Pearl committee: Things 'not OK' at shelter

Oversight group reports an 'explosion' of issues in the neighborhood

Despite reports that livability issues around Pearl homeless shelters are improving, a neighborhood watchdog committee disagrees.

“All is not OK,” was the theme of a Dec. 11 report from the Pearl District Neighborhood Association Shelter Oversight Committee.

“People are appalled at the explosion we’re seeing in the number of sleepers and in drug activity, not only in the parks, but in any recessed area,” committee Chair Linda Witt told the association.

“Very disturbingly, we’re seeing excessive sleeping, watering, etc., in violation of the community engagement guidelines, even around the shelter itself.

“We also see that the activity is reaching the streetcar stops … something that [Mayor Keith Wilson] said would not happen,” Witt said.

The stated goal of Wilson’s overnight shelter program, of which the 200-capacity Northwest Street Shelter is the largest, was to provide safe and comfortable shelter to people living outdoors.

That policy is sometimes overridden when occupants are dangerous or defy shelter protocols, in which case some are expelled.

“Extreme hard cases are being sent out directly to the street,” Witt said. “There is no problem-solving team that tries to figure out how to help these people. They are simply rejected from the shelter, and they are told to go hang out in the Pearl.

“The mayor said back in July, ‘If there’s open drug use or open drug dealing,’ we will rush care and public safety to address it.”

PDNA President Bruce Studer suggested that people who are expelled should be the responsibility of Multnomah County.

Witt said Multnomah County Chair Jessica Vega Pederson told reporters recently that such situations are an “opportunity for the county to do its work.”

Multnomah County Commissioner Meghan Moyer will speak at a public meeting sponsored by the PDNA on Friday, 9-10:30 a.m., at the Fields Bar & Grill, 1139 NW 11th Ave.

Mayor Wilson’s office was invited to respond to the Oversight Committee report but did not do so. A Portland Solutions spokesperson asked whether incidents occurred on Oregon Department of Transportation property, which would make it ODOT’s responsibility to maintain.