Source: https://missoulian.com/news/local/nowhere-to-go-how-one-city-built-housing-for-native-americans/article_9ac562de-f01a-11ed-92cc-7f7c7fbf8647.html
David Erickson May 18, 2023
The fact that the building serves Natives is crucial to keeping them from ending up back out in the streets because all the residents have support services.
Angelique Saxton, the community director at Nesika Illahee
PORTLAND — Linda Monteiro, who grew up on the Rocky Boy’s Reservation in north-central Montana, would like to return home soon. She’s fond of Missoula, where she lived for a long time and took classes at the University of Montana. She said it would be a place where she’d be closer to friends and family.
“I miss it,” she said. “Missoula’s where I’m trying to move.”
But Missoula doesn’t have what Portland, Oregon, has to offer her.
Monteiro, Chippewa Cree, is also a military veteran. She currently lives in an affordable housing apartment building for tribal members and other Native families in Portland. Almost all of the residents were formerly homeless or had unstable housing.
Monteiro was living in a Super 8 motel before she found her current home.
She said she’d jump at the chance to move back if anything like her current housing existed in Missoula or elsewhere in Montana, but no such luck.
“When I was in Missoula, I was at the Poverello Center,” she said. “I was in the veteran’s section, which I’m glad for because the other part, the dormitory, was pretty bad. I’m glad I had my own room.”
She left Missoula because there were people hanging around her doing drugs and drinking alcohol, and she was trying to get clean.
“I’ve been here three years now,” she said. “I’ve been clean and sober and I’m ready to go back to Montana.”
She lives in the Nesika Illahee building, which means “our place” in the Chinook language. The building, in Portland’s Cully neighborhood, was a collaboration between the Native American Youth and Family Center, the Native American Rehabilitation Association of the Northwest, Community Development Partners (the owner of the building) and the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians. Together, the partners utilized Indian Housing Block Grant funds to finance the $17 million project, which has 59 units of affordable housing (available to those with 60% and under of Area Median Income) with on-site service providers, a community garden and other amenities. Roughly 110 people of all ages live there.
On a recent day, Monteiro was sitting in her building’s large community room, listening to soothing flute music while beading the moccasins she plans to sell at the Butte Folk Festival this year. At the large communal table next to her, kids who live in the building were giggling and working on coloring books. Rachel Brown, the building’s resident service coordinator, sat down and started beading as well.
For Monteiro and the other residents, part of the building’s appeal is that there’s intergenerational interaction and bonding, rather than people isolated, just sitting inside their individual apartments all the time.
“I like what I’m doing now,” she said, carefully threading a bead through the leather. “I can come sit down here and do what I’m doing now. And I’ve made some good friends here. It’s right on the bus line, too. If I really need help, there’s help available. They help me pay electricity and Wi-Fi is only $9.99 a month. And my check covers rent.”
And most of all, she has stability.
“I don’t have to be scared that I’ll end up on the streets again,” she said.
Missoula housing
There aren’t many options for people looking for a large apartment complex — connected to services and specifically built for Indigenous people — in Montana, which has a Native population of 6.7%.
And for the leader of a Missoula-based nonprofit that works to provide services to Indigenous community members, something like the Nesika Illahee is sorely needed in the state.
“As far as I’m aware of, there’s nothing like that in Montana,” said Skye McGinty, the executive director of the All Nations Health Center in Missoula. “There’s an absolute need for that type of culturally specific care in a communal setting.”
According to the Missoula Coordinated Entry System, which prioritizes homeless people for housing options, the city’s population is 1.5% Native, but the city’s unhoused population is 16.7% Native.
Missoula, like other communities and tribal nations in Montana, has plenty of affordable housing options. But there isn’t enough to meet demand, and there’s nothing like a complex that could house 110 Indigenous residents together.
“That type of housing is something All Nations is trying to do once we build a new medical facility,” McGinty said. “We want to be able to provide some type of housing with that that allows for that increased access to services, culture, community and togetherness.”
She said housing is a big issue for Native American community members across Montana.
“Oh yeah, there’s a huge need, all the time,” she said. “That’s the number one need that’s coming through the door right now, is people asking for connections and help in the housing process. We all know there’s a huge need for all types of housing, but also housing specifically for Native people.”
That’s because affordable housing by itself isn’t necessarily enough.
“The way Native people live inter-generationally is important,” McGinty said. “There’s not a lot of affordable housing projects (that) are set up that way. A lot of them are set up with one-bedroom or two-bedroom units. But that’s not ideal for a family that’s having a cousin come in for a graduation party or an auntie or a grandma come stay with you. There’s not that availability to house them in one place.”
Lessons learned
Eric Paine is the chief executive officer of Community Development Partners in Portland, which owns the Nesika Illahee building. He said it was crucial to integrate Indian Housing Block Grant funds, which allows the owners to be able to give priority and preference to Tribal members to apply to live in the building first.
“The problem is you can always do affirmative marketing, right?” he said. “You know, ‘we’re gonna open the building up, let’s put word out in the community,’ but from a Fair Housing Act perspective and long-term, it’s really tough to ensure that you’re gonna get Natives to be able to move in if they can’t jump to the front of the waiting list. And the whole concept of the project was around serving Native families.”
Angelique Saxton, the community director at Nesika Illahee, said the fact that the building serves Natives is crucial to keeping them from ending up back out in the streets because all the residents have support services.
“It gives them opportunity,” she said. “There’s lots of families here that are relatives and not just from one tribe, but from many Tribes. It’s nice to be able to have people come together as families. And then the community also develops like a family as well. So we’re able to develop our own values and our own cultural stuff here for the kids and have parents come in and do little events for them and be active in the community.”
Paine and Saxton both said it’s important to have a larger building, with around 60 units, because it’s easier to finance and it means that there are more community members interacting together.
“That’s what they were looking for, that intergenerational family setting to promote cultural ties to the young children and young adults with elders,” Saxton said. “You know, back and forth. And (Nesika Illahee) really ties it in really, really well.”
Coming next in this series: A look at two affordable housing bonds passed by Portland voters.