Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Speaker A: I'm Alex Stone, former military service member and law enforcement officer, now CEO of Echelon Protected Services, one of the fastest growing private security firms on the west coast. And this is ride along, where our guest and I witness firsthand the issues affecting our community.
I believe our proven method of enacting meaningful change through compassion and understanding is the best way to make our streets a safer place and truly achieve security through community.
[00:00:50] Speaker B: My name is Lance Orton, and I'm the executive director of city team Portland, as well as night Strike. I'm here today to do the ride along podcast and talk about the issues that are happening on the ground and see if we can't focus on solutions.
[00:01:06] Speaker A: Hey, Alex Stone here. Welcome back to the ride along. We have a great guest today. He's actually a good friend of mine and associate, and just a fellow street worker. Right. A real person who really cares about folks. His name's Lance Orton. He's an executive director of an amazing nonprofit, and he's here out of Portland. Lance, why don't you introduce yourself to the folks and give a little bit of a background?
[00:01:28] Speaker B: Sure. My name's Lance. I'm a recovering heroin addict here in Portland. And like Alex said, I run an organization here that I actually went through a treatment program that I went through just about five years ago. It'll be five years October 1.
That was the last day that I was on the streets.
You know, went through a program and learned about my addiction, learned about why it was eating me up. And I'm one of the lucky ones that got out alive. And here I am getting ready to celebrate five years of radical sobriety and awesome, bro. Get to help others.
[00:02:06] Speaker A: Congratulations on that, man.
[00:02:08] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:02:09] Speaker A: I know that darkness. You know, I watch a show called Dexter, and he talks about his dark passenger, and people, they get caught up in the dope game, whether it's selling dope or whether it's doing dope or whether it's both. It really is kind of a dark passenger. Right. It brings. There's a level of comfort it brings, especially when you become addicted.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:02:33] Speaker A: That substance is like your best friend.
[00:02:35] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:02:36] Speaker A: And getting freedom from that dark passenger, man, that's totally legit. And I give you 100% props for that.
[00:02:42] Speaker B: Thank you. Yeah, I'm really grateful. I can relate to that dark passenger. And it's always there, you know? It's still. Still in there.
[00:02:50] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah. He's in the trunk, though, wrapped up in duct tape.
[00:02:52] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:02:53] Speaker B: I have to keep him.
[00:02:54] Speaker A: We keep him in the trunk. Right.
[00:02:55] Speaker B: And I, and I keep him there by going out and helping others like me.
[00:02:58] Speaker A: That's right. Service through it.
[00:02:59] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:03:00] Speaker A: So we, before we go back in time, right. Let's, you know, I want the audience to know that this is going to be an in studio session. We're not going to go out on the streets today.
But one of the questions I like to ask folks when I'm on the streets doing that type of work, trying to get people into detox, trying to get them into a shelter, I asked them, I asked, when you were in second grade and your teacher asked you, what do you want to be when you grow up?
Did you really think that you were going to put, I want to be homeless and an addict on the streets of Portland?
[00:03:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I think about that a lot. And I remember, I don't remember exactly. It was second grade. But I did get asked that question, and I had plenty of answers. You know, standard astronaut, architect. Strangely, I wanted to be an architect at one point, you know, wanted to play for the 49 ers, those kinds of things. And for a while there, when I fast forward from that time to 42 years old, which was the last year, out on the streets and in my addiction, there was, you know, there was some regret around that. In fact, the last day, I was living in the back of my 99 Jeep Cherokee in a Walmart parking lot out in Troutdale, trying to detox from heroin. And I remember laying back in that jeep, and I was just, I didn't see a way out. I wanted to die. There was so much shame and regret. And the thought was, how does a 42 year old college educated guy from a good family, a good upbringing get to this point? And I had been pretty low before, and I was always able to claw my way back out and kind of get myself plugged back into society, at least from the outside looking in, I could play that game. But inside, you know, the image was broken. It was completely shattered. And I will tell you this, though. Once I got sober and went through the program and, you know, through a program of recovery and understood it all, there's no regret today. I'm so grateful for my addiction because it's given me the purpose that I have today. It's made me the man that I'm becoming today. And I didn't. That was the, my last prayer, and this was before I had any faith in my life. It was a prayer to the universe, was for purpose. I was like, please, I don't know how to be a 42 year old. I need some purpose in my life, a reason to exist, because I was thinking about which buildings in Portland had no guardrails around him, so I could go off and jump. And those who know me well, I got a lot of zeal for life. Like, I'm a naturally optimistic person.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: I was one of those is always half full, right?
[00:05:42] Speaker B: I'm of the 51% that, like, is naturally, positively optimistic in life. And to get to that point where literally I was suicidal, you know, just speaks to how. How deadly that addiction is.
[00:05:55] Speaker A: It's deadly. And, you know, on the street, it's.
The street robs you.
[00:06:01] Speaker B: Yeah. It's a lonely place.
[00:06:03] Speaker A: It robs you. It takes the two things you need in order to not commit suicide. It takes your self worth, and then it takes your self agency.
[00:06:15] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:06:16] Speaker A: Right? And so that's kind of where you found yourself on the. In that jeep, in that parking lot, right? You. Your worth was gone, so you had no value. There was no value. Why should I be here?
[00:06:27] Speaker B: I had no significance in my life.
[00:06:30] Speaker A: And then you. And then you didn't see the ability to develop further on, right. That agency, the ability to make a decision for yourself. And you're like, the only decision I can make is suicide because, well, I have no worth, right. And it's a dangerous place to be.
[00:06:46] Speaker B: It is. And once you burn all the bridges, which I had, every bridge, I mean, even my family, I know they today, I know they love me and they care for me, but they had put up what I would call today, healthy boundaries, and said, look, you know, no more money, no more couches. But I needed that. I needed those doors to be shut in order to get to the next step, which was a complete surrender. And I needed help. And if it hadn't been for the shelter and the program I went through, opening their doors to me, I don't know what I would have done. And it also took that jeep getting taken from me as part of the story. We get to that. But, you know, it was stolen by somebody that I owed money to, a drug dealer. And if it wasn't for that, I wasn't truly on the street, you know, I probably never would have made it.
[00:07:34] Speaker A: Because you got indebted to your drug dealer, and the dope man took your jeep.
[00:07:40] Speaker B: That's right. That's right.
[00:07:41] Speaker A: I mean, that's. That you. This should be a movie.
The dope man repo to your jeep.
[00:07:48] Speaker B: That's right. And drove off into the sunset. And that moment was a key, pivotal moment. It was a necessary moment. I remember standing as the jeep drove away, and it was this very strange, unexpected serenity that came over me, almost a giggle.
[00:08:04] Speaker A: And you're like, this is it. How did I. Yeah, you're at the end of your rope.
[00:08:08] Speaker B: That's when I had the 42 year old college educated. How does that. How did I get here? And. But I also knew internally that this was the rock bottom that I needed. I cannot go lower than this.
[00:08:20] Speaker A: Explore that a little bit. Right. So when you lose the ability to be enabled by others who love you.
[00:08:27] Speaker B: Mm hmm.
[00:08:28] Speaker A: And when you lose your support structures. Right.
[00:08:31] Speaker B: Your jeep shelter. Right.
[00:08:34] Speaker A: What is it about being at the rock bottom as an individual? Right. What is it about that that makes you confront death and you're really left with that one option? Well, I'm either gonna have to make it. I'm either gonna have to figure out if I have any agency left, or I'm just gonna die. Like, what is it about that that requires us to go to these lengths, mentally and emotionally, spiritually, even.
[00:09:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:03] Speaker A: To change. Why is that?
[00:09:05] Speaker B: Well, it is, for me, in my case, very spiritual. It was. I didn't see it in the moment, but we call that the gift of desperation. That's the moment.
[00:09:12] Speaker A: I never heard that.
[00:09:13] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a gift of desperation is the moment when you realize that you need help or you need to not exist anymore. And I was thinking that it really, is that binary? Yeah, it is at that point, and it's not even binary. It was only for me, it was only suicide. I couldn't think of another way.
But in that moment, as the jeep drove off, I had that moment. I started walking. And the thing. The things that happen, the sequence of events that happen from then until now are just a series of, like, divine intervention. I mean, I wound up having a panic attack. Woke up in the hospital. Someone found me unconscious. Woke up in the hospital.
By the time the hospital checked me out and, you know, said, hey, you're actually pretty healthy, other than being addicted to drugs and 35 pounds underweight. We got to discharge you. And they gave me a voucher, I love it. To the shelter that I now run. And, you know, that's just to get there. I mean, how does that happened? It wasn't. It certainly wasn't my choice.
[00:10:16] Speaker A: You don't even know who.
[00:10:16] Speaker B: I didn't say, I'm gonna go into a recovery program, and then I'm gonna run it later. It was just one step after another. And, you know, I don't know if we're allowed to use the God piece in this story, he stepped in, you know, he stepped in. He showed me the way every step of the way. And it was a series of events from there, as long as I surrendered continuously, as I should say, as long as I do surrender continuously, I know he'll take care of me and give me that purpose and significance that I prayed to that God before I met him.
[00:10:46] Speaker A: That's amazing that I have today. So.
And I'm interested. I want to go back to the dope man.
[00:10:53] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:53] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:10:54] Speaker B: So everybody wants to go back to the dope man.
[00:10:56] Speaker A: Everyone is interested in the dope man. So I come at it from a different angle. I never wasn't. I was homeless as a child and an adult, but I never became addicted to substances. I think because I witnessed members of my family going through addiction at a young age. And to me, I recognized rather early in my life that I saw the lack of worth and the lack of agency that was a result from that drug use. And I knew that I could never go down that route.
That actually scared me more than gang banging, being shot, being whatever, selling drugs. I could do anything other than that. That was, like, scary, danger.
[00:11:39] Speaker B: Interesting.
[00:11:40] Speaker A: Right. And for me, there was no entertainment value.
[00:11:45] Speaker B: Right.
[00:11:46] Speaker A: It was so scary.
It was like. I mean, it's just too scary. So the entertainment value was even stolen just from the fear of it. Right.
Being. Coming from that side and from law enforcement.
Is it. It seems normal to me, at least, the folks that I've engaged with both as a civilian in the security world and law enforcement.
The dope man really wants to indebted you. They want to front you those drugs.
[00:12:12] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:12:13] Speaker A: I mean, if you had to guess how many people there, let's say 4500, chronically houseless in Portland. Right.
I would say a large majority of those. Right. At least from the statistics that we internally have, are using on some capacity.
[00:12:30] Speaker B: Yeah, I've heard a lot of different numbers. I think 80% is the hovering. And if I look at the real time data of the people that are coming through my shelter, I would say it's even higher. I would argue it's 90%.
[00:12:42] Speaker A: That's so scary. So let's say. Let's just use 85%.
How many of those 85%? So roughly, let's say 3800 people are indebted to their drug dealer at any moment during one week. How many do you think?
[00:12:57] Speaker B: I mean, it's so. I so hard to say. I could speculate. I can tell you I was. And from the time I was always indebted it was always front, always sell a little, use what I can. I mean, that's the game.
[00:13:08] Speaker A: And I catch people stealing a bicycle, and I'm like, yo, bro, like, hey, man, I try to jack you up, but, like, why are you stealing a bike? Hey, man, I got a, I got, I got owe some money to this guy, you know, the fear of withdrawal.
[00:13:21] Speaker B: I mean, anyone who's gone, they will do anything. Opioid withdrawal. You, we addicts. Opioid addicts will do anything, say anything to anyone to get that next hit. And I knew it. I knew it. It was against how I was raised. It was against how, and I knew it was wrong, but I was so afraid. I was deathly afraid. And then when I finally went through a cold turkey detox, 45 days of it, I knew, you know, I'll never do that again.
[00:13:49] Speaker A: That's tough.
[00:13:50] Speaker B: I'll never do that again.
[00:13:52] Speaker A: White knuckling it.
[00:13:53] Speaker B: Yeah, it was, it was rough, but I needed that. You know, I. And we can get into this a little bit, but it is of my opinion, and I see this guys coming through my treatment center, if you. If you. If you get to be eased down slowly and gently, medically, I e. They're giving you methadone or suboxone or whatever, it's. It's a much easier way to detox. Right. It's more comfortable.
The danger of that, and I'm not saying it, we shouldn't have it. I think there's some good uses for it, you know, medical assisted treatment. There are. There are use cases, and it can work for me.
[00:14:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:14:30] Speaker B: Had that been offered to me or that was the case, it would have taken away that 30 to 45 days of pure hell that I went through. That is now my deterrent. I lean into that anytime there's a temptation or I'm, you know, I have had a surgery, and I'm getting pain pills. What keeps me from taking a few extra, which I want to. I'm wired. I'm an addict. The reason I don't do it is I do not want to get hooked again. I don't want to go through that absolute hell of detox. And so, you know, the guys that I have in my programs now that choose to go through the easy detox, and now I'm going to go detox, and then I'll come to your program.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: 99% of them relapse. That's real time data. 99%.
[00:15:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:15:13] Speaker B: The ones that cold turkey.
[00:15:14] Speaker A: I agree with that data, by the way.
[00:15:15] Speaker B: The ones that cold turkey it. They have a lot better chance, because then they. They know, like, oh, I'm not doing that again.
[00:15:21] Speaker A: Just on the subject of detox, how much of your ego is attached to that drug?
The drug of choice for the addict? So the ego wants to protect your identity.
[00:15:34] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:15:34] Speaker A: Right. And as we lose self worth, the ego rises up. Right. There's kind of like a juxtaposition, kind of. It's kind of contradictory. And so the ego wants to protect yourself. How much of the ego wants to drive you, like, hey, this is who you are. You don't know anything else. If you're not an addict, you're nobody, right?
[00:15:54] Speaker B: I think, for me, my identity, you know, I didn't want to be an addict. You know, I actually always wanted to be a respectable member of society. You know, I came from a family. Dad was a Silicon Valley businessman growing up. You know, my mom was a Montessori teacher. And I wanted a normal life. I always did. But I didn't know how to get that identity. The identity. And I didn't want to be known as I did everything I could to hide. In fact, before I got to heroin, I mean, I was. It was pain pills that I got addicted to, and so I. Pain pills come from doctors when you're very respectable, right. And when you're. When you're getting them from doctors, I didn't have to associate with that dark world of drug dealers, which is how I got to 42.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: So you really never wanted to associate with the darkness?
[00:16:37] Speaker B: No.
[00:16:37] Speaker A: Okay, got it.
[00:16:38] Speaker B: No, no. It was.
[00:16:39] Speaker A: So you weren't like, I want to be a Hells angel?
[00:16:41] Speaker B: No.
[00:16:41] Speaker A: Okay. Gotcha.
[00:16:42] Speaker B: I mean, I wanted to. I wanted to get high. I wanted to get started. I wanted to get high. And then I wanted to medicate, because in 2005, there was a tragedy. My dad, my hero, my best friend, was killed in a tractor accident, of all things. A fluke accident flipped on him and killed him instantly. And I was in the army. I was serving with the 101st at that time. Well, and they sent in the red. You know, Red Cross. Anytime you see a red cross helicopter flying, it's never good news. And that day, they handed me a message, said, your dad's been killed. That was it. You need to. You're going on leave to figure this out. And that's when my drug use, my recreational use, became medicinal.
[00:17:24] Speaker A: And you were still active duty at the time?
[00:17:26] Speaker B: I was still active duty.
[00:17:26] Speaker A: Were you using the physician assistance and the sick call to.
[00:17:30] Speaker B: So I wasn't actually in that phase in my life.
[00:17:33] Speaker A: Good for you.
[00:17:34] Speaker B: Well, the reason I went in the army was one of my, you know, higher rock bottoms. I was on the verge of homelessness down in San Diego. I was using cocaine and party, baby. Yep.
[00:17:44] Speaker A: I was down surfing in ob. Yep.
[00:17:46] Speaker B: And I. And all my friends were growing up and getting jobs and getting married, and I was still, you know, partying with 20 year olds, you know, and younger. And I knew that as soon as I lost my, you know, my roommates were kicking me out, and I didn't want to. I didn't want to go to rehab. Right. So I decided to join the army. I'm like, oh, the army. They'll square me away. And it worked for a while.
[00:18:07] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah, for sure.
[00:18:08] Speaker B: It really worked. You know, I got. I learned to put my head down, do what you're told, and they'll take care of you. And they did. But it creeped up, you know. Yes, to answer your question, yeah, there were sick calls, and, you know, I got some teeth pulled to get combat ready, and I would get those pills, and. But I knew that I would get in trouble if I kept it up. So it wasn't until I went on leave. When I went on leave, my dad was killed. My stepmom had a bunch of pills. Xanax, Vicodin. I started taking those. I started drinking. And for 30 days while I was on leave, I did nothing but get high and also cope.
[00:18:41] Speaker A: Had you experienced depression prior in your life?
[00:18:43] Speaker B: Never. Never. And to this day, I never have.
[00:18:45] Speaker A: So that wound, that really. That emotional wound, really opened you up to becoming a drug addict?
[00:18:51] Speaker B: I didn't know how to process the loss of my hero, my father, my best friend. I didn't have any. There was no faith in my life, in our family. There was no real faith. We were pretty secular family, so I wasn't spiritually equipped to process that death. And I knew that the substances, whatever they may be, would at least numb me. And I thought, okay, I can go back to the army. And I was about to go career. I was ocs. I was accepted into OCS. I was getting ready to go in. And when I got back to Fort Campbell, I just couldn't reengage. I mean, I was. It only took a matter of time before, you know, they caught on, and I was. Somehow I got a general discharge under honorable conditions. They took passion, compassion on me because.
[00:19:33] Speaker A: Of the loss, as well they should.
[00:19:35] Speaker B: Yeah. And I. And I depreciated it. But if we're being honest, I didn't deserve that. You know, I was kicked out for using drugs on base and, you know, no good. But it was. It was. That was the catalyst where it went from recreational to trying to numb the pain.
[00:19:52] Speaker A: Yeah. Because now you're losing more identity.
[00:19:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:55] Speaker A: And that you were a soldier.
[00:19:57] Speaker B: Right.
[00:19:57] Speaker A: In the 101st five oh, 502.
[00:19:59] Speaker B: Yep. I gave that away. So now. Now I have no identity at all other than the sun of a father who is gone. And, you know, there's a story there with, my dad didn't have a will. And, you know, and I had it in my head that someday I would inherit my dad's wealth, which was fairly great. And, you know, in a twist of divine intervention there, my brother and I did not receive any of that inheritance because he didn't have a will.
[00:20:23] Speaker A: That's a really good thing.
[00:20:25] Speaker B: It was a really good thing. I didn't see it that way in the moment. I'd be dead today if I had gotten that kind of money.
[00:20:30] Speaker A: Yeah. That playing, that probably opened that wound up even more.
[00:20:33] Speaker B: It did. Right. And it took, you know, again, I didn't see how great. What a gift that was today until I got sober and, you know, back.
[00:20:42] Speaker A: Yeah. You probably would have died.
[00:20:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
Guaranteed.
[00:20:46] Speaker A: Yeah. So, man, that, you know, you're telling us about your journey, and eventually you end up here in Portland.
[00:20:54] Speaker B: Right.
[00:20:55] Speaker A: You're homeless on the streets in Portland for how long?
[00:20:57] Speaker B: So I was living in my jeep. So I was homeless in Bend, Oregon, for about a month or so.
[00:21:02] Speaker A: Folks, if you're gonna be homeless anywhere in America, been to Oregon is fantastic.
Fantastic.
[00:21:10] Speaker B: It wasn't bad. It wasn't bad, but it got bad real quick because the dope man, as you referred to him, we call him Crazy Cameron for the purpose.
[00:21:18] Speaker A: Crazy Cameron would be knocking on your door.
[00:21:19] Speaker B: Crazy Cameron was knocking on all the doors. And I knew I had to get away from this individual. And so my grand plan and my addiction at that point was to jump in my 99 jeep Cherokee, drive to Portland.
[00:21:30] Speaker A: Oh, good.
[00:21:30] Speaker B: I had a strategy.
[00:21:31] Speaker A: Cross the mountains.
[00:21:32] Speaker B: Yep. And I knew I could live in a Walmart parking lot. They leave me alone. It's a 24 hours story. There was a whole culture of rvs and whatnot back then. This is 2018.
But I wanted to get off the heroin. I knew from the first moment I tried this stuff, I knew it was just evil. I knew it was going to take me out. I had to get off of it. I didn't know how, though. Still too proud to go to a rehab I'd never been to. Well, that's not true. I did short stint back in 2013, but it didn't stick. It didn't work for me. So I was looking for a different solution. And that was the only plan I had, was white knuckle. So I'm in the deep five days. By the fifth day, I couldn't handle it. I needed.
[00:22:14] Speaker A: You're going insane.
[00:22:15] Speaker B: Suicidal. Wanted to jump. Find the buildings in Portland that didn't have guardrails. Jump off again. I'm praying to this God I didn't know to the universe, as I called it, some purpose. I don't know how to get out of this. I need some purpose, a reason to exist. And it's funny cause shortly after that, I caved and said, I gotta get another hit. I got on the phone, I didn't even have cell services.
[00:22:38] Speaker A: You called the dope man.
[00:22:39] Speaker B: I poached the wifi off of Walmart. I jumped on Facebook. I found a girl that I used to use with, and I knew I could con her into bringing me some dope to the Walmart parking lot.
[00:22:50] Speaker A: And she probably owed money to Cameron as well.
[00:22:53] Speaker B: Well, guess who showed up instead of her? Crazy Cameron.
[00:22:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:56] Speaker B: And so he. Yeah, he found out how he did it, but he got ahold of her account or her or whatever, and she found me. And I came out of the bathroom.
[00:23:04] Speaker A: How much were you into?
[00:23:06] Speaker B: Oh, it was Penny. $120.
[00:23:08] Speaker A: 120?
[00:23:08] Speaker B: Yeah, maybe a week. I had. I had stuck them in heroin.
[00:23:13] Speaker A: What, 20, $15 a day?
[00:23:14] Speaker B: I. Oh, no, my habit of. I was doing. I. Almost 200 a day. Oh, my. Really bad habit.
[00:23:21] Speaker A: Yeah, that's hard.
[00:23:23] Speaker B: Shooting about three and a half grams a day.
[00:23:25] Speaker A: Holy, dude, I'm surprised you're alive.
[00:23:27] Speaker B: It was terrible.
[00:23:28] Speaker A: That is insane.
[00:23:28] Speaker B: And had fentanyl been around then? I mean, it was just coming into the scene, but it wasn't widely. I would be dead.
But, you know, again, I count my lucky chickens in that department, bro.
[00:23:39] Speaker A: You must have a lot of chickens in that department because you're pretty lucky, man.
[00:23:43] Speaker B: Yes. Blessed, I like to say today.
But he. Yeah, he was in my.
[00:23:47] Speaker A: Should take those lucky chickens out to eat a chick fil a.
[00:23:52] Speaker B: Crazy cameron was in my jeep when I showed up. He was in there with a gun, and he put the gun at me and he said, get in the car and drive. I'm taking your jeep and everything you own. And I had everything I owned in this thing. The title, my Social Security car, my birth, everything. Signed the title over he did at Gumbo.
[00:24:07] Speaker A: So that's hardcore, man.
[00:24:10] Speaker B: Well, watch how. Watch how God steps into this. So the series of divine events, right? Okay. I pray to the universe, give me some purpose. I don't know what to do. Help me. Crazy Cameron shows up, right? He's an ex con prison guy. Arms the size of, you know, both my legs, which I know is not saying much, but they're pretty big arms, tatted up. I was terrified of this guy. He was also a meth addict, so, you know, I could.
[00:24:30] Speaker A: So he's former prison gang guy?
[00:24:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
I don't know exactly what. What he was in for, but the rumors were that he had killed people in the past. That's all I remember. And so I was terrified of this guy. And I'm driving, gun is to the side, and all of a sudden, you have a gun. He has the gun. He's got the gun, you know, low, pointed to the side, my hip. And he's having me drive. And I just remember I could see the knuckles on the steering wheel.
[00:24:55] Speaker A: So you think you're gonna die?
[00:24:56] Speaker B: I literally, you're like, or worse, he's gonna beat the crap out of me, leave me, you know, in a bloody pulp on the side of the road. And so I'm thinking, I got to get out of the situation. How am I gonna do it? And all of a sudden, Krazy Cameron says to me in this very strange and clear voice, don't worry. I'm not going to hurt you. God told me, not this one. He has a plan for you. You need to go to rehab and get your life together.
[00:25:17] Speaker A: What, the dope man told you this as he's robbing you of your vehicle and all your worldly possessions, everything you own?
[00:25:25] Speaker B: He tells me that God told him not to hurt me. Something about me was different, special. Not to hurt. Not this one, is what he said. And now, remember, I don't have any faith at this point in the story.
I'm thinking, he's insane. This guy is meth, dad.
[00:25:39] Speaker A: So this guy came to kill you?
[00:25:41] Speaker B: That's what I'm thinking.
[00:25:41] Speaker A: And somehow there was an intervention, and you're still here.
[00:25:44] Speaker B: Now he's telling me he's not going to hurt me because God told him not to.
[00:25:47] Speaker A: You need to count those lucky chickens, bro.
[00:25:49] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:25:50] Speaker A: And thank them.
[00:25:50] Speaker B: And he didn't. He didn't. He had me sign it over, pulled over into a park. He drove off. And that's when I was standing there going. And it wasn't until about 90 days later that I remembered all this. Right? I remembered Krazy Cameron in that moment. And, well, what I remembered first, the attic mind is pretty obsessive. Okay? So I get. I get into the program. I'm 90 days sober. I'm starting to think clearly, right? I'm feeling better. But I started thinking about that jeep, right? You know, my last possession was stolen, was taken from me. And I was pretty pissed off about Crazy Cameron, right? And I'm thinking, I gotta. I gotta get this guy. You know? Now that I'm sober 90 days, I have the whole weight of the law behind me, right? I could really let. I'm thinking grand theft auto. And I went through a list for three nights. I couldn't even sleep. I'm just thinking how I'm gonna get this guy. And I even knew how to find him, right? Facebook. So he found me.
[00:26:39] Speaker A: Easy.
[00:26:40] Speaker B: So I go down to the library and I log on to my Facebook account. I look at messenger and I see he's online. A little green dot next to his name. I'm like, I got him. And right as I'm starting to type my message, it hit me like a ton of bricks. God told me, not this one. He has a plan for you. Now, the program I'm in is a faith based twelve step recovery program, right?
[00:27:03] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:03] Speaker B: And it just hit me. And I was like, oh, God. It was God. I believe he really did tell this guy in his state, whatever his mind, right?
[00:27:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:13] Speaker B: He told him not to hurt me. And that just showed me that God was real. He'd been pursuing me probably my whole life. I was just too blind to see it. And that gift of desperation is what I needed to see it. And even then, it took 90 more days before I actually. And so all the, you know, the kind of head knowledge that I had had in those 90 days of a higher power dropped right from my head into my heart. And instead of giving him my ridiculous plan to get my car back, I wrote him a simple line. I said, thank you, Cameron, for what you did. Enjoy my jeep.
And that was it.
[00:27:48] Speaker A: Good job, bro.
[00:27:48] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Even wrote back, actually. He sent one message. He's like, wow, I'm proud of you.
[00:27:53] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh.
What a crazy story.
[00:27:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:27:57] Speaker A: If you would have told him the wrong message. You don't want to threaten. Threaten someone who is used to killing people.
[00:28:02] Speaker B: Right. Right.
[00:28:04] Speaker A: That's like a really bad thing to do. Right. And so, man, that's impressive. So as you're talking about this, I'm just kind of wondering in the back of my mind, what's the role of law enforcement in all this? Because here in Oregon, and in many other places, we've kind of started the process of decriminalization.
[00:28:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:28:22] Speaker A: Of narcotics.
[00:28:23] Speaker B: Right.
[00:28:23] Speaker A: Even states that haven't decriminalized, they're not really prosecuting at the levels they used to.
[00:28:27] Speaker B: Right.
[00:28:28] Speaker A: And, you know, as someone that was, that used to be a police officer that now does security, and I'm involved in all these different nonprofits, I always think about the scenario that I always was worried about finding myself. And as a police officer, and let's say. Let's say I'm trying to help someone that's homeless, and I go to them. I'm a police officer, right. And this. And by jurisdiction, I dealt with this very often. And I'm like, hey, you do okay tonight. What's going on? And let's say they tell me, you know what? I want to change my life. I want to get into detox. I want to do this, I want to do that. I'm going to stop all this, right?
And at the moment, they're packing up their tent, maybe some heroin in a syringe drops out or a firearm drops out. At that moment, I can no longer be that agent of transformation for them.
[00:29:20] Speaker B: Right.
[00:29:20] Speaker A: I have to be an agent of the law.
[00:29:22] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:29:23] Speaker A: Now, I don't have a clear duty to act, but I have to act.
[00:29:27] Speaker B: Right?
[00:29:28] Speaker A: And at that point, am I robbing that person of the ability to get help, to have a different life for the rest of their life?
[00:29:36] Speaker B: That's it. You put me in a difficult situation. Difficult situation. My normal answer to that isn't going to work with the way that you presented that problem. So I appreciate that challenging situation, but here's what I will say.
I've always respected law enforcement. I'm a soldier, right?
I love, I think that we need law and order. We need rules. I needed rules, you know? And I was out there using.
I was afraid of cops.
I didn't hate them. I just was afraid. I didn't want to go to jail. And so I put a lot of energy into hiding. You know, I would drive to parking garages and find places. And in Bend, it's a little different than here. In Bend, you. They will bust you, right?
[00:30:17] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:30:18] Speaker B: In 2018.
[00:30:18] Speaker A: Paradise, man.
[00:30:19] Speaker B: Yeah. They didn't mess around, and they small.
[00:30:21] Speaker A: Community, every paradise gets policed.
[00:30:23] Speaker B: But I remember coming to Portland and people were like, oh, you don't. You can just use it, even in 2018, that people like, oh, cops aren't gonna mess with you if you're shooting up in your car. They're not. And I was. I was. No, that's. I didn't believe him. So I still hit it. But I will tell you.
[00:30:36] Speaker A: So it caused more angst, and it made you work for your addiction.
[00:30:41] Speaker B: You had to work for it. It did. And it instilled some fear, personally, if the way the situation is now in Portland is, I believe it's pretty dangerous, because for me, an addict out there today where you can openly use drugs on the street and you know you're not going to get in trouble, that would have perpetuated my addiction farther and farther and farther.
[00:31:01] Speaker A: And it's an open air drug market.
[00:31:04] Speaker B: As the buzz phrase is said a lot. But I will tell you this about the Portland police. Here's a plug. Because when I was in the program in our shelter, I had a graveyard shift running the shelter. As part of being in the program, you have a job to help.
[00:31:18] Speaker A: Great shelter. I love this. I love the program.
[00:31:21] Speaker B: We like it, too. It works. It works for me.
[00:31:23] Speaker A: It does work. But one of the highest rates of success, actually, in the industry.
[00:31:26] Speaker B: Yeah. And so I'm sitting graveyard shift over the shelter, and 02:00 in the morning, I get a knock on the front door, and it's Portland police. And it was my first interaction in sobriety, is my first interaction where I didn't have anything to hide. Right. And so I opened the door, you know, what can I do for you, officer? And he said, I've got a guy here. He's pretty drunk. I picked him up. I don't want to take him to jail. Do you have a mat that you could let him? You could give him a mat.
[00:31:53] Speaker A: That's awesome.
[00:31:54] Speaker B: And I was blown away by that. I'm like, those aren't the police that I knew in my head. Right. That wasn't the image of the police that I had. And so instant respect for them. And this was 2008 to 19 at this point.
I think that today they have a really, they have a tough job. They've been hamstringed by our current policies, and I think that their role is extremely important, and I think that they do the best that they can with what. And right now because they can't prosecute using your example. Let's get back to your example, because it's a tough one.
If they were able to prosecute and they had to, let's say, if they had to, a gun's a different story. Right. But if a piece of heroin or drugs fall out today we have measure 110. It's been decriminalized, and that allows them to provide the help. Right. Overlook the drugs and provide the help. The issue as I see it is that there's not enough help out there. We haven't established. And I mean organs. What are we, the last in the nation for available drug and alcohol treatment?
[00:33:02] Speaker A: I think we're 48 when it comes to actual beds. Treatment beds, availability.
[00:33:06] Speaker B: Okay, so it's bad.
[00:33:08] Speaker A: I got that number from Tiffany Hammer.
[00:33:10] Speaker B: Okay. And that might be true. I, at one point, I know that we're one of the worst in the nation for addiction crisis and we're one of the worst in available treatment beds. And so when, when 110 was enacted, enacted, it was a good concept. Like, we can't criminalizing drugs just simply to criminalize them. It isn't really help anyone putting someone.
[00:33:30] Speaker A: In prison because they're addicted to a substance.
[00:33:33] Speaker B: Right.
[00:33:34] Speaker A: That doesn't make sense.
[00:33:35] Speaker B: No, it doesn't. And I spend a lot of time in courtrooms now advocating for guys to keep them out of jail and put them into our treatment program. And, you know, the judges, they don't want to put people in jail.
[00:33:45] Speaker A: In fact, I think, you know, the last time I was with the DA and we discussed this, it used to be prior to measure 110, almost 90% of pure, you know, narcotics persecute prosecutions. Right. Ended up in some type of what was, what is called a golden handcuffs program.
[00:34:08] Speaker B: Right.
[00:34:08] Speaker A: Where you're using the threat of prosecution to get someone in treatment.
[00:34:11] Speaker B: Right.
[00:34:12] Speaker A: And most of the, most of the people, at least in Oregon, that are serving time for drugs, it's because they threw away the gun charge or they threw away the person crime, the assault that was there. And so the only thing they were left with was a drug charge.
Right. Because they couldn't prove that he actually put the gun to her head. Because that, that the. You don't have a cooperating witness or you don't have a cooperating victim. Sure. But, yeah, almost always, especially in Oregon, prior to 110, a lot of these programs were, you know, fully were running because of this type of.
[00:34:46] Speaker B: We had a drug court in Multnomah county. And for the life of me, I don't know why that went away. I mean, drug court is, is a really good deterrent that will actually get people into treatment rather than jail. But the problem is, is that we don't have a deter, a legal deterrent for drugs on our streets. And I can tell you from experience, that's as if I was an active addict. I would love being in Portland because I could just use and use and use. And there's no legal deterrent. I think it's a combination. There has to be available, a soft hand to help and with compassion. But you also have to have deterrence through the law to keep people from killing themselves and harming them. People around in the properties, I mean, we're in a real mess right now. We've seen the numbers. We've all watched the news exposes on measure 110. And, you know, out of 4000 tickets, less than 1% actually took the treatment option. And it's a good thing because let's say 60% had said yes to treatment. There's not enough treatment for them.
[00:35:49] Speaker A: Where are we going to send them?
[00:35:50] Speaker B: Right, right. Our beds are full.
[00:35:52] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, we just. The nonprofit that I chair, we only have three employees, and we were able to transition 176 people last month. 161. We were unable to transfer.
[00:36:04] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:36:05] Speaker A: Or transition because we had, there were no available beds at a shelter or detox.
[00:36:09] Speaker B: Believe that.
[00:36:10] Speaker A: And, you know, the only, the only 24 hours or seven day a week detox facility that you can go to at any moment isn't even here. It's in Washington state.
[00:36:19] Speaker B: Right.
[00:36:19] Speaker A: We have to drive people to other state.
[00:36:21] Speaker B: Right.
[00:36:22] Speaker A: And in our most dire circumstance. Right.
[00:36:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:36:25] Speaker A: And so I want to transition again. Is that okay?
[00:36:28] Speaker B: Yeah, it's your show.
[00:36:29] Speaker A: Hey, you know, it's our show. That's your show. Right. So when it comes to the nonprofit world, right.
I think that. I think that we're learning something new, and I think that you're part of this learning curve. Right. I think it used to be prior to these new, how shall I say it, dynamics that are in play. Right. The lack of enforcement because of measure 110. Right. All these new dynamics, I think that the current model that many nonprofits employ, no longer as effective as it used to be. I'll give you an example. Just in your story alone, you said, hey, I was working the night shift at this nonprofit that you're now the executive director for, and a police officer stopped by and had someone, you know, hey, come on. Yeah. Can you have a bed available? Without that enforcement piece, it's difficult for individuals to self refer themselves right into a program.
[00:37:29] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:37:30] Speaker A: And so I, we, in my world, I call this the field of dreams model.
Right. It's like in the nineties, because of all these mechanisms, the prosecution, the prose, the DA's office and law enforcement, you were constantly getting referrals, even from hospitals. Right. But because of liability issues, hospitals, everyone's worried about liability.
You know, hospitals aren't taking as many people as they used to because of COVID Right.
Because of all this. I think what I've seen in the past three or four years is that I go to talk to people on the street, and I'm like, hey, when's the last time someone talked to you about getting into a program? Shelter, detox? And they're like, oh, gosh, never. Three months, six months.
[00:38:15] Speaker B: Yeah, a lot.
[00:38:16] Speaker A: And so the field of dreams model essentially tells people on the street, hey, when you can gather up enough self worth and you can gather up enough self agency. Right. And you're not high, why don't you abandon your tent and all your worldly possessions?
[00:38:34] Speaker B: Mm hmm.
[00:38:35] Speaker A: Go steal a shopping cart.
Push the shopping cart back 2030 minutes to your tent. Hopefully you have a couple things left.
[00:38:43] Speaker B: Mm hmm.
[00:38:44] Speaker A: Gather everything you own and put it in that stolen shopping cart, and then push it around town, and hopefully you'll find a place that'll take you. You get in line, maybe you wait five, 6 hours, you got a 50 50 chance you get a shelter that night.
[00:38:57] Speaker B: Right.
[00:38:58] Speaker A: When I ask people, hey, if you wanted to go somewhere right now and get into treatment, where would you go? If you had a shopping cart and you were. And you get, oh, well, maybe this place.
And people don't. They don't know what to do. And so I don't think there's. I think that this field of dreams model, where we just build this great facility, and everyone sits up in their office. Right. Waiting for people to show up. I think that needs to change.
[00:39:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:26] Speaker A: I think that we need to focus on street teams. And I know that you do this, and I know I don't want to plug your event, but you do. You do an event regularly, and you're one of the very few nonprofits that does this, right. You're on the streets regularly, every week. Every week. Contacting people, trying to get them into shelters.
[00:39:43] Speaker B: Right.
[00:39:43] Speaker A: Why aren't more people doing this?
[00:39:45] Speaker B: Yeah, I think. I don't know why. I can tell you that. It's a lot of work.
[00:39:50] Speaker A: It is a lot of work.
[00:39:52] Speaker B: It costs money.
We depend on volunteers weekly to show up, to run the event, and then from there, logistically, well, the magic is the consistency. Right. We figured out early, and I wasn't even a part of it when it started. This thing's been going on for 20 years, but it was the consistently showing up at the same place at the same time every week for 20 years. The houseless community knows that we're there. They know that they can come get basic services. There's a meal.
[00:40:26] Speaker A: Haircut.
[00:40:26] Speaker B: Haircut. Right, right. And you can get these things anywhere. I mean, Portland's the easiest place in the entire nation to get these kind of services. But what's different about this particular event is that we sit down and we create an environment for community. And the outreach workers or my staff and the volunteers can sit down and create community building trust, learning stories of these individuals. And we're not going to get people into treatment or into shelters every single night. But they know that we're there, and they know that we're connected to a shelter and treatment, and those are available. So maybe the first ten times that someone's down there, they're going to say no or not be ready, but when they are, we'll be there.
