So my story starts like a lot of others’ do here in Portland, I’m homeless. And I’m currently on, at least, a couple dozen housing lists. I have been for several years now. But as of now, I have made a somewhat decent life for myself, as much as I could living out of my car. I’ve come up with a fairly profitable Canning route, and was able to save enough for a safe car Now at this point all I needed help with was actual housing! It seemed like a dream come true, running into a friend who told me about Allgood, and they’re “Safe Rest Village downtown. So, naturally, I jumped at the chance at temporary housing, until I came up on the housing lists. I moved in 14 long months later(I ironically was put on another waitlist to get into the village), and lived there until the whole site had to move up to Multnomah Boulevard, just behind Barber Safeway. Reason being, the staff felt unsafe, because of the gunshots happening every half hour. Fair enough. I remember the area, and t neighborhood, close to a grocery store. So I moved with everyone.
Now, everything was amazing, for the first nine months at the downtown location. Upon arrival at the new “safer” area, my spirits were soaring! Everything was coming together for me, all the hard work id been putting in was starting to pay off in under 2 years, I’d put myself in position to be a productive member of our society again, I couldn’t of been more proud of myself! I was in the last hurdle of turning my life around. What started off as shamefully collecting cans out of peoples’ trash’s, had led me to a variety of other odd jobs, that the members of the community’s were blessing me with. I no longer was embarrassed. or harassed, when I arrived in the neighborhoods was still canning in. I was lucky enough to now have an income 6 days a week, where made-$35 a day, that is the daily limit allowed for turning in cans. Yet also had steady odd jobs on 5 of the 6 days a week. And I now owned my 2008 BMW X5 SUV free and clear! (It helped that I got family price on vehicle cost, so about a third of bluebook had just moved into the final stop before getting affordable housing! Since there was no “guide on how to get yourself out of the gutter”. I was definitely more than proud of myself.
That was until the 3rd day at “Multnomah Safe Rest Village”. I was told that if I didn’t park my vehicle a block down the street, at the end of an unlit gravel road, that Allgood was going to have my car towed! Then I was told that where I was parked, along with everyone else, was a ‘Firelane’. So after work, I parked where I was told to, by the Director and Case Manager. When doing so, I was a bit confused because no other cars were parked where I was now.. not only were they not parked there, they were all now parked in EXACT spot I was told I couldn’t park! Now, since it was later in the evening, and 2nd shift village staff was now on.. I was going to have to wait until morning to see why I was the only one who had to park off grounds! Irritated, and tired, I stalked off to bed.
The next morning, I was horrified to find my vehicle had been broken into, not only broken into but they had ransacked and destroyed just about everything in and on it. The messages left on my seats and dash, written in what I guessed was white paint, said un- kind things like “DIE HOMELESS FUCKS” “Go back to where you came from!” “die,die,die” “HA HA HA” “Fuck off!!” And, if that wasn’t enough, my backseat had been completely ripped out, and by doing so, that gave access to my fuel tanks, which were drained dry. Along with that, my transmission line(Sliced open) and both catalytic converters had been cut out. The Fan, and the entire radiator, were gone. The hood latch was busted off. And the drivers side window was missing. Among various other small things… I took a few pictures, then I got myself together and returned to the village, where I told staff and made a police report. Upon showing staff (the director walked down there and saw all of this) he told me to park my car back where it had been parked the very day before. I asked “How can I park there if it’s a Fire Lane? Won’t I get towed? And besides that, my car is undrivable. Hey, maybe I will need that tow after all!” My attempt at a joke didn’t make it far.. I was informed that was untrue, it was not now, nor had it ever been, a Firelane… What?
At that time, I was told not to worry! Allgood would take care of all of the damages involving my car. And for awhile it kind of looked like they were following through! A local garage came and fixed the drivers side window, and stated that’s all they could do, because they were just a body shop. I was asked how much I thought it would cost to fix everything I said “More than I paid for sure.” What needs fixed, that I’m aware of, is the fuel tanks, back seats, interior dome lights, tow package, transmission line, complete exhaust, hood release latch, radiator/fan, and various hoses, along with the entire interior replacment..
The Director, to this day, has not said one word to me about what’s going on. The last time we talked was when he returned from a vacation.. he pulled me aside after the Wendsday Community Meeting, and told me that “he’d been gone, but was now back!” And it’d all get “taken care of.” That was over a year ago. On the 9th of October 1 filed a grievance, where I asked for an update, or financial payment for the value of my car? Also 35$ per day that I’ve now been unable to work. I need my car to transport cans to the bottledrop, but also for the other odd jobs. Not a word. I asked how does the grievance procedure work? I was told that the Director probably tore it up, and that’s it. My car is still sitting outside the fence to this day, where we were able to pull it too, with the help of another villager.
Now none of this is my fault, I had my car downtown for over a year and never once was it touched. Had they not forced us into an area that once housed sex offenders, an area that they neglected to tell us, was literally run to the ground by the surrounding community, because they didn’t want them here. It would have been really nice to know that the community was against us moving here. But now, instead of my life moving forward, I’m now 100 steps behind, & nowhere closer to having a home.
That’s my story… But I have a few things to add;
All good claims to house people, right? Then how, out of the 30-40 people here, has only 1 moved out in over a year? And that 1 person actually paid for his apartment with his SSI checks.
Allgood has also recently gotten in trouble for overcharging their accounts, and possibly stealing, or using their funded money for anything other than housing people.
Allgood, in my opinion, is just another “NonProfit” saying they want to “help”, receiving funding, taking the money and using it on themselves. Doing anything and everything except getting people housed, and helping people. They’ve completely destroyed everything I was working towards.
So I’ve just stumbled across this website, and the funds I need to either replace or fix my car Is around ~$12,000. I have pictures from that day, If you’d like to see them? It’s worth a shot, right?