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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (July 24, 2009)
1ÉK' Street roots IB C & B B IK T M G ä is Education * Dialogue * Independence n i s Summertime, when the living is hard Behind every success story is you I ow do we measure success in these times? It’s a hard notion to embrace as we trudge through the most abysmal economic slog; of our lives. With Oregon’s unemployment languishing around 12 percent, and approximately 1 out of every 200 Oregonians experiencing homelessness today- according to the federal Department Housing and Urban Development - the crisis is hitting chest level, WHAT DO and for too many, breaching sustainability. To be sure, numbers are in the abstract, statistics are YOU THINK? cold, and speak more of bureaucratic measurements than real-time life. But in real terms, on the ground, the Street Roots ______________________ times are as hard as we’ve encourages readers ever seen them. The tragic to submit letters It's easy to think that stories carried through and columns for there Is no price to be our door ring closer to publication. Send put on trust, dignity middle-class “America” letters to the editor and equality, but there than they ever have before. to the Street Roots Is definitely a cost In And the numbers of office, 211 NW denying those people looking for help, for Davis5 St., Portland, fundamental human answers, for hope, are OR 97209, or needs Inour backing up on every e-mailed to community. agency and organization’s streetroots doorstep. ©emailxom. , But today, despite those dark clouds, we want to talk about success. It can’t always be expressed on a chart, or in mathematical extrapolations. At its core, every success, like every tragedy, is personal. ¿Success comes in the form of the young couple in homelessness that came to Street Roots last year to establish their own stability to prepare for the baby on the way. Today, they are a happy family who have gotten into housing and are paying rent, caring for their adorable son and working together to stay above the waters. They stop by the Street Roots office now and again, selling papers as money falls short, and looking far healthier and happier then when they first arrived looking for that hope. Success is in the many people who have worked their way off the streets, first by making their own income through paper sales, connecting with the community j that wants to help, and working diligently toward their own security. Our office is their office, to plan and prepare. Many of them continue to sell the newspaper even after the most extreme crisis has passed. It is their profession. . It’s in the vendor who began with us working through a powerful addiction to alcohol, who struggled to find a . balance in his life. Through us, his own commitment, g| and the larger network of support we work with, he now has two years of sobriety - and a new life. In housing now, and still a vendor, he photocopies his annual sobriety coins to turn into cards for his family. There are countless others who find a family each morning around our table in our shotgun office, among fellow vendors, the staff and volunteers, where they have someone to talk to whom they know will understand - without neither the free pass of pity nor the gavel of judgment. It’seasy to think that there is no price to be put on trust, dignity and equality, but there is definitely a cost in denying those fundamental human needs in our community. Last, but not least, is that you are reading this because a scant handful of staff, coupled by a legion of dedicated volunteers and vendors, make this success story happen every day. We do,not have a voice without them, and we cannot deliver that voice without you.. Thank you. ■ t’s time for some truth telling. Street comes to institutional support for our Roots is in a period of hard challenges in programs. the months to come. Three years ago, We need your help now! Street Roots the organization set out on an aggressive relies on individual donors and supporters growth strategy that in the community to survive. In theory, __________ /_____ would boost the regular. Street Roots readers give at least vendor program, $26 dollars, per year to their local improve and broaden neighborhood vendor. This act goes to the content of the support individuals experiencing ' itewspaper and grow homelessness and poverty with their day-to- the organization in a day survival and increasing people’s quality B y Israel Bayer way that would create of life. It also creates an atmosphere of systemic change in relationship-building across class lines that the community. Since you simply aren’t going to find anywhere 2006, the organization has done exactly else in thé city. We believe in believing in that. people, and your support and readership The vendor program for people .makes that a reality. experiencing homelessness and poverty has Saying that, StreefRoots can’t support grown. The quality of the newspaper, vendors and the relationships built with the specifically the journalism and a diverse community without having organizational range of community voices, including those support. It takes money to print and on the streets, is at an all-time'high. The maintain a newspaper. And without a Rose City Resource Guide transformed newspaper, there’s no vendor program; from a 4-page insert in the newspaper to a Both programs are joined at thediip. It also 104-page, 4-by-4 pocket guide and a state-of- takes money to maintain a day-to-day space the-art Web site connecting services to for vendors and people on the streets to people most in need. The organization has gather in a safe environment and to have led successful campaigns to secure the supplies needed to support these homeless services in Portland and efforts. throughout the region, helped families Street Roots needs to raise a humbling. maintain Section 8 housing and changed the $15,000 in July and August to keep the train conversation around homelessness and On the trades. We’re not sounding alarm > - poverty. bells, but we are saying out loud th a t Now we find ourselves at a crossroads. without your support we won’t be able to The organization is Set to add a new location in November in outer East Portland maintain at the level wë are today in the coming,months. to expand the benefits of the vendor Your donation this summer will help program to a growing homeless and low- Street Roots to: . income population on the east side. We are ■ Get the news out to 10,000 readers working on developing the technology to every other week - covering the issues that bring the streets to the World Wide Web . and are working to create a more timely and affect real people every day effective publication for readers and ■ Provide an income for 80 men and . vendors alike. women experiencing homelessness and All of this comes at a time when the poverty in Portland economy has plummeted and the ■ Lead strategic campaigns that improve newspaper industry as a whole struggles to the quality of life for residents with the develop sustainable funding streams. It also fewest resources comes at a time when homelessness is ■ Connect thousands of low-income rapidly increasing and funding is drastically residents with vital services through the decreasing from foundations. Rose City Resource Street Roots is not a conventional social- Street Roots always relies on community service agency, so we don’t receive big support. This summer it’s more important government contracts or grants. Most than ever. Thanks for giving what' you can. foundations don’t fund media projects. You can make a check or money order While we pride ourselves on being outside out to Street Roots, 211 NW Davis, the box, it’s true that oftentimes we find Portland, Oregon 97209 or donate online at ourselves on the outside looking in when it www.streetroots.org. IIR1CTOB1 DESK STREET ROOTS’ EDITORIAL BOARD STREET ROOTS PHOTO the views expressed in the editorials in Street Roots are the consensus of members of the editorial board and , contributing volunteers. Vendors gather around the front desk at Street Roots to buy papers on a busy Friday morning. Friday mornings when the, new papers hit the streets, are busiest days o f the Week. '
