Patricia Dexter, Eugene Oregon
Program participant, Homes for Good

Patricia (00:02):
I think the most important thing that someone who’s housed can do for someone who is not housed is to be compassionate. And just imagine what it’s like to be in that person’s shoes.

My story really starts at a pretty young age. I was a young single mom of 16 years, and I was kind of out in the world on my own. I got into a relationship with a much older man, and it was unhealthy and toxic. And I spent 16 years in a domestic violence relationship. I had a surgery for a work-related condition and quickly got addicted to prescription pain pills. And that experience led me into substance use disorder.

I really felt trapped in that there was no way out. I ended up turning to illicit street drugs in order to overcome that addiction with opiates and it just led me into years of being unhoused in homelessness.

Title card (01:10):
As of 2023, it is estimated that there are over 20,000 people in Oregon who are experiencing homelessness.

Patricia (01:17):
For me, the first time I actually realized that I was homeless with no place to go. I had no vehicle, no motel room. I had my belongings in my hands, and it was scary. I didn’t have medical insurance. I wasn’t going to a doctor regularly. I wasn’t eating well. And of course I was in active addiction. So I wasn’t able to access treatment because I didn’t have insurance. My substance use disorder had gotten to the lowest point. I was arrested and went to Coffee Creek. I spent five years in prison.

Coming home from that experience, I came home healthy and ready to reenter my community. I had support and I had learned skills and tools and completed programs. And so I was able to be supported in my community by sponsors, transitional housing, Lane County Parole and Probation, and Homes for Good in a pilot program called The Way Home Program. And I was able to get into public housing through that program.

Getting the keys to my first apartment was really, really special. It was the first time I had been housed in 13 years. Getting to walk into the apartment with my two children and have our own restroom, our own kitchen, our own bedrooms. To be able to know that I could regulate the heat. That I could put my own food (on the table), that we could wash our own clothes. I can’t describe the feeling. It was, very powerful and very meaningful and it, it was a blessing. And I still feel that joy today.

To have Homes for Good come alongside me and to offer me housing. Despite my past and despite my experiences, I was beside myself. I was so elated and I suddenly had this self-worth. That I thought, oh my gosh, I can do this. There’s someone else that thinks I can do this and I’m gonna be okay.

I believe that recovery is possible. And looking back on my personal experience, there is countless professionals that have seen potential in me or that advocated for me, or that had compassion for me, or that even just gave me encouragement. And I wanna be one of those people. I wanna be that person that gave just enough hope for someone to keep going on their journey.

Title card (03:45):
Housing is hope.

Place Matters Oregon

Title card:
As of 2023, of the 20,000 people experiencing houselessness in Oregon, only 35 percent are considered ‘sheltered’.

Camryn Leland, Permanent Supportive Housing Coordinator at Homes for Good (00:06):
Home means stability. Home means safety. It means comfort. Home is a place where you can drop your walls and feel vulnerable. I’m a firm believer that everybody is, a mental health crisis or two paychecks away from experiencing houselessness.

Andrea Bell, Executive Director at Oregon Housing and Community Services (00:30):
Someone’s access to housing is completely predicated upon their income and upon wealth. And without that, it inhibits your ability to have access to housing and therefore directly impacts your health, your wellness, not only on an individual level, on a community level, as well.

Camryn (00:51):
Being in a constant place of survival mode. It heightens your overall awareness. It creates physical sensations. So your cortisol is increased. You’re constantly on the lookout for trying to find and seek shelter safety. You really default back to primal instincts. And when you’re in that primal brain space, it does not allow you to have a proactive approach to your own wellbeing, which is really detrimental for people.

Can you imagine going through chemo and being houseless? Things like that blow my mind because my father went through chemo and without us having a stable house and without us being able to have a home base to come back to – to not only physically heal, but emotionally heal. It would be so much harder on your body, on your soul, just like in general. And so I think being able to have those four walls, it’s just the first step, but it’s a really crucial first step.

Andrea (01:50):
One, we have income and wealth gaps that were systemically created. We have racial wealth gaps. There’s a reason why we have an over overrepresentation of certain communities that experience homelessness – that didn’t just come to be.

Title card:
In Oregon, Black people are over three times more likely to experience houselessness compared to their population size.

Andrea (02:08):
We have a playbook for understanding what works and we know time over time housing works. We need more affordable housing and we need to make sure that, people at all income levels can have access to affordable housing.

Camryn (02:23):
So, we have multiple programs. I think the biggest ones when we think of Homes for Good as a Section eight program, so that’s distributing vouchers. Mobile choice vouchers, and also housing choice vouchers. These are vouchers that individuals can take any rentals in Lane County and have subsidized rent essentially. Income-based rent is what subsidized rent is. In housing first, there’s no requirement for sobriety. There’s no requirement that you need to be in any sort of treatment. It’s completely up to what the individual is needing at that time.

Andrea (02:56):
Can you imagine sleeping outside or going from place to place with some uncertainty as to whether there will be a bed that night and then someone wants to have a conversation with you about what your goals are?

Camryn (03:12):
Being able to give people the space that they need, the way that we all get the space that we need, to breathe and make our own choices. I think, again, going back to sovereignty and the importance of folks having the right to choose, without creating the housing first model where it’s, entirely voluntary. I don’t think we would see people that are chronically houseless and have experienced it for a long time, be willing to move into housing.

Andrea (03:40):
Over the last four years or so, the state has built nearly 27,000 units of affordable housing here in the state of Oregon. We have never built that much affordable housing ever. On a year-to-year basis, we’ve almost quadrupled the amount of housing that we are building.

Camryn (04:03):
We’re really close to fully occupying the commons on MLK. So it’s a 51 unit, mid-rise. We serve the most chronically houseless individuals at that community. And so these are individuals that engage emergency systems often. Even within this year alone. I think in January we probably average between 30 and 40 calls for service, and by October we had maybe three. So just seeing the way you approach people with wraparound support, it allows for trust. It lowers that cortisol, it gets people out of this reactivity, the fight or flight. It’s really like a powerful thing to witness.

Graphic:
The ache for home lives in all of us. The safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned. – Maya Angelou

Title card:
How can affordable housing bring hope to your community?
Place Matters Oregon