Clover Court Community Meeting

Information about Proposed Clover Court Development Provided at Community Meeting

Representatives from Washington County and the Luke-Dorf nonprofit organization answered questions and provided information at a community meeting on February 21, 2017, about a proposed six-home development meant to help address chronic homelessness.

The development, called Clover Court, would be designed to help fill a gap in the county's affordable housing rental market and provide wrap-around supportive services to chronically homeless people living with mental illness. The 1.29-acre parcel was left over from a county road improvement project along 170th Avenue.

Close to 300 members of the community attended the meeting to hear about the proposal, the county's collaborative approach to addressing homelessness and opportunities for public involvement as the proposal moves forward. Materials and information from the meeting are available at a new Housing Services web page.

Background
Washington County has a long-standing policy through which the Board of Commissioners may transfer ownership of surplus property to the County Housing Authority and to non-profit organizations that create and manage affordable homes. This is one way the county tries to address the critical shortage of affordable housing and to leverage additional resources to prevent homelessness.

Washington County's approach has been to work together with community partners to address this crisis following the "Housing First" model for ending homelessness. Housing First is a nation-wide strategy that prioritizes providing people experiencing homelessness with permanent housing as quickly as possible, and then providing voluntary supportive services as needed, to ensure that families and individuals do not cycle back into homelessness.

Washington County, along with the rest of the Portland area, is suffering from an affordable housing crisis that disproportionately impacts those with low incomes and mental illness. The County is currently working through "Year 9" of a "10-Year Plan to End Homelessness." Although great strides have been made, Washington County still lacks over 14,000 housing units for low and extremely low income residents to accommodate this great need.

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