Housing
Street Roots vendor ensures his homeless peers are remembered after they die
Longtime Street Roots vendor Rick Davis jumps in where he sees a need. He hauled a wagon full of Rose City Resource guides to organizations that needed them, and he cleared the basement of cardboard that he distributed to people who needed to line the bottom of their tent as protection against the cold pavement.…
Portraits | 7 women surviving on the streets of Portland
Nearly 220,000 women and girls experienced homelessness in the U.S. last year. Oregon was home to many of them. Oregon had the nation’s fourth-highest rate of homelessness among women, according to a recent analysis from the University of Southern California’s Department of Nursing, with 13.5 houseless women for every 10,000 people of all genders. That’s…
Mobile homes’ toxic legacy haunts wildfire relief efforts in Southern Oregon
Misty Muñoz’s bathroom had been rotting for four years. That was before radiant heat from the 1,000-degree blaze that consumed most of Medford Estates during September’s wildfires rendered the front of her home unusable. As Muñoz prepared to abandon what remained of her neighborhood due to concerns about contaminated water and lingering toxic substances, a…
A compassionate model for street hygiene opens in Portland
A cluster of small, bright blue buildings has recently bloomed beneath the Morrison Bridge on the east side of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. The buildings make up the Hygiene Hub, a new approach to compassionate hygiene situated in the midst of a sprawling cluster of tarps and tents that form a pop-up neighborhood of…
Environment
Mobile homes’ toxic legacy haunts wildfire relief efforts in Southern Oregon
Misty Muñoz’s bathroom had been rotting for four years. That was before radiant heat from the 1,000-degree blaze that consumed most of Medford Estates during September’s wildfires rendered the front of her home unusable. As Muñoz prepared to abandon what remained of her neighborhood due to concerns about contaminated water and lingering toxic substances, a…
Opinion | Methanol refineries, citizen scientists and doughnuts
When the Chinese company Northwest Innovation Works (NWIW) showed up in 2014 to pitch their methanol refinery to the Port of Kalama, local resident Diane Dick knew it was bad news: “We’re not fossil fuel people.” As she explains, the area was once host to the world’s largest sawmill. Lumber is what the community understands.…
News
Mobile homes’ toxic legacy haunts wildfire relief efforts in Southern Oregon
Misty Muñoz’s bathroom had been rotting for four years. That was before radiant heat from the 1,000-degree blaze that consumed most of Medford Estates during September’s wildfires rendered the front of her home unusable. As Muñoz prepared to abandon what remained of her neighborhood due to concerns about contaminated water and lingering toxic substances, a…
A compassionate model for street hygiene opens in Portland
A cluster of small, bright blue buildings has recently bloomed beneath the Morrison Bridge on the east side of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. The buildings make up the Hygiene Hub, a new approach to compassionate hygiene situated in the midst of a sprawling cluster of tarps and tents that form a pop-up neighborhood of…
Opinion
Opinion | Methanol refineries, citizen scientists and doughnuts
When the Chinese company Northwest Innovation Works (NWIW) showed up in 2014 to pitch their methanol refinery to the Port of Kalama, local resident Diane Dick knew it was bad news: “We’re not fossil fuel people.” As she explains, the area was once host to the world’s largest sawmill. Lumber is what the community understands.…
Kaia Sand | The ties that bind, even from 6 feet apart
The conversation topic of the morning was cats. First, vendors shared their condolences with Paulette, a long-term vendor whose beloved cat had died, taking in the grief that she suffered. Vendors were standing in line to purchase the latest edition of the newspaper (they buy it for a quarter and sell it to you for…
