NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
A2
Tuesday, December 18, 2018
U.S. homeless count grows in 2018, Seattle among top
This year’s count continued
that trend, showing 552,800
people without homes across
the country, up by about
2,000 from 2017, according
to the U.S. Department of
Housing and Urban Devel-
opment’s point-in-time tally.
It was the second consec-
utive increase after seven
straight years of declines.
The number of homeless
referred to as unsheltered —
those living in the streets,
encampments or other open
places — was more than
194,000 nationwide. That
also was up from last year.
More than 37,000 of the
unsheltered were in the Los
Angeles area this year, down
2 percent from 2017.
San Diego, California’s
second most populous city,
also saw a decline in both
total homelessness and those
on the streets. After a hepati-
tis A outbreak spread among
the homeless population and
killed 20 people in 2017,
the city turned to industri-
al-sized tents to house hun-
dreds of people. As the tents
went up, officials also cited
people camping on down-
town streets. Encamp-
ments downtown cleared
out quickly, but the number
along the San Diego River
doubled.
The city is considering
a ballot measure to raise
money for affordable hous-
ing in 2020.
By GEOFF MULVIHILL
Associated Press
A federal report released
Monday provides a pos-
sible glimmer of hope for
the homeless crisis that has
gripped many cities up and
down the West Coast.
The number of people
living on the streets in Los
Angeles and San Diego, two
epicenters of the homeless-
ness crisis, fell this year, sug-
gesting those cities’ efforts
to combat the problem could
be starting to pay off.
In Los Angeles, the count
fell by 3 percent after a sharp
increase the year before.
Peter Lynn, executive direc-
tor of the Los Angeles
Homeless Services Author-
ity, said that can be cred-
ited to results of six months
of stepped-up homeless ser-
vices after Los Angeles
County voters raised taxes
to help in 2017.
Later that year, Los Ange-
les city voters approved a
bond issue to provide more
affordable housing — a fac-
tor Lynn said will start show-
ing up in future counts.
“We’re also dealing with
the countervailing pressure
of housing markets that are
pretty unforgiving,” he said.
Cities in California, Ore-
gon and Washington have
driven an overall spike in the
number of homeless people
nationwide in recent years.
AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File
In this May 24, 2018, file photo, a man sleeps on the sidewalk as people behind line up to buy
lunch at a Dick’s Drive-In restaurant in Seattle.
Nationwide, the over-
all increase this year was
driven by a 2 percent rise
in the unsheltered home-
less population — those liv-
ing in vehicles, tents and
on the streets — along with
4,000 people in emergency
shelters after hurricanes,
wildfires and other disas-
ters, according to HUD. The
numbers of homeless veter-
ans and families continued
their long-term declines.
At a time when rents are
rising faster than wages —
especially for lower-income
Forecast for Pendleton Area
TODAY
WEDNESDAY
Cloudy, a little rain;
windy
Mostly cloudy,
breezy and mild
55° 42°
52° 40°
57° 42°
53° 37°
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
Mostly cloudy and
mild
SATURDAY
Turning cloudy
and cooler
Cloudy
42° 27°
45° 29°
HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
51° 40°
44° 30°
49° 29°
OREGON FORECAST
ALMANAC
Shown is today’s weather. Temperatures are today’s highs and tonight’s lows.
PENDLETON
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Seattle
Olympia
53/46
49/38
54/36
Longview
Kennewick Walla Walla
58/44
Lewiston
54/45
59/43
Astoria
55/46
Pullman
Yakima 53/37
53/43
53/42
Portland
Hermiston
55/46
The Dalles 57/42
Salem
Corvallis
56/43
Yesterday
Normals
Records
La Grande
46/36
PRECIPITATION
John Day
Eugene
Bend
57/45
51/34
49/35
Ontario
46/34
Caldwell
Burns
52°
34°
39°
27°
61° (1937) -13° (2016)
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
Albany
57/45
0.01"
0.24"
0.85"
7.20"
8.84"
9.32"
Today
Boardman
Pendleton
Medford
55/39
46/32
Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2018
SW 4-8
SW 10-20
Sunrise today
Sunset tonight
Moonrise today
Moonset today
7:31 a.m.
4:12 p.m.
1:53 p.m.
2:35 a.m.
Full
Last
New
First
Dec 22
Dec 29
Jan 5
Jan 13
NATIONAL EXTREMES
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
High 75° in Columbus, Texas Low -9° in Gunnison, Colo.
ing to determine how State
Police accessed the Capitol’s
surveillance video about the
delivery.
In his email, Boquist
said he delivered the doc-
uments to offices on three
floors at the Capitol between
7:30 a.m. and 9:30 a.m.
He said he was distrib-
uting documents about an
incoming senator “as a
reminder” to other senators.
He said the material included
“biographical data, online
data and quotes of a candi-
date who is now a senator
elect.”
Boquist apparently was
referring to Jeff Golden of
Ashland, a Democrat who
will take office next month as
a senator.
Golden told the Oregon
Capital Bureau that the mate-
rials other senators received
referenced things he had said
and done in the 1970s.
Wed.
SW 10-20
SSW 12-25
SUN AND MOON
Klamath Falls
SALEM — A state sen-
ator caught on tape slipping
anonymous packets under
the doors of at least seven
other senators last month
has been warned his conduct
could be considered work-
place harassment.
The letter’s public dis-
closure is the latest in a
series of actions by Sen.
Brian Boquist, R-Dallas,
that have raised eyebrows
and prompted concern at the
Capitol.
Boquist’s conduct recently
drew a written warning from
the Legislature’s top in-house
lawyer, Dexter Johnson.
“I strongly urge you to
be mindful (of) your actions
and the appearance of your
actions so that concerns
about workplace harassment
are not raised again,” John-
son, the legislative counsel,
wrote in a “memo of con-
cern” dated Dec. 5.
Such communications are
typically confidential, but
Boquist himself disclosed
the memo Friday by distrib-
uting it to senators and hav-
ing it posted on a legislative
website.
Johnson said senators or
their staff discovered doc-
uments tucked under their
doors the morning of Nov.
15, a Thursday.
“In the security camera
images, one can discern that
the top page of the documents
being held by you matches a
page of the documents deliv-
ered to the offices,” Johnson
wrote.
Boquist
last
month
acknowledged his conduct in
an email to Travis Hampton,
Oregon State Police super-
intendent. Boquist was try-
WINDS (in mph)
46/34
44/26
0.02"
0.39"
0.80"
9.26"
15.43"
12.27"
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Pendleton 45/33
57/46
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
HERMISTON
Enterprise
55/42
52/42
54°
40°
39°
26°
62° (1917) -12° (1964)
PRECIPITATION
Moses
Lake
53/43
Aberdeen
47/36
47/37
Tacoma
Yesterday
Normals
Records
Spokane
Wenatchee
54/46
data picture is incomplete
because several West Coast
areas with large populations,
including San Francisco,
Portland, Oregon, and Cali-
fornia’s Orange County, did
not conduct new counts of
unsheltered homeless pop-
ulations this year. Those
places will do fresh surveys
in early 2019.
Homelessness
has
exploded along with a soar-
ing economy in several West
Coast cities in recent years
and has become a hot local
political issue. From 2015
Boquist reprimanded for secretly
distributing documents to colleagues
By CLAIRE
WITHYCOMBE
Oregon Capital Bureau
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
53° 37°
people — an essentially
stagnant count is a not a bad
sign, said Steve Berg, vice
president for programs and
policy at the National Alli-
ance to End Homelessness.
“Given what’s going
on with rental housing, it’s
not exactly good news. But
it means communities are
pushing back against the
headwinds,” said Berg, who
like other advocates urges
caution about reading too
much into one-year trends in
the homeless count.
The
homelessness
through last year, voters on
the West Coast approved
more than $8 billion in
spending — most of it in
tax increases — to address
homelessness.
In Seattle, which has
the nation’s largest home-
less population outside New
York or Los Angeles, the
count this year rose to more
than 12,000 — more than
half of them unsheltered.
The number was less than
9,000 just four years ago,
and the city has been wres-
tling with what to do about
the problem.
The City Council in May
passed a $48 million tax on
businesses to raise money
for affordable housing. But
under pressure from Ama-
zon, Starbucks and other
companies, it repealed it the
next month.
Another place in the West
with a rising number was the
Phoenix area, where the total
count this year was nearly
6,300, up 12 percent from
the previous year. About
two-fifths of people without
homes there are in shelters.
The region’s status as the
fastest-growing county in
the U.S., with 200 people a
day moving in, is a factor in
the rising homeless number,
said Anne Scott, a human
services planner who coor-
dinates the count for the
Maricopa Association of
Governments.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
State lawmakers revisit worker
protections for off duty pot use
SALEM (AP) — Ore-
gon lawmakers will con-
sider making it illegal for
businesses to fire employ-
ees who flunk drug tests
for using marijuana off the
clock, reviving a workers’
rights campaign that failed
in the statehouse last year.
The Statesman Journal
reports that a proposed bill
would also change state law
to protect job seekers who
use substances like pot that
are legal here.
The proposal reflects a
debate over whether Oregon
workers should be forced to
abstain from marijuana use
— which is allowed under
state law but remains fed-
erally illegal — for fear of
getting fired or losing an
employment offer.
Senate Bill 301, which
represented a previous
attempt to loosen employ-
ment restrictions, failed in
2017. That bill generally
dealt with discrimination
against medical marijuana
cardholders who tested pos-
itive for the cannabis.
The latest proposal
has come before the Sen-
ate Interim Committee on
Judiciary, chaired by Sen.
Floyd Prozanski, D-Eugene.
Prozanski said Monday that
the concept was a redrafted
form of SB 301.
“We’ll definitely have
some discussions” on the
proposal, he said.
The
proposed
bill
wouldn’t allow employees
to use pot if their collective
bargaining agreements pro-
hibit partaking while off-
duty, or if there is a “bona
fide occupational qualifica-
tion” associated with their
job. It also does not permit
working under the influence.
SB 301 included excep-
tions for labor agreements,
workers doing their jobs
while impaired and con-
tracts between employers
and federal officials that
require employers to have
“ a drug-free workplace” to
receive federal dollars.
“There are a lot of ques-
tions employers have when
it comes to establishing
workplace rules, particularly
when it comes to cannabis,”
said Beau Whitney, a senior
economist with Washington,
D.C.-based cannabis think
tank New Frontier Data.
Shown are noon positions of weather systems and precipitation. Temperature bands are highs for the day.
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showers t-storms
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rain
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ice
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cold front
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