Street roots., October 10, 2014, Page 6, Image 6

street roots
6
O c t 10,2014
For the
HOWUifi
A compilation of facts, large and
small, about our community
• Number of sites in Oregon approved
as petroleum-contaminated soil
landfills; 16
Living and
learning - a
day in a life
in Portland
SARAH HANSELL
STAFF WRITER
• Number of contaminants found in
fish eaten by tribal members in the
Columbia River watershed: 92
A ft
• Number of dams in Oregon: 26
• Number of Multnomah County dams.
classified as a “high hazard,” meaning
dam failure would likely result In loss of
life: 6 ’
• Depth of Oregon’s deepest drilled
water well, in the Grand Ronde Basin:
2,700 feet
Justin Harris
• Number of vehicles and off-road
equipment in Portland’s CityFleet:
together. When Justin was 20, he was ready
to leave his tiny hometown in Washington
State, but he had one interview left at a
pizza place.
“I told my dad if I didn’t get the job, I’m
going to join the army. And then I didn’t get
the job, so I joined the Army.”
He was stationed in El Paso, Texas, and
went overseas twice, to Qatar and Kuwait,
working as a mechanic for the Patriot air
• Median annual cost of assisted living
facilities in Oregon: $48,000
• Median annual cost of semi-private
room in a nursing home in Oregon:
$93,258
• Number of reports of neglect and
abuse received by Child Protective
Services in 2013:64,305 -
~
• Percent of victims under the age of 6.
in t e e cases: 48.7% ‘
• Percentage of children leaving foster
care who were reunited with their
families: 58«7% .
Sources; Oregon Department of
Environmental Quality, Oregon EPA,.
Oregon Water Resources Department,
CityFleet, Oregon Health Authority,
Genworth Cost o f Care Survey 2014,
Oregon Department o f Human Services
Answers to puzzles on page 15
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and missile defen sesy stem s. JJe jwas .in the
"army Toffive y^are,^iF m ontn^nd 10 days.
“I counted itall the way down from two
years, day by day.”
Justin says he did have some good times-
in the army, but hew as eager to be done.
He says his time in the military helped him
grow up experiencing and seeing things he
didn’t have the opportunity to in his
hometown.
“I traveled the world and did a lot of
things I couldn’t do and I excelled.”
When he returned,he attended Yakima
Valley Community College, paid for by the
GI bill. However, his grades, weren’t high
enough for his funding to continue. He
moved to North Carolina to live with an. -
army friend, and then to Iowa to reconnect
with an old girlfriend, When that didn’t work
out, he ended up living on the streets.
“Basically, at that point I was just trying
to figure out what I was going to do. I’d
never been homeless befoire in my life.”
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fter being in and out of homelessness
since age 26, Justin Harris finally had
M e >ome steady housing in Portland
through Transition Projects. But when his
brother Bryan left their hometown m the
Yakima Valley to join him, he moved back to
thé streets.
“I would’ve been staying inside and my
brother would’ve been on the street,” Justin
said. “I can’t do that. A lot of people don’t
really understand that, but it seems pretty
cut and dry to me.”
Justin and Bryan haven’t always been
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lii our Sept. 26 editorial about the
funding for housing programs for
homeless schools, we incorrectly stated
that a proposed $75,000 grant from the
Department of Human Services
amounted to $15,000 per year. It's grant
would actually have been $75,000 per
year over the five-year period.
The information on the grant in the
story, “Home work,” was correct.
Please report any errors to our
managing editor, Joanne Zuhl, at 503-
228-5657, or write to Joanne®
streetroots.org
h r
i •
S8s
11
STREET ROOTS P H O T O
Veteran Affairs helped him get to
Justin and Bryan hope to eventually make
Washington, a n d from there he was m ana
out of apartments and Jobs, donating plasma' "cate aboui'iT ii^started working at Street
to make ends meet. Since moving to
Roots on the same day, about five weeks
Portland in March, everything from injuries . algo. The newspaper is an ideal ware for the
arts-inclined
brothers to sell - and it’s |
to no resources for a phone has prevented
Justin from finding steady work.
something they can believe in.
“Learning the city, learning the people,
“It’s not a Rupert Murdoch kind of
learning how to operate the politics of life,
controlled situation. It’s not cookie-cutter,
you know. That’s also been a huge
nonsense news. IPs people that actually
distraction^ I think that has been a good
care about what they’re doing.” =
thing though, just generally that I’ve been
Justin finds that one of the most valuable
able to experience a lot of different things,
parts of working at Street Roots is the
and I have a little hit more ofari
connections he’s made with vendors, staff
understanding of what life is.”
and customers ¡alike, some who have
Despite the difficult times Justin and his
become close friends.
brother Bryan have faced in Portland, he
“It’s a good thing for my brother too, so
still says it is his favorite city in the world -
that’s a good thing for me.”
he loves the music scene, the architecture,
You can find Justin selling in front of the
the art. These were things he found missing
McDonald’s in front of Northeast Grand
in his small hometown,
Avenue and Weidler. You can find the profile
“If you don’t do sports, you were pretty
on his brother Bryan in an upcoming issue.
much a no one. You pretty much fall into the
classic small town nothing kind of life.”
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