Street Roots • April 7-13, 2017
E d ito r ia l
Time to revamp Oregon’s destructive drug laws
he travesty of the so-called War on Drugs plays on a
in-time behavior, a category of offense or punishment. It’s is
constant loop, destroying lives, families and
attached to one’s identity for a lifetime. A felony shuts
communities, and starting over with each generation. people out of housing and employment options. It can
It continues, seemingly on autopilot, despite decades of jeopardize future access to critically needed services, even
evidence showing it be a social, economic and
food stamp assistance. It is a sentence that is far more
environmental disaster.
likely to aggravate a person’s addiction or drug use than
And most people get that. Which is
correct it.
why it’s no surprise that a poll of 600
Indeed, serious crimes should have consequences, but
registered voters in Oregon, funded
let s repeat: One in three of those new felons have no prior
by ACLU of Oregon, found a vast
criminal record.
majority - 73 percent - favored making simple drug
Oregon lawmakers have the opportunity to correct this
possession a misdeameanor with access to treatment,
destructive practice with HB 2355, which would de-felonize
rather than a felony.
low-level drug possession charges, reform sentencing
As it stands now, felony charges for possessing even the
policies, and emphasize public health and safety. Large,
most trace amount of drugs can carry stiff penalties and
commercial quantities of drugs would still be felony
years, even decades, in prison. For about 1,500 Oregonians
offenses, but user-quantities of drugs would be treated as
every year, drug possession charges are their first felony
misdemeanors. The bill also gives the state critical data to
conviction, and one out three of those new felons have no
identify patterns in profiling, along with training on
prior criminal record, according to the Oregon Criminal
identifying implicit bias.
Justice Commission.
Oregon needs this law. Its policies advance years of work
And Oregon’s African-Americans are disproportionately
in Salem to correct drug laws and the racial disparities they
ensnared by felony drug possession laws - more than
create.
double the rate of whites in 2015, all to preserve a relic of
We waste too many lives and spend too much money
political posturing.
creating felons in our society. Let your local representative
The gravity of a felony conviction goes far beyond a point- know you support HB 2355.
T
EDITORIAL
Page 3
Write in
If you would like
to have
something
that you’ve
written published
in our pages, or would
like to get involved as a
member of our reporting staff,
contact Managing Editor Joanne Zuhl at
503-228-5657. joanne@streetroots.org.
We ask that all submissions include 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. Mon.-Fri., 7:30
a.m.-2 p.m. Sat. and 7:30-1 p.m. Sun.
Advertising
Right to Rest bill’s end leaves people’s lives in the balance
newly released ACLU of Oregon report,
“Decriminalizing Homelessness: Why Right to Rest
Legislation is the High Road For Oregon,” finds that
there is an entire legal infrastructure in Oregon that makes
basic survival in public spaces illegal.
The report analyzed local laws in 69 communities and
cities throughout Oregon w ith populations above 5,000, and
fohnd that there are 225 laws
that create clear barriers to life-
sustaining activities and legalize
unfair and harmful treatment of
people experiencing
homelessness.
The report outlines that
By Israel Bayer
beyond the approximately 125
laws that outlaw some form of
sleeping in public spaces
throughout Oregon — restrictions extend to those who have
security of a car, bus, trailer or RV. Thirty-one cities in
Oregon restrict sleeping in one’s vehicle even if it’s in
normal parking place and posing no safety hazard.
There are 11 communities in Oregon that ban
panhandling, and another 48 communities and two counties
have laws against sleeping or sitting on sidewalks.
Anti-homeless or poor laws have existed for centuries.
Oregon is no different. It used to be illegal to live in idleness
or without employment or having no visible means of
support in Oregon. In many ways, not a lot has changed.
The reality is if you’re homeless in many communities
throughout Oregon, you’re driven into urban environments.
For one, there are little to no services available in many of
rural or suburban communities. Secondly, as the report
clearly outlines, if you’re homeless, you’re clearly not
welcome.
The times are a changing in Portland, or are they? For
nearly 40 years of modern-day homelessness, Portland has
grappled with how to handle homelessness through a public-
safety lens. We’ve covered all of the bases in that time -
from a more lenient harm-reduction approach to the flat-out
criminalization of the people on the streets through
sidewalk laws and heavy enforcement.
I like to remind people that it’s not that there are more
homeless people in our neighborhoods than anytime over
the past couple of decades. It’s simply that our
neighborhoods have changed.
The Pearl and the inner Eastside of Portland used to be
areas of town that people experiencing homelessness could
bed down. The Pearl was an empty warehouse district and
the inner Eastside had not yet seen development. Today,
both of those neighborhoods are off limits. More so, Old
Town is gentrifying rapidly.
A
Israel Bayer is the
executive director o f
Street Roots. You can
reach him at
israel @streetroots. org
or follow him on
Twitter @israelbayer.
The result is tent camping that is dispersed throughout
the city. Our parks that have become a last refuge.
The mayor has said that he’s not for tent camping, but
the reality is there’s not a lot the police and the city can do
about it. After all, we are experiencing a housing crisis and
are on th e verge of facing m assive funding cuts by both th e
state and federal government.
While, creating more and more shelter beds is costly,
enforcing laws that make homelessness illegal is even more
costly.
Advocates and city officials should avoid going back to an
era where fighting over these laws was commonplace. We
should all be working toward affordable housing and
leveraging resources to support people having a safe place
to call home. A fight over criminalization in Portland would
be disastrous and one that I wouldn’t look forward to
having.
The reality is Portland is working to thread the needle.
It’s not perfect, but we’re trying to find the right balance.
Unfortunately, the Right to Rest Act (House Bill 2215)
did not get a chance in Oregon.
The Right to Rest Act sought to end the criminalization
of rest and accompanying violations of basic human and civil
rights for all people. This legislation would have protected
the following rights and prohibit the enforcement of any
local laws that violate these rights:
■ Right to move freely, rest, sleep and be protected in a
public space.
■ Right to-rest in public spaces and protect one self from
the elements in a non-obstructive manner
■ Right to reasonable expectation of privacy of your
property in public spaces
■ Right to occupy a legally parked vehicle.
■ Right to share food and eat in public.
Of course, in a time when the poor are demonized for
being poor and the homeless are increasingly seen more as
a burden than human beings or Oregonians — it’s not
surprising.
“At the end of the day, this bill deserved a hearing,” said
Paul Boden, Director of the Western Regional Advocacy
Project. “The practice of law-enforcement targeting people
experiencing homelessness has to be stopped. These laws
have to become a part of the past. People’s lives are
depending on it.”
It’s true. People’s lives are depending on it.
In a time when our community can’t provide affordable
housing, mental health services and stability for its own
residents — the idea of criminalizing people that fall through
the safety net seems cruel. And it is. It’s downright cruel.
Interested in advertising in Street Roots?
Contact Israel Bayer at israel@streetroots.org
Staff
Executive Director Israel Bayer
I
joanne@streetroots.orq
V en d o r P r o g r a m D ir e c to r
Cole Mevke\
Operations Director Sarah Beecroft
Development Director Sarah Cloud
Program Assistant Meghann Van Pelt,
Jesuit Volunteer
Patricia Romero
Monica Kwasnik
Emily Green, Suzanne Zalokar,
Sarah Hansell, Leonora Ko, Jared Paben,
Amanda Waldroupe, Stephen Quirke
Photographers Diego Diaz, Joe Glode,
Arkady Brown
Canvasser Desmond Hardison
*
Board of Directors
Chairman Brad Taylor
Vice-Chairman Rachel Langford
Treasurer Heather Stadick
Secretary Dan Jones
Directors Rich Rodgers, Michael Anderson,
Sandra Hahn, John Brown, Nels Johnson and
Alison Hallett
Volunteers
Jan Bayer, John Barker, Stacey Heath, Anjali Rathore,
Zoe Klingmann, Dan Jones, Dennis Hogan, Monica
McKune, Susan Wolfe, Lucas Hawthorne, Thomas
Buell Jr., Jeanie Lunsford, Yasmin Amirsoleymani,
Jason Cohen, Tom Ray, Doug Spangle, Susannah
Kamala, Jon Raymond, Diana Richardson, Cherie
Manning, Paul and Madeline Gefroh, Mary Anne
Joyce, Del Shawn Davidson, Gillian Floren, Mark
OIDani, Meg Holden, Bridget Brown, Cody Travels,
Bianca Butler, Robb Hengerer, Alex Cherin, Tom
Vandel, Grace Gallagher, Jenny Farres, Evan Firsick,
Camber Hansen-Karr, Miranda Woods, Henry
Brannan and Helen Hill. If you're interested in
volunteering with Street Roots, please submit a
volunteer application at streetroots.org/volunteer. Or
you can call for more information at 503-228-5657.
J
4