Brian HoweyOver the phone, Olantis Livingston’s gravelly voice is tinged with fear. In addition to a viral pandemic, the 46-year-old must confront a sudden loss of income. Livingston has sold Street Spirit, a Berkeley newspaper covering local homelessness issues, for 16 years. But on March 19, Spirit staff, led by UC Berkeley alumna Alastair Boone, decided to temporarily cease distribution of the newspaper’s print edition out of concern for the health of vendors like Livingston, leaving him and dozens of other sellers without the income they once relied on.
“It’s like a nightmare,” he said, adding that his only other source of income, a social security check, just covers his rent.
Street Spirit is part of a network of more than 120 newspapers covering homelessness, called the International Network of Street Papers (INSP), located in 35 countries and written in 25 languages. Ninety percent of these street papers have shut down their print editions and switched to online-only publication due to coronavirus concerns—something that has never happened in the network’s 26-year history, said Israel Bayer, director of the North American Bureau of the INSP.
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