For a few months now, Street Roots vendors Sonya Aho, Robin “Shaggy” Douglas, George McCarthy, Craig Preston and Robert Waters have taken turns folding into my old Volvo so I can drive them across town. The occasion is always unique, but the goal is always very similar: to talk to people about the experience of being unhoused and navigating a hostile and unforgiving world.

The group represents Street Roots at its Civic Circles. Community groups from around Portland reach out to Street Roots frequently to ask if vendors can come share their stories. Often, the request comes from friction in a neighborhood stemming from something like Safe Rest Village expansion, or neighbors complaining about a meal service.

Civic Circles bring together two groups that are far too often pitted against each other — housed and unhoused neighbors — to learn from each other, learn about what they have in common and talk frankly about their concerns.

Civic Circles started when Street Roots board member Jay Parasco and his neighbors in Sunnyside wanted to support people sleeping outside nearby, and found that other neighbors were opposed. Street Roots hosted a dialogue between the two groups about how they could support their unhoused neighbors. Some of the neighbors who were initially more hostile and opposed to the idea changed their minds. And so, the Street Roots Civic Circles were born.

Today, Civic Circles happen all over Portland, with groups as varied as the city itself. Students from Lewis & Clark College hosted Douglas and McCarthy. The students visited Street Roots a few days later to interview vendors about their experiences relating to the environment and climate change, expanding their own understanding of these issues. Various church groups who provide services to their unhoused neighbors — from lunch services to shelter — also welcomed Street Roots ambassadors.

As part of a recent Civic Circle with St. Andrews Episcopal Church in St. Johns, Waters, Douglas and Aho surveyed 49 people living in the area around Lombard Street in St. Johns. They asked questions about what makes a good neighbor.

The answers were telling. While housed neighbors might suggest a variety of neighborly acts of service, or a general friendly attentiveness to one another, the people living in the Lombard Street area often answered that a good neighbor is a quiet person who keeps to themselves, doesn’t cause trouble or avoids drawing attention. There is a world filled with lesser and greater injustices that feed the thought among unhoused people that the goal for them is to be as small and invisible as possible. And yet, it is also what gives them safety.

“When you’re living and sleeping outside, no interaction with a neighbor is often the best interaction,” Douglas said.

Aho shared a story about the time she lived in her car. One evening, she was sitting in the driver’s seat mending a blanket when an angry neighbor knocked on her window and told her that he knew 'what she was doing.' He very clearly did not mean mending a blanket.

From the beginning, an important goal for Civic Circles has been for housed people to start seeing unhoused people in their neighborhood as community members rather than as strangers they would prefer not to see. Reimagining that connection as neighbors between people can affect much larger social and political questions.

The Civic Circles have allowed participants to be curious as well as vulnerable.

At the Civic Circle at St. Andrews, a retired gentleman thanked Aho, Douglas and Waters for sharing their stories. He talked about how he became involved in his neighborhood over the past couple of years, volunteering and trying to help his unhoused neighbors. But he was not afraid to share that he had been, as he called it, “wrong” in the past. Whenever he saw damage to front yards or trash strewn across the sidewalk, he would mutter to himself that it was probably a homeless person who was responsible. He knew better now, he said. He added that even in the last hour of the Civic Circle, he learned more about homelessness than throughout the rest of his life.

At the Civic Circle about the proposed expansion of the Safe Rest Village in Multnomah Village, hosted by Friends of Multnomah Safe Rest Village, one of the participants asked how we could possibly know if the Civic Circles were a success. Sure, participants might be moved by the stories and express gratitude. But how do we know if something genuinely changed?

The question caught me off guard, and I had to think about it for a moment. And then I realized the gathering itself is already a success. Whether we spend an hour making small talk or exchanging our favorite recipes for Brussels sprouts, or whether we discuss sources of misunderstanding and friction between housed and unhoused neighbors — the conversation is the point. Civic Circles bring people into a room who don’t talk to each other very often, if at all.

“For me, one of the very difficult things about living outside was the fact that people would often not even acknowledge you,” Douglas said. “They would pretend you simply did not exist. I’m happy that I get to tell my story because it means that I’m being seen.”

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Street Roots is an award-winning weekly investigative publication covering economic, environmental and social inequity. The newspaper is sold in Portland, Oregon, by people experiencing homelessness and/or extreme poverty as means of earning an income with dignity. Street Roots newspaper operates independently of Street Roots advocacy and is a part of the Street Roots organization. Learn more about Street Roots. Support your community newspaper by making a one-time or recurring gift today.

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