Thoughts on How to Bring Portland Back from the Brink of Destruction

In the past thirty days here in Portland I have had to call 911 twice for safety issues. Both calls were in response to big knives wielded by our homeless friends.

First Emergency Call

The first incident occurred when I was walking from my car over to our office in the Pearl district. Passage Immigration is headquartered in the stunning Ecotrust building, which has been beautifully restored with the original wood intact. We regularly get compliments from our clients. As I walked over – looking forward to greeting my colleagues who were in the office that day – I noticed a large, fit guy across the street sporting a scary skull tattoo on half his face.

Skull tattoo guy was pacing back and forth, then looked aggressively at me and another pedestrian, and pulled out a huge machete to forcefully stab the tree right in front of him. My theory is that he believed the tree was about to attack him. However, I don’t have a good theory for why he then pulled out a guitar and started strumming and singing.

I entered the Passage office, said hello to our Legal Assistant Michelle, and realized:? “stabbing trees with machetes to scare pedestrians has got to be illegal.” Michelle agreed and I called 911, looking out at the machete still hanging from the tree and skull guy strumming away.

Remarkably, it took over 5 minutes of being on hold before a 911 operator picked up! This was almost as jarring as the tree stabbing itself. In the U.S. we pride ourselves on having emergency services available and responsive immediately, arriving within a couple minutes. (For example when we thought our kid couldn’t breathe an ambulance was there incredibly fast).

After I finally got through to a 911 Operator and explained what happened, they sent a police cruiser over fairly quickly by Portland standards – arriving about 10 minutes later. The emergency Operator asked me to describe what the perpetrator looked like and it was easy to do. As I explained to my kids later: “if you’re going to be a successful criminal long term, don’t opt for a skull tattoo on your face.” The police questioned the tree stabber and then arrested him and drove him off.?

Second Emergency Call

Just two weeks after this first incident, I drove down with my wife and three kids to another nice part of Portland to attend the Thorns women’s soccer match. We parked near 23rd Avenue, which is full of fancy boutique stores and excellent coffee shops. Over the years it’s been a very enjoyable, safe place to walk around. However, as soon as we parked and my family exited, an extremely upset homeless guy (also very fit and buff, interestingly) walked over to us and another family that had just parked nearby. He angrily yelled at both families that we needed to move our cars because we parked near his tent. We then saw he was holding a baseball bat in one hand and a knife in the other. I joked later to my family that I wasn’t concerned because this guy didn’t have a full machete…??

Thankfully we are a fit, active family who were prepared to sprint away as needed. But similar to a being approached by a bear in the woods, we figured it was best not to bolt. As we walked away I called 911 and it only took a minute this time for an Operator to pick up (Sunday afternoons are apparently not as busy).?

We learned when a policeman called me later that this particular homeless guy triggers emergency calls daily. The policeman said that it’s not even worth it to press charges because this just results in him being locked up temporarily and then quickly released. A permanent solution isn’t possible because he has been deemed mentally ill and there are no long term options for him.

What Needs to Change?

This crazy environment of rampant lawlessness is a regular discussion topic with my kids. Yes, like many big cities, Covid has had a huge negative impact on the urban interior. With so many healthy, gainfully employed members of society choosing to work from home, we are starving local businesses of revenue and the vicious cycle continues.

For those businesses like Passage Immigration that chose to renew multi-year leases in ground zero, we are not feeling the love from our city leaders. Yes, there has recently been positive movement towards law and order with a daytime camping ban. But the more fundamental issue is how Oregonians legalized drug use which has ravaged those who needed some guardrails. It’s essentially a green light to destroy themselves. As my kids and I have concluded, it’s likely that most people who approved legal drug use are not parents or were at least not thinking like responsible ones.

I’ve been reading an excellent biography of Benjamin Franklin the last several weeks. We’re overdue for some big changes here in Portland as we see established retailers like REI decide to leave. Portlanders pride ourselves on being an educated, informed group. But we should listen to Mr. Franklin who says: “Common sense without education, is better than education without common sense.”? He also says: “The problem with common sense is, it isn’t.”