Local News
Warming
Trick or Treat?
continued from page 1
change will worsen existing equity issues
within the United States,” the Black Caucus
says.
Public Impact
Officials at Multnomah County say their
newest report strongly embraces climate
change equity, which it illustrates with
charts showing health statistics on hospital
visits in environmental hotspots.
The county’s charts show the elderly, dis-
abled, people living in
poverty, communities of
color and the homeless
are the people most like-
ly to be concentrated in
parts of the city with
fewest trees, greenbelts,
parks or waterways.
Multnomah County’s
short list of public
impacts includes:
—Congressional Black Caucus Foundation
— an increase in heat-
related illness and
deaths, including heart
African Americans are proverbial canaries emergencies, especially “among vulnerable
in the mineshaft,” the report says. “We are populations such as the elderly, low income,
on the frontline of the likely social, envi- homeless, pregnant women, and individuals
ronmental, and economic upheaval with outdoor occupations;”
— “diminished lung function, increased
resulting from climate change.”
Reports and calls to action specifically asthma, and increases in premature mortali-
within Black communities nationwide ty,” from air pollution, including ozone;
— and more diseases spread by insects
picked up first after Hurricane Katrina in
2006 and again after Hurricane Sandy in and vermin — especially mosquitoes that
carry West Nile virus — due to longer
2012.
The CBC Foundation listed three find- breeding seasons.
Urban Heat Islands
ings:
Of extra concern is the “urban heat
1) African Americans are already hit more
than other groups by the health effects of island” effect, in which the concentration of
climate change, including deaths during paved surfaces in a neighborhood absorbs
heat waves and from worsened air pollu- heat and magnifies it, boosting temperatures
tion. “Similarly, unemployment and hotter than the surrounding area.
In 1995 some 750 people died in Chica-
economic hardship associated with climate
change will fall most heavily on the African go’s infamous heat wave when daytime
temperatures spiked for just five days in a
American community,” the report says.
2) African Americans bear less responsi- row – the hottest day reached 106 degrees,
bility for climate change than other but, experts say, the heat island effect made
Americans do because “both historically it closer to 150 degrees in some spots.
Most of the dead were elderly, disabled
and at present, African Americans emit less
and African American people who did not
greenhouse gas.”
3) Finally, the CBC Foundation warns want to open their windows or go outside
that policies to help soften or fix climate for fear of crime, reports said at the time.
Experts say similar heat waves will espe-
change are likely to “generate large health
and economic benefits or costs for African cially impact the Pacific Northwest because
Americans, depending on how they are our climate has historically been so mild
that few people have air conditioners; an
structured.
“Unless appropriate actions are taken to increase in daytime, and nighttime, heat
mitigate its effects or adapt to them, climate waves in summer has already begun, the
the answer is yes. In fact a significant body
of research is emerging that suggests that
Black people care more about climate
change than most other groups in the Unit-
ed States.
The racial impact of global warming is
laid out in the Congressional Black Caucus
Foundation’s 2004 report, “Climate
Change: An Unequal Burden.”
“Where U.S. Energy Policy is concerned,
PHOTO BY JERRY FOSTER
‘Unless appropriate actions are
taken to mitigate its effects or
adapt to them, climate change
will worsen existing equity issues
within the United States’
New Portland Bureau of Transportation Director Leah Treat on Halloween
handed out bike safety lights to kids at Vernon Elementary School on
Northeast Killingsworth Street. She was helped by Principal Tina Acker; all
were swarmed by eager kids.
hottest clocking in at 115 degrees in 2009.
Not only that, these warmer temperatures
simmer air pollutants into a toxic soup
called ozone — the culprit in upper respira-
tory illnesses from asthma to pneumonia
and bronchitis — not to mention turning up
the dial on heart attacks.
Duncan says the simple question of where
people live and how rich or poor they are
can make all the difference in terms of who
is most hurt by the extra smog, heat and ver-
min that all come with global warming.
“These are people who do not have the
means to adapt or to get out of town; these
are people who often live in substandard
housing, conditions that already have mold
and mildew that exacerbate their children’s
asthma,” he says.
“They are elders who are not socially
mobile but they live in a heat island, and
they may have little access to parks and
greenspaces because they have little choice
in their housing options.
“People here are subject to a double-
whammy.”
For more on the Multnomah Climate
Change Plan go to www.multco.us and
search “climate change,” or go to
www.kingcounty.gov and search “climate
change.”
Highland
continued from page 1
churches we are working with, are so criti-
cal,” she said. And that’s why we are
actively targeting funding dollars to cultur-
ally specific services.”
Jean DeMaster, executive director of
Human Solutions said that while the reces-
sion may officially be over, DeMaster said,
“It is not over for poor people.
“We are seeing an increase in homeless
families, especially families who are hard
hit by the recession and the fact that our
families can’t get living wage jobs.”
Pastor William Hardy said he thought of
the 18,000 people displaced in the 1948
Vanport flood, when he decided to offer the
church building for use by the day center.
“The African American community in
Portland became instantly homeless,” he
said. Many Vanport residents lost their pho-
tos, treasures, everything they possessed
that day. “Everything sacred to them was
gone in a flash.”
Hardy’s parents told him the story of the
flood, and how Portland churches and citi-
zens rallied to help.
“So if I’m in a position to open doors for
other Oregonians who are homeless, why
shouldn’t I do that?”
The Parkrose Winter Family Shelter
opens today Nov. 1 at Parkrose Community
United Church of Christ, 12505
NE Halsey St. It will be open from
7 p.m. to 7 a.m. nightly between
Nov. 1, and April 30, 2014.
The Parkrose shelter has space
for 100 people at night, but just 70
during the day. Human Solutions
also operates the 15-bed Daybreak
Shelter Network. Portland Home-
less Family Solutions runs a
27-bed family shelter in Goose
Hollow. The City of Portland will operate a
shelter for 70 single women.
In the past, Human Solutions held a lot-
tery to decide who could stay inside, and
who had to leave. Opening the day shelter at
Highland Christian Center means from now
on no families will have to be on the street
during the day. And if more family shelter
beds are needed this winter, Highland has
agreed to host a night shelter too.
“There is no person, no parent who wants
to be homeless. And in a perfect world no-
one would be,” said Multnomah County
This is a problem that can only be solved
on a national level, DeMasters says. “We
need housing that’s affordable to people at
very low income levels.”
Li urged the public to join in the effort
to help homeless families by donating
bedding, food, books, toys, clothing and
volunteer time.
“No one person can end homelessness
but we can all contribute to this effort,”
she said.
— Marissa Madrigal
“These are our children. These are our
community’s children. Please engage
with us.”
The support means a lot to Johnny and
the effort to meet the need is inspiring.”
Even affordable housing often is priced Emoni Hollingsworth. Johnny, 33, became
too high for people under 40 percent of the a father at just 19 years old, after a child-
average family income, DeMaster points hood of insecurity. Today he is taking
Emoni to register at high school. Then he
out.
A new 67-unit affordable housing com- begins his job search. He says he’ll take
plex on NE 102nd and Glisan, created with anything offered.
“Failure is not an option for me,” he says.
state, city and county funds, will house fam-
ilies earning from 40-60 percent of median “I just want to make my child happy.
Emoni knows she has six weeks of catch-
income. But with rents priced from $400 to
$700, it is beyond the reach of people on ing up to do, but she is not daunted.
“I want to be a judge or an attorney when
welfare or those in low-waged or part-time
I get older,” she says. “I like school.”
work.
Chair Marissa Madrigal at the day center’s
launch.
“The need is huge and heartbreaking, but
The need is huge and
heartbreaking, but the effort to
meet the need is inspiring
November 6, 2013
The Portland Skanner Page 3