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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 26, 2016)
oireei Moots Aug. 26-Sept. t,'2O16 E d ito r ia l Housing is not the only social justice issue Write in to have s "omelessness. Housing. Crisis. Those three words have become i -commonplace in our city over the past three years. It s for good reason too. The skyrocketing their philanthropy programs while maintaining record profits in the tens of millions? The list is long. The reality, my friends, is the game is rigged. Anyone who’s got any skin in the game knows this. If you’re a person of color, losing their housing. you’ve known it from the day you were born. Thousands of people We like to think of ourselves as a continue to suffer on our sophisticated city, but the reality is we live ih streets. There is no end ah environment where everyone knows in sight. It is a crisis. No everyone and there’s limited resources, question. capacity and political capital to go around. B y Israel Bayer Saying that, it doesn’t In short, it’s hard to create social change ■ m h h m m h mean housing is the on multiple fronts at any one time. Step out only social justice issue of line o r upset the wrong person or group that should be deserving and there goes your ability to raise money of our attention or the media’s watchful eye. and to have the political capital to influence A colleague of mine recently good policy. It’s these very dynamics that communicated that with the amount of stunt social change or reform in our city and attention being focused on housing in our our state. community, we are losing an opportunity to - During the recession it was most apparent connect the issue itself to the larger social when you would see large corporations, like justice movemfent. Other issues that are banks, force local housing and homeless equally important and ultimately connect agencies to provide photo ops for $5,000 with the issue of housing are being drowned donations, when in fact it was those very o u t It’s true. national banks that helped create the housing For example, why are we more focused on crisis. IPs humiliating. the issue of a homeless shelter than the fact Our system is riddled with these kinds of that mentally ill people are being warehoused realities. in our county jail? Why are we talking about None of this is to say that great work isn’t homelessness without talking about the fact being done in our community. It’s to say that that the lack of criminal justice reform in our to be able to get ahead of many o f the H ■ MBBCTOB'S DESK Israel Bayer is the executive director o f Street Roots. You can reach h im at israel@streetroots.org or follow him on Twitter @israelbayee community continues to create more p ro b lem s th a t fa c e o u r co m m u n ity , e s p e c ia lly homelessnessi.It’s.ope; thing Tor.goyerjaraent to highlight these issues in a report or offer a recommendation. It’s another thing all together to actually do something about it. It’s easy for government, nonprofits, the business community and neighborhoods to call fof more revenue and policies to support housing and homeless, services. The house isn on fire. It’s a lot harder to call for radical reform at the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office, to end racial profiling or to hold the Portland Police Bureau accountable to its residents. What about focusing on the fact that TriMet should be offering low-income bus fare region-wide, or asking that hospitals offer more than window dressing through in the context of poverty, we’ve got work to 'do. . In a time when there is a growing divide between government and the realities playing on the streets it’s important for all of us, including myself and Street Roots, to connect the many social justice issues. We can alt do a better job. We will. ' There’s no shortage of work to be done from the environment to early childhood education, from tax reform to police accountability, from transportation issues to criminal justice reform. We’re all on this planet together, and we all have a responsibility to make our community the best it can be. We have to support one another. a if you would like . / / \ something Z - ——\ that you’ve written published x . in our pages, o f would \ x. 5 \ 7 \ \ / / like to get involved as a ' member of our reporting staff, contact Managing Editor Joanne Zohl at 503-228-5657, joanne@streetroots.org. We ask that all submissions indude the author’s name and contact information, if available. Street Roots 211 NW Davis St Portland, OR 97209 503-228-5657 Fax:503-227-3117 www.streetroots.org www.news.streetroots.org Hours: 7:30 a.m.-3 p.m, Mom-Fri,, 7:30 - a.m.-2 p.m_. Sat. and 7:30-11 a.m. Sun. Advertising Interested in advertising in Street Roots? Contact Israel Bayer at israetereetroots.org Staff Israel Bayer israel@streetroots.org E x e c u t iv e D i r e c t o r Managing Editor Soanne ZuW . 5oanne@sheetcgotsorg Cofe M erkel cbfe@ streetroots.org. O p e r a t i o n s D i r e c t o r Sarah Beecroft V e n d o r P r o g r a m D ir e c t o r D e v e lo p m e n t D i r e c t o r Sarah Cloud P ro g ra m A s sis ta n t Meghatm Van Pelt Jesuit Volunteer Development Assistant Patricia Romero Reporters Emify Green, Suzanne Zalokar, Sarah Hansell, Leonora Ko, Jared Paben, Am anda Waldroupe, Stephen Quirke Photographers Diego Diaz, Joe Giode, Ben Brink Editorial Assistant Monica Kwasnik Canvasser Desmond Hardison Board of Directors Chairman Brad Taylor Vice-Chairman Rachel Langford Treasurer Heather Stadick Secretary Marcus Swift Directors Rich Rodgers, Michael Anderson, Leo Rhodes, Sandra Hahn, John Brown, Dan Jones Volunteers Jan Bayer, John Barker, Stacey Heath, Anjali Rathore, Zoe Kltngmann, Haven Herrin, Dan Jones, Dennis Hogan, Tom Wright, Judy Taylor, Karen Allen, Monica McKune, Susan Wolfe, Lucas Hawthorne, Thomas Buell Jr., Jeanie Lunsford, Yasmin Amirsoleymani, Jason Cohen, Tom Ray, Doug Spangle, Susannah Kamala, Jon Raymond, Hilary Smith, Diana Richardson, Cherie Manning, Paul and Madeline Gefroh, Mary Ann Joyce and Faye Powell. If you're interested in volunteering with Street Roots, please submit a volunteer application at streetroots.org/volunteer. Or you can call our volunteer coordinator for more information at 503-228-5657.
