Street Roots spoke to more than 12 unhoused Portlanders living along roads and freeways included in Mayor Ted Wheeler’s Feb. 4 emergency order banning encampments in high-traffic corridors.
Of the few who had heard of the order, none were clear on if they were impacted, when it would be applied, how it would be enforced or where they could go if swept.
Many said they either wanted housing or to be left alone. Few said the declaration made them safer.
Heather Hafer, a spokesperson for the city’s Office of Management and Finance which runs Homelessness and Urban Camping Impact Reduction Program — the program tasked with notifying campers of their pending removals — said she cannot speak about the emergency declaration.
Denis Theriault, a spokesperson for Multnomah County’s Joint Office of Homeless Services said the office is not involved in the declaration. Both spokespeople pointed Street Roots back to the mayor’s office.
Wheeler grounded the declaration in a recent Portland Bureau of Transportation report finding 19 of the 27 pedestrian fatalities in Portland in 2021 were homeless people, according to the department’s 2021 Vision Zero Traffic Crash Report.
Wheeler said he was working on the order before the PBOT report was released.
The move was slammed by 25 organizations in a response letter, including Street Roots’ advocacy wing, saying they oppose the ban and disagree with Wheeler’s characterization of what contributed to increased traffic deaths.
Wheeler said he felt his new direction had public support.
The emergency declaration dropped amid consecutive weeks of controversial new policies and proposals impacting homeless Portlanders, including mayoral aide Sam Adams’ plan to force homeless people into mass shelters and Wheeler’s new move to create massive outdoor sheltering sites smaller than Adams’ proposal.
A1, Near Interstate 5 in North Portland
Street Roots: How long have you been homeless and how long have you lived in this specific location?
A1: I’ve been homeless since I was 18. I’ve had jobs and all that to get me out of the situation but here I am. And I’ve been here in this situation in Portland since August.
SR: The mayor has introduced a ban on camping along highways and many busy streets. What is your reaction to that?
A1: Well, as long as it doesn’t say there’s no trespassing signs, then it’s to sit and lay law. Anywhere we can sit where public property, we can actually sleep as well..
SR: Does this policy make you safer?
A1: I do not feel it does because that just gives everybody else the right to come out and harass us even more. If you want us off the streets, how is creating more problems going to make a solution?
SR: And what things would make you safer?
A1 : Just to know that every day, we have a safe place to go, to do our laundry or take showers, get ready for trying to prepare for a job, trying to find a job. Access to computers where that’s a legitimate reason for us to be there.
SR: If told to leave by the city, would you leave this spot?
A1: With very, very much hesitation, yes. Because I’m comfortable here. I don’t see how I’m affecting anybody really besides my tent being in eyesight of people’s view.
SR: What else would you like readers to know?
A1: Give it time, you guys could be out here with us. You could be one of the statistics that are being evaluated now. And how would you feel if you were in this situation? If you were placed here without your credit card, your car, your house? Everything that you relied on? How would you fare?
DW, Near Interstate 5 in North Portland
Street Roots: How long have you been homeless and how long have you lived in this specific location?
DW: I’ve been homeless off and on for many years, and in this location, almost a year.
SR: The mayor has introduced a ban on camping along highways and many busy streets. What is your reaction to that?
DW: I can understand the initial concern, but the amount of danger supposedly it’s creating or whatever? I have not known a single person that I’ve known through this last year that’s ever got hit by a car or had any difficulty with traffic of any sort. I heard about other places that had but it’s not here, not where we’re at.
SR: Does this policy make you safer?
DW: No, it’s the same thing. No matter where you go, you’re gonna it’s gonna be tagged (with no camping notices). You can’t do anything. So we can’t exist. Just trying to live a normal life. Yeah, we’re homeless. We just can’t afford the rent. We can’t afford things. We have to exist in our own way.
SR: And what things would make you safer?
DW : I don’t know, just being left alone.
SR: If told to leave by the city, would you leave this spot?
DW: Well, if it came down to, unfortunately, where law enforcement or something might have to get involved to even further my captivity, to be incarcerated over just existing, then I guess I would choose my freedom over incarceration of course. But, I don’t believe it should ever come to this.
SR: What else would you like readers to know?
DW: If you’re homeless, stay strong, hold your ground, understand your rights as a human being and just don’t give up. And try to exist as best as you can. And if you’re forced into like a certain situation, rebel against it, protest it, do whatever you need to do and show everyone else that’s too scared or too shy, or whatever to get up and actually do something about it.
Jeannie Martin, Near Interstate 405 downtown Street Roots: How long have you been homeless and how long have you lived in this specific location?
Jeannie Martin: I’ve lived in Portland homeless for seven months … and I’ve been in this specific location now for two weeks.
SR: The mayor has introduced a ban on camping along highways and many busy streets. What is your reaction to that?
JM: Greatly disappointed because we’re running out of places to disappear to. The dogs have parks, but the hobos don’t.
SR: Does this policy make you safer?
JM: Not me. I’m a single woman. I picked this spot on purpose because it’s seen. .... I’m alone, so being in a public venue area has served me, making me feel safer knowing that I don’t have a lock on my wall. Hell, my walls are made out of fabric.
So knowing that there’s traffic means that I’m not going to just disappear. So, no, now that I have to go disappear. It’s more likely that I can get victimized.
SR: And what things would make you safer?
JM: Well, balls. But because I refuse to be in a domestic situation with someone I don’t care about and it takes two incomes to pay for rent and I don’t even have one...
I went to the shelter that can’t turn you away, by the way. They turned me away. And I went and found a police officer and I said, ‘you told me to come to this shelter that can’t turn me away out on Powell.’ And he said ‘Oh, they must be up to their capacity.’ … So there’s half the shelters, twice the population of the homeless and they can turn you away once it’s full to capacity.
SR: If told to leave by the city, would you leave this spot?
JM: Yes, because they make your life a nightmare.
Jennifer Bute Near Interstate 5 in North Portland Street Roots: How long have you been homeless and how long have you lived in this specific location?
Jennifer Bute: I’ve been homeless since July 5 when my husband was hit (by a car) and killed. And I’ve been in this location since July 26.
SR: The mayor has introduced a ban on camping along highways and many busy streets. What is your reaction to that?
JB: I can understand his reasoning behind it — at the same time, he needs to understand that it’s because of the allocations of stores, gas, the things that we need, supplies that we live in those areas.
SR: Does this policy make you safer?
JB: No.
SR: And what things would make you safer?
JB : Let us live in the public because actually living out further from the city — I was shot Nov. 19. Don’t know who, don’t know why — and so living out further away from the city where there’s less access and slower access to emergency and medical supplies or anything like that would not be safer at all.
SR: If told to leave by the city, would you leave this spot?
JB: I’m not leaving, I can’t. (My camp) is the resource, the supply (hub that) distributes everything to the people out here in this area. If I leave, who’s going to do that? Where are (housed neighbors) gonna drop the stuff off at? I mean, that’s how we survive out here.
SR: What else would you like readers to know?
JB: Everybody’s story, because we’re not all wanting to be here. Or we’re not all druggies. I’m out here because my husband was a veteran, he was hit and killed July 5 and we lost everything.
Gabriel, Near Interstate 5 in Eliot
Street Roots: How long have you been homeless and how long have you lived in this specific location?
Gabriel: I’ve been homeless for approximately three months now and I’ve been here the whole time.
SR: The mayor has introduced a ban on camping along highways and many busy streets. What is your reaction to that?
Gabriel: I don’t see anything wrong with it. If people can find the good, nice little niche, basically he’s saying, ‘Yeah, it’s cool to camp, just do it somewhere where you’re kind of out of sight and you’re not putting yourself out there and keeping it low key.’ It’s basically like giving us a green light to just to chill but at the same time not make it so obvious and try to keep clean..
SR: Does this policy make you safer?
Gabriel: I never felt unsafe. But I guess it would add an extra measure of safety that it’s nice to know that there is even that being done, implemented for that because we all have family members, we all have friends and you never know. Accidents happen and they’re unfortunate and so just to know that there’s been an extra measure taken to help prevent that. Yeah, that would raise my safety level up maybe like a notch or so.
SR: If told to leave by the city, would you leave this spot?
Gabriel: It’s not like I’m gonna go against the city. If that’s what they want me to do, then yeah. I never expected to like just stay here forever, like make this my permanent home. But if asked to move, yeah. I tried to make everything portable in a way.
SR: What else would you like readers to know?
Gabriel: Not everyone’s bad out here, there’s some good people. And I know there’s a lot of people good people on the other side too.
Justin, Near Interstate 5 in Overlook
Street Roots: How long have you been homeless and how long have you lived in this specific location?
Justin: I’ve been homeless off and on probably since I was like 18. And I’ve only been in this location about a week or so. Before that, I didn’t have a location at all.
SR: The mayor has introduced a ban on camping along highways and many busy streets. What is your reaction to that?
Justin: Honestly, I don’t think it’s that bad because there’s plenty of other places to camp and who wants to be next to a noisy highway anyways? Obviously, I don’t, I hate it. That’s just my opinion. You said just a couple seconds ago you couldn’t hear me because the frickin highway. You got a wall right here, imagine if you were right next to the highway? Yeah, that sucks
SR: Does this policy make you safer?
Justin: I honestly don’t think it makes me safer. I think it’s more of like a public look thing. They’re just trying to make it look like it’s not as bad as it is with homelessness and stuff in Portland. And the highways are where people just passing through go and stuff. So when they see that they’re like, ‘Oh, crap,’ they don’t want to stop in Portland, but if it was a little bit cleaner, they’d probably be a little bit more willing to stop I guess.
SR: And what things would make you safer?
Justin : I don’t know, if equal opportunity employers were actually equal opportunity and I could actually get a job and get a steady income and get off the streets. And that would make me safer because then I would be in my own place.
SR: If told to leave by the city, would you leave this spot?
Justin: Yeah, hell yeah. I’m not going to risk going to jail over this bullshit. Fuck that.
SR: What else would you like readers to know?
Justin: Regardless of people’s pasts … when you see somebody that’s actually working to do better, stay clean and not be homeless, and they’re trying to get off the streets, to actually help them. Not just ignore them.
But I know that some people they’re okay with this, this is what they want. But there’s some of us out here that — I don’t want to be out here. I don’t like being outside. I don’t like being cold. I like to be inside, where it’s warm. I like to wake up and be able to go to the bathroom in a toilet. I like to be able to wake up and go to the fridge and get some food but out here you can’t really do that.
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