E - Less Than a Home

One of the things that struck me about Eugene when I first arrived was the large number of people standing on street corners holding signs, pleading for help.  Looking into that I discovered that this beautiful state has been hit hard by the recession, harder that any other state in our nation.  A crash in the timber market combined with 3 local RV manufactures going out of business produced a devastating effect on the local economy causing an incredible 17% rate of unemployment.  Before coming here I had traversed the whole country by land and water; Key West to Vermont and Connecticut to Oregon.  Just before that I had traveled through the Caribbean, the Bahamas and Central America and by far Oregon was showing signs of the most desperate poverty anywhere in my travels.  

I wanted to help in some way.  The first initiative I joined was the remarkable street theater project (Street Code Theater) that encourage and enabled unhoused folks to tell their stories.  

After several months of workshops & rehearsals, that project culminated in an amazing performance at the Wildish Theater.   The unhoused shared their incredible stories of loss and survival with the general public.  Inspiring stories of desperate people facing unimaginable adversity.  I felt a deep respect and kinship with these unhoused folks.  They were accepting and honest and we were all looking for a home.  After the project was over I was left with poignant stories and a strong desire to do more to help the unhoused in our community. 

I use the term unhoused instead of the more common "homeless" because of an encounter I had with Ibrahim Mubarak.  Ibrahim found Right to Dream Too, a self-managed, tent community in Portland for the unhoused.  He was visiting Eugene in an effort to help us get a village for the unhoused started in our community.   In his introduction, Ibrahim said that he was three things you don’t want to be in America today; a black man, a Muslim and homeless.  He doesn’t like to refer to himself as homeless.  He believes that ones home is where their heart is, so while it’s true that he doesn’t have a house, he does in fact have a heart, a big, beautiful heart and that’s where his home is.   Very inspirational. 

Next I volunteered at the Egan emergency warming shelter that provides unhoused folks with a warm, safe place to sleep, but only on the few, coldest nights of the year.  Then I joined the staff and volunteers who serve food to the unhoused folks in our community, an average of 275 diners a night, all served with dignity in a family restaurant atmosphere. 

I’ve been volunteering at the Dining Room for the past two years.  It's a wonderful place that does great work but unfortunately it functions in a “sustaining” capacity only.  It’s does nothing to house folks and little to help move them out of poverty.  So I joined the SLEEPS movement in town.  SLEEPS' mission is to establish and maintain Safe, Legally Entitled, Emergency Places to Sleep for the unhoused and they’ve been actively fighting for the unhoused in our community for the past year.  Right now SLEEPS' is pushing two big initiatives; Opportunity Village Eugene, a self run community for unhoused folks and the suspension of the city camping ban.  Right now, if you don’t have a home and get caught sleeping within Eugene, you are subject to a $200 fine for “camping” and a $500 fine for a second offense.  We’re asking the city; if you can’t do more to help the unhoused, can you at least stop prosecuting them?  It’s been a much harder fight than it’s should be but at least it feels like there is some movement in the right direction.