Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 28, 2018)
Street Roots • Sept. 28-Oct. 4, 2018 Rural Housing Page 10 Housing Rural Oregon E lia s and Farrah H anna Ipok out the door o f their home in Ontario, with baby Steve in the foreground. One fam ily’s struggle to navigate the bureaucracy o f survival BY EMILLY PRADO STAFF WRITER t’s the first of the month, rent is due, and Sarmad Elias’ government benefits haven’t been deposited yet - another instance of paperwork gone wrong, he said. Seror Abdullah, Elias’ wife, bounces their baby in a donut-shaped pillow while their older sons, Elias, 11, and Farrah, 9, watch TV. The air conditioning hasn’t worked since they moved in, so the fans in the house is blowing profusely and the front door is propped open to let in any air that might help cool them About this series down on this 101-degree day. Elias crouches, then This article is part of Street points to a boarded-up hole underneath his kitchen Roots’ Housing Rural Oregon sink: “The mice come through there.” series. Street Roots received The Elias family moved to Ontario from El funding from Meyer Memorial Cajon near San Diego, Calif., after struggling to Trust’s Affordable Housing make ends meet in the metropolitan area. Before Initiative to develop dedicated California, they lived in a Turkish refugee camp for reporting on rural housing issues, more than two years after fleeing religious Read more articles from the persecution under ISIS in their hometown of series at news.streetroots.org/ Mosul, Iraq. ruralhousing While stUl in El Cajon, Elias’ brother-in-law, Melad Jarjees, told him about the short Section 8 wait list and lower cost of living to be found in Eastern Oregon, so Elias and family packed up their belongings, and migrated once more. Once in Ontario, they found their dollars could stretch a little longer and the job application process was more accessible. But after moving into their second home in the area, they discovered the apartment was already inhabited by rodents. “He paid a deposit of $850 here. The rent is $650 per month.. I I I I I I I | J j | ( (After) he signed the lease, he (found the) mice, but when he signed, they (didn’t) tell them they had mice,” explained Jarjees, who works a second job as a translator through the recently opened Four Rivers Welcome Center for refugees. “He called the manager and said, ‘I bought everything. Can you just fix the hole?”’ She reportedly agreed but hadn’t followed through with the agreement when we spoke 10 days after the phone call. Instead of waiting, Elias ended up fixing the hole himself fearing that his six- month-old son, Steve, might eat the droppings. Seeking Section 8 • l a g a s l i i H i ONTARIO Over the past year or so, Ontario has Living in poverty: 38 percent experienced a rising influx of refugees, largely as a result of spreading awareness about the lower-than- MALHEUR COUNTY usual wait time for the Section 8 Housing Choice Living in poverty: 25 percent Voucher program. While most metropolitan areas can have wait times exceeding three years, the Renters paying more than half wait for housing assistance in Ontario was only their income in rent: 1 out of 3 three months. But in May, the Housing Authority of Malheur and Harney Counties announced it had closed the wait list due to a budget shortfall. The Four Rivers Cultural Center - partly for its name and because of the lack of proactive government outreach - organically became a site See EDGE, page 11
