Dear Friends,

Don't mourn...Organize! Here are some important news and events in Oregon that you need to know!

Street Root vendors stand with Occupy Ice!
Sharing their thoughts on the occupation and how they relate to those being detained.

On June 21, a Thursday evening, the Mexica Tiahui Aztec Dancers, in their tall, feather headdresses and colorful embroidered clothing had just finished performing for a cheering crowd.

Hundreds of protesters, supporters and families were standing outside the Portland U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement headquarters at 4310 SW Macadam Ave. when the roar of a speeding car with a pulled muffler interrupted the festivities.

A large Confederate flag billowed from the window and several men shouted out "white supremacy!" The car stopped and revved the engine menacingly in front of the crowd. The terror was tangible; cars have increasingly been weaponized in conflicts across the country. People acted quickly to move children and those in wheelchairs behind a human blockade. After a tense stand off, the car sped away.

Despite these isolated acts of terrorism, the occupation of the Portland ICE office was gaining momentum. In a decisive response to the Trump administration's separation of immigrant children and families, swelling numbers of Portland activists converged at the ICE facility with the intent to remain until it is permanently shut down. In addition to the round-the-clock protesters, hundreds of people have been dropping in for the vigils, speeches and performances. Supporters have brought food, money, tents, sleeping bags and kitchen supplies. Tribal members, musicians, pro bono lawyers and activists have created an impromptu working village with a welcoming booth, kitchen, medical tent, sanitary services, children's play area, and even a library.

Street Roots vendors Barbra Weber, Bryant King and Bob Dickey have been at the protest since Tuesday, June 19. Dickey is a veteran occupier who has protested at Standing Rock, Occupy Flint and many other sites. They describe themselves as best friends and in it for the long haul.

On Thursday, June 28, federal officers from the Department of Homeland Security cleared the camp from federal property, arresting some members of Occupy. As of press time, it was expected that the occupation would continue in some form.

Street Roots' vendors at OccupyICEPDX
Among the protesters are Street Roots' vendors Barbra Weber (below left), Bob Dickey (below right) and Bryant King (not pictured). Photo by Helen Hill

Helen Hill: So what's it like out there?
Barbra Weber: This is my first occupation. It's disorganized but it comes together because it's a collective consciousness, people just step in whenever they can. You come across somebody struggling with something and you help them out. It's been like that the whole way. Now that we've been there a few days, people are breaking up into committees. These people are in the kitchen, these people are on finance, these people are on security. Me and the people I'm working with are on child care and accessibility to the camp. It's been an experience, nothing like I've ever been through before. I feel like we have the support of the whole city, except for some fringe people. Every five minutes someone comes by with a donation.

H.H.: Why are you protesting?
B.W.: We're talking about children locked up in cages, away from their family, with no human contact, or barely. We shouldn't do that to prisoners, why the hell are we doing that to kids?
Bryant King: I've got to stand my ground against injustice, and to me that's a damn injustice. What they are doing is unconstitutional.

H.H.: What is the goal of the occupation?
B.W.: To close down all the ICE facilities in sanctuary cities. If you're going to call yourself a sanctuary city, you shouldn't have ICE. We're trying to encourage other sanctuary cities. Once we get this shut down, we're going to Sheridan.

B.K.: And I want to take my two best friends here and go out and sell some Street Roots and pitch in. It might not be much, $5 or $10 between the three of us, but we can contribute.
H.H.: How do you think the occupation is helping?

B.D.: This is definitely doing what occupations do; they bring awareness to the problem. I've been willing to be a martyr for the cause for the past seven years.

B.W.: This is affecting whats going on in the rest of the United States. And this is what's really sad, and I've tied it in for the people at camp. We're talking about the immigrants who are locked in these facilities, but we're also talking about people of color and discrimination. I'm homeless, and most of my brothers and sisters on the streets are people of color. We get treated the same way. They take our kids, they give them to people (saying): "Oh, they'll have a better life with these people."

So when you're talking about robbing people of basic human dignity, we live that shit every day, and that's why we're taking a stand, it's because we do understand at a very deep level. We might not be locked into cages, but that sidewalk is a damn cage in this city.

On Wednesday I talked before at least three or four hundred people. I spoke about how homelessness comes together with this issue of basic human dignity. I spoke about people dying on the streets, how drug addiction and alcoholism are symptomatic; you keep getting hit, that's what happens. I got up there and I talked specifically about people of color, about sweeps, the basic things we go through; lack of restrooms, laundry, showers. How they take our kids.

Because of the stigma of homelessness, our families depart from us. It is nothing that we did, its because we're homeless. They are embarrassed. That's why homeless people begin to build their own families. We get ripped down the middle.

Bells Ring In Portland

The faces on the streets of Portland are more strained, more frustrated, more resilient than weve seen in many years. Portland has increased the ways they address houselessness.

Yes, they have opened more shelters and have a one shop stop of services coming in the fall 2018. As if its the answer to the houseless prayers (SMH).

However, the number of unhoused neighbors has also risen. The stepped up measures of Police stops and profiling of houseless has changed the atmosphere. Folks are afraid to walk to food and services for fear of having their names ran, bags search or confiscated, asked to show ID, profiled for appearing houseless.

The Mayors office and Pdx Police, Oregon Dept of Transportation and Metro are SWEEPING unhoused neighbors at alarming rates. So folks dont want to leave their spots fearing targeting or that their stuff will be gone when they return. In some areas displacement happens every (3) days. One hour is allotted to move belongings.

Anything left after that is either bagged for folks to claim at a far off facility or thrown away as bio hassareds. 24 hour to 7 day notices are not always posted creating another level of trauma. Missing during these raids apparent lack of social service agencies or mental health providers present when SWEEPS are taking place to support our unhoused neighbors.

Recently, a member of Right 2 Survive was offered the opportunity to research and map the number of SWEEPS, frequency and estimated number of folks displaced. Here is a sampling of the findings:

-Over the last 18 months or so, campsite sweeps have significantly increased in Portland. The last 8 months have a count of sweeps above the total average (mean=112.4 per month), showing that the trend is consistent.

-While campsite reports by the public have increased as well (One Point of Contact data), the estimated number of reported campsites in those reports as given by the City of Portlands HUCIRP program has remained stable.

- The five neighborhoods with the highest quantity of sweeps over this time period are Buckman, Lloyd Center, Lents, Old Town/Chinatown, and Hosford-Abernethy.

- With an estimated average of 5.8 (0-22) people per campsite, and an average of 24.7 sweeps per week, up to 143 people are being displaced on average each week.
Similar tracking work has happened in other cities with alarming stats. The use of displacement and criminalization tactics to manage houselessness is not solving the issues only fostering larger ripples in a broken system.

It is no wonder the faces are strained and flustered. Having constant threat of harassment from police by profiling, SWEEPING and complaints to City call in numbers, folks have little time for anything else. Uncertainty, sleep deprivation, summer temperatures as well have strained and flustered our neighbors without walls. There is no end coming in the foreseeable future for Portlands houseless. Neighbors without walls are resilient. They will be moved again. They will be targeted by injustice and they will come together to fight back. We will continue to track and record these despicable tactics aimed at destabilizing the houseless and targeting them with criminalization.

Call for Presenters and save-the-date for the 2018 Oregon Coalition on Housing and Homelessness Conference!

Please Save the Date!

Announcing the 2018 OCHH Annual Conference

"All Roads Lead Home"
September 26, 27, 28, 2018

If you would like to be considered for a presentation/seminar at the upcoming Oregon Coalition on Housing and Homelessness conference, please complete the "2018 Call for Presenters" by clicking on the following link.

https://www.ochh.org/conference-and-events/

Presentation proposals are due no later than July 10, 2018.

Click Here For More Informacion >>>>>>>>

Mayor Wheeler & Chief Outlaw: Stop the Police Harassment of Homeless People (ACLU)

ACLU of Oregon sent a letter (Click here to read letter) to Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and Police Chief Danielle Outlaw to ask them to investigate complaints of Portland Police Bureau profiling and harassing homeless individuals in downtown Portland. If true, PPBs harassment and suspicionless stops of homeless individuals are not only morally wrong, but are almost certainly violations of state and federal law.

In late April and early May of this year, the ACLU of Oregon received reports of PPB officers stopping and questioning people on the street, running warrant checks, and searching their tents and personal belongings without reasonable suspicion or probable cause that a crime has occured. A news story documented police officers running names of every homeless person they came across. In early June, Police also conducted sweeps of homeless people to clear them out before Fleet Week.

Evidence of the criminalization of homelessness in data, too. In police statistics analyzed by The Oregonian and published yesterday, the paper found that houseless people accounted for more than half the arrests made by the Portland Police Bureau in 2017, despite representing less than three percent of the citys population.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Oregon sent a letter to Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and Police Chief Danielle Outlaw to ask them to investigate complaints of Portland Police Bureau profiling and harassing homeless individuals in downtown Portland.