PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Two people are suspected of freezing to death during last week’s winter storm, according to the Multnomah County Medical Examiner’s Office.
KOIN 6 News asked county officials if the two people suspected of dying from hypothermia were homeless, they said they don’t have that information yet but temperatures were deadly for anyone living outside.
Multnomah County opened four warming centers with a combined capacity of nearly 500 beds. KOIN 6 News talked to Daniel, a man who lives in a tent downtown, who said he didn’t go to a shelter during the storm but said it seemed like most people living in the tents around him did.
He said burning a fire inside his tent helps him keep warm. He lights a fire by pouring hand sanitizer and rubbing alcohol into an empty cat food can. He told KOIN 6 News he worries flames could get out of control.
“That’s a worry every day, it’s happened pretty close a couple of times but I was able to put it out,” Daniel said.
The Portland Fire Marshal said firefighters have been called to more than 1,000 tent fires within the last few years. Commissioner Rene Gonzalez called it a “dire public safety emergency”. Two weeks ago Gonzales announced an immediate temporary suspension on tent and tarp distribution by employees of the public safety bureaus he manages.
KOIN 6 News asked Gonzalez’s office if he still stands behind the decision, considering the two suspected hypothermia deaths. They sent this statement:
There is a humanitarian crisis on our streets that has been further enabled by the failed policy of unconditional tent and tarp distribution from public bodies — which discourages people from seeking shelter and services and encourages them instead to improvise dangerous warming fires in highly flammable settings.
Commissioner Gonzalez is committed to working with the mayor and other government partners on transitioning from unsanctioned camping to safer shelter options. His clear direction to public safety bureaus on tents leads to good policy: an example of this came in the sudden cold weather event, where the Portland Bureau of Emergency Management worked with the Lloyd Center Mall to establish warming shelter for over 100 people.
Commissioner Gonzalez will continue to evaluate tent policy as the city’s ADA lawsuit is resolved and as the mayor’s office operationalizes its sanctioned camping model.
Justice Hagar with the non-profit Sisters of the Road acknowledged that tent fires are a serious problem but believes there are other ways to solve it.
“We can create more spaces for people to be able to stay warm or get access to food or we can create places where people are allowed to have fires where we know it’ll be safe where they’re actually being monitored in some way. In late February we almost now always have an ice storm like this, especially with climate change seems to be making it worse, so we know this is going to happen and then we’re refusing people something that’s going to help them survive in these conditions,” Hagar said.