rebekahjorgensen

[rebekahjorgensen]

In this video, Angelita speaks about how many politicians view the housing crisis as a aesthetics issue rather than a moral issue. She points out that it is more affordable per bed to have people housed renting apartments rather than building encampments and that our overall goal should be to get people housing. Despite that Portland approved the more expensive option. I think this relates back to consciousness of self and congruence or lack there of. The city isn't evaluating their morals before making big decisions and if they are, then they must not have very many morals.

In this video, Rebekah is replying to a comment of someone informing them of a campaign to provide eviction representation for all (ERA) and that signatures are currently being collected. Turns out Rebekah is one of the coordinators of the campaign. I believe this shows an example of collaboration right in front of us where multiple people are coming together to get signatures for a common purpose.

Lastly, I Link Angelita for Portland's entire account. In each of her videos she is advocating for some topic related towards helping the city of Portland, many of which address issues within the housing crisis. I think this shows she has committed to truly creating and advocating for change.

[rebekahjorgensen]

In this news video, the reporter goes on to compare Oregon’s homeless population with other states, specifically Texas has a much larger overall population, but only has 10,000 more homeless than Oregon based on numbers from 2019. He brings up the possibility of homelessness being a political issue, but quickly shuts that down as a lot of Texas’ bigger cities are liberal and have implemented several programs to help people experiencing homelessness. He then speaks to the regional housing director from metro who goes on to explain that the housing crisis is country wide, and the reason Portland and other areas in the Pacific NorthWest are experiencing it at a higher rate is due to high rent increases, but wages maintaining a flat rate. This is something that has been a constant throughout my research. The demand for housing is there, but people are not making enough to be able to afford housing. As mentioned in a previous post, the majority of low income and extremely low income households are paying over 50% of their income on rent. They are one medical emergency from experiencing homelessness already. Something needs to give, either lower rental prices, or higher minimum wages. Either way, we can’t continue on this way and continue putting people in our community at risk.

[rebekahjorgensen]

Davis Tuller wrote an article called “To Improve Outcomes, Health Systems Invest in Affordable Housing.” In this article, Tuller writes about Lisa Greenfield and her rough upbringing leading her to a life of addiction. By the time she was clean, she hadn’t held a job in years. Luckily there was a transitional program that allowed her access to affordable housing despite only working a minimum wage job. He quotes her saying “Without that missing piece— the housing—I just don’t think stability and recovery are really obtainable… Not many people are able to stay clean or maintain a job while being homeless.” He speaks with Pam Mariea-Nason, the executive of the community health division at Providence Health and Services, who says more and more doctors are reporting patients who have lost their homes, and hospitals are reporting more and more emergency department usages. She says, “No matter how good the medical treatment we provide is, people have to have their basic needs met in order to prioritize their participation in their health care.”, confirming that lack of housing affects healthcare needs. Tuller then highlights several health agencies who announced the multi-million dollar donations they planned on making towards affordable housing. The initiative Housing is Health, includes 3 buildings with up to 400 units of housing for those who are homeless or at risk of being homeless. They split up these units so that 51 units go to families displaced by gentrification, 153 units go to permanent housing for people leaving transitional housing, and 175 units for people in recovery. Central City Concerns, or CCC, is an agency “Homes, Health, Jobs”, they prioritize getting people access to affordable homes in order to be able to treat outstanding medical needs and rehabilitate the people they help to be able to take care of themselves moving forward. They provide stable housing and healthcare, and eventually job training as well. This agency serves more than 14,000 people annually. The concern that the article presents is that despite the efforts made it is not enough to solve the problem entirely and efforts need to continue to be made. Hospitals are continuing to see more and more patients who don’t have the proper housing, and the long term effects this can have are concerning. Agencies like the CCC show us why it’s important to advocate for affordable housing. Helping 14,000 may not seem like a lot compared to the whopping 60,000 people in need of housing, however, it’s still 14,000 people who are now sleeping somewhere other than on the streets. I think it’s important to recognize that even the small differences are important.

Citation

Tuller, D. (2019). To improve outcomes, health systems invest in affordable housing. Health Affairs, 38(7), 1068–1072. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2019.00676

[rebekahjorgensen]

Taylor Swift is someone who has had a very long career in music and through her years has faced a lot of backlash and criticism on the songs she writes as well as her dating life. Her career began when she was just 15 years old and has a very strong and supportive fan base, however has still had to face the challenge that come with being a woman in a world full of misogyny. In her song, The Man, she starts with "They'd say I played the field before I found someone to commit to, and that would be ok" and then proceeds on a line later "Every conquest I had made would make me more of a boss to you" pointing out how if she were a man people would respect her more for sleeping around as women who sleep around tend to be labeled as "sluts". The song continues saying "I'd be a fearless leader, I'd be an alpha type, when everyone believes ya, what's that like?" When Taylor Swift, or women in general, do address rumors spread about them it's not often people believe them. In a lot of cases men are believed more than women. Her chorus goes on, "I'm so sick of running as fast as I can, wondering if I'd get there quicker, if I was a man, and I'm so sick of them coming at me again, 'cause if I was a man, then I'd be the man." As mentioned, Taylor has been in this industry since she was 15 and has continuously working hard to put out music, go on tours, while also developing easter eggs for her fans to find making participation in the fandom a lot more exciting. In her chorus she's essentially highlighting that if she were a man with all of her same accomplishments, then she would be THE man. Everyone would hold high respect for her. She carries on to say, "They'd say I hustled, put in the work, they wouldn't shake their heads and question how much of this I deserve, what I was wearing, if I was rude, could all be separated from my good ideas and power moves?" Women tend to get degraded, really in every scenario, but especially when dressed in a revealing manor. If a women is pretty, then she can't also be smart. When a woman is pretty and also smart, it makes misogynistic people upset and they jump to immediately trying to invalidate the pretty woman's success. I specifically linked the music video to this song because in the video Taylor dresses as a man and throughout the video is shown as someone powerful with seemingly a lot of influences. At the very end of the music video, the "man" version of Taylor comes up to Taylor directing and asks if the take was okay. Taylor says "Pretty good, could you try to be sexier? Maybe more like-able this time?" This is a line women hear often, and I'm sure Taylor has heard it plenty. This whole song and video really calls out misogynistic habits and tendencies people hold.

#theman #taylorswift #feminism #antimisogyny

[rebekahjorgensen]

The Portland Real Estate Podcast hosted by Steve Nassar and Joe Fustolo, although heavily focused on the impact on realtors and property owners, does give some insight to what the city of Portland is doing to address housing needs. They brought guest speakers, Ezra Hammer and Jamie Howsley, who are attorneys at Jordan Ramis and both have expertise in land use and developmental and natural resource permitting and government affairs. One conversation that has been started is the flipping of commercial properties to residential homes. This is something other large cities have started doing and have been successful in creating thousands of homes for people. The city of Portland recently passed a law that makes it easier for commercial property owners  to flip their properties to residential by cutting down some of the requirements. They also talked about how the city of Portland tweaked their zoning code in order to allow for senior housing in residential areas rather than only commercial which will then give more opportunity for affordable senior housing. It might not solve the housing need completely, but that is a big win. Multnomah county introduced the RIP movement also known as the Residential Infill Project. This movement encouraged multi-family housing and discouraged cars, garages, and driveways. After just one year of being introduced, the city released a report of its impacts and they were able to approve several hundred units of various multi-family housing projects. This is also a win despite it not solving the problem at large.

They did also provide some insight into the challenges faced when building in Portland. When it comes to housing regulations, there are several different bureaus who are in charge of different things. These bureaus will all go to a builder with some regulation like where a tree needs to be, or a driveway. Well sometimes one bureau will say the tree needs to be in this spot and another will say the driveway needs to be in that same spot. This is causing the builders to get frustrated and not want to build in Portland. The conversation has been started that the city of Portland needs to update their housing regulations structure and condense the amount of bureaus in order for everyone to be on the same page when building housing.

Portland still has a long way to go as they are only putting up about 7 new housing units per 10 families moving into the city causing a deficit of 60,000 homes.

[rebekahjorgensen]

How the media views the housing crisis

There are many factors that play into the cause of the Portland Housing Crisis. The majority of news articles I come across highlight lack of new construction and affordable housing. For instance, KGW8 news highlights how Multnomah County has some of the lowest rental vacancy rental rates, but highest rental prices. Whereas other news articles, like the Willamette Week, claim the scarce housing is caused by millennials wanting to settle down and buy homes. They seemed surprised that people in their 30s-40s want to settle down and buy a house rather than live out the rest of their lives renting an apartment. 

I think it’s safe to say this issue is way deeper than millennials choosing to settle down. In fact, I feel as humans it’s expected for us all to want to settle down and own a home of our own one day. That is what the propaganda of the American dream sells to its citizens after all. Whether the population is growing or not, new construction for affordable housing is not popping up fast enough. The housing that is available is only available to those in a certain tax bracket, and extremely low income households are left paying over 50% of their income on rent.

[rebekahjorgensen]

[rebekahjorgensen]