Street Roots • April 13-19, 2018
O p in io n
Page 3
These are the times to cherish life, respect survival
t has been a hard week at Street Roots. A
handful of our vendors witnessed the police
shooting Saturday night at City Team
Ministries. People struggling with homelessness,
and the trauma inherent in that existence, now
have to contend with this memory of a person
gunned down in their proximity.
■■■■■■■■
Throughout the week,
Street Roots vendors came
into our space recounting a
terrifying scene. Some had
gathered Saturday night for
By Kaia Sand
the AA meeting; some to
get some rest. They
describe how a clearly
disturbed man burst into
the space, police lights flashing from the street.
All those who had sought City Team as refuge
desperately fled out the exit door, pushing each
other to safety.
One man’s glasses were broken in the crash of
bodies getting to safety, and he wandered to Street
Roots barely able to see. As we helped him sort
out that repair (his glasses are now in good shape)
others gathered to talk and share pizza. They were
alone in the terror of it, and sought a bit of
community.
“There were a whole lot of victims there that
night other than that [alleged] carjacker and his
family,” one Street Roots vendor told me. “This
took a piece of our serenity.”
The Street Roots vendors who were present
describe sleeping on a bus that night, and
eventually, Imago Dei, a shelter that opened
temporarily while City Team was shut down. Now
each person deals with the brutal aftermath
crushing down on their mental health while they
face the daily struggle of being homeless,
I
Aim S a n d is the
executive director o f
Street Roots. You can
reach her a t
kaia@streetroots. org.
Follow her on
Twitter @ m kaiasand
including where to sleep each night. Some have
returned to City Team, some to other shelters,
some now back on the street.
One of our vendors described feeling alone in
the terrifying aftermath: “Nobody cared about the
homeless victims,” he said. “Here’s one more
thing for your crappy life. You are so used to being
in the rain, you can deal with this.”
There’s a lot to think about, including the
desperate ongoing need for de-escalation when
people are in crisis. But here’s something for us
all to grapple with: Each person who was
homeless before that shooting was homeless after
that shooting, now with one more layer of trauma.
While they deal with sleep deprivation, self-care
can feel as far away as the stars.
I send out love and admiration to our Street
Roots vendors, staff and volunteers, steadfast in
their kindness; and to the staff at City Team
Shelter, who worked hard to re-open the shelter
quickly; and to all the others in our community
who have helped, including the Trauma
Intervention Program who came to support our
vendors. Thank you.
I wanted to write about the news around the
Harbor of Hope navigation center planned for
under the Broadway Bridge, but this week, the
space of grief is a gulf. I will dig into that soon
because we must dream and plan and design.
This week, let’s remember just how hard it is
day in, day out, for people who are homeless in
our community.
Please keep showing our Street Roots vendors
kindness and community support. When you walk
by people in desperate conditions on the sidewalk,
please remember that for many folks who struggle
through the crush of traumas, survival is a feat.
Let us as a community cherish each of their lives.
Street Roete
211 NW Davis S t
503-228-5657
Fax: 503-227-3117
Hours: 7:30 a.m.-3 p.m. Mon.-FrL, 7:30
a.m.-2 p.m. S at and 7:30-1 p.m. Sun.
Interested in advertising in Street Roots? Email
Staff
Executive
Executive
joann
D e v e lo p m e n t
Director Cole Merkel
X3ts.org
D ir e c to r i
•ewUoqan
a n d re w & s tr e e tr o o ts . o rg
Operations Director Sarah Beecroft
Program Assistant Caelin Miltko, Jesuit
Volunteer
Vendor Assistant Scott Jackson, Alex
Gillow-Wiles
Development Assistant Rosemary Wilson
Editorial Producer Monica Kwasnik
Reporters Sarah Hansell, Leonora Ko, Emilly
Prado, Jared Paben, Amanda Waldroupe,
Thacher Schmid, DeVon Pouncey, Helen Hill
Photographers Diego Diaz, Arkady Brown,
Celeste Noche
Canvasser Desmond Hardison
Board of Directors
Chair Brad Taylor
Vice-Chair Rachel Langford
Treasurer Heather Stadick
Secretary Dan Jones
Directors Michael Anderson, Sandra Hahn,
John Brown, Nels Johnson and Alison Hallett
Soon after the April
7 shooting at the
City Team
Ministries shelter, a
memorial was set
up outside to
remember the
victim, John
Elifritz. Elifritz
was shot and killed
by police after he
burst into a shelter
meeting wielding a
knife.
P H O T O BY K A IA S A N D
Volunteers
John Barker, Stacey Heath, Anjali Rathore, Dennis
Hogan, Lucas Hawthorne, Thomas Buell Jr., Jason
Cohen, Doug Spangle, Susannah Kamala, Jon
Raymond, Diana Richardson, Paul and Madeline
Gefroh, Mary Anne Joyce, Brooke Anderson, Gillian
Floren, Mark Oldani, Bianca Butler, Camber Hansen-
Karr, Miranda Woods, Henry Brannan, Helen Hill,
Mary Emerson, Brooke Anderson, Kathleen McFall,
Robb Hengerer, Maile Yeats-Rowe, Erin Parsons, Faye
Powell, Jon Raymond, Danny Moran and Megan
Pickerel-Winer. 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.