March 21, 2018 The Skanner Page 3
News
cont’d from pg 1
of all renters in the state
spend more than half
their income on housing,
and that half of all rent-
ers spend more than 30
percent of their income
on rent and utilities.
The U.S. Department
of Housing and Urban
Development
defines
anyone who spends
more than 30 percent of
their income on hous-
Nearly two-thirds of all
low-income renter families
spent more than half their
income on rent and utilities
that year, the report said
ing (including utilities)
as “cost-burdened.” In
2016, the report says, Or-
egon had about 298,000
cost-burdened
renter
households, more than
the total number of
households in Portland.
About 85 percent of
households making less
than $25,000 and living
in rental properties were
cost-burdened in 2016.
Nearly two-thirds of all
low-income renter fami-
lies spent more than half
their income on rent and
utilities that year, the re-
port said.
The report also notes
the crisis has dispropor-
tionately affected Orego-
nians of color, who are
far more likely to rent
and who report lower
incomes than non-His-
panic White households.
One-third (35 percent) of
Oregon’s non-Hispanic
White households are
renters, majorities of
all communities of color
rent, except for Asian
Americans. Seven in 10
households with mem-
bers identifying as Black
or African American are
renters.
“Low-income renters
stand at the epicenter
Meyer
OCPP’s analysis of U.S.
Census American Com-
munity Survey data, 24
percent of Oregon house-
holds – about 234,000
households total -- head-
ed by homeowners were
cost-burdened.
About
92,000 (or 9 percent) of
homeowning
Oregon
households were severe-
ly cost-burdened.
Moderate-income Or-
egonians also struggle
with housing costs, ac-
cording to the report.
More than half of Oregon
renter households mak-
ing between $25,000 and
$50,000 per year were
cost burdened in 2016.
The Center for Pub-
lic Policy, a nonprofit
progressive think tank,
drew on census data and
HUD publications for
its analysis. In the press
release, Hauser praised
the Oregon legislature’s
recent decision to raise
the state’s document re-
cording fee, which is ex-
pected to generate some
$60 million per budget
period to invest in af-
fordable housing, and
said lawmakers need to
find additional ways to
fund affordable housing.
March For Our Lives Town Hall
Congresswoman Pramilla Jayapal met March 17 at the Quincy Jones Auditorium, Garfield High School with local student organizers for
March For Our Lives, the youth-led national day of action against gun violence scheduled for March 24. The congresswoman and some
of the students held a community town hall to discuss the movement to end gun violence after their meeting.
Art
cont’d from pg 1
racial oppression in its North and
Northeast neighborhoods.
Running from April to June, the
residency will select three artists
— one per month – from any dis-
cipline to create works around
re-establishing a community in
the aftermath of gentrification.
Participants will be provided
with a stipend and have access to
a network of resources.
Not specific to one location,
however, the residency will al-
low artists the flexibility to create
pieces throughout the city, from
inner Northeast Portland to re-
gions where gentrification has
displaced residents to.
“You don’t have to prove to us
that you were forced out,” said
‘Art Saved My Life’ organizer
Donovan Smith. “’Gentrification’
is a word we use for an experi-
ence that’s been continuing in
Portland for a long time, so we
just want to make sure that Black
and Brown folks from our com-
munity are first in line for these
resources.” Priority will be given
to those artists from North and
Northeast Portland with ances-
tral ties to the neighborhood.
During their month-long resi-
dency, artists will also have the
opportunity to host free, all-ages
events to showcase their work,
“
beneath the surface that can only
be healed through community
and fellowship. That’s the lifeline
we’re trying to create with ‘Art
Saved My Life.’”
The artist residency is a part-
nership between local organiza-
Priority will be given to those artists
from North and Northeast Portland
with ancestral ties to the neighborhood
as well as hold discussions and
workshops on how art can help
heal a community.
“The whole premise of heal-
ing is rooted in the fact that our
community has a lack of resourc-
es and opportunities, and that
comes with a lot of trauma,” said
Janessa Narciso of Deep Under
Ground (DUG), an artistic plat-
form and partner organization
of the residency. “When we think
about ‘healing,’ we want to be
able to dig deep into the logis-
tical obstacles that stand in an
artist’s way, but also the things
tions YBG Portland, Deep Under
Ground, Friends of Noise and
Gentrification is Weird, with
funding through a Community
Placemaking grant from Oregon
Metro.
Candidates must be 18 years or
older and be of African, African
American, Asian, Asian Amer-
ican, Black, Chicano, Hispanic,
Indian, Latino, or Native Ameri-
can descent. Participants will be
selected on a rolling basis.
For further information, art-
ists can contact the organizers at
artsavedmylifepdx@gmail.com.
cont’d from pg 1
tributor to the neighborhood?” Hallová
said.
Stamm said the organization has
reached out to community partners
representing organizations in the
neighborhood — including Self En-
hancement Inc., Portland Community
Reinvestment Initiatives and the Urban
League – to talk about ways to develop
the space so it benefits the neighbor-
hood. For example, Stamm said officials
floated the idea of having a “convening
space” available for community meet-
ings, but said the organization won’t do
it if it takes business away from other
facilities.
Stamm also wants the new building to
blend with some of the older buildings
in the Albina neighborhood, which was
initially developed in the 1910s and
1920s but has, in the last five to 10 years,
undergone a wave of new construction.
He doesn’t want the finished product to
be more than three stories tall, and said
some of the preliminary drawings even
have residential-style gables.
“When Doug reached out to me to
talk about this, I said, ‘I think this is
phenomenal, but make sure that folks
understand a few things. You could
have gone anywhere. You chose to
“
Stamm and others
stressed the impor-
tance of developing
a site that wouldn’t
displace anyone
from their homes
come here. There’s plenty of space in
the Pearl and they would have been just
as happy to have you continue to stay
resident there,’” said Michael Alexan-
der, who has served as a volunteer com-
munity liaison and advisor for Meyer
on the project. “But I believe that the
decision that’s made here is because the
work that gets done here is important
to the foundation -- being able not only
to support the work but to become an
institutional partner in that work was
important.”
Hallová said Meyer has also reached
out to the National Association of Mi-
nority Contractors and Portland’s Met-
ropolitan Contractor Improvement
Partnership with the intention of en-
gaging minority-owned contractors on
the project.
According to Stamm, Sergeant will
remain on the lot until this fall, and
construction will run through 20119.
Meyer spokesperson Kimberly A.C.
Wilson, said the total budget for the
project has not been set since the orga-
nization has not settled on a design.
Stamm said the purchase and reloca-
tion is also part of an “equity journey”
Meyer embarked on five to seven years
ago. The organization’s board of trust-
ees, staff and leadership team are now
predominantly people of color. Meyer
PHOTO BY BERNIE FOSTER
“
of Oregon’s housing cri-
sis,” said Center analyst
Daniel Hauser in a press
release accompanying
the report, which was
published March 15. “Or-
egon lawmakers need to
devote their attention
and resources to helping
these families.”
The crisis has affected
homeowners as well as
renters: according to the
PHOTO BY SUSAN FRIED
Housing
Doug Stamm, Meyer Memorial Trust’s retiring CEO,
and communications director Kimberly A.C. Wilson
have announced the foundation’s purchase of a
property in North Portland.
has also selected an African American
woman to succeed Stamm--Michelle
DePass, who most recently served as
the New School’s Milano School of In-
ternational Affairs, Management, and
Urban Policy in New York City, takes
the helm of the organization April 1.