Street Roots vendors are helping to get accurate information about Covid-19 to other homeless folks in Portland. Street Roots Executive Director Kaia Sand joins us, along with Tina Drake, a member of the new Street Roots Action Team.

StreetRoots Responds To Covid-19

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Plans are underway to turn part of the former Presbyterian Church of Laurelhurst into a tiny home village for Indigenous families experiencing homelessness. As reported in Underscore, the project – known as Barbie’s Village – will also include family and children’s programming in the former church building. The project was made possible after regional Presbyterian Church leaders voted to sell the land for $1 to Future Generations Collaborative, a local Indigenous services nonprofit. 
Jillene Joseph is the executive director of the Native Wellness Institute and the engagement mode lead for Future Generations Collaborative. Chris Dela Cruz is a former associate pastor at Westminster Presbyterian Church, which helped sponsor the project. They join us to talk about the vision for Barbie’s Village and how the project came to be. 

Indigenous tiny home village planned at former Presbyterian Church of Laurelhurst

Four years ago at the dawn of the pandemic, many universities across the country scaled back on their admissions process, many no longer requiring SAT or ACT scores with an application. Now, U.S. universities are bringing standardized testing back. Institutions such as Brown University, the University of Texas at Austin and University of Tennessee are all reinstituting the requirement for applicants. This also comes at a time where the Supreme Court recently struck down Affirmative Action.
In Oregon, no schools have made an announcement to require scores again. Milyon Trulove is the vice president and dean of admission and financial aid at Reed College. Jon Boeckenstedt is the vice provost of enrollment management at Oregon State University. They both join us to share what the admissions process is looking like now and why they are not reinstituting score requirements.

Why some Oregon universities won’t require the ACT or SAT

When one of the city’s vehicles are in need of repair, they may find themselves at Kerby Garage, a two-story city-owned facility in North Portland. But while the facility is responsible for servicing more than 2,000 city vehicles such as snowplows, dump trucks and excavators, the building has been labeled in city reports as in “very poor condition.” Some of the many problems with the building include no automated smoke detectors, frequent garage door issues and no air conditioning. Willamette Week reporter Sophie Peel has been covering this issue. She joins us to share more on what workers are facing and potential plans to address conditions at the facility in the future.

A city-owned garage in Portland is in desperate need of repair

Last week, Gov. Tina Kotek signed into law HB 4002 which effectively ends Oregon’s experiment with drug decriminalization under Measure 110. As of Sept. 1, the possession of hard drugs like fentanyl and meth will be a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail. But the law also sets aside nearly $21 million to incentivize counties and Tribal governments to deflect drug users from jail time by connecting them to treatment and recovery service providers. Twenty-three counties in the state, including Washington County, have signed letters committing to prioritize deflection over incarceration. The details of those programs, however, are left up to each participating county. Joining us to talk about what deflection could look like in Washington County, and its impact on law enforcement and treatment providers are District Attorney Kevin Barton and Alison Noice, the executive director of Coda Inc., a substance use disorder treatment provider serving the tri-county region.  

Washington County offers a window into what deflection could mean for law enforcement and treatment providers

In her State of the City address last month, Vancouver Mayor Anne McEnerny-Ogle touted the city’s rapid growth and development since she was first elected to the city council more than a decade ago. But with that growth comes challenges for Washington’s fourth-largest city. In the past decade, homelessness has increased by more than 250%, prompting city officials to declare a state of emergency to streamline responding to this crisis. Last year, voters approved a new property tax levy that is expected to raise $100 million over 10 years to shore up the city’s Affordable Housing Fund. Meanwhile, hundreds of new housing units are being planned for the Heights District, a neighborhood redevelopment project in central Vancouver. Mayor McEnerny-Ogle joins us to talk about her vision for the city’s future, the challenges it faces and reflections on her past decade in city government. 

StreetRoots Responds To Covid-19

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