This book will forever change your perception of the ‘homeless crisis’ and the doomed attempts to sweep it away."—Jesse Katz, author of The Rent Collectors

"Brian Barth has done a tremendous service with his book, not only for those who are unhoused on the streets of America but for those of us who are housed. He has managed to capture the humanity of those who have fallen through the cracks and can no longer afford to pay for their housing. But he has also shown us housed Americans that there are amazingly compassionate communities within the shanty towns and encampments who are generously supportive of each other despite all the sufferings that come with living on the streets."—Mike Pyatok, award-winning architect of affordable housing and author of Good Neighbors: Affordable Family Housing

About Front Street In his first book, award-winning investigative journalist Brian Barth takes us on an immersive journey deep into Silicon Valley’s homeless encampments, challenging everything we thought we knew about our unhoused neighbors.

In this wide-reaching portrait of the constellation of people living in tents, shacks, and cars in the shadow of tech campuses and skyscrapers, award-winning journalist Brian Barth introduces us to the misfits, activists, and iconoclasts of Silicon Valley’s homeless encampments. Blending memoir, investigative reporting, history, and cultural criticism to paint a portrait of a community searching for dignity and connection in the midst of a national crisis, Front Street is a conversation-changing story about the struggle for housing.

This immersive work follows residents of three distinct camps—Crash Zone in San Jose, Wood Street in Oakland, and Wolfe Camp in Cupertino. Regularly harassed by police and local government, and frequently at risk of often violent and always destabilizing sweeps, these camps may seem chaotic to some but more often than not, to their residents they are sites of refuge and rebirth. In research on 19th- and 20th-century homelessness and philosophical contemplations of communal anarchy, and through honest conversations with residents, Barth shows how the solution to homelessness isn't as straightforward as one might think.

Front Street considers the root causes and possible solutions to chronic homelessness, contemplating political, economic, social and spiritual approaches alike. With empathy and poise, Barth follows this cast of characters, describing their personal stories, quotidian experiences, private philosophies and political activism. In doing so, Front Street explains why the country's current approach to homelessness has become at once cruel and ineffective and makes the radical argument that encampments, when treated generously and fairly, have something important to teach the rest of us about autonomy, dignity, connection and care.

About Brian Barth Brian Barth is an award-winning independent journalist with bylines in the New Yorker, National Geographic, Washington Post, The New Republic and Mother Jones, among other publications. He lives between the Bay Area and California's remote Lost Coast region, where he is developing a spiritual refuge—open to seekers, broken souls, and all of humankind—amid a foggy, fern-filled forest. Front Street is his first book.

About Nuala Bishari Nuala Bishari is an investigative journalist and opinion columnist with more than 12 years of reporting experience in the Bay Area. She's writes about public health, homelessness, LGBTQ+ issues, and local politics for SF Weekly, the San Francisco Examiner, ProPublica, and the San Francisco Chronicle, where she spent three years as an opinion columnist. In September she launched COYOTE Media Collective, a worker-owned publication that aims to revive the playful, sassy, smart vibes of old alt-weeklies. When not writing, she's volunteering at a local homelessness nonprofit and handing out harm reduction supplies.

Accessibility The event is located on the ground level, and there are no stairs between the entrance and event space.