Following public outcry over leasing rates from tenants at Everett Station Lofts, Portland City Councilors Mitch Green and Candace Avalos have suggested a potential solution in the form of a rent subsidy.
Everett Station Lofts has a unique agreement with the city that lies outside of the usual state and federal affordable housing programs, allowing the building owners to calculate rents using square footage rather than number of bedrooms, which has resulted in higher rents for tenants. Residents have questioned the validity of this agreement in recent years, including in an ongoing lawsuit brought by tenants against ownership.
Green and Avalos’ plan, which comes as a proposed amendment to next year’s budget, would effectively lower rents for many tenants at the building. The news comes as a relief to residents at the embattled Old Town property, though many are still frustrated by the uncertainty and difficulty of the situation.
Kimberly Kimble, who has been living in an affordable unit at Everett Station for nearly four years, said subsidies would help lift some of the burden. But she expressed disappointment at how difficult it has been to make rents affordable for tenants. “It shouldn’t be this way,” she said. “We shouldn’t have to take it all the way to the fucking City Council and try to get it in a budget.”
While their court trial has yet to take place, a regulatory decision by the Portland Housing Bureau (PHB) earlier this year affirmed the legitimacy of the building’s unique agreement, even as it called the deal “ambiguous.” The bureau’s decision meant building ownership wasn’t required to reduce rent prices, leaving many tenants at Everett Station Lofts frustrated, with some contemplating leaving the building altogether.
Now, Councilors Green and Avalos are trying to help. “This budget add would make those tenants whole,” Green said during a City Council budget conversation on May 7, citing prior reporting in the Mercury.
His sentiment was echoed by Avalos, who chairs the City Council’s Homelessness and Housing Committee. “I, too, am intending to offer an amendment to support the Everett Loft tenants,” she said, “I think that’s an important investment.”
But tenants aren’t ready to celebrate. “I’m very thankful that [Green and Avalos] have gone through the trouble of requesting the cost analysis and suggesting this be part of the budget,” Kimble said. “I just worry that it’s not important enough to be included.”
It’s true that Green and Avalos’ proposed amendment faces an uncertain future as the mayor and Council attempt to address a massive budget shortfall.
Green and Avalos are asking for $100,000 to be set aside for the PHB in order to subsidize rents at Everett Station Lofts. “I think it’s a small cost to keep some of our vulnerable tenants housed in my district,” Green said.
The Council is slated to vote on this amendment, as well as other proposed budget changes, on May 21, where it will need a majority of the Council’s votes to pass.
“I guess it’s the best they can do”
For years, tenants at Everett Station Lofts harbored fears that they were being overcharged. In 2023, Miranda Krone, a resident in one of the Lofts’ affordable units, realized she was being charged for a multi-bedroom unit, despite her studio loft not having any bedrooms. Krone reached out to her neighbors, including Kimble, who were being charged at similar rates. Eventually, they were told the building owners were charging rent based on square footage, not number of bedrooms, in what the tenants believed was a violation of the building’s regulatory agreement with the city.
At first, the Portland Housing Bureau seemed to agree that tenants were being overcharged. However, upon further investigation the Bureau determined that charging rent based on square footage was in adherence to the building’s unique agreement with the city, though the Bureau admitted the situation was complex.
By then, the tenants had already reached out to newly-elected Councilor Green, whose district is home to Everett Station Lofts. In January, after the PHB released its decision, representatives from Councilor Green and Avalos’ offices held a meeting with Everett Station Lofts tenants and the PHB.
“We determined that there was really no legal path forward that the Housing Bureau could take,” recalled Jamey Evenstar, Avalos’ chief of staff, who was present at the meeting. Instead, Evenstar suggested that the city could provide a rent subsidy that would ease the rent burden on Everett Station tenants for the remainder of the building’s agreement with the city, which is set to expire in December of 2029.
Evenstar said she asked PHB to calculate how much the residents would be paying if their rent was capped according to the standards set by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and what the difference was between that rent calculation and what they were currently being charged. “If it was cheap enough,” said Evenstar, “[the city] could just pay the difference,” ensuring the tenants would be “paying what they should be paying anyway.”
The PHB agreed to perform the analysis, and reported back that it would cost the city just over $100,000 a year to subsidize rents for the Everett Station tenants—roughly $465,000 in total to subsidize rents through the end of the agreement.
At the City Council’s budget meeting on May 7, Green proposed an amendment to allocate all $465,000 to the PHB, in order to fund the subsidy in its entirety. Avalos echoed Green’s commitment, but posited allocating only $100,000 in the current budget, and planning to allocate the necessary funds in each following year. Green ultimately endorsed Avalos’ plan.
Christian Aguinaga, Green’s policy coordinator, said the decision to ask for the lesser sum was made in light of the city’s “massive budget crisis,” though he added Green’s original plan was “still available as an option.”
Green has suggested ways that the city could pay for this subsidy and other suggested amendments, including raising fees on programs like golf course usage and ride share fees. “We can find $100,000 somewhere,” assured Evenstar.
Krone, one of the Everett Station tenants and plaintiff in an ongoing lawsuit against the building’s owners, said she was happy to hear that the city was taking steps to alleviate the burden on tenants. “Somebody is actually thinking of what’s going to happen to people right now, that’s amazing,” said Krone. “That’s wonderful.”
However, Krone was not entirely satisfied with the proposal, expressing frustration that this plan would give taxpayer money to the building’s owners and would do little for former tenants “who have been in this fight for years and have lost their homes.”
Roxanne Seaton, who moved to Everett Station in 2022, was priced out of her market rate unit in April. “I had to say goodbye to the only home I’ve known in Portland,” she said. “I could no longer afford to live [there].” She had been paying $2500 a month for a roughly 1,000-square-foot lofted studio, and is now living in a similarly sized apartment in Southwest Portland where her rent is over $1000 cheaper.
Seaton appreciates the attention that city councilors have been paying to the tenants at Everett Station. “Their help feels really genuine,” she said. “They’re really trying to problem solve.” Still, Seaton expressed frustration that “thousands of hours” of work done by tenants has resulted only in a possible subsidy that will “ultimately go to the pockets of this developer.”
Kimble, Seaton’s former neighbor, expressed similar disappointment, saying she feels “deflated” by months of advocacy that have produced little change. “I guess it’s the best they can do,” Kimble said of the proposed amendment, “but it just doesn’t feel quite like justice.”