Portland mayor tells House committee emergency nighttime shelters are the missing link in city’s homelessness response

Mayor Keith Wilson told the House Committee on Housing and Homelessness on Feb. 24 that Portland needs a rapid expansion of scalable, low‑barrier emergency nighttime shelter beds to address an unprecedented rise in unsheltered homelessness.

Wilson said the city urgently needs what he called the “missing link” — surge capacity emergency nighttime shelters — and thanked the committee for considering roughly $217 million to support 24/7 beds. “We must change the way we think about this crisis and immediately and decisively respond,” Wilson said.

Wilson framed the request as a crisis response aimed at reducing deaths and visible suffering on city streets and restoring public safety and livability. He said Portland recorded 456 deaths of people living outside in 2023 and described cascading impacts: he cited that 40 percent of firefighter callouts relate to unsheltered homelessness and that polling showed strong public support for adding more shelter beds. “We can’t look at this chart and think in terms of three‑year plans,” he said.

In his presentation, Wilson said emergency nighttime shelters are intended to be a temporary but scalable “surge” resource that uses existing facilities — churches, community centers and businesses — and a mix of paid staff, volunteers and people with lived experience. He emphasized these shelters are not a replacement for supportive housing or longer‑term programs, but a “no wrong door” entry point that can free up resources elsewhere in the system and create a pathway to services.

Wilson described personal examples included in his slides and said people living outside are often too preoccupied with day‑to‑day survival to pursue treatment or rehousing. “Sheltering the unsheltered is the missing link but only the first step,” he said. He told lawmakers the city had opened two shelters in under 50 days in his first weeks in office and had more in the pipeline.

Members asked about comparisons with other cities. Wilson described work with Boise’s mayor and said Boise mounted a rapid surge of shelter options after litigation, which helped reduce its unsheltered population. He also said shelters can be markedly cheaper on a per‑person per‑day basis: he estimated 24‑hour supportive sites cost $100–$150 per person per day, whereas emergency nighttime shelters could cost as little as $20–$30 per person per day.

Committee members also asked how the city plans to address related problems such as drug activity, tents, RVs and encampments. Wilson said removing tents and makeshift shelters can allow outreach and enforcement to address associated crimes and substance use, while other city efforts such as a deflection center are being expanded.

Wilson closed by urging a coordinated local, county, regional and state effort and thanked members for time and consideration.

Ending: The mayor’s remarks framed emergency nighttime shelters as an immediate, cost‑effective complement to Portland’s existing shelter and rehousing work. Lawmakers on the committee followed the presentation with statewide briefings and a separate public hearing that focused on a proposed statutory framework for sustaining shelter services statewide.