A survey in Portland reveals profound racial disparities even in basic answers about where people sleep Every two years, homeless service providers and volunteers spread out across their communities to conduct a census of people experiencing homelessness. ...
2 Dec 2020 - Marisa A. Zapata
DIRECTOR’S DESK | Let's not wait for private equity firms to snatch up financially distressed properties There’s a kind of optimism that we speak of at Street Roots — a wild optimism — that I’d describe as a commitment to hopeful, bold ideas despite ...
2 Dec 2020 - Kaia Sand
Local government can only do so much. We expect more from our national leadership. H omelessness looks very personal. And it is, in the way that all tragedies are personal. While it’s a national crisis — created over generations by local and federal polic ...
21 Oct 2020 - SR editorial board
Opinion | Street Roots suspended our print edition this week because of the air quality It wasn’t much, but it was pizza – a small effort at fire prevention. Mike D, a Street Roots vendor who coordinates action team outreach, and I crossed the busy St. He ...
12 Sep 2020 - Kaia Sand
OPINION | Extremists' 'antifa' allegations are cruel and dehumanizing. Here's the truth about these Portland communities. W hat I noticed first was the peacefulness. It was that hot time of the day on Sunday, pre-dusk, when I stopped t ...
9 Sep 2020 - Kaia Sand
COMMENTERY | It has never been clearer: The right to housing is ‘a matter of life and death’ Public health officials are calling the stay-home policy the sacrifice of our generation. To flatten the curve of COVID-19 infections, this call of duty is now em ...
25 May 2020 - Maimunah Mohd Sharif and Leilani Farh
DIRECTOR’S DESK | Street Roots and four partner organizations asked 97 houseless Portlanders where they’d prefer to live temporarily during the pandemic Over the past few weeks, the Street Roots vendor-led Coronavirus Action Team fanned out, offering unho ...
22 May 2020 - Kaia Sand
DIRECTOR’S DESK | There are some things we all can do to stay focused on everybody’s public health The disconcerting phone calls started coming in this week. Antsy to open up businesses, people were once again complaining about all the tents. My response ...
8 May 2020 - Kaia Sand
COMMENTARY | If we don’t do enough now, today’s youth will struggle with housing insecurity in older age We are in a period of incredibly rapid change and ambiguity, and there is a growing recognition that many of the changes experienced in the past month ...
6 May 2020 - Marisa Espinoza
Street Roots endorses Measure 26-210 Tens of thousands of people are unhoused in this region, and many more are on the brink of homelessness. That was before the COVID-19 pandemic. Record unemployment levels point to drastic increases in severe poverty ah ...
1 May 2020 - SR editorial board