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Ending Addiction as Overdose Deaths Soar
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After support from a local addiction advocate, two people share their path to recovery
By Jack Harvel
The number of overdose deaths in Oregon last year jumped 57% over what was already a record-breaking year. About half of the 745 Oregonians who died from an unintentional overdose were on fentanyl, according to preliminary data from the Oregon Health Authority. At the same time the use of stimulants like methamphetamine has also risen sharply, killing 548 Oregonians in 2021 compared to 93 a decade prior. Both drugs are highly addictive and usually require some medical assistance to wean off once a person is dependent on them.
But, the first step into treatment can be a difficult one to take without support, and reducing these stats requires work from people on the ground who can identify and support people struggling with addiction.
Shawnda Jennings works as a peer support specialist for Ideal Option, an addiction treatment provider with over 70 clinics across the United States. On Tuesdays she visits inmates at the Deschutes County Jail and plans their recovery on release, and afterward rides along with sheriff’s deputies to do outreach. On Thursday she’s tagging along with the Shepherd’s House Project S.H.A.R.E van, which distributes food, clothes and other household items to homeless camps, to talk with people on Hunnell Road. On Fridays she visits the Lighthouse Navigation Center to offer up Ideal Option’s services to the people staying at the shelter there.
Jennings couldn’t put a number on how many people who have gone into treatment on her watch, but said Ideal Option’s seen a steady increase in clients since bringing her onboard in May. At the camps and the shelter people greet her like an old friend and are just as likely to chat as learn more about Ideal Option.
“I really just kind of familiarize myself to them, ask them how they’re doing,” Jennings said. “It’s kind of just being available, and the consistency of seeing them to where they start getting comfortable to open up. Sometimes it’s just like being at the right place at the right time.”
Jennings said the decision to go into treatment is up to the individual, but that once that decision is made, she can be the connection to long-lasting help.
Overcoming addiction
For Mary Bishop and Michael Brizendine, that decision happened just before becoming stranded in Bend. The couple was on their way to the east coast from Portland after deciding to quit using drugs. They felt they couldn’t quit in the same environment that got them hooked.
“Before we had a car we lived on the street and when you go to lay down at night, and you have to constantly watch your back to make sure that nobody steals a book bag with your wallet, your birth certificate, and all your life properties are in that bookbag,” Bishop said. “Other people on the street, if you’re not a drug user, will tell you, ‘Hey, if you just do this one time, you’ll be awake for two days, and you’ll be able to take care of yourself and you’ll have energy,’ or, ‘Hey, if you do this, you won’t be cold.’”
When en route to Salem with the intent to eventually get back to the East Coast, another drug user they didn’t know broke their windshield and flattened their tires. They visited the Shepherd’s House homeless shelter on Second Street and asked what resources were available for addiction treatment. They were referred to urgent care and given Jennings’ number.
“Shawnda immediately came to me and helped me set an appointment up. She met me at the office for the first appointment, and they all very well explained to us what would happen and what I would need to go through,” Bishop said.
Bishop and Brizendine are proud of their progress; in just a few months they’ve stopped using and work regular jobs — Bishop is even training to become upper management at IHOP after just a couple months on the job.
Ideal Option uses a suboxone treatment that reduces withdrawal symptoms and cravings while blocking other opioids from binding to and activating opioid receptors in the brain. People start with two appointments a week and doses are gradually spaced out as the patient becomes more stable.
“The most important part is to make sure that they make it to the first, second and third appointment,” Jennings said. “It’s really hard because sometimes you see a lot of people just disappear.”
Jennings approaches her clients with empathy that comes from personal experience. She and her family struggled with addiction for years. Her father died from an intentional overdose less than an hour after
her grandmother passed away. Her half-brother died by suicide in the same way. She’s been in recovery for five years, using the medication Sublocade and a 12-step program to turn her life around. She said the foundation of her life began after hitting rock bottom and growing from it.
“It kind of runs deep in my veins and my soul. So, I felt like there was a purpose of why I went through everything I went through. And that’s to be able to share that hope to other people and let them know that there is light on the other side,” Jennings said.
The light on the other side for Jennings is a rewarding profession where she helps people, a sense of community among the helpers and a good environment to raise her 15-year-old son. That son is an honor student and popular YouTuber who amassed over 16 million views and 253,000 subscribers in a little over a year posting videos about the video game Minecraft. But Jennings’ work takes a village to be successful, and she’s often working with other programs to provide full wrap-around services.
“Not having that support is really hard for individuals and not having a home, not having somewhere to take a shower and the normal things that we take for granted, they don’t have that and it makes it hard for people that are homeless to seek out recovery,” Jennings said. “That’s why I tried to get that relationship and get them in some sort of program. It can actually give them a good support system to do to be able to overcome what they’re going through.”
Jack Harvel Courtesy of OHA
Overdose rates have been steadily growing as more people die from both synthetic opioids like fentanyl and methamphetamine.
—SHAWNDA JENNINGS
being anything but a spoiler potentially pushing Oregon in what we consider an alarming direction.
When we considered the candidacy of Christine Drazen we are reminded of the adage, “you can’t win if you don’t play.” The Republican gubernatorial nominee has shown that “not playing” is a problem. In her first year as leader of the House Republican caucus, in 2020, many in her caucus left the state to protest cap-and-trade legislation. This led to a great deal of other legislation not getting passed and the needs of Oregonians left unaddressed. What’s to come if Drazan, who’s likely to face a majority-Democrat legislature once again, doesn’t get what she wants as governor? We believe that she will likely take her ball and go home.
Both Drazan and independent Johnson—who represented Scappoose as a Democrat in the legislature—are campaigning on the notion that Democrat Tina Kotek, who served as Speaker of the House, should be blamed for all the ills in Oregon today. They primarily point to the rise in the houseless population that is so prevalent across the U.S., accompanying record amounts of income inequality.
Kotek is a hard-driving legislator. No one is arguing that. However, it is in this drive that we’ve actually seen progress in addressing the issue of homelessness, and in correcting the problems that led to so much inequality in the housing sector over the past few decades. Kotek was instrumental in funding the statewide homeless Navigation Centers that give people a place to find resources to get them out of homelessness. She also helped to launch Project Turnkey, which converted old motels into shelters around the state. Due to the Martin v. Boise ruling, without adequate numbers of shelter beds, cities have little to no leverage in clearing camps or getting people off the streets, where homelessness is currently most visible. Motel-shelters brought instant, lower-cost shelter-bed capacity. Kotek also spearheaded the bill that did away with single-family zoning in bigger towns—allowing duplexes and triplexes and quads to be built to increase Oregon’s housing supply. These are just a few examples of her commitment to improving the lives of the most vulnerable in Oregon—and far from the “status quo” that certain politicos would have you believe is what is at stake in this election.
While Kotek also negotiated Oregon’s Student Success Act—the act that ushered in the Corporate Activities Tax, during the campaign she has expressed a willingness to tinker with the tax to make it fairer for businesses. Throughout the campaign season, the business-minded among us have shared with us that adjusting the CAT is a high-priority issue. Kotek’s willingness to open this issue up for discussion—while also continuing to advocate for better outcomes and graduation rates for Oregon students—is heartening.
Oregonians have three choices in this race, and despite the fact that some of them want you to think they’ll bring entirely new ideas, each of the candidates has a track record and a history in the legislature. Our faith is on the one who’s prioritized what we believe is Oregon’s biggest challenge—homelessness and housing—and put her legislative career where her mouth is.
New Rules for Short Term Rentals
Bend City Council approved an ordinance that doubled the required distance between short-term rentals
By Jack Harvel
New short-term rentals can’t be within 500 feet of another STR under an ordinance the Bend City Council voted unanimously in favor of at its regular meeting on Oct. 5. In March City councilors directed staff to look at changes in the development code that could increase the availability of longterm rentals.
The last time the City put regulations on short-term rentals was 2015 when it added a 250-foot buffer zone. This time around the City is also adding a long-term rental option to its proof of use requirement, which gives STR owners the ability to lease a home as a longterm rental without losing its permit for up to three years. Previously STR code would terminate the permit to operate an STR if it was rented for less than a month per year.
The changes only apply to people renting a whole home and who obtained a permit before the last code amendments in 2015. People renting a room in a house they occupy are also exempt from the density buffer. Bend’s Business License Program Manager Loralei Williams said the change will make the majority of Bend households ineligible to rent the entire property on a shortterm basis.
The percentage of area where STRs are ineligible is expected to increase by 20%, from 34% to 54%. The remaining 46% of properties in the short-term rental rule area — which is all area zoned residential or mixed-riverfront use outside of the Old Mill district— could still apply for a permit.
The changes won’t revoke current licenses if they’re inside of the newly defined buffer, but any permit granted after April 2015 will terminate as soon as it’s sold. Prospective buyers and owners often collaborate to renew STR permits if it’s still eligible. The code also specified that only one STR dwelling can be approved on a property — meaning any ADUs or multi-unit properties can’t rent more than one structure.
AirDNA, a company that tracks active listings on STR platforms like AirDNA and VRBO, told the City that it had identified 1,082 unique addresses in Bend. That’s less than the number of permits the City has granted.
“We do know that some people aren’t actively utilizing their permits, some people just hold on to them, some of them utilize it for their family and friends only; they aren’t necessarily advertising it,” Williams said.
Williams also said an audit of illegal STRs is in the works, in which they’ll cross reference AirDNA’s data with City permits to spot illegal rentals. Currently the City relies on a complaint-based system to identify unpermitted STRs.
Courtesy of the City of Bend
Right: A map shows where new STRs cannot be located. The new rules decrease the percent of eligible properties from 66% to 46%. Left: Before the ordinance.
Noticias en Español Nuevas reglas para el alquiler a corto plazo
El concejo municipal de la ciudad de Bend aprobó un reglamento que duplicó la distancia requerida entre los alquileres a corto plazo
Por/By Jack Harvel Traducido por/Translated by Jéssica Sánchez-Millar
Los nuevos inmuebles de alquiler a corto plazo no pueden estar a una distancia de menos de 500 pies de otro inmueble de alquiler a corto plazo (STR por sus siglas en inglés) según el reglamento al cual el concejo municipal votó unánimamente a favor en su reunión del 5 de octubre. En marzo, el concejo municipal de la ciudad ordenó al personal que revisará los cambios en el código de desarrollo que podría aumentar la disponibilidad de inmuebles de alquiler a largo plazo.
La última vez que la ciudad estableció reglamentos en los inmuebles de alquiler a corto plazo fue en 2015 cuando agregó una zona tope de 250 pies. En esta ocasión, la ciudad también está agregando una opción de alquiler a largo plazo a su requisito de prueba de uso, lo cual otorga a los dueños de STR la habilidad de alquilar una casa a largo plazo sin perder su permiso hasta por 3 años. Previamente, el código de STR anularía el permiso para utilizar un STR si se alquilaba por menos de un mes al año.
Los cambios solo aplican a las personas que alquilan toda una casa y que obtuvieron un permiso antes de las últimas enmiendas al código en 2015. Las personas que alquilan un cuarto de una casa también están exentas del tope de desplazamiento. La gerente del programa de licencias comerciales de Bend, Loralei Williams, dijo que el cambio hará que la mayoría de las viviendas de Bend no sean elegibles para alquilar toda la propiedad a corto plazo.
Se espera que el porcentaje de área donde los STR no son elegibles aumente en un 20%, del 34% al 54%. El 46% restante de las propiedades en el área de la regla de alquiler a corto plazo, que es toda la zona para uso residencial o mixta frente al río fuera del Old Mill District, aún podrían solicitar permiso.
Los cambios no revocarán las licencias actuales que se encuentran dentro del tope recién definido, pero cualquier permiso otorgado después de abril de 2015 será anulado tan pronto como se venda la propiedad. Los posibles compradores y dueños a menudo colaboran para renovar los permisos para STR si aún siguen elegibles. El código también especificó que solo se puede aprobar un STR en una propiedad, lo que quiere decir que cualquier unidad de vivienda adiciona (ADU por sus siglas en inglés) o propiedad multi-habitacional no puede alquilar más de una estructura.
AirDNA, una compañía que rastrea los listados activos en plataformas de STR como AirDNA y VRBO, le dijo a la ciudad que habia identificado 1,082 domicilios únicos en Bend. Eso es menos que el número de permisos que ha otorgado la ciudad. “Sabemos que algunas personas no están utilizando activamente sus permisos, algunas personas solo los retienen, algunos los utilizan solo para sus familiares y amigos; no necesariamente lo están publicitando,” dijo Williams.
Williams también dijo que se está trabajando en una auditoría de STR ilegales, en donde cruzarán los datos de AirDNA con los permisos de la ciudad para detectar alquileres ilegales. Actualmente, la ciudad cuenta con un sistema basado en quejas para identificar STRs que no constan de permiso.
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