The Beaverton Valley Times has a story today on our weekend efforts to draw attention to homelessness in Washington County, Oregon:
It was right around the time a group of citizens began an all-night camp-out to raise awareness of homelessness in Washington County that the rain began to fall.
The drops came ever so lightly at first, but as Saturday night turned to Sunday morning, the amount of precipitation – combined with low temperatures and light wind – made the Out in the Cold Camp Out exactly as the name implied: cold.
Occasional raindrops, however, didn’t stop those who gathered outside Cedar Hills United Church of Christ from staging the event to help get the word out on the need for affordable housing in Washington County. Of the 20 to 30 people who showed up for the candlelight vigil at 7 p.m., nine of them stayed the night.
“Homelessness is not just an urban problem. It doesn’t matter where you live; poverty is growing, homelessness is growing,” said homeless advocate Chuck Currie, a minister at Parkrose Community United Church of Christ. Currie said he planned on sleeping in his car during the camp-out, much in the way so many others in the area do every night.
Figures from January 2007 showed that the county’s population includes at least 1,261 homeless people. Eric Canon, a Forest Grove resident and chairman of the Washington County Interfaith Committee on Homelessness speculates that the number is much larger – between 2,000 and 5,000.
County officials say only 12 out of every 100 people who knock on the doors of family shelters in the county are allowed in, with the other 88 being put on a waiting list or sent back out into the elements.
Click here for the full story.
Related Post: Hillsboro Argus Covers Weekend Homeless Protest
