February 8
Good evening Mayor Wheeler,
I have been on jury duty the last two days. Though I was not picked to be a juror I was called up along with 40 other citizens to be questioned and winnowed out for a criminal trial needing a 12 person jury. I was winnowed out. I guess it’s probably because when I was asked about how honest I thought the police are I answered my experience was they were a mixed bag. That the biggest problem was the us vs them mentality the police are susceptible to that so often causes poor decision making. And I told the story about my friend, a homeless man, who was tazed by the police. They later “apologized” when everyone present agreed the tazed man was the peace maker in the conflict. The man with the knife was not questioned or arrested.
So, that’s not what I’m writing about tonight. While on lunch break a few of the jurors embarked on a conversation about traffic congestion. I mentioned in an earlier email that I lived on Commercial St as a kid, 6342 N Commercial. My parents sold it for $11,500 in 1968. It sold in 2015 for $425,000.
Anyway coincidently one of the other jurors currently lives on Commercial St, just a couple blocks south near Killingsworth.
She told me her husband had grown up in their house. Weirdly out of the blue she said “he often talks of the penquins at Peninsula Park”. Of course I had to pull out the open letter the Portland State Vanguard printed (a better version of my letter to you, editors can do wonders!)_And that opened the conversation to the homeless situation in our beloved city. She and I, close in age, were the only lifelong Oregonians in the break room, there were about six of us. One of the other jurors actually asked us if the homeless population had always been so large. It was very surprising to find that the very causes of the problem are so unaware of what their moving here has created.
One of the new comers, just 2 ½ years residing here, told us about his experience with being homeless in Portland. He doesn’t have family here and did not have friends already living here when he came. What he did have was a job and savings. He was able to sublet a room from primary renters his first year here but the landlord evicted them for not keeping up the house – and since his name was not on the lease he had no way to remedy the problem. He lived in his car for a while, storing his belongings in a storage shed (he said he’d often change his clothes at the shed) and showering at the gym where he had a membership. Before finding his current location he lived on Mt Hood in someone’s RV. He said that was better than living in his car but there was no septic system, just a large hose that drained into a hole. Thankfully he was able to find permanent housing eventually because a stranger he started a conversation with liked him. He was lucky because it was before he ran into problems with the law. One of the problems with being homeless he mentioned was the 6 hours of everyday he had nowhere to be.
I encouraged him to write down all his experiences. I told him it’s a story that needs to be told.
Who are today’s homeless? Anyone.
What is the solution? Compromise.
Frani Grover