NORTHRUP FOOD CENTER sticks out like a sore thumb in Northwest Portland. Taking up a valuable half block in Portland’s Nob Hill neighborhood, the old grocery store has been closed for nearly a decade. Stained pieces of cardboard block the windows and homeless people camp at the front door.

“We need that eyesore out of the way,” says Vitaly Paley, owner of Paley’s Place restaurant across the street, summing up a popular neighborhood opinion. “For 15 years, I’ve seen that ugly thing out of the corner of my eyes from the cutting board.”

But stop by the back lot and you’ll find Northrup Food Center owner Jeff Baldwin still puttering around, determined to work. Baldwin ran the store with his parents until 2001. Now he runs a one-man recycling operation from the valuable property, driving 35 miles round-trip to pick up cardboard, plastic, and shipping pallets from local businesses. All the work doesn’t even cover his costs. Baldwin is spending his semi-retirement running the rogue recycling program out of a belief that he’s saving the world one cardboard box at a time.

“If everybody had a more frugal attitude, the world could be a lot cleaner than it is,” Baldwin tells me when I show up on a Friday morning to ride along in his old Dodge truck to make the recycling rounds. He looks to be in his 40s, with long stringy blond hair and eyes that squint like he’s trying to figure you out. “I have all I ever need,” he says. “This is almost like running a social experiment.”

We unload piles of miscellaneous junk from the Dodge until there’s enough space for me to fit my legs. Baldwin’s dog JJ sits on the middle seat, shedding and panting. On the dashboard there’s a library book soaked through with rainwater: How to Start a Small Business.

Our first stop is Cali Produce in inner Southeast, where we pick up big bundles of plastic wrap. “At first, the owners didn’t trust me because they thought I wanted something in return,” Baldwin tells me. He never accepts payment for his services.

At the Hollywood Bike Gallery, Baldwin pulls into the loading bay and greets all the employees by name. We stack about 80 big cardboard boxes, moving swiftly through the bike-building workshop and storage areas. It’s hard work.

I watch Baldwin tie a preposterously high stack to his truck, and then we putter onward like a Depression-era photo of Okies headed west.

It’s mid-afternoon when we arrive at the recycling company, Far West Fibers. We throw cardboard onto the floor of a giant warehouse, sifting out pieces Baldwin says he’ll give to friends. A huge bulldozer roars by a few feet away, shuttling the product toward a compactor. I ask if they do the actual recycling here. Baldwin shakes his head no. “It’ll be shipped off on barges. Fifty percent of American recycling is done in China.”

It’s nighttime when we get back to the shuttered store. Baldwin tells stories he knows about the neighborhood: The building housing Paley’s Place was trucked down from its original location in the West Hills; when the nearby old folks’ home was built, builders excavated loads of fine white sand that turned out to be discarded ballast from the South Seas, from when the whole neighborhood was riverside swampland.

I ask Baldwin if I can see inside the store, and he declines. “I have about 2,000 projects in my life,” he says. “But I’m not looking for notoriety.”

13 replies on “In the Shadows”

  1. Quit trying to get rid of it and support another local business. Make it look better for the neighborhood if need be but keep a good, important business going. Oregon needs it!

  2. I have a lot of questions about this article. “Northwest Food Center” is the name of a closed grocery store, but the owner runs a recycling operation from its backyard? Why doesn’t he put up a new sign and be a little more official about his operations – why does he want to be a “Rogue Recycler”? Does he earn money from his operation but not pay taxes on it?

    Also, what did he have to say about neighbors who want him out? Is there any dialogue between local owners like Paley, and Baldwin?

    And why wouldn’t he let you see the inside of his store?

    The story really didn’t explore these important questions.

  3. The building is an eyesore, plain and simple, and Baldwin has made no effort toward that end. Take a walk buy during the day and see for yourself: it is a dump. At night, and through early morning, street punks and homeless bunk up in the former doorway. Does he live there? Is it legal? He should be forced out, rent the place to some small retailers or restaurants, or be forced to fix the place up– not run this under the rader business beneath the signs of a grocery store that has been boarded up for years. Can adjacent residents complain to the city about the unsightly nature of the premises? I feel bad for the tourists who come to stay at the Northrup Station and have their dinners at Paley’s and Wildwood— that this ghetto building is what represents upper 21st. A very big shame. Someone needs to kick that guy out. If he want’s to run a recycling business, move to inner southeast, or further into the industrial area. This is a neighbor NO ONE here wants.

  4. And, I also meant to add that he had been approached before about this prime location, fixing/selling/ the building, at least renovating and and dividing it for small retail and restaurant shops. Something that is at least visually appealing, and more so, a desitination. When Music Millennium chose to vacate their NW 23rd space, they supposedly approached “Northrup Food Center”as a viable location. Of course, Baldwin was a no-go on that.

    Again, this is a neighbor nobody wants. What is the building zoned for? Who knows what fire hazards lurk inside, where he did not want you to see. His illegal “home?” One of his thousands of projects… such as… what? Is it a grow house? A lab? Is is a torture dungeon? What is he keeping in there, all boarded up? Can a building inspection make anything of this? Where’s Randy’s team when you need it?

    I’d be happy to sign any petition that got that space cleaned up. Eyesore… eyesore… eyesore.

  5. i’ve been waiting for the nw examiner to lose its shit on this place for years. the guy must be holding hands with somebody to make it this far. i don’t argue his right to run his recycling business, but the place just look sketchy — as does his quote of 2000 projects inside the place. i’d love to see the building cleaned up/out and rented out, especially now that the block just lost two unique storefronts to collision repair’s expansion. just keep the singer-fever away, a la 23rd big boxes and huge rent. i’d suggest staying away from another bar in the area. something that would anchor the gap between, say the Lovejoy block and the Paley’s/Wildwood block. lots of possibilities though.

  7. Hey, at least there’s almost always a parking space out front if you want to stop by Anna Bananna’s. I was always curious about that place, having lived in the neighborhood for years, but it never bothered me. And honestly, the Starbucks down the street at Lovejoy is the biggest eyesore of all.

  8. Eyesore, schmeyesore. If the guy owns the building, and doesn’t let it fall into disrepair to the point that it becomes a safety hazard, then he has just as much call to be there as anyone else. If the neighbors don’t find the peeling paint and cardboard in the windows genteel enough, fuck ’em. He’s been there longer than most of them have, and as a property owner, he’s got his rights. This seems to happen every time somebody moves into a neighborhood and fixes up an old house or starts a successful business… Suddenly they feel entitled to demand everybody who was there before start living up to their aesthetic standards. Well tough titties, bo-bos, but I’m afraid you’re not the center of the universe. Get used to it.

  9. AMAZING!! Is it ZONED for RECYCLING???? What does City Hall Say?? Is this Healthy(vermin)? If this is “his” business WHAT does his home look like and WHERE does he live………can you IMAGINE???? Its about time Portland DO something about these things instead of BIKE LANES!!!

  10. Could the assholes commenting on this be any more entitled? I liked nw better when homeless people shit on the sidewalks there. There’s a new stench that comes from gentrification and its less appealing than vagrant dook.

    This recycling business may be an eyesore to you mealy-mouthed pussies, but I say god bless the motherfucker for 1. Caring enough about our planet and future to walk the talk. So many of us pay lip service to being environmentally conscious, but the buck stops at the fucking curb where you dump your weeks worth of packaging and leave it up to someone else. And 2. Allowing homeless people to rest at his door. Again, how many of us claim to be compassionate, but cringe at the sight or smell of someone less fortunate than most?

    Shame on you.

  13. Jeff is one great guy! I have know the family for close to 30 years…These are good people and have helped many people back in the day with free credit, check cashing and always on hand to give help to anyone in need!
    Jeff pays his taxes and helps the needy..Leave him alone!

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