Hello Oregon!

Press Advisory Monday, February 5th 2018

Sisters of the Road, Right 2 Survive, Street Roots, Western Regional Advocacy Project, ACLU-Oregon

Sweeping homelessness; as though unhoused people are dirt

Last week in Northeast Portland’s Wilkes Neighborhood, volunteers, community members, and friends came together to build what became known as the Village of Hope. They were building platforms, pitching tents, creating communal spaces, and preserving the ecology in the area. The intention was to construct a place of refuge when other housing options are not available. Their vision unfolded in a wooded grove nearby a heavily industrial area. This village was built on land under the authority of Portland’s Parks and Recreation. In other words, on Public Land!

Friday morning police came out in full force to tell people to leave what had become their home. People tearfully collected their belongings, many not knowing where they were going to go next. Ted Wheeler and Amanda Fritz released a fictitious statement regarding the sweep, framing it as an act of “courtesy and compassion”. These words disguise the inherently cruel nature of sweeps. Wheeler and Fritz also justified their decision with concern to “environmental degradation,” but what about degradation of human dignity? The manner in which the city responded to Village of Hope demonstrates the lack of respect for the lives of people who are unhoused and a total lack of understanding what a “State of Emergency” really means.

Village of Hope offered a solution for people experiencing houselessness that met their needs in a way that no other service could. Solutions like Village of Hope are at the core of what Right 2 Survive, Sisters Of The Road, Street Roots, ACLU, Western Regional Advocacy Project, and others in the community strive for. We stand in solidarity with the Village of Hope organizers and their creative solutions to an ongoing crisis.

The city continues to criminalize the very act of existing in public space. City officials have disregarded the need to create stable places to set up camp and build community. It is time for the rights of people without housing to be prioritized. We want the city to have trust in our community to find solutions and create healthy alternatives to living in the streets. The city needs to support the solutions created by those who need them the most. People deserve to exist freely in public spaces without fear of harassment from the city.
All People deserve the Right To Rest, with dignity and respect. Portland must end the sweeps now!

Director's Desk: Police sweep of new self-governed camp is opportunity lost

Village of Hope wanted to equip homeless campers with tools to care for the land, but now they've been evicted from the public space

by Kaia Sand | Street Roots

First, they hauled away bag upon bag of garbage. Then, in small clearings, they pitched 10 green tents on platforms atop cement pier blocks. Next, they scattered bark dust on existing paths, determined to leave a light footprint. The underbrush, the downed branches; all was left in place.

On Jan. 28, this group of people experiencing homelessness organized with a coalition to launch Village of Hope, a new self-governed encampment. It’s located along Northeast Airport Way in the Big Four Corners Natural Area, managed by Portland Parks and Recreation.

Less than a week later, on Feb. 2, Portland Police officers cordoned off the Village of Hope with police tape, working with park rangers and Rapid Response workers to force all campers to leave.

Campers told Street Roots it was not the first time they'd been forced to leave the premises.

A bit of background: Organizers with Right 2 Survive and Advocacy 5 teamed up with Anawim Christian Community, which was working with homeless folks in outer Northeast Portland who are frequently displaced by the dozens of “camp cleanups” the city of Portland contracts each week. Village of Hope was launched the same week the city contracted 49 campsites to be “cleaned.”

People must continually move elsewhere.

A number of people already camping along the Columbia Slough had been displaced repeatedly by these camp sweeps, and they were isolated in the woods without access to trash disposal. At best, they could haul trash on their bikes or with shopping carts.

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Village of Hope: An Open Letter to The City of Portland

Author Mat dos Santos, Legal Director | ACLU Oregon

Recent experiments in Portland and around the country have shown tent villages to be an inexpensive, scalable, and easy-to-deploy solution when cities are unable to house all of its residents. They are an alternative to (1) homeless shelters when beds aren’t available or safe; (2) difficult to access transitional housing; and, (3) the much discussed low income housing that simply isn’t being built fast enough.

When I first heard of Village of Hope, the newest village in Portland run by and for people who are experiencing houselessness, I was really excited. A group of housing advocates and members of the public they serve came together to build a new village on a small piece of land adjacent to a heavily developed industrial area. They met with their new neighbors to discuss the project. They cleaned out debris and trash. They created solutions to minimize their environmental impacts, to keep the community safe, and to bring social services into their new community. Our city’s residents were innovating solutions to the potentially fatal, and always dangerous, situations faced by those who sleep on Portland’s streets.

Within a day, what advocacy groups and housing advocates were praising, the Mayor’s office condemned. Mayor Wheeler was quick to criticize this effort as “unilateral” and suggested that it endangered sensitive habitat. He promised consequences and, today, the City delivered on its promises when Park Rangers began issuing citations, exclusions, and arresting peaceful activists.

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