{"id":1577666,"date":"2022-07-29T08:59:11","date_gmt":"2022-07-29T12:59:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1577666"},"modified":"2022-07-29T08:59:16","modified_gmt":"2022-07-29T12:59:16","slug":"church-on-portlands-deadliest-block-cleans-up-drug-encampment-while-mayor-fixates-on-guns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/church-on-portlands-deadliest-block-cleans-up-drug-encampment-while-mayor-fixates-on-guns\/","title":{"rendered":"Church On Portland\u2019s \u2018Deadliest Block\u2019 Cleans Up Drug Encampment While Mayor Fixates On Guns"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fchurch-on-portlands-deadliest-block-cleans-up-drug-encampment-while-mayor-fixates-on-guns%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1577666&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The Democratic mayor of Portland, Oregon, Ted Wheeler, has declared a gun violence emergency in his city. \u201cWe will not stop until we bring peace back to those Portland neighborhoods too often caught in the crossfire,\u201d he said at a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.oregonlive.com\/crime\/2022\/07\/portlands-mayor-declares-state-of-emergency-due-to-historic-levels-of-gun-violence.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">press conference<\/a> on July 22. Portland is reeling from a combination of a crime spike, a large and growing homeless population, and the decimation of the local police department.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In 2020, Portland was rocked by months of protests and riots. Under pressure from the defund the police movement, the city government voted to cut its police budget. Subsequently, police officers fled their thankless jobs. Two hundred fifty of them have resigned or retired since July 2020, with more retirements expected this summer. This has left the Portland Police Department barely functioning.<\/p>\n<p>From 2019 to 2020, Portland\u2019s homicide rate <a href=\"https:\/\/crime-data-explorer.app.cloud.gov\/pages\/home\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">jumped<\/a> 83 percent, one of the largest increases of any city in America. More than 50 people have been shot so far this year, meaning the city is likely to overtake last year\u2019s record of 90 homicides.<\/p>\n<p>Portland is also facing a homelessness crisis. In 2019, there were 4,015 homeless people in the Portland metro area, but in 2022 this number had risen to 5,228, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.multco.us\/johs\/news\/news-release-tri-county-point-time-count-numbers-shared-regionally-first-time-show-shifts\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">data<\/a> from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.<\/p>\n<p>The struggles of <a href=\"https:\/\/firstopcportland.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">First Orthodox Presbyterian Church<\/a> are a microcosm of what has gone wrong in Portland. The church is located in northeast Portland, far from the epicenter of the 2020 protests, but the members feel the reverberations.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The church, which has about 150 members, has been meeting in the same building for 77 years, but the surrounding neighborhood has been deteriorating for some time. On the church\u2019s block, there is a strip club, a methadone clinic, a food bank, and a seedy motel that church members believe serves as a hub of drug dealing and prostitution.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>During the pandemic, however, the problems went into overdrive. A large drug-use camp developed on the street directly behind the church\u2019s parking lot. Since last summer, four homicides have taken place there, prompting \u201cThe Oregonian\u201d newspaper to dub it \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.oregonlive.com\/crime\/2022\/07\/portlands-deadliest-block-people-are-getting-murdered-here-on-a-regular-basis-why.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Portland\u2019s Deadliest Block.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What do you do when your church is located on your city\u2019s \u201cdeadliest block\u201d? For starters, church leadership decided to hire private security. About a year and a half ago, they started paying a firm called Hawkeye Protection a monthly fee to make two stops on the church property each night. \u201cIf Hawkeye sees someone on the property, they will tell them that they are not allowed to stay there and then hang around until they leave the property,\u201d said church member Jamie Bradshaw.<\/p>\n<p>After several incidents, the church also reluctantly started locking its doors during services. \u201cWe try to keep the door locked during services so that we don\u2019t have people wandering into the church. Three years ago, we would never even have considered leaving the outside doors locked,\u201d Bradshaw explained. The church also recently installed security cameras.<\/p>\n<p>But church members wanted to do more than just protect their building. They wanted to love their neighbors. Thus, they asked <a href=\"https:\/\/portlandrescuemission.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Portland Rescue Mission<\/a>, a nonprofit that works with the homeless, for guidance on the best way to minister to the people who frequent the drug camp. \u201cWe want to help people who need help. And we wanted to have the right attitude about it,\u201d insisted Bradshaw.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Portland Rescue Mission evaluated the camp but concluded it was purely a site for drug use. Unlike some homeless encampments, no one lived there. Bradshaw recounts that Portland Rescue Mission sent the church an email that said, \u201cWe\u2019ve been doing an assessment of that homeless encampment. And, in our view, the best thing you can do is get them to leave because they\u2019re dangerous. They\u2019re not interested in getting help. And it\u2019s not safe for you or the community to have a homeless encampment of that nature.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In Portland, the police have the legal power to remove \u2014 or \u201csweep\u201d \u2014 a homeless encampment that is located on public property. However, this was not a straightforward situation where the church could contact the police and set a date.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Police efforts to sweep homeless encampments are sometimes frustrated by homeless advocacy groups. These groups see sweeping as cruel and inhumane. If they find out about a sweep, they turn up to protest. \u201cOur street behind our church and another section in Portland are two hot spots for shootings. And the police have a hard time dealing with the other hotspot because there are activists in that area,\u201d Bradshaw said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Before approaching the police, church members went door to door in the surrounding neighborhood to sound out residents. \u201cWe told them what we were going to do because we wanted to see what the reaction would be. We were looking for any elements in the neighborhood that would be allies to the homeless rights movement because they wouldn\u2019t have approved,\u201d said church member Mark McConnell. To the church\u2019s relief, no one objected to sweeping the drug camp. \u201cWe found only support,\u201d he affirmed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>At that point, the church reached out to the police, and McConnell said their assistance has been excellent. The police were happy to finally encounter a community that does not hate them and proceeded to sweep the camp. \u201cThey were hungry for a win,\u201d McConnell said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>One police officer has now incorporated a drive through the church parking lot into his regular patrol route, which has been a big help to the church. \u201cHe\u2019s found people sleeping on the back steps in the middle of the day, and he\u2019ll just go up and tell them, \u2018You can\u2019t sleep here.\u2019 And make them move along,\u201d Bradshaw said.<\/p>\n<p>After the drug camp was swept, the site needed heavy cleaning. Church members volunteered, but they asked Hawkeye Protection to send a guard to watch over them \u2014 primarily out of fear of activists turning up.<\/p>\n<p>The church understands the structural factors that led to the drug camp are all still present. \u201cThe security people coming by and the police making frequent patrols are environmental steps. It doesn\u2019t accomplish anything directly. It just says we have certain expectations for this place. And it probably doesn\u2019t fit very well with drug dealing,\u201d McConnell affirmed.<\/p>\n<p>Lasting change will require a new attitude and probably new leadership in Portland. But in the meantime, the members of First Orthodox Presbyterian Church will have to cope as best they can.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Emma Freire is a freelance writer who has lived in Brazil, South Africa, and Europe. She is a 2021-2022 Robert Novak journalism fellow for the Fund for American Studies.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-comments mt-30 mt-sm-60\">\n<div class=\"article-comments-container d-flex flex-column align-items-center py-30\">\n    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"110\" height=\"106\" src=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/fdrlst-mark.svg\" class=\"img-fluid mb-20\" alt=\"The Federalist logo eagle mark\" \/>    <\/p>\n<p>Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.<\/p>\n<p>    <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/plans\/pricing\/\" class=\"btn btn-on-white\">Subscribe<\/a>  <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Democratic mayor of Portland, Oregon, Ted Wheeler, has declared a gun violence emergency in his city. \u201cWe will not stop until we bring peace back to those Portland neighborhoods<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1197,"featured_media":1897827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1577666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_finder_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/07\/29\/church-on-portlands-deadliest-block-cleans-up-drug-encampments-while-mayor-fixates-on-guns\/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=church-on-portlands-deadliest-block-cleans-up-drug-encampments-while-mayor-fixates-on-guns","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1577666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1577666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1577666\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1897827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1577666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1577666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1577666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}