Kim began selling Street Roots again this year after a few years’ hiatus. In early February, she brought her son into the office to go through orientation. She said it would give him some extra spending money while he found his footing after a lengthy hospital stay last November. The paper has been something of a last resort for her in the past, something she did until she could get into housing, but now she plans to keep selling it even after she gets a place of her own.
“This time I’m just gonna stick with it,” she says. “Even if I do find housing and I do find a job, I’m still going to do Street Roots because it will help me to maintain.”
Kim’s story illustrates the difficulty of finding and keeping a job when experiencing homelessness. She was born in Bandon, south of Coos Bay, but when she was 15, her mother moved the family to Kelso, Wash. She moved down to Portland in her late 20s for better job opportunities, “and it’s been hard times.” She has medical issues that can prevent her from working if she has an emergency or if a doctor tells her she shouldn’t work for a few days, which has limited her job prospects. She worked through Labor Ready, a job placement agency, while still in Kelso. However, that office shut down a few years ago, and she is unable to reach the former manager to get references for the work she did. She has been mostly unable to search for a job because of her son’s hospitalization.
However, she is optimistic and hard-working given her situation.
“If I don’t get up and get out there, how am I supposed to move forward with my goals?”
She lives in Southeast Portland with her sister — this allows her to at least stay off the streets — and has a caseworker through her doctor’s office who is helping her find housing. She has her eyes on the prize: “The most important thing to me right now is housing. Housing and family.”
You can find Kim at the Hollywood Library on Northwest 42nd Avenue and Tillamook Street and at New Seasons at Grant Park.