We need to muster the political power of love Six months have passed since I joined Street Roots as executive director, and I learn each and every day. I will keep sharing what I learn with you, and I am grateful when I hear your stories from street corne ...
1 Jun 2018 - Kaia Sand
Everyone deserves secure, quality housing A couple falls asleep on their mattress, a blanket pulled up to their chins. Elsewhere, a man nods off in a pink overstuffed chair. These are scenes that might be unfolding in houses across the city, but that matt ...
25 May 2018 - Kaia Sand
Help us make our spring fund appeal wildly successful As she flipped pancakes on the portable griddle she had transported on her bike, Katherine Deumling chatted with Street Roots vendors, calling them by name and remembering details of their lives. ...
18 May 2018 - Kaia Sand
We don’t have enough places that very poor people can afford to live There are two women who stay nights in a shelter, and on some warm days spread a blanket on the waterfront like picnickers. One morning I saw one woman helping the other walk with a cane ...
11 May 2018 - Kaia Sand
In May, a generous donor will match your gifts up to $10,000 One by one on April 29, a dozen Street Roots vendors approached the podium to recite their poetry at the Multnomah County Central Library, a packed house cheering them on. They read love poems ...
4 May 2018 - Kaia Sand
If plans for a remote homeless shelter materialize, the developer should find a new way to listen to homeless folks about their needs It is a story that has covered yards of newsprint – Wapato jail and its possibility for sheltering people who are homeles ...
27 Apr 2018 - Kaia Sand
Harbor of Hope’s Homer Williams once fought Right 2 Survive Too. Now, he’s proposed a shelter and navigation center near the same site where he had resisted the homeless rest area. Today only pigeons and geese wander among the low puddles of the gravel lo ...
20 Apr 2018 - Kaia Sand
Several Street Roots vendors were at Cityteam, some for shelter and others for an AA meeting, when police shot John Elifritz on April 7 It has been a hard week at Street Roots. A handful of our vendors witnessed the police shooting Saturday night at Cityt ...
13 Apr 2018 - Kaia Sand
Don’t make life more difficult for people experiencing homelessness: It’s a low bar, but one we often don’t meet Holding out a lime-green lava lamp and a brown belt, a man asked whether Street Roots vendors might be able to use these items he found discar ...
30 Mar 2018 - Kaia Sand
SPARC is working with Multnomah County as part of a nationwide effort to change the conversation about racial disparities and homelessness Why does homelessness affect communities of color at higher rates, and how can we make sure that we respond to homel ...
23 Mar 2018 - Kaia Sand