Street Roots Makes Twitter Worth It Today

By ANDREA DAMEWOOD

For all you Twitter holdouts, Street Roots' social media experiment today may make you rethink your resistance to the 140 character format.

The nonprofit newspaper, sold by homeless folks around Portland, is taking to Twitter for 24 hours, putting a fleet of eight reporters on the streets themselves.

They're talking to formerly homeless folks, social services, city leaders, police and those experiencing homelessness.

All sorts of facts and insights are flooding their stream, which you can follow using the hashtag #SR24.

As of 10:45 am, reporter Jake Thomas (@JakeThomas2009) is with a homeless couple named Lisa and Bill, tweeting that "the are burning a couple of old pallets for a fire" and that "Lisa wishes the cops would leave them alone."

And from city commissioner Nick Fish, as tweeted by Joanne Zuhl (@jozuhl) "Single biggest asset in combatting homelessness? Short-term rent assistance."

#SR24 goes through 6 am tomorrow.


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