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THE ASTORIAN • SATuRdAy, MARcH 6, 2021
OPINION
editor@dailyastorian.com
KARI BORGEN
Publisher
DERRICK DePLEDGE
Editor
Founded in 1873
SHANNON ARLINT
circulation Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN
Production Manager
CARL EARL
Systems Manager
BEHIND THE NEWS
‘Homelessness has many different faces’
C
latsop Community Action has an
outsized role in the social ser-
vices safety net on the North
Coast.
The nonprofit operates the regional
food bank and provides housing, energy
assistance and other critical services to
low-income people.
Over the past year, Clatsop County
has expanded the agency’s portfolio to
encompass a veterans
services officer and a
homeless liaison.
Like Helping Hands
and the volunteer-driven
Astoria Warming Cen-
ter and Filling Empty
Bellies, Clatsop Com-
DERRICK
munity Action has tried
DePLEDGE
to change perceptions
around homelessness.
“It’s not just people who are staying
on Commercial Street or by the River-
walk,” said Viviana Matthews, the agen-
cy’s executive director. “We see a lot
of people who are staying in their vehi-
cles, or living in a place not meant for
human habitation, such as an abandoned
building or an RV that is not considered
a home.
“Homelessness has many different
faces. I just want to be able to tell peo-
ple to have an open mind, because they
don’t know the person next to them at
the store, if that person is struggling with
homelessness.”
“You don’t often think about peo-
ple who are couch surfing and doubled
up, so that’s a huge amount of homeless-
ness,” said Susan Prettyman, the agen-
cy’s social services program manager. “I
think it’s worth noting that last year we
helped with over 12,000 services to peo-
ple in Clatsop County, and we don’t care
if they are federal (defined) homeless or
state (defined) homeless, we just want to
help families.”
In an interview, Matthews and Pret-
tyman talked about the challenges of
homeless outreach during the coronavi-
rus pandemic, the role of local govern-
ment and the new homeless liaison.
Q: How has the coronavirus pan-
demic challenged the North Coast’s
response to homelessness?
Matthews: I would say probably the
homelessness issue went to the back
burner, because we needed to work
on preventing people from becoming
homeless.
To me, we haven’t done much to help
the people who are staying on the street,
because our focus has been preventing
homelessness.
Prettyman: When businesses were
closed down and people were laid off,
and people waited weeks and weeks to
receive their unemployment, that caused
a huge amount of housing instability.
Q: What do you see as the role of
Hailey Hoffman/The Astorian
Viviana Matthews, right, is the executive director of Clatsop Community Action. Susan Prettyman is the agency’s social services program manager.
BuT FuNdING, IT’S THE NO. 1 ISSuE THAT WE’RE
HAVING. FOR dIFFERENT TyPES OF SERVIcES, NOT
ONLy A HOuSE OR AN APARTMENT OR A PLAcE FOR
THEM TO STAy, BuT ALSO SERVIcES TO HELP THE
HOMELESS POPuLATION WITH THEIR ISSuES, SucH AS
MENTAL HEALTH ANd NuTRITION ANd ALL THE AREAS.
local government in responding to
homelessness?
Matthews: Many different ways. One
of them would be funding for homeless-
ness services, such as the homeless liai-
son in Clatsop County.
The other would be looking into
housing, not only for homeless, but
affordable housing for people who are
able to move to more of a permanent
solution.
Prettyman: I think we have a respon-
sibility to provide housing. Housing is a
basic human right.
Q: Housing has been a significant
public policy issue on the North Coast
for the past several years. Astoria cre-
ated a homelessness task force in 2017.
Why haven’t we seen more progress?
Matthews: The main reason probably
is funding. Once we start talking about
funding and how we can work on differ-
ent services for the homeless population,
then we see some alternative services to
the homeless population.
But funding, it’s the No. 1 issue that
we’re having. For different types of ser-
vices, not only a house or an apartment
or a place for them to stay, but also ser-
vices to help the homeless population
with their issues, such as mental health
and nutrition and all the areas.
Prettyman: There’s definitely a lack
of availability of housing and places for
us to provide those services for people.
Q: The Sunset Empire Park and
Recreation District’s retreat from a
warming center in Seaside is an exam-
ple of the gap between good intentions
and reality. What went wrong there?
Matthews: I think we tried to do
it too fast without having a lot of plan
behind it.
CCA was able to partner with Help-
ings Hands in trying to accommodate
and trying to make it happen within a
certain amount of days without going to
the board first. And make sure that it’s
first approved, and then we have to have
a plan in place, and all of that.
We just went into the mode of trying
to fix it, trying to accommodate as many
homeless as possible going into a warm-
ing center, because we do have the fund-
ing for that.
But we forgot that we needed to stay
back and plan it. This was, to me, a great
learning opportunity for next year. So it’s
not a closed door, but definitely some-
thing that we are going to be working to
achieve for next year.
Prettyman: I think that it happened
really quickly, and I think that was a
huge barrier to it.
Q: You are bringing on a homeless
liaison. How will you measure success
in that position?
Matthews: I would say by making
sure the homeless liaison interacts with
the homeless who are in Clatsop County
and provides services. That could be
information and referral ... mental health,
medical assistance and all of that.
To me, how we’re going to measure
success is going to be by the numbers
the homeless liaison is going to see, how
many people they are going to be reach-
ing out to.
derrick dePledge is editor of The
Astorian.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Get the vaccine
I
have friends who have told me they
don’t plan on getting the COVID-19
vaccine because, in the past, when they got
the flu shot, it didn’t work.
The yearly flu shot is a gamble because
it contains four flu virus strains that are
serious viruses; and the above selections
are chosen months ahead of the flu season,
hoping they chose the correct viruses that
will hit us.
So, the flu shot-included viruses are an
educated crap shoot. Therefore, people say
the vaccine didn’t work, and we hear that
that year’s vaccine was only 30%, 40%,
50%, etc. effective.
Other vaccines are designed for a spe-
cific virus. Examples are: measles, mumps,
smallpox, shingles, chickenpox, polio
and tetanus. They are extremely effective
because they were designed to attack spe-
cific viruses.
The COVID-19 vaccines are designed
to attack a specific virus, thus their effec-
tiveness is in the 70% to 90%-plus ranges.
This vaccine isn’t crap shoot. It is for a
specific virus, and hopefully for the muta-
tions. Because COVID-19 has a tendency
to mutate, we will probably need yearly
boosters.
Get the vaccine when it is your time.
Help defeat this deadly virus.
KAREN ELDER
Astoria
Got my first shot
A
fter all my complaining about the vac-
cine rollout, I finally got my first shot
at the Clatsop County Fairgrounds.
There was a long line, and the park-
ing lot was quite full. However, I must
commend the health department. The line
moved well.
The situation was organized, well-
staffed with volunteers and there was a
pleasant reception. I can’t say enough good
comments about how well-run things were.
REBA OWEN
Warrenton
What causes homelessness?
s I began to look deeper into the prob-
lem of homelessness, I asked myself
the question: What causes homelessness?
Of course, I knew there would be many
answers, because just like any population,
A
the unsheltered population is diverse. I
was left more confused after a consultation
with Professor Google, so being a numbers
cruncher, chose to collect some data for
myself, and see what they had to say.
The short answer — rental prices have
a huge impact on homelessness. Duh.
As it turns out, two scholars, John Quig-
ley and Steven Raphael, beat me to this
conclusion when they published their
research findings in 2001. They estimated
that a “10% increase in rents is associated
with a 6.5% increase in the incidence of
homelessness.”
A March 2019 study, prepared for the
Oregon Community Foundation, showed
“median rents across U.S. states explains
43% of the variance in rates of homeless-
ness in 2017.”
Further, they found that “over the 2010-
2016 time period, Oregon created only 63
new housing units for every 100 house-
holds that formed during the time period.”
That’s not good. We’re not solving the
problem; we’re allowing it to get worse.
My point is, we have had this informa-
tion for 20 years. Obviously there are other
factors, but housing solves homelessness.
RICK BOWERS
Astoria