Digest: Friday, February 4, 2022

Report on traffic deaths provides opportunity to criminalize homelessness

The Portland Bureau of Transportation released a report earlier this week on traffic deaths in Portland in the last year. Key numbers include:

• In 2021, 63 people died in traffic crashes — the highest number in Portland since 1990 (though actual numbers are likely closer to 73 deaths, depending on how one classifies certain deaths)
• 60% of crashes in Portland happened on 8% of Portland’s streets, with 82nd Avenue and streets further east showing a dramatic concentration of crashes
• Speed and impairment are routinely factors in crashes
• Black and Latinx Portlanders are over-represented in traffic deaths
• People without access to housing were 70% of pedestrian deaths, and 33% of all traffic deaths
• National traffic deaths have also increased substantially

Houseless community members made up 33% of people killed in traffic deaths, and 70% of pedestrians killed, an alarming trend we have not historically tracked but will going forward. pic.twitter.com/fjnfSN5OE9

— Portland Bureau of Transportation (@PBOTinfo) February 2, 2022

In response, Ted Wheeler, Portland’s combo mayor-police commissioner, plans to issue an order today that will enable the City of Portland to sweep homeless camps that city officials deem are too close to roads. Wheeler issued a separate order yesterday to prohibit camping near proposed safe rest villages — although that order is a bit premature, given the lack of progress Commissioner Dan Ryan has made in establishing those safe rest villages and concerns that the villages would enable the city to further criminalize homelessness. Wheeler is reportedly considering additional emergency orders in order to reduce the number of homeless camps in Portland, right on the tail of polling funded by the Portland Business Alliance suggested that

Members of the unhoused community have substantially fewer resources with which to lobby Wheeler and other city officials; there is no evidence that anyone who is actually homeless was consulted on the planned emergency order.

Wheeler’s willingness to listen to PBA is infuriating, especially in light of PBA’s long-running campaigns against people pushed out of housing and lack of accountability. Wheeler is exploiting PBOT’s report in yet another move to criminalize homelessness and other poverty in Portland. But when you consider that pedestrians and bicyclists rarely die in traffic accidents that don’t involve cars, the reality is that Wheeler is punishing people who are homeless for the actions of drivers. There seems to be minimal efforts to address the actual cause of these traffic deaths — after all, there’s no emergency declaration to lower traffic speeds or remove cars from certain streets. The small successes PBOT was able to report on came from efforts like the redesign of Northeast Glisan Street that lead to an 80% decrease in speeding on that street.

Ultimately, the story of why people are suffering on the streets Portland en masse, not unlike many American cities is a story of greed & neglect & how the rich & powerful want their cake & to eat it too. In their world. The sky is always falling.

— Israel Bayer (@IsraelBayer) February 3, 2022

Wheeler’s emergency order will not include any efforts to help those facing sweeps to access housing. It will simply continue to shuffle people around camp sites in a city where rent has increased 29% in the past year. It will increase the many harms associated with sweeps. And it will not reduce homelessness when we are again posed to see increased numbers of evictions.

Zenith Energy will continue to move oil through Portland terminal while legal battle continues

The Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals upheld the City of Portland’s decision to refuse to permit Zenith Energy’s facility for continued operations on Thursday. However, because LUBA is requiring the city to provide further proof that Zenith Energy’s operations prevent Portland from reaching environmental goals, the fossil fuel company can continue to operate for now. Both Zenith Energy and environmental activists are declaring the decision a win.

There’s no deadline for the City of Portland to hand over that additional evidence, so there’s no clear timeline on when the facility might actually stop transporting oil. Portland officials refused to provide a form to Zenith Energy last August as part of the company’s attempt to renew its air permit with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and expand operations. Zenith Energy applied for that renewal in 2012, but DEQ has a severe backlog. Zenith Energy has been able to effectively ignore regulation for a decade.

The terminal has been operating on an air permit issued to the former owners of the facility (which had previously been built in 1947 and used as an asphalt facility). As of 2021, Zenith Energy’s facility has 85 above-ground tanks that can hold over 1.5 million barrels of oil. The site sits on ground that is expected to liquify during an earthquake, which would result in a massive fuel leak into both the Willamette River and into the surrounding air. A fire is also likely. In such an event, Zenith Energy could avoid responsibility for clean up relatively easily.