The #TLTogether series highlights the incredible people who are part of the Tenderloin’s diverse community.
This week, meet Tracey Mixon. Since her teen years, Tracey has been visiting her dad who lives in one of the SROs in the Tenderloin. She lives here now, along with her ten-year-old daughter. Tracey—as someone who knows what it’s like to be down on their luck, to be a single mother, and to be unhoused—has dedicated herself to helping others get back on their feet.
Tracey has worked as Safe Passage Corner Captain before becoming a community advocate for the Coalition on Homelessness a couple years ago. She is someone others depend on. She says her own strength and resilience come from her daughter and her support network—including people at her job, certain family members, people at her daughter’s school, and her boyfriend (who had also been facing housing challenges of his own at the same time that she was).
“Imagine you are eight years old, your home is taken away, you go to another home to a shelter. It really takes a toll on your mental health. Even when I started to doubt myself, I knew I couldn’t let her down, so I kept pushing. I was really trying to convince her and myself that we’d get housed…but she never lost faith in me. Never lose faith in yourself.”
Tracey brings her own experience and knowledge with her as she hopes to get others into stable housing:
“The key to coming out of a hard spot is to keep pushing and fighting. Fight for yourself, don’t let yourself fall through the cracks. Learn to advocate for yourself. Have a good support network. Nothing is accomplished alone.”
She adds that, even if someone felt seemingly alone and isolated, they should still look to create a support network. “We’ll find a way to help you with your situation or direct you to someone who can help.”
As someone who has been in the neighborhood for close to twenty-five to thirty years, and working in the Tenderloin for the past fifteen years, she has seen how the neighborhood has both dramatically changed and stayed the same in many ways.
“Drugs and alcohol have always been here but this is my community. I consider the unhoused neighbors part of this community too. I’ve never seen the sidewalks so crowded. Not to this magnitude. It shouldn’t have taken a lawsuit to make sure that everyone, whether they’re housed or unhoused, feels safe. We’re starting to see changes, and it’s refreshing to not have to walk in the streets or squeeze past tents, but there’s a character about the Tenderloin we don’t want to lose in the process either.”
Some see raising her daughter in the Tenderloin as a setback, Tracey sees the positive—this is where she has a community, and her daughter can learn the importance of being kind to others.
“My daughter has been in the Tenderloin basically since before she was born…since she was in my belly. Everybody knows her. A lot of people know me. Because of the family and friends that live in the Tenderloin, I feel like I know who’s safe around here for the most part. Respect goes a long way out here.”
Tracey adds that her daughter was also raised with her grandmother. “I taught her from a young age, that you give your seat up on the bus for anyone that’s elderly. The same way you would treat Granny…that’s the way you treat other [elderly] people that look like Granny, of all other races too. She is so respectful—people in my building tell me that about her too. I just love that she’s that way. And that’s how I was raised too.”
While the struggle and concern to find housing for her unhoused neighbors in the Tenderloin weighs heavily on Tracey’s mind, she finds moments of joy in the simple things—coming home to her Eddy and Taylor apartment after a day’s work, having a couch to sit on, a TV to watch. Being able to be silly with her daughter and just spend time together. Recently they went out to lunch and got matching pink camouflage pants…it was a good day.
Find more TLTogether features here.
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