PPAG Background Report Review Discussion Notes
March 15, 2010 Meeting
Table Discussion Notes
HEALTH, FOOD AND PUBLIC SAFETY
Table A
• Key fact missing from discussion of public safety - #1 killer of Americans under 35 years old is the automobile.
• Issue of equity/equality is a desirable lens for health, arts, and many other action areas, but quality of life metrics for this action area are critical to Portland’s future.
• The healthy food issue is critical – there is an enormous correlation between food and health (especially geographically equitable access to farmers markets and full-service grocery stores).
• Both physical AND mental health measures are critical for success. Parks and natural areas play a huge role – access to nature. See ‘Last Child in the Woods’ book – No Child Left Inside movement.
• Access to greenspaces and parks are also critical to public health.
• Returning to the automobile usage link – communities are healthier and safer when walking and biking are connected to this issue. We need more projects like the recent improvements to the Springwater Corridor and other regional, inter-connected multi-use trails.
• In the Portland Plan as a whole, we should analyze our efforts as a city today with regards to how they impact our youth. Do a comparative benefits analysis of focusing on youth in the process.
• Portland neighborhoods are becoming increasingly segregated, largely along economic lines. Issues of equity and race are critical when evaluating these public health issues (e.g. New Seasons moves into an area, gentrification prices out low-income people, who then lose their recently-gained access to healthy food).
• Class is also an issue (per point made in bullet above).
• The jargon around food issues in both the national and local dialogues is astonishing. When governments use terms such as ‘food insecure’ it just disguises the problem. We need to connect people to this critical issue by using jargon-free, understandable language. People know that they have limited access to healthy food, that food quality is low, and that they or their children are hungry. Using the term ‘food insecure’ just cloaks the real issues for most people.
• In the Round I Public Workshops the average income levels were fairly high. Do we really understand what food-related challenges are on a day-to-day basis for people in Portland? How can we ensure that our plan will be realistic and reliable in our proposed health strategies? Can we truth-test our strategies keeping in mind folks who can’t attend the workshops (ie. because they’re working two jobs, or can’t afford the bus ticket or babysitter?).
• Keep seniors in mind, how to keep them in the community, provide decent access to health care options, and transportation. Transportation issues for seniors with health issues is a large issue looming on the horizon – Tri-Met LIFT rides average $22 per ride.
• Yes – transportation and physical access is always bound up with housing issues. People need workable access to housing, health care, and jobs.
• We should be thinking about ways to get 3-4 ‘wins’ out of each individual strategy that comes out of the plan. For example, if schools sites are redeveloped, they could incorporate affordable housing, senior housing, etc. Why are farmers markets, clinics, and other community events not more commonly held at school sites? We need to strategically leverage our resources, support age diversity in housing, and cultivate community and land resources with ‘multi-win’ strategies.
• Right now an unfortunate outcome is our over-housed empty-nesters. People nearing retirement or wanting to downsize are frozen in too-big housing because of the economic climate. The credit and economic crises have reduced the dynamism and functionality of the market.
• Also, very few families with kids can afford the large, close-in properties that the ‘over-housed’ occupy, even in ‘normal’ economic times. Need to focus more on large family housing in our more affordable close-in neighborhoods.
• We should be measuring our targets in terms of how it proportionally benefits X (age, income, race) groups.
Table B
• ISSUE: We haven’t moved off the line in terms of the equity gap, with regard to park access. We need to focus on equity. We’ve met other benchmarks (bike improvements used as an example), but [in terms of equity] we haven’t put our money where our mouths are. We have money for things; it is about what we choose to fund.
• ISSUE: Funds for improvements (e.g., parks and other needed infrastructure) are not aligned with greatest needs (e.g., underserved, low-income, communities of color). Priority is given to communities with the strongest voice, but not necessarily the greatest need.
• ISSUE: School meals; Oregon has one of the lowest reimbursement rates for free and reduced lunch
• ISSUE: Active lifestyles; need infrastructure and adequate public safety to promote; need bikeways, parks, recreation facilities in all areas of Portland to promote active and healthy lifestyles
• ISSUE: Geographic equity (infrastructure) needed
• APPROACH: Address the problem at a system/policy level (e.g., decision-making processes, policy frameworks) and at the project level.
• APPROACH: Develop equity criteria for selecting infrastructure projects/priorities.
• APPROACH: Soil and conservation districts are underutilized resources; they have money (example, community garden matching project among districts)
• APPROACH: Localize the farm to schools movement (cost reduction; quality improvement) for school meals
• APPROACH: Define our gaps and map our gaps and identify a project per year.
• APPROACH: Trees have value beyond health; recognized as a crime deterrent; trees are an Oregon value.
Table C
• The group overall felt fairly strongly that public safety, particularly as it relates to police/community relationship, was too big of an issue and should be a separate discussion and category.
• Missing: Noise is a health issue - particularly as it relates to sleep interruption. In particular - MAX trains (especially if we are planning to build more< trains, and liquor establishments. Also - there are no requirements for sound-proofing in multi-use buildings (separating first floor retail from living areas) - which is fine if it is a coffee shop, not fine if that coffee shop later becomes a bar, etc.
• The high cost of health care causes people to become homeless (pay medical bills, can't pay rent/mortgage).
• It is important to get some clarity on identifying which factors are more important when it comes to health....is income more important than sidewalks, for example. To help prioritize efforts and investment to make the biggest impact on improving health.
• More people perceive their neighborhoods to be unsafe, this is especially true for multi-family and affordable housing areas of neighborhoods. The housing (affordable) is better in terms of quality (less mold, for example), but people feel less safe. There is also a connection with kids feeling safe coming/going to school -- the inability of kids to be able to safety walk and bike to school has health impacts.
• Need to figure out how to have the conversation without saying that affordable housing causes crime..."Affordable housing doesn't cause crime or gang activity, poverty does".
• Need to look at issues systemically versus in this fragmented approach.
• Missing: Human trafficking (Portland #2 in the nation) - significant health and public safety implications.
• City needs to build Health Impact Assessments into planning - to change the lens that we look at the issues through.
EQUITY, QUALITY OF LIFE AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
Table A
• For quality of life and equity – both are disadvantaged in Outer SE, with disproportionate numbers of poor whites and lack of sidewalks. The more we can focus on single actions or outcomes with multiple benefits, the better (e.g. green infrastructure that provides park spaces, access to nature, improved stormwater services, etc.).
• Equity starts at the top. Bureau and budgetary allocations in the city often have little to do with desired programmatic outcomes, but much to do with politics. Meaningful measures to establish equity must address this issue in the city (embedding Portland Plan equity goals in budget process).
• Earl (Blumenauer), Charlie (Hales) and Sam (Adams) have pushed for this in the past, but it needs to be a consistent approach. Some of the imbalance is structurally endemic to the budget process.
• There is a missed opportunity in North Portland. During the recent boom, housing built in North Portland was primarily studio and 1 bedroom units, not larger family size housing. This would have been a good opportunity for a ‘two-fer’ – more appropriate family housing and money/enrollment for schools.
• Dedicated funding for affordable housing has direct links to school funding – a direct feedback loop.
• Investments in diversity of workforce training should be a priority, especially with city-sponsored contracts, energy retrofit programs, etc. There is a clear skills and opportunities feedback loop (investments in skilled workforce leads to more opportunities, greater opportunity increases skills and capacity, etc.).
• Approach/scope issue: Many of these problems are regional in scope. Bigger approaches are often better if we don’t want to just move the problem around to some other location. For example, Portland and Multnomah County have suffered because of a lack of affordable housing efforts in Washington County, where many jobs are located. Portland’s Housing Bureau is learning that place-based strategies can often leave the people behind. People-based strategies should be kept in mind.
• The Portland Plan process should push Metro to pursue and follow-up on a regional (affordable) housing plan.
• Yes – the Housing Authority of Portland is now talking about the portability of Section 8 housing vouchers outside of Multnomah County, into Washington County.
• Geography and school districts. A great challenge for Portland is that Portland has more school districts (6) than any other city in the country. Each school district competes for good leadership, teachers, and private partnership resources with every other district. When families with school-aged children move around, they get caught up in school district boundary issues: family stability is impacted, and consistent teaching and school environments are critical to educational success. No politician is willing to take on this issue, and yet it warrants a city-wide conversation. The city would need to provide some political cover in order to have this conversation – it’s unlikely to succeed at the state level because we’d need at least 31 representatives to push the issue (unlikely to happen). In order to succeed, the conversation should be centered on the kids and their future, not adults, teachers, or the school district bureaucracies. For the Portland Plan, we should also be viewing this issue through a 25-year lens, and consider what the status quo does to overall student achievement in the city. Many Portlanders will oppose this idea as one of reducing local control, access and accountability. By one estimate, this duplication wastes $45 million/year, which could go right back into schools. Teachers also should be involved in the discussion – it’s a fiction that teachers are driven by school district structure and location – they want a healthy overall system. The multi-district duplication situation also impacts equity issues (curriculum, facilities, crowding, etc.).
Table B
• ISSUE: There is an assumption that community is geographic; this is not true for many communities; there needs to be other ways (non-geographic) to engage people.
• ISSUE: We keep trying to find a “one-size-fits-all” equity solution. We needs lots of models that link together.
• ISSUE: The subsidization of privilege (homeowners in neighborhood associations) is unfair; neighborhoods associations have large budgets (compared to other community groups funded by the city – DCL example given); there are class/race/ethnicity issues embedded in the neighborhood association structure
• ISSUE: Civil engagement; the tone of engagement is uncivil; unwelcoming; rude; exclusive.
• APPROACH: Example given of local school district (Milwaukie) in which school choice is not an option and in which the schools are associated with the neighborhoods; they are the infrastructure of the community.
• Note: Schools are not safe spaces for everyone.
• APPROACH: Create mechanisms to ensure civil civic engagement in city-sponsored groups; city-sponsored groups need to diversity and become more inclusive
• APPROACH: Expand the set of groups who are welcome to use the meeting rooms in City Hall; open city buildings to the public so it isn’t always the same people in City Hall.
Table C
• Big discussion on how "equity" is different from "equality". If we are really going to have a focus on equity, then it means a drastic change in how we make decisions on investments and services. Need to look more closely at who is benefiting from decisions we are making; want everyone to be benefiting more; need to narrow the gap.
• What about gentrification - and the lack of support for those that get pushed out of their neighborhoods because of it (e.g. support for those ending up in NE Portland).
• Need to talk bigger than just race - need to also talk about class, sexual orientation, age, etc. Can't work on one to the exclusion of the others.
• City needs to focus more on helping all Portlander's engage with decision makers better (e.g. helping the homeless population effectively engage). Discussion about taking engagement and leadership training/services out to those communities that we need to get involved. Need to go to those populations, not expect them to come to City. "Take the time" grants the COunty used to offer may be a good model.
• The stresses caused by the fragmented social services system (and similar systems) diminish the quality of life for so many Portlanders (e.g. system for housing assistance...all service providers require different things).
• Can't volunteer when you don't know where you are going stay for the night or where your next meal is going to come from....
• We don't have the level of cultural competency needed to make sure that when people do engage, that it is valued, that they are really listened to and that it makes a difference (e.g. something actually happens as a result). So, when those communities do engage, they feel like nothing actually happens as are result.
Discussion Group Notes
HHFPS
· How do we compare to others (in socio-economic factors and variations by group)? Generally better, but not the best.
· Who do we compare ourselves against? Select from U.S., Vancouver BC, Europe, Japan, etc.
· At PP workshops, people wanted better access to affordable food (Winco vs. Safeway vs. New Seasons). Consider cultural appropriateness and affordability.
· Losing education around healthy food preparation (youth). Consider:
· economics, culture, time
· across income and racial/ethnicities
· schools, extension service, classes
· changing perception of “convenient”
· link to healthy, low carbon food production
· different use patterns by ethnicity--of parks (African-Americans, Hispanics) and of yards (whites)
· how to get ‘non-hipsters’ biking? Community Cycling Center program is a model. Bikes serve downwardly-mobile people. Do we know bike use by ethnicity?
· Crime numbers have fallen; is there equity between neighborhoods? Issue of being afraid to call 911, etc.
· How do we return to “community policing”? Police responding to mental health issues because we don’t have sufficient services
· Issue of silos--need to better coordinate community and mental health services
· Do we really “attract” more homeless with mental health problems?
· Need to provide services where people are
· How do we create policies that encourage income diversity in neighborhoods
· Other mental health issues (depression, anxiety, etc.)
ECEQL
• How can we engage whites in the uncomfortable equity issue (message that they have privilege)? We need to learn language and skills to discuss equity issues.
• Prefer use of “inclusion” over diversity. Don’t let anyone off the hook. We all have a role in making progress. How can Portland be more inclusive?
• Gays are not counted, for public contracts
• Include access to education, including college
• Blacks are moving east
• Leadership development and opportunities--where are African-American leaders to provide visible presence? Is there a process to identify and cultivate? Lack seeds of power.
• How plug into 25-year plan?
• Exposure to education
• Add corporate responsibility in education; apply as work requirement
• Does anyone track new employees of incoming corporations?