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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (June 24, 2011)
street roots 10 INTERSTATE, fro m page 3 The expansion would give the organization access to loans and grants from the PDC to renovate the organization’s 6,000-square- foot building so that it can be used to provide space for emerging non-profits, she said. “It’s giving everyone the same opportunities,” said Livingston of the expansion, who hopes the PDC will keep the lessons from the past in mind as it moves forward. The S t Johns Neighborhood Association is also supportive of having an urban renewal area encompass its commercial center and Roosevelt High School. Clinton Doxsee, the association’s land use chair, said that after a long process it became clear to many in the North Portland neighborhood that the money could give the streets a facelift put some empty lots to use and generally make St. Johns a destination that might even get a write-up in The New York Times. He also said the association is cognizant of urban renewal’s potential of gentrification and aims to use the money inclusively. “We basically asked people, who wants in?” said PDC Business and Equity Director John Jackley, speaking of the feedback, process with area residents interested in the benefits of urban renewal. Jackley also points to an endorsement for the expansion of ICURA by the 21-member ad hoc community advisory committee that included representatives from minority business organizations,. neighborhood groups, the county, the schools, the Portland Trail Blazers, social service nonprofit Central City Concern, a resident of the New Columbia Housing project and others. The committee met for nine months beginning in August 19, 2QO9 at the newly renovated BiHy”^ibb~E lks Lodge7a historic June 24, 2011 “In 20 years, neighborhood leaders make clear, the district won’t be measured by the Starbucks, fancy restaurants or penthouse condominiums built Instead, the yardstick will be whether the area continues to include everyone. History suggests the city won’t be able to pull it off.” The plan for ICURA states that it would be used to “primarily benefit existing residents and businesses,” create housing for all income levels, be a driver of jobs, be a force that would help struggling seniors, and transform the part of the city that has suffered from deliberate disinvestment into a vibrant, attractive and inclusive place. The plan also explicitly acknowledged how the area has been on the wrong side of progress, like the creation of 1-5, which resulted in some households and businesses getting the boot The document also stated that there would be no condemnation of property, especially in the Eliot Neighborhood, a clear reference to the neighborhood-wrecking Emanuel Hospital expansion. than ease i t Although he did note that urban renewal is not the sole cause of gentrification, he said that too little investment in affordable housing, which would have helped longtime residents, has come too little too late. Portland State University professor Gretchen Kafoury, who had recently left Portland City Council shortly before the urban renewal area was formed, said she was cynical about the Interstate URA early on. However, Kafoury recalled hundreds of abandoned or decrepit homes that filled the area’s neighborhoods prior to urban renewal that have been revitalized. However, she questions if it has stabilized and preserved neighborhoods. “Urban renewal itself contributes to gentrification,” said Karen Gibson, an associate professor of planning and urban studies at Portland State University. “It sounds kind of hilarious,” she said of the notion that urban renewal could slow gentrification. She explained that the very mechanism of urban renewal intrinsically lends itself to gentrification. In order for it > to work, she said, it requires that property values rise. John Jackley, however, defends the hortly after the Interstate URA was created in 2000, it was expected to PDC’s record. “It’s apparent to generate 6,700 jobs everyone that and 2,600 new homes there is a growing over the course of 20 segment of years. No one from Portland that the PDC responded to When city officials pitched doesn’t have the requests if this goal the Idea of creating ICURA same equity of had been met. (In in the late 1990s, they opportunities as May, County everyone else. So Commissioner Loretta argued that gentrification what are we going Smith, who represents was already creeping into to do about this?”, the North and said Jackley. Northeast region,- held North and Northeast Portland and claimed that He ticks off a a forum of African list of American men on the central goal of the new accomplishments their concerns and urban renewal area would be he’s particularly yjsionjqr a More S equitable com m unity. to m a k e isivestxneitts th a t proud of th a t have helped historic With hundreds of men would benefit existing residents of North in attendance, the residents, preventing their prevailing concern and Northeast displacement. Portland, including was over the access to jobs.) the June Key Delta According to . Community Center, which will Margaret Bax, who be run by an worked on housing African American sorority in a rehabilitated policy for the PDC when ICURA was being gas station on North Albina Street with created, the primary purpose of the urban financial and technical support from the renewal area was to help finance the MAX PDC. Yellow Line, but its goals were steadily - expanded to other projects, such as driving Jackley also said that the PDC provides apprenticeship training on all its projects, home-ownership and creating rental properties. partnering with organizations like the Irvington Covenant and Oregon “We knew we had to spend the train money, but there was an absolute Tradeswomen to help provide job training. commitment to other projects,” said Bax. He also said that business programs have been instrumental in helping African By PDC figures, the stock of rental housing in the Interstate Corridor had American small business owners, and points to the MAX Yellow Line and New been declining while sale prices of homes Columbia as worthwhile investments. The , soared during the housing boom of the MAX Yellow Line, which opened four years 1990s and early 2000s as houses were after the ICURA was created, cost $350 purchased and “flipped” for a profit. million, $28 million of which came from The same report also paints a troubling urban renewal money. The PDC picture with more than oné-third of all contributed $6.4 million for the $20.2 households in the Interstate Corridor million New Columbia project that created paying more than 30 percent of their 854 housing units. income on housing costs and 17 percent But not everyone is sold on the numbers paying more than 50 percent The Coalition or promises. Without more detailed for a Livable Future’s Equity Atlas also information, the Northeast Coalition of found that between 1995 and 2004, nearly Neighborhoods declined to take a clear every neighborhood in both urban renewal position for or against expanding urban areas in North and Northeast Portland and renewal. The coalition said it wouldn’t take nearby saw the median sale price of single a position on the expansion without family homes rise by over 100 percent information from the PDC on resident “I wouldn’t say it’s been good at displacement, criteria for future projects, mitigating gentrification,” said Lew Frederick, a Democrat who represents part an analysis on whether original goals of the ICURA have been met, and an assessment of Northeast Portland in the Oregon House hen city officials pitched the idea of of urban renewal, among other issues. of Representatives. “It’s done the creating ICURA in the late 1990s, “We are not against investing in the opposite.” they argued that gentrification was already “Whomever is commanding money needs neighborhoods and, not against expanding creeping into North and Northeast the URA,” the coalition said. “However, to be a lot more mindful of who the most Portland and claimed that the central goal because this decision involves so many vulnerable are, or they need to be clear of the new urban renewal area would be to that this policy (urban renewal) is not about factors and so many viewpoints, we make investments that would benefit continue to believe that complete abating gentrification,” said Michael existing residents, preventing their information is essential to guide the Anderson, a long-time affordable housing displacement decision.” advocate. Anderson says urban renewal has Two months before the City Council The Portland City Council is scheduled a “spotty record at best” on housing and voted to create ICURA, a writer in the has done more to spur gentrification rather to finalize the expansion in July. Oregonian Issued a prescient statement: social hub for the city’s African American community, to discuss investments, economic development in area, housing, gentrification, and the historic role of the PDC. However, the iCURA’s primary advisory committee — each URA has a standing advisory committee — voted to oppose most of the expansion over concerns it would spread resources too thin and drain money from existing projects. The North Portland Neighborhood Chairs Network, which represents neighborhood associations in areas that would be affected by the expansion, sent a letter supportive of the expansion to the committee with its own list of urban renewal projects. Sam Brooks, an African American entrepreneur who founded a successful staffing firm, wrote a letter of support for the expansion to the committee as well, arguing that it could help spur black entrepreneurship. The trade association he founded, the Oregon Association of Minority Entrepreneurs, has also adopted sent a similar letter. On May 19, 2010, the committee voted to support the PDC’s expansion plans while also prioritizing a $70 million list of projects including parks, housing and other undertakings dubbed the “Gem L ist” The committee punted on the prickly issue of the Rose Quarter redevelopment while the details of the deal were being worked out elsewhere. W I Am War Wallace E. High I am war, I am a living, breathing, beast, Mercy I know it not, My fuel is diesel and blood, Bleak detritus of forceful men Who once knew honor, Who once knew love, But power stole their souls. I am war, Unleashed bequeathed upon the earth Where no segment lies untouched, Carried by the winds hastening To escape the horror that stirs them, That makes the cyclone a child’s toy, A mere puff from a lad’s lips Blowing at dandelion’s lacés. I am war, I am ravenous beyond sating, Starving for destruction, There is no justice here within For there is no heart in this; This is the madness of men, Cruel beyond imagining, Relentless in pursuit of death. I am war, I am brilliant in my scheming, My intelligence soars seeking, Leaping like a springbok For meaner ways to erase Memories of façes smiling, Baby’s tiny fingers grasping, Laughing at daddy’s nose. I am war, I am the master of waste Making-mot-heFS,pale-and-cry~«™--<-^- For dying children tom from the breasts; My breath comes in napalm blasts, Clouds of sinister, seeping gases That stifle feeble efforts at life And turn good deeds to mockery I am war, I am a strident voice ringing In cloistered halls where Old men gather to vent their ire With the lives of stalwart sons And daughters directed to th e fray Beguiled and betrayed to stand Before the maws of howitzers roaring. I am war, I am misery beyond reckoning, The greedy grider hastening The return to the earth of dust Made of moldering bones Strewn by deadly claymores leaping, Blasting upward from concealment, Scattered by jackals on desert sands. I am war, I am relentless in my pursuits, Making no distinction in the dying, Man, woman, child or beast, What câre I where shrapnël flies; Suffice to say I am here, My history written in blood, darkly, Learn from this, my child, and fight no more ,
