This whole cartoon is a response to a single article in the New York Times, “Two Families Got Fed Up With Their States’ Politics. So They Moved Out.” Well, and taking a potshot at David Leonhardt, whose bloodless newsletter appears in my inbox every morning, like a turd on my doorstep.
I moved to Portland in 1995, when housing was still affordable and employment was easier to find. Yet the seeds of gentrification were evident then, and in the ensuing 28 years, Portland has outgrown its reputation as a quirky, livable city into one of homelessness, open drug use, and crime. Every day our local media has some news report of a visitor who said he won’t ever come back to Portland again, or a business owner moving out of downtown, or complaints by residents in a luxury condo about people living in tents near their building. The right wing media eats this up as more evidence of the failure of “Democrat cities” as if small towns don’t have all the problems related to poverty or unemployment.
I live in one of the poorest parts of the city, so I see the homelessness, open drug use, and crime people complain about. But I also see that the cost of housing has more than doubled in the last 20 years, outpacing wages, and while the cost of rent has cooled off a little recently, it has been rising at significant rates since 2014, spiking dramatically during the pandemic. Another contributor to the rise in homelessness in the city is the behavior of right wing run communities that criminalize homelessness and offer no social services to support people who are in distress. Portland has been doing a poor job of serving these folks, but at least part of the problem is that our underfunded social service agencies are overburdened taking care of people who had to flee towns that won’t help them. Making matters worse is the wave of punitive legislation targeting the rights of women, immigrants, and queer people (whom homelessness disproportionately affects) in so-called “red states” that are driving people to find more hospitable places to live.
I could go on and on about this topic. Portlanders gripe about it all the time. We know what our problems are, and while we differ over how to solve them, we also know these are not unique to American cities. And we meet the people who have left their homes in “red states” because of the existential threat posed by the right wing religious authoritarians overtaking their governments. New York Times writers — who used to write fawning articles about “quirky, livable Portland” 10 years ago — might treat this as another “both sides” problem, but it’s more than just some partisan ideology for those of us living with the consequences of these policies.
One thing I have to say about the Michigan couple who claim they won’t visit Portland again: in what city can you leave a gaming console in open view in your car and not get robbed? Detroit? I don’t think so.
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