Portland Design Commission Removes Language Encouraging Developers to Provide Campsites for Homeless People

The Portland Planning and Sustainability Commission voted twice for the code change.

Homeless camps beneath the Broadway Bridge in 2017. (Daniel Stindt)
By Nigel Jaquiss

The Portland Design Commission has deleted the word "rest" from a controversial code change that would have encouraged developers to include design elements for overnight camping outside new private buildings.

The Portland Planning and Sustainability Commission voted twice for the code change ("Rest Easy," WW, Dec. 4, 2019) before passing its work to the Design Commission.

Oriana Magnera, the planning commissioner who pushed hardest to include the new language, explained that public spaces around buildings often include "benches but not a lot of place to pitch a tent."

"Sitting is brief," she said, "but the reality of the housing shortage is, folks need to rest on a longer-term scale."

At its Dec. 19 meeting, however, the Design Commission took a less expansive view and deleted "rest" from the document it will send to the City Council this year.

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