Opinion
Opinion | Why was Oregon’s Measure 110 repealed?
I've spent the last few years as the operations coordinator for an organization called Street Books. It’s a job that has placed me on the streets — in the neighborhoods most acutely impacted by “the drug epidemic” — throughout Oregon’s experiment with decriminalization. As a mobile library, Street Books delivers thousands of books each year…
Opinion | Recovery services exist in prison, but the need far outpaces availability
I am an enrolled member of the Cherokee tribe of Eastern Oklahoma. I am in recovery from alcoholism, opioid addiction, mental health, poverty, childhood domestic violence, prison, trauma colonization and the patriarchy. I’m serving my third year as Oregon State Correctional Institution’s, or OSCI, Native American Inmate Club President. I am a certified recovery mentor…
First-ever ‘New Paper Day’ at new Street Roots office
Street Roots held its first “New Paper Day” in its new Burnside Building on Oct. 23. It was a historic moment for vendors, staff, volunteers and supporters who turned out in droves to help transfer bundles of the Oct. 23 issue from a curbside pallet to the 281 W. Burnside St. lobby. The event capped…
News
Arron Magar on his new book, ‘How Long is Five Minutes?’
I first met Arron Magar in a writing workshop at the Columbia River Correctional Institution, where he read aloud from his autobiography in progress. The class met weekly to share work, record memories, both sweet and harrowing, and shape the raw material of their lives into stories. I was struck by their honesty, how they…
Vendor Profiles
Street Roots Vendor Profile | ‘Life and healing can only take place in sunlight’
“I realized that life and healing can only take place in sunlight,” George McCarthy, poet and Street Roots vendor, said. George’s nine-year journey in Portland — living in shelters, on the streets, and now in subsidized housing near Portland State University — has been full of challenges. He moved to Portland from South Carolina seeking…
