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Who Can Feed the Hungry?
HOMELESS OUTREACH GROUP BREAKFAST BRIGADE RESISTS THE CITY’S EFFORTS
TO STOP ITS MEMBERS FROM FEEDING THE HUNGRY AT WASHINGTON JEFFERSON PARK
By Emerson Brady
O
n Friday, June 30, Lisa Levsen spent
her morning the same way she always
does fi ve days of the week: feeding the
hungry at Washington Jeff erson Park.
Levsen and her crew had tables lining
the sidewalk with a buff et-style break-
fast. The menu consisted of chili mac
and cheese with a corn side dish, coff ee, tea, hot chocolate
and milk, with packaged peanut butter and jelly sand-
wiches for later. Levsen greeted her regulars warmly as
she scooped a heaping pile of chili mac on their plates.
“No, that’s too much,” one man said. Levsen ignored
his humility and continued to pile on the food. She says
she hears that sentiment often.
Formerly known as the Eugene Catholic Worker,
the Breakfast Brigade has been serving meals every
Wednesday through Saturday morning at Washing-
ton Jeff erson Park for nearly 10 years. But recently the
group’s eff orts have come under fi re from the city with
unclear reasons as to why Breakfast Brigade can’t feed
Eugene’s hungry.
As the Breakfast Brigade’s usual crowd went through
the line, Levsen noticed what she thought was the police
slant
• Now that national Pride month has wrapped
up and Eugene’s offi cial Pride celebration is on the
horizon for August, we are pondering where, for
the rest of the year, do LGBTQIA+ folks hang out
and meet people? Spectrum? Cowfi sh? Blairally?
If you are young and queer or older or trans or
anything else, where are the safe and fun places
to meet someone you might love, or at least make
out with?
• Back in February, the Eugene City Coun-
cil won praise for its stand on climate change
when it voted to restrict the use of natural gas
in certain new buildings. However, a ruling by the
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals would probably have
impacted Eugene’s authority to regulate our local
fossil fuel infrastructure. So on July 10, the council
voted unanimously to repeal that ordinance. Mayor
Lucy Vinis explains the decision — and why fi ghting
climate change matters — in an online EW Extra
viewpoint this week. Readers of our Tuesday EW
Extra Newsletter got jump on the story, and you
can too by subscribing to our email newsletters at
EugeneWeekly.com/newsletter.
• Some of us were wearing glitter at the Oregon
Country Fair, while others were in their running
shorts in town. Tracktown USA, also known as
Eugene, shined as host of the USA Track and Field
Outdoor Championships last week. But at the real
heart of Tracktown are the all-comers meets,
4
J U LY
1 3 ,
2 0 2 3
ELLEN FURSTNER HOLDS A SIGN OF SUPPORT FOR
BREAKFAST BRIGADE AT A SATURDAY, JULY 1 BREAKFAST.
FURSTNER HAS MADE SANDWICHES
FOR BREAKFAST BRIGADE FOR THE PAST TWO YEARS.
Photo by Emerson Brady
hosted Wednesday and Thursday evenings over
the summer, with almost no fans in the stands
at Hayward Field. Anyone from small children to
octogenarians can come out to compete against
themselves and each other on the world famous
track. Learn more at OregonTrackClub.com. The
next 12 and under meets are Wednesday, July 19
and August 2, and for 13 and older it’s Thursday,
July 13, July 20 and August 3.
• Confronted with a hazing scandal on the foot-
ball team at Northwestern University, where he
is now president, former University of Oregon
President Michael Schill fumbled, giving head coach
Pat Fitzgerald a slap on the wrist in the form of
a two-week unpaid suspension after a university
investigation. Then student journalists at The Daily
Northwestern stepped up with a story documenting
the very sexualized hazing that the football team
got away with for years — not to mention a racist
culture on the coaching staff — under Fitzgerald’s
eyes-carefully-averted watch. At that point Schill,
embarrassed into doing the right thing, announced
he had “erred” and fi red the school’s winningest
coach. Good job, student journalists; bad job, adult
administrators. UO watchers have expressed worry
that new President John Scholz is a Schill cookie-
cutter. We hope not.
• Laural O’Rourke announced on her Facebook
page and via a letter to the Eugene District
4J School Board that she had submitted her
resignation to fellow board members, 4J Super-
intendent Andy Dey and other 4J administrators
on July 8. O’Rourke cited racism and not feeling
safe at meetings. Her tenure on the board was
approaching them. The men called themselves Neighbor-
hood Service Offi cers (NSO). When asked what they do,
Levsen said, they declined to comment. “They told us
we needed a permit to be here, and that if we come out
tomorrow we will be cited and if we come out the next
day we will be arrested,” Levsen says.
Frightened by the threat but unwilling to back down,
Levsen and her crew stood beside their tables in disbe-
lief as to why the police would want to shut them down.
Kelly McIver, communications manager for the city’s
unhoused response, says that the NSOs are parking
enforcement staff who address reported complaints
related to vehicles parked longer than regulations allow.
Eugene police spokesperson Melinda Mclaugh-
lin says she had never heard of them. In addition to
threatening the group with citations and arrest, the
NSOs also chalked the group’s tires. The city as a rule
has generally moved away from chalking tires, instead
opting for a digital system that records a photo of the
rear license plate.
“We’ve been serving the homeless for nine years,
now all of the sudden we’re criminals,” fellow Breakfast
Brigade member Jan Zoll says.
tumultuous, but the board had transparency
issues such as using texting and the Signal app
to communicate and skirt Oregon public records
laws — the latter of which O’Rourke pointed out.
The board will now need to start the process of
fi lling that position. If the current board members
are pondering Gordon Lafer, who was ousted in
the most recent election in what appeared to be
voter dissatisfaction with the board’s sometimes
dysfunctional public meetings, let’s just point out
that sometimes it’s better to get a fresh start
and look to foster diverse voices.
• The Oregon Country Fair is over, but summer
events go on! GenX can take a trip down memory
lane July 13 with ska band The English Beat at the
Hult Center. Then, next week, the very, very diff er-
ent from OCF, Lane County Fair kicks off July 19
with a performance by Lil Jon. Also at the fair
will be Sheila E. and Quiet Riot, to name a few, and
community stages will feature the likes of local
party band Riffle and Springfield-based outlaw
country singer Isaac Barrager. And because it’s
the fair there will be racing pigs, hula hoopers and
all your favorite foods, crafts and rides.
• What's “in”? Cottage cheese, according to
The New York Times. That's fi ne with us if we
can add tomatoes or blueberries or even canta-
loupe, and as long as it’s the tangy local goodness
of Nancy’s. Birding is certainly in, thanks to Cornell
University and the Merlin app, which identifi es for
you the birds you are seeing or hearing. What birds
did you hear on your walk today? We recently were
told that straight long blonde hair seems to be in,
and we wonder where that came from? What else?
E U G E N E W E E K LY . C O M