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Unionized employees at Sunstone Way saw billboards advertising the nonprofit’s services at an awkward time: when their leaders were negotiating severance agreements for workers at the 120-bed Market Street Shelter, scheduled to close at the end of this month.
It was hypocritical for Sunstone Way to spend money on billboard advertising while it was pleading penury with soon-to-be-jobless workers, says Joy Nicholson, a shelter case manager and member of Local 1790 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.
“Who thought this was a good idea?” Nicholson asks.
So far, WW has located two Sunstone Way billboards, one on East Burnside Street and another on Northwest Nicolai Street. Readers have spotted two more, one on Southeast 122nd Avenue and another on the Tualatin Valley Highway in Hillsboro.
“Everyone deserves to be inside,” the billboards say. “Help us bring people inside at sunstoneway.org.”
Neither Sunstone Way chief executive Andy Goebel nor the nonprofit’s spokeswoman returned messages seeking comment on the campaign.
The billboard ads are likely to come down soon. Earlier this month, Sunstone Way said it would close on July 1, citing reduced government funding and rising costs. The announcement came a month after a former finance executive sued, alleging that Sunstone Way had overspent on office rent, organizational retreats, and third-party services.
The purpose of the billboards isn’t clear, Nicholson says, and he wonders if it could be a pitch for donations. They don’t appear to be aimed at homeless people because they guide to a website that doesn’t offer intake. “Please note that we are unable to accept shelter referrals or prospective participants at this address,” a notice on sunstoneway.org says.
Nor is it clear how Sunstone Way is paying for the billboard ads. Multnomah County, which pays Sunstone Way to run three shelters, has no line items on invoices that would allow contractors to seek reimbursement for advertising, spokeswoman Julia Comnes tells WW in an email.
“That said, there is no county policy preventing our providers from using non-county funding sources to pay for marketing/promotion,” Comnes says.
Similarly, organizational marketing is not a line-item expense “that would be/has been reimbursed by the city,” spokesman Robert Layne says.
Sunstone Way’s closure, and earlier problems, shows that the city and county should consider managing shelters directly, instead of contracting nonprofits, AFSCME says.
Sunstone Way has operated under a cloud since 2022, when Multnomah County Auditor Jennifer McGuirk followed up on a call to the Good Government Hotline and determined that the nonprofit had overbilled the county by $525,000. Some $330,000 of that amount came from duplicated payroll expenses submitted for the same pay period in separate invoices.
“We can reduce the reliance on expensive consultants and contractors, and bring more work in-house where possible,” Joe Baessler, executive director of Oregon AFSCME said in a statement. “These are practical solutions that protect public services and resources.”
In a memo sent to staff announcing the closure, Sunstone Way said the shelters would stay open. Multnomah County spokesman Denis Theriault last week said the county is working “with urgency to assess next steps.”
