City Club of C.O. forum examines ways to reduce homelessness, add more affordable housing
BEND, Ore. (KTVZ) -- The City Club of Central Oregon focused its monthly forum at The Riverhouse on the Deschutes Thursday on a familiar, challenging set of issues: the rising number of homeless and how to ease the area's housing crisis.
Special guest speakers, political leaders and club members showed up for the discussion.
Guest speakers for Thursday's forum included a doctor from Mosaic Medical and officials from Central Oregon Intergovernmental Council and J Bar J Youth Services.
The recent Point in Time Count showed over 1,600 adults and kids are without a place to live as of January 24, 2023, a 28% increase from last year.
Tammy Baney, executive director of COIC, said she feels the local government is doing a better job at counting unsheltered people, and the increases reflected in the count are because of that.
"One, we're doing a much better job counting individuals," she said. "Community members that are experiencing being unhoused are, as you know, all around the community, and it may not be easy on one particular day to capture what that number is."
Deschutes County Homeless Response Director Cheyenne Purrington was slated to be part of an extended Q&A at Thursday's meeting. The City Club's executive director didn't elaborate, but said Purrington was unable to attend.
Her office has been criticized by Deschutes County Commissioner Phil Chang for a lack of adequate progress.
The end of pandemic eviction moratoriums and ever more expensive housing are issues Baney says keeps people from finding permanent homes, but she said efforts are having increasingly positive impacts: "We're building a system that many communities of our size would've already had -- a lot of these investments and a lot of these services already foundational within their continuum of care."
Eliza Wilson with J Bar J Services says unexpected medical conditions, not making enough money to cover basics and other financial issues may keep someone from getting help.
"What we have to do is have resources available for people that they know about and that they can access, so that they don't have to experience homelessness long-term," she said.
Wilson didn't appear to want to take on the question raised by some critics of whether some people move to Central Oregon to gain easier access to homeless services.
I asked Wilson, "But is that of concern to people like you? That unfortunately people move here, like in Portland, because they feel it's safer or nicer for people to be on the streets?"
Wilson then asked me, "So, um, can you pause the camera?"
After I obliged to pause our interview, Wilson told me she felt I was perpetuating a stereotype about homeless people, and was effectively done with the interview.
COIC's Baney did answer the question for me, though: "There will be people that, as the population grows, individuals get squished out of, gentrification or whatever it ends up being, that will require housing."
The next City Club meeting will take place on Thursday, June 15th.
