Tent City: Bushville

Today the Kensington Welfare Rights Union set up a tent city, dubbed "Bushville," in North Philadelphia to welcome the Republican National Convention.

At 3:30 our caravan of vehicles, including many representatives of the press, rolled into an abandoned lot in the southern end of Kensington. We immediately began construction.

The neighbors came out with an amazing amount of support. They spontaneously took our posters and put them up on their homes, cars and businesses. Many of them complained how this lot and others had been neglected for years, simply allowing trash to pile up.

Despite this support, the owner of the lot showed up and refused to allow us to stay there. We took down the tents and structures we had built, loaded them into our van, and caravaned to another abandoned lot nearby. There we were able to set up the tents and other makeshift structures. Construction continued late into the night.

This tent city has been named Bushville in honor of the republican candidate. The record that George W. Bush has built in Texas on the issues of housing and poverty lets us know what is in store for poor Americans if he is elected President.  There are representatives here of the Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign from organizations across the country. We would like press and delegates to visit Bushville, so this convention can begin to address the real issues facing Americans.

For more information about Bushville and other tent cities, we invite you to take our online Tour of Kensington. For those in the Philadelphia area for the convention, we will be conducting regular tours for the next several days, just contact us at (215) 203-1945.