‘People are dying every day:’ Oregonians call on Portland’s fentanyl emergency to reach beyond the central city

PORTLAND, Ore. — There’s a deadly grip tightening around many Oregonians, especially those living on the streets and addicted to deadly drugs like fentanyl. The crisis reaches farther than Portland’s central city.

James Pritchard smoked a cigarette outside a Beaverton homeless shelter on Wednesday morning. He says fentanyl is always at his fingertips, whether he wants it or not. 

“Unbeknownst to me, I had gotten some coke, and it was mainly fentanyl… I overdosed and almost died,” Pritchard said. 

“Fentanyl is everywhere … People are dying every day from it,” added his friend Ronald Hastenpayne, who stays at the Beaverton shelter because he couldn’t find an available bed in Multnomah County.

This week, the governor, along with Portland’s mayor and the Multnomah County chair, declared a 90-day fentanyl emergency focused on Portland’s central city.

“The fentanyl crisis on our streets has destroyed too many lives,” Gov. Tina Kotek said at a Tuesday press conference.

 Under the emergency order, there will be a new data command center based out of downtown Portland, a focus on addiction prevention among youth and the police response there among other things. Many argue that these efforts should be happening beyond just Portland's central city.

“I think maybe the governor doesn’t have a firm grasp on how wide that crisis has spread,” said Sarah Toner, who lives in Beaverton. 

Toner says drug use happens outside a homeless shelter, which is across the street from the public library and her child’s elementary school. 

“It is affecting all of us and there’s spread from Portland. If Portland doesn’t have the service, these people are going to come into all of the other bedroom communities,” she said.

Multnomah County Commissioner Julia Brim-Edwards agrees. “If you go to any neighborhood, whether it’s near a school, inside the bathroom at a public library, at a bus shelter, all over the city, you will see that fentanyl has a grip on our neighborhoods.”

“Focusing the emergency response in Portland will benefit the entire region, state and tribal lands because we know a large share of fentanyl in Oregon is trafficked through our major city,” said Kotek.  

Wednesday morning, Multnomah County Commissioners got a resolution from the county chair to make their part of the emergency order include the entire county, not just the central city. They will vote on that Thursday morning. However, that still leaves surrounding counties and cities to deal with this deadly crisis seemingly on their own.