[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 guests 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 the community.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Eric Cole. I'm the director of the Revitalize Portland Coalition. We're the voice of the commercial real estate industry in the Portland region, trying to make our city a better place to live and work.
I'm excited to be here today to get out and ride along and see what's happening in the streets. We care about issues like homelessness, and there's no better way to address that than to really see what's going on.
[00:01:15] Speaker A: Hey, I'm Alex Stone. Welcome back to the ride along. Our guest today, Eric Cole. Eric, introduce yourself.
[00:01:21] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Eric Cole. I'm the director of the Revitalize Portland Coalition, which is a coalition of commercial real estate interests trying to restore Portland, make it even brighter economic future.
[00:01:34] Speaker A: Awesome. So tell us a little bit about your background. We know that you're from Nashville, and I know how to say it's Nashville. It's not Nashville. Right. Other than that, give us a little story and history about where you come from.
[00:01:47] Speaker B: Sure. So, yeah, I'm from Nashville, Tennessee. It's where I was born and raised. Actually. My dad is from out here, from Portland itself. So it's kind of a full circle that I live here now. Yeah, my background is in government and local government, but also in that kind of intersection between where nonprofits and government institutions meet. I've done a lot of work on homelessness over the years, low income issues, poverty, affordable housing.
I feel like a lot of my work is always about networking and bringing different stakeholders to the table to work towards common goals.
Here, I'm doing that from the business side, whereas in the past, I was either in the mayor's office in Nashville or in a nonprofit role.
[00:02:34] Speaker A: And you were actually an elected official.
I was. You didn't mention that.
[00:02:39] Speaker B: I know. I call myself a reformed or a recovering politician.
[00:02:43] Speaker A: Sounds good. Can you actually reform from that? Is that.
[00:02:47] Speaker B: That's a great question, actually, no. There are certain things that leave scars your whole life, but, yeah. I was a city council member in Nashville for two terms, served as chair of the budget and finance committee. And it was actually in that service that the mayor asked me to help spearhead a mayoral committee or commission on homelessness, and I couldn't say no. And so I've kind of worked on that issue ever since.
[00:03:12] Speaker A: Wow, that's a really hard issue to connect yourself with.
[00:03:16] Speaker B: It is.
[00:03:17] Speaker A: Could you tell us some truths from that time at Nashville that you just walked away with knowing, wow, this is what homelessness is really about?
[00:03:29] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. I think that the first thing I learned was that old adage there, but by the grace of God go I. Meaning that I saw, as I met folks that were living on the street or had lived experience in different rooms, that their circumstances, their situations were not that much different from me. I had certain stability and certain things in my upbringing that certainly were privileges, but they had had one or two or three bad things happen and really understanding and getting to know that issue. Meeting a woman. I met a woman once in our family shelter who had three graduate degrees, bless her heart, and she had two kids, and she was saddled with debt, but she also was super intelligent. It's just the pieces hadn't fallen together for her. So, anyway, that was the real thing I took away. Also, I worked with a lot of really committed people, and there are tons of committed people working on the issue of homelessness.
I quickly kind of figured out, though, that not everybody was working well together and that we didn't have much of a weaved, woven system. We had a whole bunch of different individual programs operating.
[00:04:49] Speaker A: And this is back in Nashville.
[00:04:50] Speaker B: Yeah, that was back in Nashville. And so I felt like part of my role and part of the local government's role was to try to align and really prioritize how we were treating this really big societal issue.
[00:05:05] Speaker A: So kind of acting as a catalyst to create community on a small level, to serve the community on a big level.
[00:05:13] Speaker B: Wow, that's better said than I could say it.
[00:05:15] Speaker A: Well, I don't get paid to do this, but I should.
[00:05:19] Speaker B: Yeah, I think what we realized was funding decisions were kind of happening the way they'd always happened. Right.
[00:05:30] Speaker A: Explain the sausage making.
[00:05:32] Speaker B: Okay, I'll try. I mean, in this case, you get this big bunch of money that comes from know federally. I'm just talking about the federal money.
[00:05:40] Speaker A: The Department of Housing.
[00:05:42] Speaker B: Thank you. Housing and Urban Development. That's right. And for every community, they know block grants, basically, that they provide, and then the community has some role in deciding how those are distributed.
Largely, when things get done a certain way, they just stay that way. And so what I kind of walked into was we didn't really have an independent governance process, and so I was fortunate enough to be asked to kind of get in the middle of that and lead it by some of the stakeholders. Not all the stakeholders liked that, because the way it had always been done meant that their funding continued. Right. But in order to innovate, in order to take on new challenges. So Nashville was facing a huge increase in youth homelessness.
One provider. Right?
[00:06:32] Speaker A: One provider for the juvenile youth.
[00:06:34] Speaker B: Oh, wow. Yeah.
[00:06:35] Speaker A: In the entire city?
[00:06:36] Speaker B: In the entire city, yeah.
[00:06:37] Speaker A: And that's for sheltering housing.
[00:06:39] Speaker B: That's right. They were literally doing sheltering in the back of their building on the coldest nights.
[00:06:45] Speaker A: How many beds?
[00:06:46] Speaker B: I think the max was twelve. Yeah.
[00:06:48] Speaker A: And so I would imagine you have at least 100 to 200 homeless youth.
[00:06:54] Speaker B: Oh, easily. Easily for what we could count. And as you know, probably more than that. Couchsurfing or across the, you know, same vulnerabilities that we see in every population. But I think the other thing in Nashville is like shelter and services.
The funding is so threat, it's so little. It's all from private or philanthropic or faith based entities. So we had very little public money going into it, so we would really only do our most active work when we had bad weather. So I ended up standing up a cold weather shelter for a week one year during an ice storm. I mean, I worked in the mayor's office. I didn't know what I was doing, but we had to, basically to save people's lives. But it was at that point that I ended up with four homeless youth in the back of my car driving them to the shelter.
[00:07:50] Speaker A: I've been there.
[00:07:51] Speaker B: Yeah. Because they couldn't be in the congregate shelter because basically they were being discriminated. Anyway, I don't mean to go off on that tangent, but I think that's what I learned was it's kind of, you do what you've got, you do what you can with the resources you've got in front of you, but you always think about, couldn't we do this better? Couldn't we have more of an impact if we're looking further upstream?
[00:08:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
The parallel I draw to the homeless issue is cancer. And you might not ever get cancer or experience homelessness as an individual, but it's very likely that someone in your family will go through that during your lifetime. And it's the connectivity to that individual experience within your own familial system or community that can draw someone into better understanding that this isn't a lot of time. What leads to homelessness is circumstantial. People don't really choose it.
[00:08:54] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:08:54] Speaker A: People might end up living in that space because they've become inured to it.
They create an immunity for themselves, and it becomes just a part of life being homeless. But the actual deep dive into that experience is usually unwanted. Almost always.
[00:09:17] Speaker B: Yeah, no, I think that's right. I think that's right.
I think getting to that individual person's set of needs and addressing the things that are in front of them is our challenge. Right. But if we have the resources, we ought to be able to do that. The other thing, though, is we looked around at one point, and we would have high users of the system, folks that were experiencing homelessness, that had six or seven case managers that they never saw. Right. And the case managers, they would see.
[00:09:53] Speaker A: Each one once a year.
[00:09:55] Speaker B: Yeah. Or maybe they had a touch point with that person and then they were gone.
So one of the simple things that we started to do, and this came from. Well, was case conferencing. Right. Just know, because in Nashville, you've got all these different providers, and they're all their own organization and nonprofit. They aren't necessarily talking to one another. They might meet up in our coalition meetings or in governance meetings, but that's not like case review. And so I think that's where that networking and that building community and trust between the providers, and then technology can be huge in serving the system overall.
Again, not super easy, but I think if you can create some of that shared space and shared activity. I mean, I went on, I was in Phoenix for four years, and that was the bulk of the work we were doing there, which was to put together as many of these disparate programs as we possibly could. And in those two cities, you have less that are run by the government than you do here. And so you would think kind of run by the government under one roof, there would be a little bit better ability, certainly to pull, certainly to kind of create that space. But I've learned that's not necessarily the case.
[00:11:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm going to ask an obvious question.
[00:11:14] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:11:14] Speaker A: Is that okay?
So in Houston, I worked with youth and also adult homeless, and I've experienced homelessness. It's my overall experience that there's always going to be tension between the private sector and the public sector.
And so getting those two to work together where you're. I mean, let's not even go to daily standups, but weekly standups. Right. Is there a path forward in a city like Portland where we can actually have a great workability between those two mean? What does that look?
[00:11:58] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I hear mean. I think there is. I think it's why I was pleased to move here and be able to take on this challenge, because I feel like there are more resources at hand than either of the two places I've been previously.
And this is what's interesting. I mean, our coalition is 25 different commercial real estate associations and businesses echelon.
[00:12:23] Speaker A: Full disclosure, we were members, and we're.
[00:12:26] Speaker B: Always looking for more businesses and individuals to join us. What blew me away was the level of compassion and kind of understanding among the business leaders that I met with. They were frustrated that they didn't feel like they were heard or their issues were important to elected officials, but they weren't, as a group, turning towards greater criminalization. Lock everybody up, or just some of the things you see in towns or cities where they try to move the problem out of sight. I mean, I really didn't experience any of that here. I really have experienced our leaders saying, okay, we want to get to the bottom of this thing. We want to help. How can we help? How can we be part of the solution? And that's awesome.
[00:13:19] Speaker A: More of an integrated, holistic approach.
[00:13:22] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:13:22] Speaker A: And there is a place for law enforcement.
[00:13:25] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:13:26] Speaker A: And people who commit crimes have to suffer the consequences of those crimes.
[00:13:31] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:13:31] Speaker A: But healing a social ill, that's not.
[00:13:36] Speaker B: The place of the criminal in our commission. And the work we did in Nashville, we intentionally put a member of the police department on the commission.
[00:13:45] Speaker A: Oh, that's great.
[00:13:45] Speaker C: Right?
[00:13:46] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:13:47] Speaker B: The best results we had were when we had a deputy chief who was also a big time data nerd, who really dug into the repeat arrests that they were tired of. Right. The quality of life arrests they were doing downtown, a lot of public urination, public drunk trespass.
[00:14:09] Speaker A: Back in Nashville.
[00:14:10] Speaker B: This is back in Nashville. Thank you.
[00:14:11] Speaker A: Which is amazing. Now, I go there all the time. I'm going there in May for a conference, echelon front conference. And I love Nashville. They're always going to have problems, but Nashville does it better than most.
[00:14:22] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, Nashville's interesting because you have a lot of people that come to Nashville to make their dreams. I mean, that is a stereotype, but it's also true.
[00:14:29] Speaker A: It's a new Hollywood.
[00:14:30] Speaker B: Sure. But I think it in Austin similarly. And there's a great economy in the cultural sector, but you still can fall through the cracks. And there are lots of country singers, for instance, that will talk about their time living on the street or down on Music row. But the police were important to us from a data perspective. And also with them and the sheriff's office, we're also realizing the price tag of what repeat he did a chronic offenders list, and we found a guy that had over 400 arrests.
[00:15:04] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:15:05] Speaker B: In one year, that's more than one a day. Yeah, seriously, it's more than one per day.
The cycle in the jail was something everybody knew, and it was kind of this repeat situation. So that was a place where it was like, okay, how can we then use limited city dollars and private dollars and kind of leverage that workforce and try to work at it away? And one of the big proponents of our work there was our downtown bid, the business improvement district for downtown. They actually hired outreach workers. I mean, that happens a lot nowadays. But then it was kind of very innovative.
[00:15:53] Speaker A: We're just now getting to that here now.
[00:15:55] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. And so suddenly you've got outreach teams.
[00:15:59] Speaker A: Doing direct access, direct services to the homeless population on the street, which is what we do here all the time as a private entity.
[00:16:07] Speaker B: One of the first things they did was check everybody's eligibility for Social Security and for ten care on the street. On the street, yeah.
[00:16:16] Speaker A: And they should be handing out ids, full wraparound service on the street. That's what's required.
[00:16:23] Speaker B: I think the other thing going back.
[00:16:25] Speaker A: To that, I just call it meeting people where they are.
[00:16:27] Speaker B: It is. It's meeting people where they are. But then it's also recognizing that our system itself is extraordinarily complex. And know, I had friends. I had a friend who was a lawyer who tried to help. We had a fantastic newspaper written by homeless individuals in Nashville called a contributor. And people would build relationships with their vendor. Right. So this friend tried to help that person get their id. Well, he realized he didn't have his Social Security card. Right. So this is a lawyer. Right. This is very smart individual. And he would call me and say, eric, another week has gone by.
I am trying to figure out how to navigate this, and it is taking months.
And so you kind of realize that we make the system really difficult for people that are trying to recover and get out of it, and that's something we can also do something about.
So anyway, I think. But the start is to understand that and then to have folks that help navigate through that system.
[00:17:32] Speaker A: So to jump forward, you took over the executive directorship of Revitalized Portland Coalition.
Explain exactly what that entity is and how you're going to leverage that entity to achieve success in Portland.
[00:17:47] Speaker B: Sure. So, yeah, the coalition was founded by Jordan Snitzer. Great guy, Snitzer properties, incorporated, who, basically.
[00:17:56] Speaker A: Full disclosure, that's a.
[00:17:58] Speaker B: Sure, sure. And he's my employer and has done an enormous amount of things for the city of Portland his whole life. He cares deeply, very much about this city. Great guy. And so most of his philanthropic work is in the arts and culture. Obviously, his parents were extraordinary public figures in the city of Portland. But basically, at the end of 2022, he gave a speech to a group of assembled realtors at an annual breakfast and kind of just said everything that everybody was thinking, which he's really good at doing. Yes, he speaks his mind quite well, and he did. And he just kind of laid out the case for businesses coming together, but particularly the commercial real estate industry coming together and saying, hey, we are here to help. We have seen a better economic situation in Portland, but we also see a brighter future.
Let us sit the table, like, let us come in and get, you know, they started dealing with gnarly issues. Homelessness, public safety, crime, economic development. I mean, really took on these issues and just started organizing themselves into, okay, what are the ways we can get involved and make a difference? I come along with my background in public policy and in coalition building and in kind of advocacy. And so that's really where we've tried to push, is to hold accountability, hold elected officials accountability, to understand where the roadblocks are. That's not always obvious, but then ultimately, it's to assemble our business leaders, our real estate leaders, our community leaders together to try to really focus on solving these problems. If we don't have an action plan that we're executing as a whole or as a large group, it's going to be really difficult to make progress. And so that's part of what we've tried to do, is really to be that voice for the commercial real estate industry in the courthouse, in city hall, here in Portland, at the multinoma County Commission, which is very important, and then also at the state House as well. And what we have pulled together is about 10,000 people among our members and our member organizations. And so we speak, I think, with a pretty powerful voice, where we're raising up these issues that people face day in and day out and day in and day out of harm to their property, of dangerous situations in their neighborhoods, of all of these quality of life challenges that add up to the economic crisis that we're in and the humanitarian crisis that we're in. So, yeah, we've kind of shown up at the table and said, hey, we're here to help. We've got some solutions in some of the spaces that our folks have pulled together that I think are innovative and could make a difference.
But at the end of the day, we're at a place where we've got to act. There's got to be a sense of urgency here locally because we're quickly getting to a place where I think some of the damage is irreversible.
[00:21:14] Speaker A: Yeah. And people ask me, in fact, I had a meeting with a new client yesterday, very heavily invested in commercial real estate, as that's my purview, and asked know, and I get this more now this year than ever before.
Alex, what is the future of Portland?
[00:21:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:21:37] Speaker A: And we're in other cities. We're in Colorado, New Mexico, whatever. California. Right. We're all over. And I'm getting this question in the Bay Area, Albuquerque, Denver, Seattle, and for Portland, unfortunately, I'm becoming more and more, I believe it's becoming more and more apparent that we're entering into a road more towards 1980s Detroit, where this could be a generational turnaround if we don't do this quickly.
And so it appears that you're taking that integrative, catalytic approach here. Tell us about some things that are coming up that people, because we're going to release this next week.
Tell us some things that people can do here locally where they can join, where they can get a hold of you become part of the RPC. Right. Revitalize Portland coalition and any events you have coming up.
[00:22:34] Speaker B: Okay, great.
Yeah. So our kind of big focus right now is on public safety and crime. We've got a big statewide discussion happening about measure 110.
[00:22:45] Speaker A: Explain measure 110 to the people who aren't aware.
[00:22:48] Speaker B: I will do my best. Measure 110 is a voter approved referendum that basically legalized the possession and use of the harder drugs as well as the lighter drugs here in.
[00:23:05] Speaker A: And just to be a little lighthearted.
[00:23:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:23:08] Speaker A: I wish they would have put claritin D on that descheduling list. In Oregon, you have to have a prescription to get claritin d, which if you don't know oregon is horrible for allergies. They make you go to a doctor to get a prescription to get, to buy claritin D. But yet, because it's a precursor to making meth in, like a mobile lab that they would do, like in the can actually go and get meth and smoke meth on the street legally. But you can't get claritin d without a.
[00:23:39] Speaker B: It's just, it's, it's silly.
So we've got a crime and safety committee. We have property managers. We have employees. We have neighborhood organizations. All the downtown neighborhood organizations have kind of been in alignment with us that we have not seen any accountability around. Property crimes, smashed windows, graffiti.
Yes, they are lower scale, lower level.
[00:24:05] Speaker A: Even lower level theft.
[00:24:06] Speaker B: Even lower level theft. Bicycle theft. That's right. Even cars, I think. And we have not had prosecutions happening in that space. We obviously have very limited resources in law enforcement.
And so that is an alarm bell for our companies. Right. I mean, yes, it affects their bottom line, but it also affects the quality of life for our residents and for our tenants and for our businesses. I mean, the number one reason people have not returned to work downtown, if you ask them why you don't come downtown to go to your office, is safety. I mean, that's not a challenge in a lot of these other cities that have tried to recover, that are recovering. Right. So that's another issue we can do something about. So our committee has pulled together with our biggest member, the NAOP, which is the commercial real estate association, an event on March 5 from four to six at the armory.
We're calling it onward, the future of law enforcement and crime in the tri county region. We'll have the police chief Bob day. We'll have commissioner Renee Gonzalez from the city council. We'll have county Commissioner Sharon Myron from the county. And then we'll have Nathan Vasquez, who's assistant DA right now but is running for the district attorney's seat in Multnoma county. So that's a great event. We'd love for people to turn out and show up.
[00:25:39] Speaker A: That is on March 5.
[00:25:40] Speaker B: March 5.
[00:25:41] Speaker A: 04:00 p.m. To 06:00 p.m. At the armory. At the armory. And that is a building that is no longer an actual armory for all those out there.
[00:25:49] Speaker C: Right.
[00:25:49] Speaker A: It's an event center.
[00:25:50] Speaker B: It's an event center. That's right. But right in the heart of the pearl, we walk what we talk right with local events. But the idea here is accountability. It's to put those same four leaders in the room, tell us how they're working together, tell us what they need, honestly, like, what else needs to happen. We tried very hard to get the incumbent district attorney to join us, and he refused. So that's unfortunate. We would love for him to be able to speak to our audience. We think it's really important, but he opted not to do that. So other things that folks can do. Our website is revitalizeportland.com. So check that out. We're on LinkedIn and Instagram as well, and they can reach out to me. It's just
[email protected]. We'll hook you up onto our mailing list. We try to send out alerts for different issues that are going on. And we do have a wide range of issues. I mean, we just got finished working and advocating for the city to lower regulations on creating new residential housing. Right. Because we know that pipeline in process is very slow.
So we try to advocate on those different types of issues all the time, basically, so they can connect with us and get involved, join one of our committees or part of it. We just help educate, and we try to give people the ammunition they need to kind of understand what's happening. This is a crucial, crucial year, 2024. We've got major elections happening. The city council, our whole form of government is changing. But you've also got two seats, two open seats that are in the county commission. Those players make a huge bit of difference in these issues. And so that's the other thing is we encourage folks to stay involved, to run for office. There's still time to file and register, but to really understand those candidates and then hold our platform of issues and our expectations up in front of them. So we're in the process of working on that, which is the slate of issues that we care about as commercial real estate leaders and the things we think that the next county commission and city council should take on so that we can put that in front of the candidates as they're filing, pushing those legislative efforts. Yeah, legislative, administrative. I mean, in some cases, there's lots of things that they can.
[00:28:25] Speaker A: It's just an executive decision.
[00:28:27] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:28:27] Speaker A: Or a council vote or commission vote.
[00:28:29] Speaker B: That's right. I learned inside government that sometimes the best actions that can happen are not even legislative. They're trying to make department heads or departments work more closely together. Right. Not cutting or necessarily firing people, but having your permitting really closely working with your planning department.
[00:28:53] Speaker A: Integration.
[00:28:54] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:28:55] Speaker A: Integration. Innovation.
[00:28:56] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right.
[00:28:58] Speaker A: Eric Cole, thanks for joining the studio portion of the ride along. I appreciate you coming in studio for this, because this is an issue that we both deeply care about.
[00:29:06] Speaker B: It is.
[00:29:07] Speaker A: We're going to go get informed.
[00:29:09] Speaker B: I'm very excited.
[00:29:10] Speaker A: The way we get informed is we hit the we, this is not the field of dreams. We're not going to build it. And you don't have to come and find us. We're going to go hit the streets of Portland, and we're going to find you, we're going to get your feedback, and we're going to ask people on the street what you want from us.
[00:29:26] Speaker C: That's great.
[00:29:26] Speaker A: You ready?
[00:29:27] Speaker B: Way to do it.
[00:29:27] Speaker A: Let's do it.
[00:29:28] Speaker B: All right, we'll catch you later.
[00:29:30] Speaker D: Great.
[00:29:41] Speaker A: People parked really close, so during the filming of ride along, we don't break any traffic laws.
[00:29:49] Speaker D: Oh, got you.
[00:29:50] Speaker B: That's the way it is normally, though, too. Never break traffic law.
[00:29:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
What you said.
What brought you up to Portland? How did you find out about revitalize?
[00:30:02] Speaker B: Actually, my wife got a job in the pearl running the arts college, the Pacific Northwest College of Arts. So she actually runs a property here in downtown.
[00:30:14] Speaker A: And that's the neighborhood we're currently in, right?
[00:30:16] Speaker B: Yep. So, yeah, that was how I connected with the revitalize effort was through her coming to the city.
[00:30:24] Speaker A: Perfect. And so right now we're going to meet Michael Bach.
Bach is the director of patrol and investigative services. He runs nationally all the investigations that we conduct. But for Oregon, he's in charge of all patrol.
[00:30:43] Speaker B: Oh, okay.
[00:30:44] Speaker A: And so you've probably seen him on, he does national news shows, stuff like that. Oh, yeah.
[00:30:51] Speaker B: Was he the one featured in the York Times? Yeah.
Which got great attention, by the way.
[00:30:57] Speaker A: Yeah, he's solid, does great work.
Really good guy. We're going to meet up with him. He's going to jump in and then we're going to go.
[00:31:06] Speaker B: Okay, fantastic.
[00:31:20] Speaker A: So we're here on the ride along and we're meeting up with Michael Baugh, director, and he's actually driving resources right now, which I'm sure, you know, is very critical.
It helps open dialogue, meeting needs with real people in the street, real time.
[00:31:42] Speaker B: So you bring along stuff that you starts to build that relationship and that rapport that leads to trust.
[00:31:49] Speaker D: That's great.
[00:31:51] Speaker B: There he is.
[00:31:54] Speaker A: What's up, brother?
Take your time.
Where am I going?
[00:32:03] Speaker C: Just go south.
[00:32:04] Speaker B: I don't care where.
[00:32:06] Speaker C: You'll find something.
Hey, Eric, we just met, man. Tell me, what are you about? What do you do? What's going on in your world?
[00:32:15] Speaker B: Sure thing.
Yeah, I work with a lot of the companies, probably that y'all serve. We created a couple years ago, a coalition of real estate interests and companies working to turn around downtown to return Portland to its brighter days and to really focus on economic rejuvenation in the city.
[00:32:42] Speaker C: Awesome.
Brighter days. Yeah. I would tend to agree that Portland has had its brighter days.
[00:32:50] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:32:51] Speaker C: When I was in college, I used to remember coming down here at any hour of the night that I wanted with groups of people, and we would go to various spots, grabbing coffee or whatever.
And during that time, there was no risk, there was no threat. We just walk around, just go visit with people. Just go be you walking around on brick sidewalks and call.
[00:33:13] Speaker B: I know, not what it used to be. It's not. I was telling these guys, my dad was born out here, so we would come and visit family pretty regularly, and we always came downtown.
You didn't have, really a destination. Just go walk around, enjoy.
You know, I just think the livability in Portland is one of our big selling points.
[00:33:35] Speaker A: Right?
[00:33:36] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:33:36] Speaker B: And that's really hurt. These last few.
We're I lobby, and then we also are advocates at the city and the county and the state level as well for some focused action to see things turn the.
[00:33:53] Speaker C: I was talking to an apartment complex maintenance man recently. He's somebody I interact with on a regular basis.
[00:33:59] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:34:00] Speaker C: And he was talking about curb appeal. And I think Portland has greatly lost its curb appeal.
The flowers don't bloom.
The safety is a concern.
There's lots and lots and lots of issues that people who are down here every day are struggling with. And it goes way beyond just the. Right in front of your face, that sort of problem. Like fentanyl. Although fentanyl and violence are so huge and overwhelming, they are big components of a problem. Like the gentleman next to us who's currently smoking fentanyl.
There's so many components to this that it's like the curb appeal.
Why would people want to be in an environment that is so toxic unless there are significant efforts made to make change in that regard?
[00:34:54] Speaker B: No, you're right.
Part of our coalition is not just the owners, but also, as you say, the property managers, the engineers, the folks that run the properties day in and day out. And they kind of feel like their voice has not really been heard by the governmental officials or other folks in charge because they're cleaning up the trash, they're dealing with the hazardous materials, they're seeing the impact on their tenants of dangerous situations, frankly. And we have several that are really compassionate.
They literally come to us or want to know how to refer people to get help and resources. Their main priorities, they're building. Right. But they really want to provide some solutions and some help in the process.
[00:35:49] Speaker C: Yeah, no doubt, no doubt.
That's a long standing problem or modus operandi of many people down here. They have good hearts and they want to help.
[00:36:01] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:36:02] Speaker C: But ultimately, if you make the situation unlivable, if you make the situation not profitable, then they've got no profits left to give to other people to help them. It's not about one ideology or another, but if you're going to make somebody choose between a thriving location and not, I know where they're going to go.
[00:36:20] Speaker B: That's right. Yeah.
[00:36:21] Speaker C: Well, when you talk about, like, advocacy, I mean, obviously I know what advocacy means, but can you absolutely put some legs on that?
[00:36:32] Speaker B: So one of our focuses is crime and public safety, and that's how we try to interact with the police bureau, with city council, with the mayor's office, as well as clean and safe and the other entities that are working on enforcing the laws in Portland.
It's interesting. A lot of our folks kind of came together and said, look, we see all these problems.
First few times I met with them, it was a group gripe session. Right. A lot of blowing off steam about anger. A lot of anger, yeah, a lot of frustration. And a lot of that came from not knowing what was going on, from not understanding, asking who's actually in charge? Or are we getting the accountability? Are we able to hold our elected officials accountable? So a lot of what we did was just kind of start digging into. Okay, we just started researching the issues and finding out that a lot of crimes and issues that happen downtown are not getting charged. Right. And that's a real frustration, I think, for our owners. I know you see that all the time.
[00:37:42] Speaker A: All the time. Yeah. They got to the point where they were literally only doing lot going. There's a lot there.
[00:37:52] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a lot.
What we try to do is untangle that tough issue and try to find some ways we can poke the bear and make it a little bit better in different places, from the DA's office to the PPB's office to the governor's office, even. Right.
[00:38:13] Speaker A: So we have an ambulance going by running code.
[00:38:18] Speaker B: We're getting waves.
[00:38:20] Speaker A: All right, so we're here at. This is our resource center for the nonprofit.
[00:38:24] Speaker B: Oh, for loving one another.
[00:38:25] Speaker A: Yeah, I figured we could talk to a couple of people here, get their opinion.
[00:38:30] Speaker B: Sounds good.
[00:38:31] Speaker A: Going to knock to see if the answer.
[00:38:36] Speaker C: How's it going, fellas? You guys doing okay out here?
[00:38:40] Speaker A: Chilly?
[00:38:40] Speaker C: You guys cold?
You need a what now?
[00:38:47] Speaker A: What's up, y'all? Have y'all seen Spence? Spencer, y'all seen your pocket for the nonprofit? Right here?
[00:38:56] Speaker C: That's pretty funny, actually. That's pretty funny.
[00:39:02] Speaker A: Hey, do you know Spencer? He runs the nonprofit here. Okay.
[00:39:07] Speaker C: I'm Michael, man.
Good.
[00:39:09] Speaker B: I'm Eric. I'm just here with Michael.
[00:39:12] Speaker A: I'm Alex.
[00:39:12] Speaker C: If you guys need anything, you're right outside loa, right?
[00:39:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:39:17] Speaker C: Have you guys spoke with Spencer yet at.
[00:39:23] Speaker B: G?
[00:39:24] Speaker A: Hey, we're out doing a documentary today about homelessness. And this is Eric Cole. Eric used to be on city council in Nashville, Tennessee, and he runs a nonprofit called Revitalized Portland. Would you be willing to talk to him about what it's like to live on the street?
[00:39:38] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:39:42] Speaker A: 30 days.
[00:39:42] Speaker B: 30 days.
[00:39:43] Speaker A: What led to you being on the street?
[00:39:47] Speaker D: Come on.
[00:39:47] Speaker A: Yeah. I love you.
Are you from Portland?
[00:39:55] Speaker D: No, I'm not.
I'm born and raised in Michigan, but I came here from Washington.
[00:40:01] Speaker A: Okay. From Washington state.
[00:40:03] Speaker D: And I was homeless there also.
[00:40:05] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:07] Speaker D: But I'm married now. My wife, I have a son, and we moved out of Portland. And I wasn't homeless. I had a job and everything, but the problem I lived in was really cracking. Rats. Everybody in my house got bit, and even a baby. They really come for babies the most.
[00:40:25] Speaker A: Really? Yeah.
[00:40:27] Speaker D: Like a lion can't get the big dip. You can get a little dip.
[00:40:32] Speaker C: That's rough.
[00:40:33] Speaker B: So the apartment conditions were rough.
[00:40:36] Speaker C: Terrible.
[00:40:36] Speaker D: I lost my job because I didn't want to go to sleep at night.
At night I got out of it. Somebody like her, african family members came and got her, and then I went with her. Now we married. And, yeah, I was doing good, but everybody thought I was lying myself, biting me and everything.
I don't think people really believe me. That's why I was joking.
[00:41:05] Speaker A: And so you went from an apartment to a shelter, and then eventually you got kicked out of the shelter.
[00:41:11] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:41:12] Speaker A: What happened with that? Can you talk about that?
[00:41:16] Speaker D: I walked to the store, and somebody gave us the beer, and I didn't drink the beer. I just opened it.
[00:41:23] Speaker A: But it's drug free.
So they kicked you off for having a beer, and you've been on the streets for 30 days, and this is probably the roughest time to be homeless. It's winter in Portland.
[00:41:37] Speaker C: It's wet, cold, and rainy.
[00:41:39] Speaker A: How are you making it at night?
[00:41:40] Speaker D: Yeah, easy.
I got a little fire, some visible ventilation, so I'll get smoked out. And two sleeping bags.
[00:41:54] Speaker B: So if you could say to folks that are in charge, what would be helpful? What would help you? If you had something to say to, like, the mayor or the city council, what would you tell them?
[00:42:08] Speaker D: I didn't even talk about that deep.
[00:42:11] Speaker B: I know.
[00:42:16] Speaker A: Has anyone come by and offer to you services?
[00:42:18] Speaker D: No, because I just picked up the second.
[00:42:24] Speaker A: But I'm the executive director of this nonprofit right here. I work with Spencer and Terrence. I don't know if you met them.
[00:42:30] Speaker B: Yet, but they provide a bunch of services and help folks kind of deal with the.
[00:42:37] Speaker A: Oh, thanks.
[00:42:41] Speaker B: Appreciate that.
[00:42:43] Speaker D: I'm good.
[00:42:43] Speaker B: I'm all right. Thanks, man. Thanks for thinking of me.
That's right.
[00:42:53] Speaker D: I said, what's the homeless that I don't like about homeless?
That's what song. Got no idea. Nothing. So it'll be a little hard for me to get it.
[00:43:00] Speaker A: So you've been robbed since you've been on the street?
[00:43:02] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:43:07] Speaker A: Has anyone from the city or county contacted you on the street in the last 30 days?
[00:43:13] Speaker C: How are you doing, man?
[00:43:14] Speaker A: Giving you options to get off the street. Good.
[00:43:17] Speaker D: No, because, I don't know, I was in the shoulder here for a couple. About a week.
[00:43:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:43:25] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:43:27] Speaker A: Hey, Spence, you know G?
No, he's only been homeless 30 days.
Great guy. This is Spencer.
It's good to see you, bro.
[00:43:37] Speaker C: I was just walking around, passing out.
[00:43:38] Speaker A: Cookies this morning, you guys.
[00:43:43] Speaker B: Gee, we appreciate you talking to us. Yeah, you try to get inside.
[00:43:50] Speaker D: This is my first day outside.
[00:43:52] Speaker C: Well, cigarette.
[00:43:53] Speaker A: You were in Portland rescue mission?
[00:43:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:43:55] Speaker C: What happened over there? Are you staying nearby?
[00:43:56] Speaker D: Brother, if I was working, I was going to be at 10:00 knock, knock.
[00:44:05] Speaker C: Anybody here?
[00:44:06] Speaker A: Yeah. So they have a curfew at 10:00 and this is one of the things with you can't have any conjugal visits.
So if you want to be intimate, you can't do it inside.
[00:44:19] Speaker D: Right.
[00:44:19] Speaker A: Which is important. Right. There's curfews. I mean, you can't even go outside after 10:00 right. And there's those life restrictions that make people feel like it's more institutional and not as compassionate. Yeah, right. I understand rules. You got to have rules.
[00:44:33] Speaker E: Sure.
[00:44:37] Speaker B: And that's why they have tents outside.
[00:44:38] Speaker D: So that you have time for business outside.
[00:44:40] Speaker B: Oh, I think.
[00:44:44] Speaker A: Cool. Well, aG, I appreciate you.
This is our resource center. Spencer is the director of all services, so he can help you with anything you need from two to 330 tomorrow, Wednesday, whatever you need.
[00:44:59] Speaker B: Yeah, but I know how to overstate id so you can get a free id through TPI.
[00:45:07] Speaker D: TPI. I also even paid for my driver's license, but I haven't received it yet from Washington because they wouldn't mail it to organ address.
And then people say they never got it. But that was like six months ago though.
[00:45:20] Speaker A: So you have a Washington driver's license?
[00:45:23] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:45:23] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:45:27] Speaker C: Trying to think how we could get that done.
[00:45:28] Speaker B: I live in Washington myself.
[00:45:32] Speaker D: I love how id because they gave me one from the CCI, but they said I need some extra papers because I never had.
[00:45:42] Speaker B: Can we just get you an organ driver's license?
[00:45:50] Speaker C: You can get you an organ driver.
[00:45:51] Speaker B: Gee, did you say you were working on that six months ago?
The driver's license, the id and the.
[00:45:56] Speaker D: Driver'S license just came. Sold, like, last week.
[00:45:58] Speaker B: Oh, okay.
All right.
[00:46:00] Speaker D: Two weeks ago, maybe.
[00:46:02] Speaker B: Okay.
That stuff's hard to navigate.
[00:46:08] Speaker A: It is, man, it really is. But through that in the nearly impossible.
[00:46:11] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:46:11] Speaker D: What's that identity stuff? That's why if I just walk up and tell them you.
[00:46:16] Speaker C: Oh, sure.
[00:46:20] Speaker D: I'm glad. It's this little hard.
[00:46:22] Speaker B: Yeah, that's thoughtful.
But it still holds you back from being able to do different things without your id, right?
[00:46:30] Speaker D: Ain't always easy. And things happen.
[00:46:34] Speaker B: You got a great attitude, man.
[00:46:36] Speaker A: You deserve better than this.
[00:46:38] Speaker B: You do.
[00:46:39] Speaker A: You deserve better than this, g. I do. We don't want you on the street, man. We want you living your best. We want you living your dream. I was homeless for two years just down the street at a McDonald's. I slept in the parking lot over there. And so that's why we're out here helping people, because we believe in you.
[00:46:57] Speaker B: Yeah, we do.
[00:46:58] Speaker A: We don't want you being cold and living on the street, man. We don't want that for you.
[00:47:03] Speaker D: I was homeless.
Tacoma, Washington, under IO five bridge. You can see it on YouTube. And it was crazy getting out.
First of all, I got out this lady, he seen her husband on TikTok video and he doing liquor bottles out. And she seen him on that video and came and got him like the next week. And then out of all the people, his wife said she wanted to pick one person to help. It was me.
But what happened with that?
[00:47:54] Speaker A: Well, tomorrow I want you to hook up with Spencer.
[00:47:57] Speaker D: Absolutely.
[00:47:59] Speaker A: And start working on the process of getting off the street. If you want to get into a shelter, we can do that as well.
[00:48:04] Speaker D: Yeah, my whole plan is my first step will be id, then get a job anyway. If you got the money is option, I will get id job and then save the money up. Because imagine how much money you can save. You've got a full time job. Limited.
[00:48:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:48:29] Speaker D: Nice year.
[00:48:31] Speaker A: For real.
Oh, you're a veteran.
[00:48:47] Speaker B: You're a vet?
[00:48:48] Speaker A: Navy veteran. What was your job in the Navy?
[00:48:51] Speaker D: I was machinist.
[00:48:52] Speaker A: Machinist mate. Oh, nice.
So have you had any contact with the VA recently?
[00:48:59] Speaker D: No.
Bad conduct discharge. I need to pipe upgrade.
[00:49:09] Speaker B: That happens.
[00:49:10] Speaker C: That happens.
[00:49:14] Speaker D: Life is very interesting.
[00:49:15] Speaker B: I mean, he should talk to Spencer about veterans assistance, don't you think? When there are some things for veterans that are more options.
[00:49:30] Speaker D: Save money, get an apartment. That'd be easy. And then get back with my wife and my son. Yeah.
[00:49:38] Speaker B: Are they still local?
[00:49:39] Speaker A: Where they.
[00:49:43] Speaker B: Oh, really?
[00:49:43] Speaker A: Oh, Byebye Lakes. Okay.
[00:49:44] Speaker B: Oh, good. That's one of the things I do, is help fund them and help sponsor that.
[00:49:50] Speaker A: Are they still at Bybee Lakes?
[00:49:53] Speaker D: Yeah, probably.
[00:49:56] Speaker A: We're going to head out, man. I appreciate you talking with us today. We're going to be putting this on YouTube and we're going to be putting this out because we want to help people and we want people on the street need a voice.
[00:50:05] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:50:06] Speaker A: So we appreciate you talking with us today.
[00:50:10] Speaker D: Password.
[00:50:28] Speaker B: Thanks for letting us just butt in.
[00:50:30] Speaker A: There you go.
Thanks, homie.
[00:50:34] Speaker C: Hey, I appreciate you, man, hanging there. Okay.
[00:50:38] Speaker A: And there's a burnt out trash can.
[00:50:40] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:50:41] Speaker A: We need the city to fix that.
[00:50:42] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:50:43] Speaker A: We need people walking around taking notice of that fixing.
[00:50:46] Speaker B: You talk to G and you realize he knows everything that he needs to get done. He just needs that support around him.
[00:50:56] Speaker A: He's not using drugs either.
[00:50:58] Speaker B: I didn't seem like it to me.
[00:51:00] Speaker C: At 30 days, that's a good time to get him back out.
[00:51:04] Speaker A: He's right in that window where he needs to get back in. And it's sad because if he had in his own apartment, having a beer at night, watching tv, that's normal activity.
[00:51:12] Speaker B: Right? And he could be with his wife and his kids.
[00:51:14] Speaker A: You can't do normal activities in a shelter. It's so restrictive.
[00:51:18] Speaker B: You need rules.
[00:51:19] Speaker A: But it's so restrictive. Yeah, right. But who doesn't want to kick back and have a beer? I know.
[00:51:27] Speaker B: And again, who knows?
Well, yeah.
[00:51:34] Speaker A: Tough, man. It is tough.
[00:51:35] Speaker C: All right, let's boogie.
[00:51:36] Speaker A: We got a wrap here.
Maybe we go somewhere else. Maybe hit up North park blocks. I'm down.
[00:51:43] Speaker B: Spencer.
[00:51:43] Speaker A: Oh, gosh.
[00:51:44] Speaker D: Eric.
[00:51:44] Speaker C: Nice to meet you.
[00:51:45] Speaker A: Eric Cole, revitalize Portland. Colis.
[00:51:47] Speaker B: I've met you.
[00:51:48] Speaker C: When do we meet?
[00:51:48] Speaker B: Several places, I think.
[00:51:50] Speaker A: Have we? Yeah.
[00:51:50] Speaker C: Okay. Yeah.
[00:51:51] Speaker B: Fancy things.
[00:51:52] Speaker C: Eric. You said Eric?
[00:51:53] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:51:54] Speaker A: He was on city council in Nashville. He helped lead a lot of the homeless initiatives and write legislation for the mayor's office and governor's office in Tennessee.
Jordan hired in citrus hired him doing the policy.
[00:52:09] Speaker B: Do what we can.
[00:52:10] Speaker A: We need.
[00:52:11] Speaker B: We helped Bobby Lakes get their county money last year. That was a big part of it.
Yeah, we three or four more of them don't.
[00:52:19] Speaker A: I know.
[00:52:19] Speaker C: Ken.
[00:52:20] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:52:20] Speaker C: Tim was calling me. He's like, so what do you think about Bobby Lake? I'm like, that place needs to stay open.
[00:52:25] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:52:27] Speaker C: We're in trouble if it doesn't stay open.
[00:52:30] Speaker B: We can't go backwards.
At the very least, that would be.
[00:52:33] Speaker C: Like ten steps backwards.
[00:52:35] Speaker A: Right?
[00:52:35] Speaker C: We'd have families. We'd have good people backing on the street that can't go to work. They can't do those things anymore.
[00:52:41] Speaker A: That's the biggest thing.
[00:52:42] Speaker B: I mean, it's the example, honestly, of the private sector saying, hey, we want to jump in and doing something. And my boss, Jordan, he ended up. Jordan Schitzer, he ended up buying the old jail and property. He didn't get into it as an investment.
[00:52:54] Speaker A: He did it because I forgot about that.
[00:52:55] Speaker B: He knew that for a dollar, he did. And so now we get a dollar a year in rent, but are super proud of that organization.
[00:53:04] Speaker C: Can you find a better deal?
Look hard, bro. You might.
[00:53:09] Speaker B: $0.50.
[00:53:11] Speaker C: Let's shop around, shall we?
[00:53:12] Speaker A: You got any other properties for rent? Right. That's amazing.
[00:53:18] Speaker B: And he didn't really know the helping hands folks ahead of time, but then he saw their model and saw what they did. Got to talk to Alan and hear his experience. And that's the kind of commitment that folks want us to have folks do.
[00:53:32] Speaker A: The thing is, we throw so much.
[00:53:34] Speaker C: Money, wasted money, into all these different programs. Right.
[00:53:38] Speaker B: Why not throw it into a program that's absolutely works for everybody, right. Where you're making that kind of contact, face to face.
[00:53:48] Speaker A: Direct service.
[00:53:50] Speaker B: Direct service. Building a relationship every day. It's got to be repetitive.
[00:53:55] Speaker C: Come down here and feed somebody at lunch.
[00:53:56] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:53:57] Speaker C: Once a month and think you're going to get.
[00:53:58] Speaker B: That's exactly right.
[00:53:59] Speaker A: We're going to roll out.
[00:54:00] Speaker C: Okay. Hey, good to see you.
[00:54:02] Speaker A: Love you, brother.
[00:54:03] Speaker B: Keep up the great work. Appreciate you.
[00:54:18] Speaker A: All right, let's roll.
[00:54:19] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:54:19] Speaker A: All right, let's do it. Wrap it up.
[00:54:21] Speaker C: You first. Of course.
[00:54:22] Speaker B: Thank you, sir.
[00:54:31] Speaker C: She's a nice guy.
[00:54:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:54:34] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:54:34] Speaker A: I mean, what a great interaction.
[00:54:36] Speaker B: Totally, totally.
[00:54:37] Speaker C: I think it's kind of wild that he's only been out here for 30 days.
[00:54:40] Speaker D: Me, too.
[00:54:40] Speaker C: I mean, like, super fragile time. And we need to get that guy connected quickly.
[00:54:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:54:47] Speaker A: He's in that window of opportunity, and that's why it's so critical to contact people every day. Like you said, he's been out 30 days on the streets, hasn't been contacted one time by anybody. Nobody known from the county, no one from the city. He doesn't exist. To the people who serve the homeless, this gentleman does not exist.
[00:55:06] Speaker C: And the crazy thing is, at that fragile time, he knows exactly what he needs and exactly what he needs to do and exactly where to go. But he hasn't had anybody kind of come alongside and sort of assist with that process.
[00:55:18] Speaker B: Right.
[00:55:18] Speaker C: And were it not there, were it not in this guidance process for that, then he very well could turn into somebody who's here chronically.
[00:55:28] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:55:28] Speaker C: Because he's in that fragile state in an absolutely window without id, which is super important.
[00:55:34] Speaker B: Yeah. And he's clear that id is his next step and has to be able to follow through on that.
[00:55:41] Speaker C: Yeah. I'm just glad we got him connected with Spencer who can kind of guide him.
[00:55:46] Speaker B: And, you know, we asked him, are you okay? And he's like, I'm fine. And he gave me that piece of cardboard, offered us a piece of cardboard for our know, welcoming us. So even in a tent in a situation like that, he's like, hey, I'm good and I'm going to think about you.
[00:56:01] Speaker C: That brings up a good point. Because what is so true that I see regularly is that the monetary ability of somebody else to generate does not impact their self worth or their goodness as a human being.
[00:56:14] Speaker B: I think that's right.
[00:56:15] Speaker C: And so many people out here are afraid of people intents because they think that all of them are criminal or all of them are drug users or all of them are bad. And you know what? There have been bad presidents, there have been bad governors.
[00:56:32] Speaker B: No, you're right.
[00:56:32] Speaker C: There are dentists, there are bad nurses, there are bad doctors, there are bad police officers, but there are good ones too. And it makes this particular segment of the population no different. These are human beings that are worthy of respect and love. And just like you said, alex, you deserve better than this. He certainly does.
[00:56:52] Speaker A: He does.
[00:56:52] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:56:52] Speaker C: I like that guy.
[00:56:53] Speaker B: I did too.
[00:56:54] Speaker A: If you're not in prison for a crime, you should not be living on the street. No, you deserve better. Well, society should not be working towards punishing people. We need to stop accepting low standards and we need to lift people up.
[00:57:08] Speaker B: Well, you think about how any of us would react if you're separated from your wife and your kid because of something that happened that may or may not have been in your control. Right. So he's motivated to get back to them. But also what that shock would be to any of us. Right. Would be just dramatic.
I feel for the guy.
But you realize, like, sticking with him, following up kind of that consistency that you all provide is really important.
[00:57:43] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:57:44] Speaker B: And starts with listening and understanding.
[00:57:48] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:57:48] Speaker A: So right now we're headed to the north park blocks.
This is an area that was at one point affected heavily by.
[00:57:57] Speaker B: Did you see that guy's leg?
[00:57:58] Speaker A: No.
[00:57:59] Speaker C: God, can I go talk to that guy? Can you pull over please?
[00:58:03] Speaker A: Well, we might not make it there today, but I want to go. It's because we're on patrol.
[00:58:06] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right.
[00:58:08] Speaker A: We got to do real things in the real world.
[00:58:11] Speaker C: Watch this. I'm going to put this right here. Don't spill my coffee.
[00:58:17] Speaker A: Jump out, bro. Okay, we're good.
I think we might have talked to this guy about his leg before, maybe like several months ago.
[00:58:31] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:58:32] Speaker C: Hey fellas, I was just driving by my brother and I saw your leg and I want to help you. Your leg looks like it's really bad, can I help you?
You want to go to the hospital?
[00:58:51] Speaker D: Hey man.
[00:58:54] Speaker E: Last time I was not good, right? And you get good sam, smoking, it was a horrible experience, so I prefer I go my own, but you guys are my homies. Literally, if it pass 50 minutes, whatever thing. I got to go, I got to go.
[00:59:08] Speaker C: What about street response? If you don't want to go to the hospital, we can do that.
[00:59:13] Speaker E: I've literally been telling you, my little brother has 15 minutes to let me go to the hospital.
[00:59:22] Speaker C: Do you want me to help you get there?
[00:59:28] Speaker E: I appreciate you, sir.
[00:59:30] Speaker C: Well, here's.
[00:59:35] Speaker E: I really like you, my budy, my budy rolling cart.
[00:59:46] Speaker C: Whatsoever I get you, brother.
[00:59:49] Speaker A: Can we get you into a hospital?
Hey bro, I'm from Texas, I know you're from Austin.
I was homeless on the streets here in Portland and in Houston where I'm from. I'm telling you right now, bro, you're going to lose that leg unless you get it taken care of. I know that people don't want to go because you go to the hospital and then when you get out you can't get a fix.
I know people don't want to go to the hospital for that reason, bro.
[01:00:21] Speaker E: But I told you, I want you to know something real quick. So I went to the hospital, they admitted me, right, for whatever, 810 days I'm there, okay? I get out, I'm out here, I'm trying to change it. You don't take care of myself, 100 and dollars of my own buddy, whatever on badass, all these top notcherial bands, fucking whole bunch of dang shit dude. And I'm changing it. But check on ring Dylan, it all got fucked off, I lost it, so I went to the fucking hospital myself. Street response came and got me and they put me attached to fucking Emmanuel legacy, bro. And they did. Swear to God, dude, I was there for fucking three, 4 hours. I fell asleep. I woke up, I fell asleep.
I wake up telling you, okay, you're being discharged.
Antibiotics.
Here's bands like five or six random shit. They had their junk drawer, right? They kicked me out the door. Three in the morning, right?
Yeah, we know about SAS and that's it, dude, even EMG.
[01:01:49] Speaker C: Can we get you to the hospital though, buddy?
[01:01:52] Speaker E: Kick me out and literally get the. You served.
[01:02:13] Speaker C: Budy. I'm listening.
[01:02:14] Speaker E: Literally, he pointed out there was tunnels of puss in my shit and he still dodger. Look at that, dude. They literally just cleaned it and fucking.
So what makes me. Why should I believe that you be talking about. Actually give me a bit, honestly, I just have a very little place where I'm planning on going right now. I was going to Oasisu. I don't know why you'll believe that's where I'm going, but I was going to Oasu because there's a bus right there, they'll take you straight there. And because I've also been told, yeah.
[01:02:50] Speaker B: They'Re like, also they can do it.
[01:02:55] Speaker C: Open.
[01:03:04] Speaker A: Hey, man, I'm asked you quick and easy, yes or no? Do you want us to get you an ambulance or get you a ride of the hospital?
[01:03:12] Speaker E: A ride to the hospital would be cool, but honestly, I'm going to go. But the ride of the hospital is cool, but honestly, dude, it's not going to give me unless. Are you going to call ahead? You have to go ahead back door to talk to make sure I get admitted. If so, then yeah.
Last time I do the taxi, I thought they were going to know who I was when I got there. They didn't know who I was. Do they fucking right back out. So if that's the case, I'm just going out to do anyways. You just go get on the bus.
I don't want to move my leg, bro. I don't want.
She's fucking just funky as fuck. I wasn't in a position financially to be able to go because when you're taking too much fentanyl, I was doing every day, I can't just go.
I do my own little.
[01:04:32] Speaker C: We can take him or we, I mean, we can call cab for you or I can call, but if you hope band, which takes longer, but I.
[01:04:39] Speaker D: Mean.
[01:04:43] Speaker E: I'm not hell of a face, I'm telling you.
I'm rolling the hospital tonight. That's by, that is by gameplay.
Yesterday, when I first pulled me in on, I seen how funky it was.
I rode my bike up to fucking the park.
And then the fucking private dude today told me, the fucking customer service guy on the private, like, yo, I know. I'm not going to do like this, dude. I just need to go. I literally need to go handle something with my girl. And then I was going to go there.
[01:05:20] Speaker C: Tell you what, do you want me to help you get to a hospital?
[01:05:29] Speaker B: No.
[01:05:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:05:31] Speaker E: What I mean is, I feel like you don't believe that I'm going to go.
[01:05:39] Speaker C: We're just concerned about it.
[01:05:46] Speaker E: Or my fucking grandpa.
[01:05:48] Speaker C: Sure.
Good luck, buddy.
[01:05:54] Speaker B: We got you.
[01:05:55] Speaker C: I believe you.
[01:05:56] Speaker B: We got you.
[01:05:57] Speaker A: We believe you. Good luck.
[01:05:58] Speaker B: Good luck with your girl and with the. All right, man.
[01:06:03] Speaker A: So that's a hard situation because, number one, he's on our property, he's loitering. We have businesses that are open that want to.
Thank you, brother.
[01:06:15] Speaker B: All right, brother.
[01:06:16] Speaker A: So he wants us to continue to help folks.
[01:06:18] Speaker B: Wow.
[01:06:18] Speaker A: He says he needs to reconcile something with his girlfriend, and he's going to actually catch a bus and go to the hospital. And so we're going to take him at his word again. This opens up a whole other issue of constitutionality with O'Connor v. Donaldson.
[01:06:32] Speaker B: Sure.
[01:06:32] Speaker A: At what point is someone a danger to themselves medically, that a civil commitment needs to occur for them to receive medical care? Right. And that's way above and beyond our.
[01:06:43] Speaker B: And when he's been in before and had an experience where he didn't feel like, I mean, who knows what happened, but he feels like the hospital may not even treat him do.
[01:06:51] Speaker C: We have spent eight years of my life.
I get it. I get what he's talking about. Right. Get in line. Right. And you're treated a little bit like cab.
[01:07:00] Speaker B: You are. Yeah.
[01:07:01] Speaker C: But at the end of the day, I offered him to get a.
[01:07:06] Speaker B: Right.
[01:07:06] Speaker C: Portland street medicine will visit.
[01:07:08] Speaker A: Yeah, they do.
[01:07:08] Speaker B: That's what I was going to ask you about.
[01:07:10] Speaker A: You can call, make an appointment. They'll be here tomorrow.
[01:07:12] Speaker B: Good.
[01:07:12] Speaker A: The next day. But where is he going to?
[01:07:14] Speaker C: Sometimes the same day, but not usually.
[01:07:17] Speaker A: If you call him in the morning.
[01:07:18] Speaker C: Yeah. Right.
[01:07:19] Speaker A: So I say we roll out, we hit up North park blocks, stay on target. We try to help someone.
We did what we could do.
What else?
[01:07:39] Speaker B: Cool.
[01:07:40] Speaker A: All right, we got a guy named feels like John, I think. Right? He does calisthenics. As you can tell. We took a cut break. There's coffee in Mike's hand. He's getting through the day here.
We're going to go talk to him, see how he's doing. This is more of a mental health issue, so hopefully everything will be cool.
This is good because you're really getting a good cross section of just.
[01:08:05] Speaker C: Oh, man. Hey, John.
[01:08:07] Speaker A: What up, John? How are you?
[01:08:09] Speaker C: Broke.
[01:08:15] Speaker A: Good to see you, man.
[01:08:17] Speaker C: Doing okay.
[01:08:19] Speaker A: How's the park blocks today?
Dude, you're always working out.
You're in the best shape of everyone. I know.
[01:08:33] Speaker C: Do you need anything?
[01:08:35] Speaker A: All right, cool.
[01:08:36] Speaker C: Anything.
Okay. If you don't need anything, let me know when you do. All right. I'm down here all the time. I'm happy to help you anytime you need.
Okay, buddy. See you, John. Have a good day.
[01:08:57] Speaker A: Cool.
So that's John, let's cross over. We're here in the north park blocks because obviously you're connected to the university down here, down the street. Your wife is the dean, I believe, right.
[01:09:10] Speaker B: She runs that college, civic Northwest College of Art.
That's what got us me to Portland, actually.
She took the position there.
Anyway. She took the position there, and that brought us here. And they have their challenges in the neighborhood with protecting their students, keeping them safe.
And it affects the experience, right. That a student would have coming in from out of state.
They have residential facilities in the area. So it's been a struggle and a challenge, like with every other business.
[01:09:50] Speaker C: Not far from here, we had a female get shot in the leg.
[01:09:54] Speaker A: Yeah, Kathy.
[01:09:57] Speaker C: Our guards were here. We ended up giving her medical aid. Wow.
[01:10:02] Speaker A: Put a tourniquet on real quick. Yeah. Likely saved her life.
[01:10:06] Speaker B: I was going to say probably saved her life.
[01:10:08] Speaker C: So we ran into her again. Really nice gal. We're still talking to her, trying to get her into housing, but. Yeah.
Right now it's really clear.
[01:10:21] Speaker B: Yeah, it really is.
[01:10:22] Speaker C: It looks so much.
[01:10:26] Speaker A: So much better than it used to be. We put a really big emphasis. There was about six shootings within a two week period.
[01:10:33] Speaker B: Right.
[01:10:34] Speaker A: Gang related.
Just within a block or two, there were two separate memorials of two deaths that occurred in the area.
[01:10:43] Speaker C: One of our guards was in the area.
You could hear the shots getting closer and closer to him.
[01:10:49] Speaker A: They were just walking down the street shooting tents. Bam, bam, bam. Then they would walk. Bam, bam, bam. Walk into another.
[01:10:56] Speaker B: Forget about how dangerous it is to live on the street. Right. It's not safe, and you don't have some of the protections that people have when they're inside.
[01:11:06] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:11:07] Speaker B: But, yeah, this looks great. I mean, it looks remarkably better.
[01:11:11] Speaker A: Like a community. People would want to come and hang out.
[01:11:13] Speaker B: Yeah. And what a great thing, park blocks.
[01:11:15] Speaker C: With the basketball courts.
[01:11:17] Speaker B: I mean, it's an awesome public space. Right.
[01:11:20] Speaker A: Yeah.
So you saw a good cross section of life today?
[01:11:25] Speaker D: Yeah.
[01:11:25] Speaker A: Right. We talked to G's homeless, been on the streets 30 days. Right?
[01:11:32] Speaker C: Yes.
[01:11:33] Speaker B: Just needs that little extra attention and that little extra push to follow through on some of those goals.
[01:11:39] Speaker C: Yes.
[01:11:39] Speaker A: And he wasn't nothing.
He was showing no indicators of drug intoxication.
[01:11:47] Speaker C: No. Very clear.
[01:11:48] Speaker A: Very clear minded. His peoples weren't constricted, they weren't overly too open.
[01:11:54] Speaker B: Right.
[01:11:55] Speaker A: And so he was a guy who was lucid and clear, can make his own decisions. Right. We encountered another gentleman who. The gash in his leg and the redness in that leg really shows that he's going to end up having to lose that leg if he doesn't get real medical care. But yet he was drug induced.
I would even say in a drug induced psychosis, incoherent most of the time.
[01:12:21] Speaker C: Rational and good decisions. No. Hard right there. Nope.
[01:12:25] Speaker B: A lot of paranoia.
[01:12:26] Speaker A: And then we have John, who's also who we just met. Clear mind or not clear minded mental health. Clear mental health issues.
[01:12:32] Speaker B: Right.
[01:12:33] Speaker A: Nothing drug induced.
[01:12:34] Speaker B: I was going to say, do you think any of that substance or is that just mental health?
[01:12:36] Speaker A: No, it's all mental health.
[01:12:38] Speaker C: Wow.
[01:12:38] Speaker A: One guy was a veteran, clear minded on the street. Right. Another gentleman, a former gang member, obviously. He had gang tattoos, Texas syndicate, prison style tattoos from his face from doing time in Texas. Drug induced, unclear. And then you have someone with mental health. No drug connection, no tattoos, nothing on him. And those are three types of people we absolutely just within 2 hours that we've contacted. And each of them needs a unique solution.
[01:13:06] Speaker B: Exactly.
And each of them needs that individual approach to get them what they need and to help them.
[01:13:13] Speaker A: Bach, thoughts?
[01:13:15] Speaker B: I just really appreciate it. I really appreciate y'all taking.
[01:13:18] Speaker A: I'm glad that you came today to.
[01:13:19] Speaker B: See what you do every day.
[01:13:20] Speaker C: Well, the environment that we're in is one where everybody's hurting on the outside.
[01:13:25] Speaker B: Yeah, good point.
[01:13:26] Speaker C: It's really easy to see you and I walking around in our regular clothes. Our heart hurts. Are closer to the onion.
[01:13:31] Speaker B: No, that's right.
[01:13:33] Speaker C: Which it does two things. It makes it harder to interact with them and hard for people who could be embarrassed by some of those things. Right. That's true with that. But the overcoming force on this is the power of genuine care and relationship.
As if people care and they know that you care, and they're like, hey, man, I'm here. I call you by name. You call me by name. I introduce myself. Hi, my name is Michael.
[01:13:56] Speaker A: That's right.
[01:13:56] Speaker C: I got nothing to hide from you. Why do you have a camera for everybody's protection. Because I can't. Cameras.
[01:14:02] Speaker A: And we're also on private property. You're on a property that I'm contracted to provide security services for.
[01:14:08] Speaker C: Right.
[01:14:08] Speaker A: And so I'm well within my rights to record myself on my own property.
[01:14:13] Speaker C: Right.
[01:14:14] Speaker A: And we're just trying to help you.
[01:14:15] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[01:14:16] Speaker A: We want you to go to the hospital.
[01:14:17] Speaker E: Absolutely.
[01:14:18] Speaker D: It's amazing to me.
[01:14:20] Speaker B: I don't get a sense of apprehension. You look like a law enforcement officer. Right. But I don't even get that sense of apprehension from the people we talk to.
[01:14:31] Speaker C: I think there's a degree of exposure.
The lion's share of people down here, myself and my coworkers we've talked to before, we know people by. They know us. Hey, man, how you doing?
[01:14:46] Speaker B: Yeah. As we drive around, y'all are like, that's so and so, and that's so.
[01:14:48] Speaker C: And so and so. And the relationships that we are building are time consuming. But in the end, if you're playing long ball, that's it. That's the winning.
[01:14:58] Speaker B: That's it.
[01:14:59] Speaker C: We always want, like, that quick fix.
[01:15:00] Speaker B: But you got to have this repetitive, and you got to stick with man first.
[01:15:06] Speaker C: Thanks for coming out and look at this. I appreciate it. I think that all of us can recognize that Portland's a beautiful town. It has got wonderful people in it. It has got incredible people with a philanthropic heart who are in the private sector. It's got people who are greatly hurting that are out in the public.
And the redeeming qualities of this environment are many. But right now, it's upside down. The world turns upside down. The crime is out of control. The narcotics addiction is out of control. The mental health is out of control. And really, if we care about other people, we're going to get involved and start making changes.
Look at where we're at. It's gorgeous.
[01:15:48] Speaker A: It's gotten a lot better.
[01:15:49] Speaker B: It has gotten a lot better.
[01:15:50] Speaker C: But at the same time, there's so much work still to do well.
[01:15:53] Speaker B: And I see so much promise in us coming together as opposed to just.
[01:15:58] Speaker C: Being pushed apart always.
[01:16:00] Speaker B: And that relationship, that understanding what is happening on the street, building the trust level with the individuals, is so critical. We can take that to scale. We ought to be able to take that scale in Portland and be able to solve some of these.
You know, we have limitations in resources in some areas, but that doesn't mean you don't care up front and offer what we can offer.
[01:16:25] Speaker A: Right.
[01:16:28] Speaker B: As OD as it sounds. I'm hopeful, having spent.
[01:16:31] Speaker A: That's what I like about you, eternal optimism. An ever flowing fountain of optimism.
[01:16:38] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I think it would be different if we got shoved away or got yelled at or told.
[01:16:44] Speaker C: I don't know.
People will talk to us, but that takes time for them to.
[01:16:52] Speaker B: But in general, pretty well received.
[01:16:56] Speaker C: Everybody we talked to.
[01:16:58] Speaker A: Well, Eric, I want to thank you for coming on the today. Yeah, you're an amazing guest.
I hope that you can use your power and influence to bring about.
[01:17:07] Speaker B: We need more people to do these ride alongs, don't we?
[01:17:10] Speaker A: We need more people to do these ride alongs. Please solicit people.
Find us on YouTube. Find us on Facebook. Eric, again, tell us what's going to happen.
[01:17:21] Speaker B: 5 march at the armory. We're having a public conversation on crime and safety in the Portland area. Four to 05:00 p.m. You can get information on revitalizeportland.com and love for people to show up and hear from our elected officials, police chief candidate for district attorney talk about how we can do some system solutions to a lot of these issues.
[01:17:46] Speaker A: Perfect.
[01:17:46] Speaker B: That should be a good conversation. Join us.
[01:17:48] Speaker A: Join us. We'll be there right along. Podcast. Appreciate you all. Let's head up.
[01:17:54] Speaker C: Awesome.
[01:17:55] Speaker B: Thanks, y'all. Thanks, y'all.
[01:17:57] Speaker A: Thanks, y'all.
It does look really good today.
