In my opinion Commissioners Ryan and Meieran are working thoughtfully and willfully to encourage development of alternative shelters.   Both have accelerated and deepened the resources available for these endeavors.  

This will not be enough. 

Agape Village and now Beacon Village continue to evolve without government leadership.  I hope our local foundations and private donors will embrace these current efforts and support development of more projects that bring together diverse groups of housed and unhoused Portlanders.  After all, it takes a village. 

Please let me know if you’d like to get involved. 



A spreadsheet published Friday by Ryan's office breaks down the 71 potential [city owned] village properties the City has identified, location, size, utility hookups, access to public transit, parking access, etc:

https://www.portland.gov/ryan/news/2021/7/16/inventory-city-owned-parcels

 

"Here Are Where the City’s New Houseless Villages May Be Located." by Alex Zielinski. 

https://www.portlandmercury.com/blogtown/2021/07/20/35246060/here-are-where-the-citys-new-houseless-villages-may-be-located. 

 

I'm glad the city has finally produced this list publically. I think they might have done it years ago, as suggested to them, without the several years of intervening, possibly partly diversionary, activity on Shelter to Housing Continuum to revise entire city code to hypothetically guide this for every lot citywide. Everyone knew all along that the key need was a list of most-likely 100+ sites, not revising all city code for 100,000s of mostly irrelevant lots.

 

Also, I'd note that the actions so far by City and Dan Ryan's office do not appear to offer support for  'village' aka "Outdoor Shelters" (note: oxymoron) sites developed independently or on non-city land. The "Safe Rest Villages" ordinance creates a concept of and focus solely on City-determined, City-owned sites.

 

The city still has not, and doesn't appear to have any intent to, release the long-requested citywide lot-level map showing eligible sites for Outdoor Shelters under recently passed S2HC.  As many people have articulated, such mapping and inventorying is a crucial resource for involving the community broadly in this effort, allowing a healthy diversity of responses, and achieving response on the scale of need. (which is far larger than the six "Safe Rest Villages" contemplated by the City). 

 

For example, Portland developer/philanthropist Homer Williams, and his organization Harbor of Hope, have worked extensively to propose a broder city-wide network of shelter villages under their leadership: see 

https://www.wweek.com/news/2021/04/22/developer-homer-williams-releases-tentative-plan-for-homeless-pod-village/.

 

Also, more fundamentally, the City's approach here illustrates its relentless reduction of 'village' concepts to temporary shelters, operated by behavioral-health providers.  In my view, and discussion of it in Village Buildings book draft, it represents a political recuperation of and conservative reaction against, Portland's former leadership in envisioning & developing resident-governed, long-term, alternative 'village' housing. 

 

Bcc:

Commissioner Dan Ryan

  + housing lead Mark Bond 

Homer Williams

Alex Zielinkski

[note to all:  you can reply to full PDX Shelter Forum group by doing Reply to All to this email. We invite open discussion between officials and staff, publics, and especially, those closest to homelessness].

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Tim McCormick

Moderator PDX Shelter Forum, Editor at HousingWiki,
Organizer at Village Collaborative

Portland, Oregon 

tjm.org/about / @tmccormick