Introduction
Conflict
CCRH Presents: Northeast Passage
Community Development Corporations (CDCs), whose main purposes are the development and management of government subsidized low-income neighborhood housing, are an integral part of the story of the gentrification of North/Northeast Portland. In the beginning CDCs were necessary for the development of the abandoned property in the neighborhood. But as the neighborhood changed, so did community support for the CDCs, most specifically Housing Our Families (HOF).
HOF was having some problems with drug activity at a couple of its low income housing properties, the Maya Angelou and the Betty Campbell, which drew the attention of the Boise Neighborhood Association (BNA). HOF conceded they were experiencing some property management issues in part fueled by the pressures of rapid growth but that they were addressing these issues.
What is unclear is whether the reaction of the BNA was to poor property management on the part of HOF, or the desire of the Boise neighborhood property owners to limit renters and more specifically low-income renters from living in the neighborhood. The Boise Neighborhood Association (BNA) successfully blocked the proposed development by HOF of a ten-plex low-income housing development.
The BNA even drafted a Housing Preservation and Development Policy formally stating that they favored home ownership but not subsidized rental housing. Since many of the traditional low-income renters in the Boise neighborhood were minorities this led to racial tension, whatever the motivation of the BNA.
In the film "Northeast Passage," Portland City Commissioner Eric Sten sums up the conflict when he says the CDC's went from "revitalizers of the neighborhoods, to defenders of the poor."
The author used the documentary, Northeast Passage and an article in Willamette Week entitled, "Battle of Boise" to write this page.
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