Portland State Magazine Spring 2017

SPRING 2017 PORTLAND STATE MAGAZINE 13 address emergencies, make sure the facilities are running properly, and help coordinate the residents’ connections to case workers. The Kenton Neighborhood Association will coordinate with local residents to help with the community garden and organizing donations of needed items. The Joint Office of Homeless Services, operated by the city and Multnomah County, is helping to tie all of these elements together, working to ensure that the village isn’t a dead end for the residents, but provides a realistic path out of homelessness. Marc Jolin, director of the Joint Office of Homeless Services, spoke about how the success of the endeavor will be measured. “Is it a welcoming and safe and supportive environment for people while they are there? Does it give them the stability that they need to work toward getting out of homelessness altogether and back into housing?” Jolin says he expects it will work well and that the women who are staying there will benefit from the community that’s created. “I think the sense of ownership that they have over the space will translate into whatever work they need to do to move back into more permanent housing,” he says. “It’s been exciting to get to know some of the work that’s going on at Portland State and to see how students can contribute to solutions for people experiencing homelessness,” he adds. “It is the best of what you can do when you pull people together around a shared goal.”  Karen O’Donnell Stein is communications, marketing and recruitment administrator in the PSU School of Architecture. Fourteen unique tiny dwelling units for the homeless were designed and built by Portland teams. Two of those teams were from Portland State and included (left to right) architecture graduate Tomasz Low, faculty member Todd Ferry and current student Olivia Snell.