Is there something I I'm I'm missing and I don't know. I can't think of what it is. Ohh keys. Can't lose my keys out here. You just get to the point where. Just don't even care. It's a mindset, one that has slowly worn on 50 year old Tara Pietro Monaco. For nearly three years she's lived in this broken down trailer on the West side of NE 33rd Drive. You know, you don't have anything to organize your things with. You don't have your a stable environment. You don't know if you have to pick up and leave. That's been Tara's reality since we first met her back in July. I need your help. She was stuck in the chaos. When I don't have gas in my generator. Yeah, I sleep in my car. Because the rats. Hey, Kate, Cliff, we need to push this car over there. Whoa, and pushing to get out. They go forward. This lifestyle wasn't her choice. It's something she fell into after leaving prison, where she did time for identity theft. I've just been having a hard time getting back up on my feet again four months after meeting her. Not much had changed. I think of, like, forgetting something, but I don't know what. Dozens of people just like Tara, searching for a way off the streets, are getting into transitional housing through the help of outreach workers at join a Portland nonprofit. We meet people where they are. And warehousing first, a few years ago, Anthony Robertson's team at join partnered with Kevin Kavanaugh. He runs a real estate company, Guerrilla Development. We make the buildings that you see around town. They're also doing something different. Building apartment buildings like this one in Southeast Portland, specifically for homeless people living in the city. It's impossible. To to to ignore the homelessness crisis, affordable housing crisis. So because we make buildings. We are on the front lines of the problem and hopefully the solution to the building has 10 rooms. When we were there only nine of them were filled so we told join about Tara. Right. Tara agreed to meet us. Do you know Joanne? Do you know about Joanne? Have you you heard a joint before, kind of. We were talking earlier. Maybe there's a there might be an opportunity to help you into a place, into an apartment that you could afford just on your SSI, on your Social Security while you're waiting, while we're working on the subsidized housing thing, which might take a year, could take multiple years, right. But instead of being outside for all that time, for a year, two years, we might be able to get you into a place like. Studio apartment kind of situation? That would be awesome. We managed the apartment complex. That they're kind of SRO's a little bit, but it's a cool place. That's an SRO single room occupancy. So it means you would get like a bedroom, but it's a house where everybody shares like a common kitchen space and everybody shares like a couple bathrooms and showers. There's. Nine other residents, you would be the 10th resident. It's mixed male and females, primarily women. What are my choices be able to stay with me? Sometimes I can leave you the information. It's all in here, including Elise. Yeah. So it's moving. Ready basically. If you want, I could pick you up tomorrow. WWE awesome. Yeah. And I just need to. No pressure like. But if you see it, you like it, you can have it, you know you can move in there. Yeah, I can give you keys tomorrow. Cool. Yeah, alright. Well, I'm going to leave this with you. OK. If you want to just there's you know, input the information into the lease sign where it says resident and then when I pick you up tomorrow. So I'll be down here tomorrow around 4:30, alright, alright, give me a hug. OK. We'll get you out of this cold and wind. Yes. And thank you. Yeah. And pink. Yeah. It's like a fresh start in a lot of ways, Tara. You know, it's like turning the page and getting a fresh start, you know? Awesome. Thank you so much. OK, I will see you at 4:30. It doesn't usually happen that fast. My heart went out to her. Yeah, I saw somebody who desperately wanted a change in their life and who appeared to be rather stuck in their situation. It was 415 the next day. Ohh. I need that too. We caught up with Tara before the outreach team arrived. I've been thinking about it. I'm just like going. Am I really gonna be getting off the street again? How's it going? Going good. Good. Can I help you move some stuff? I don't know what to throw in it right now. I'm. I'm just overwhelmed a little bit. Yeah. Be ready for a lot of transition to happen. There's gonna be a lot of emotions. Yeah. I'm following you out. But something was holding her back. Hey bro, I'm not leaving you. Tara's brother is also homeless. I promise I'll be back. We're ready to go. Yeah, OK. I'm in the black Jeep right there. 30 minutes away. Was a warm bed and the stability she'd been searching for. Hey, Tara. Hi. How you doing? Alright. Excited. Yeah, a little overwhelmed. I'm excited for you to, like, sleep in a new place, you know? Yeah. Here is Tara. We're going upstairs, that's the key. Room 10. What do you think? It's warm. Yeah, like. Like it's nice. So here's the bedding. One thing, I'm going to have to try these two. It's quiet. Yeah. A silence almost deafening Charlie compared to the cacophony of the streets and the world she left behind. You got your key. Tara had a lot of keys. I stick it on here. That way I don't use it. But she made room for one more. Adjustment Blair best KGW news. Wow. And what a powerful story. Blair joining us, what an incredible thing you did to really bridge that gap for Tara. And we really saw the range of emotions, right. You saw overwhelm and shock and happiness. A lot went into that for her. So it's been a little while since we, she got into that building. What has happened in the last month? Yeah, Ashley. So Tara moved into that apartment about a month ago, and I'm told that that night she went back to her camp to check on her brother. She returned to the apartment two days later and has been there ever since. Now we're told that is common since it's such a huge adjustment and many people, just like we saw here, have a family and a community out on the streets. Now, I haven't seen her since that night, but today she testified in front of county commissioners advocating for more money to be spent on housing the homeless. Take a look. My name's Tara Pietro Monaco. I've been trying to get help and I just didn't know where to go or anything. And this news lady come out and she had talked to me and we were talking and she and I met her a while back ago but. She recognized me and she's like what are you doing out here? And I says I just don't know where to go. I don't have anywhere to go. And and she says and then next day I know Gurney and and someone else Mike I think his name was shows up at my door one morning and said. Well, we we'd like to take you for a drive. I just think that funding for the housing people would be helpful because that's what some of us on the street really need. So she's obviously using her story to really try to help other people and really powerful, incredible, you know, more often than not. Unfortunately getting people off the streets and into housing isn't so fast and it's not always a success story. So what made Tara's situation different? Yeah, very much so. So there are many factors to this, one being that there was a room available for her now that that's not always the case. Another reason is the relationship piece to it. It takes an outreach workers time to build trust with people. But since her and I have been meeting and talking since July. We were able to help bridge that gap. Now, I also want to point out that join the nonprofit featured in this story has a 100% success rate with that apartment building in southeast. Every person that they've moved off the street and into that building has either stayed there or moved into permanent housing. Well, I hope that you keep us apprised of developments with Tara. We wish her well and a really good future in her new home. Great story, Blair. Nice job.
