Terminal 1 Dirk VanderHart As a shelter at Terminal 1 plods forward, a handful of development and business entities are falling back on a standby for stymying new homeless facilities: Appealing to state land use officials. Three groups and a Portland architect have announced [PDF] their intentions to fight Portland City Council’s recent decision to […]
Homeless
Posted inHousing
Mayor Charlie Hales Wants to Extend Portland’s Housing State of Emergency By Three Years
A proposed shelter at Terminal 1 relies on the city’s housing “state of emergency.” Mayor Charlie Hales is preparing to push his council colleagues to take a step stronger than anything envisioned when City Council enacted a housing “state of emergency” last year. As the initial period of that emergency is set to run dry […]
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The Proposed Homeless Shelter at Terminal 1 Is Now Part of a Lawsuit
The fight over Terminal 1 has a new home: The courts. As promised, local attorney John DiLorenzo filed a fresh pleading today in an ongoing legal dispute over how the city spends sewer funds. He says Portland’s on the verge of violating it’s own rules at Terminal 1, the plot of land at 2400 NW […]
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Costco and Affordable Housing Were Among Offers to Buy Terminal 1
Leave it to Costco to try to sneak away with a bargain. Earlier this month, the Washington-based retailer wanted to plop one of its enormous members-only outlets at Terminal 1, the controversial, Pearl District-adjacent property that might become a homeless shelter in coming months. And of a handful of offers the Portland Bureau of Environmental […]
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After A Fraught Hearing, Terminal 1 Might Be Portland’s Largest Homeless Shelter Within Months
The warehouse at Terminal 1, 2400 NW Front, might be a 400-person shelter by this fall. City of Portland For all the remarkable things about the debate over Northwest Portland’s Terminal 1, the most striking may be how it’s scrambled the long-drawn battle lines we’re used to when it comes to Portland’s homeless. It’s partly […]
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Commissioner Nick Fish Wants the State to Weigh In On a Homeless Shelter He Opposes
Terminal 1: Where that nice star is. City of Portland If Portland Housing Commissioner Dan Saltzman succeeds in winning the go-ahead for a temporary homeless shelter at the city-owned Terminal 1 on Wednesday, he might be forced to share his every move with the state’s Department of Environmental Quality. And that could be an issue. […]
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The Portland Business Alliance Is Now Opposing A Homeless Shelter… At A Property It Suggested
Developer Homer Williams makes his pitch. Dirk VanderHart There’s nothing like the specter of a homeless shelter to bring out a little hypocrisy. For some fun examples, look at Wednesday afternoon’s meeting of the coordinating board for A Home For Everyone—the group of government officials, social services providers, and other stakeholders that’s been strategizing to […]
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The Next Fight Over A Large NW Portland Homeless Shelter: How Much Should It Cost?
Terminal 1, with the disputed warehouse. City of Portland A week from today, city council is scheduled to take up one of the more politically intriguing questions to come before it in some time: Whether to open a temporary homeless shelter in a 96,000-square-foot warehouse at the city-owned Terminal 1 property. And with various factions […]
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Mayor Charlie Hales Has Pulled the Plug on His Radical, “Rational” Safe Sleep Policy
Adam Wickham YOU WOULDN’T have known it from the increasing panic over homelessness, but there was actual excitement over Mayor Charlie Hales’ “safe sleep policy.” In a nation where there’s an increasing acknowledgment that criminalizing homeless people for being homeless is the wrong position, Hales’ six-month experiment—which formally allowed small groups to sleep on sidewalks […]
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Mayor Charlie Hales is Pushing Back His Springwater Corridor Sweep
In the face of bitter outcry and imminent litigation, and with advocates around the country watching, Mayor Charlie Hales this afternoon pulled back on a promise to sweep hundreds of homeless campers from the Springwater Corridor beginning August 1. In a statement issued shortly before 5 pm, the mayor’s office announced the cleanup will now […]
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Portland’s Planned Springwater Sweep Has National Advocates Talking—And Not in A Good Way
Portland Park Ranger Sam Sachs speaks with homeless campers and advocates on the Springwater Corridor on July 23. Dirk VanderHart Eric Tars is a senior attorney with the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. When we spoke this morning, Tars was at a conference focused on ending homelessness in Washington, DC, and less than […]
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Homeless Advocates Will Set Up an “Economic Refugee Camp” For People Displaced in Springwater Sweep
Ree Kaarhus, executive director of Boots on the Ground PDX Dirk VanderHart Organizations advocating for homeless people on the Springwater Corridor say they’ll establish an “economic refugee camp” for people displaced in a planned sweep of the multi-use trail beginning August 1—and unlike a previous, similar camp, they say they’ll refuse to budge if the […]