Portland, Ore. (Jan. 9, 2024) — Working together to address the humanitarian crisis on our streets, Multnomah County and the City of Portland re-housed, sheltered and prevented evictions for hundreds of households using their share of statewide emergency funding — meeting or exceeding a series of goals set by Gov. Tina Kotek’s office.
Locally, according to preliminary data shared with Oregon Housing and Community Services, 140 new shelter units came online, 191 households left homelessness for housing, and an additional 1,474 households were prevented from being evicted and ever having to experience homelessness in the first place.
The collaboration and coordination between the City and County to achieve those goals follow months of work by Mayor Ted Wheeler and Chair Jessica Vega Pederson’s offices to build a more effective relationship through the Joint Office of Homeless Services.
The Chair and Mayor announced a new operating framework last year that sets clear goals to measure the reduction in homelessness, increases transparency through data, metrics and progress reports, and will facilitate the growth of the County and City partnership.
“We prioritized urgency and collaboration, and this is exactly the progress I expect,” said Chair Vega Pederson. “These are families who aren’t on the street because their eviction was prevented. These are individuals who aren’t in a tent on the sidewalk because they are safely sleeping in a shelter bed. And for nearly 200 people, they have a place to call home. I’m proud of our providers and partners for stepping up – let’s keep moving forward with this same focused action.”
“I’m thankful that the state has supported the city’s vision of providing a new shelter type — TASS — to directly serve unsheltered adults in Portland,” said Mayor Wheeler. “We are proving that this work can be successful as we all work together to reduce homelessness from local communities across Oregon. These goals would not have been met without the City’s Temporary Alternative Shelter Sites. I urge the Governor and the Legislature to continue supporting these efforts, as cities and counties cannot do this work alone at the scale that is needed to be successful.”
Last year, Gov. Kotek directed counties across Oregon to achieve a set of rehousing, shelter and eviction prevention goals by Jan 10, 2024. The state of emergency provided emergency funding to local governments starting in late April 2023 and directed the creation of local Multi-Agency Coordination (MAC) groups to craft cross-jurisdictional plans to help achieve those goals.
Multnomah County’s MAC group — with members from the County, the City of Portland, the City of Gresham, Home Forward, service providers, the healthcare sector and others — received $15.9 million from the state to complement ongoing rehousing and shelter efforts.
Separately, Multnomah County’s Department of County Human Services received $5.4 million to provide additional eviction prevention rent assistance and services.
Gov. Kotek announced preliminary statewide outcomes — including Portland and Multnomah County’s progress — on Tuesday, Jan. 9, the anniversary of her inauguration.
Shelter expansion provides services and safer spaces for people seeking housing
Goal: 140 beds
Outcome: 140 beds
In July 2023, the City of Portland opened Mayor Wheeler’s first Temporary Alternative Shelter Site (Clinton Triangle) using state emergency funding for operations accessed through the MAC group. The City funded the site capital construction while state emergency funding was used to purchase shelter pods. The site became operational within three months upon announcing the site.
State funding has also supported operating costs through Jan. 10, 2024, and the City is hopeful a second tranche of funding will be awarded to ensure the site remains operational through June 2025.
The TASS at Clinton Triangle, which is the largest pod shelter in the state, has also introduced a new shelter case management service model. The site was developed to provide services to unsheltered adults with a high acuity and, as such, the site has a 15-1 staff ratio. The TASS provides an additional option within the spectrum of shelter offerings including smaller pod shelters managed by the City, such as the Safe Rest Villages program, and pod shelters funded by Multnomah County through the Supportive Housing Services Measure.
Additionally, the site brings services on site. In partnership with Health Share of Oregon and Central City Concern, physical and behavioral health services are provided onsite and guests are connected with all relevant Medicaid benefits thanks to Care Coordinators from Health Share.
The site is also providing job opportunities for Portlanders as the provider, Urban Alchemy, primarily hires individuals who have experienced long-term incarceration and have lived experience with homelessness. This has allowed guests to stabilize, receive the case specific management they need, and organize their housing paperwork quickly — all with the goal of being successful and remaining in housing once placed.
This model has proven to be successful. Outreach teams have had success offering these pod shelter units to unsheltered adults — many of whom have been shelter resistant in the past. Once at the sites, immediate casework begins, and both health and housing plans are developed for guests. There are not enough substance use treatment beds in the state and these sites provide an opportunity for people to be safe, stable, and access services until housing, recovery, or reunification with family can occur.
The Board of County Commissioners last year allocated $4.7 million to support capital costs at two additional TASS sites, as well as $16 million to support operations at two additional sites.
Partnership and network of shelter options support urgent work to rehouse vulnerable community members
Goal: 186 households moved from homelessness back into housing
Outcome: 191 households moved into housing
This housing placement work was completed within three months (October – December 2024) and was done in partnership with local nonprofit service providers, including Do Good Multnomah, as well as partners including the City of Gresham, which launched a dedicated housing team.
Overall, the Multnomah County MAC group rehoused 191 households experiencing homelessness using state emergency funding — with more households expected to be housed in the coming weeks. It demonstrates a powerful housing placement model when multiple entities work together toward a clear goal.
Partnership with the City of Portland was essential to achieving this goal. While a minor number of households were rehoused directly from the streets, the vast majority of housing placements were from the city-shelter sites including the City’s Safe Rest Villages and Temporary Alternative Shelter Site (Clinton Triangle).
Temporary Alternative Shelter Sites and Safe Rest Villages, which in total provide 509 shelter units, are both city-led projects that began development in 2022 and 2021, respectively. They operate alongside more than 2,000 shelter beds in villages, motels or congregate sites funded through the Joint Office.
This placement work was in addition to hundreds of other households placed into housing with resources from other local funding streams.
Local funding augments expansion of eviction prevention resources
Goal: 1,426 households
Outcome: 1,474 households
Using the state’s emergency funding — plus $1.2 million in federal funding — the County’s Bienestar de la Familia program expanded its work providing rent assistance and other supports to households who either had active eviction notices or who were at risk of receiving one.
Bienestar’s work involves reaching out to households on eviction court dockets, working with families who have a notice to vacate or who are otherwise at risk. Outreach workers either visit the courthouse or knock on families’ doors directly.
The County allocated additional resources to support this work after learning the expected cost per household had exceeded the state’s initial estimates.
The effort to exceed the state’s goals came alongside other work over the previous 12 months preventing evictions for thousands of people using other local and federal resources.