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M artin L uther K ing J r .
2016 special edition
January 13, 2016
From Hunger Strikes to Board Rooms
Young activist
finds purpose
in path for
social justice
by o livia o livia
t he P ortland o bserver
Activist Cameron Whitten
wipes his bike down from the rain
as he sits down in his small Union
Station office stacked doo-to-door
with dozens of other work spaces
overlooking Old Town and the
Pearl. Whitten is the new leader
for the community service orga-
nization, Know Your City, and a
young African-American male
who not so long ago was one of
the countless homeless youth
passing through the Pacific North-
west, many of whom might be
getting off a train or a Greyhound
bus right downstairs from where is
now employed.
“I will never forget how lucky
I was as an 18-year-old homeless
youth during one of the worst re-
cessions in American history,” he
says of his start in Portland six
years ago.
C ontinued on P age 10
Photo by o livia o livia /t he P ortland o bserver
Cameron Whitten, the new executive director for the Know Your City organization, says he loves putting time into changing the world
around him and loves having a hand in the city’s future.