Patricia Kullberg hosts this episode of the Old Mole which features the following segments:
Crisis in Higher Ed: What’s at stake for the city of Portland if its flagship university is strangled by budget cuts? Laurie Mercier speaks with Bill Knight, Associate Professor of English at Portland State University and president of the PSU American Association of University Professors (AAUP), about proposed dramatic cuts to academic programs and faculty positions. PSU-AAUP represents about 1200 instructional faculty at the university.
For more about the administration's proposed cuts and how faculty have offered alternatives to grow and build a stronger PSU, so important to the city of Portland, see https://psuaaup.net/.
Wassailing in the Age of Moral Monsters (Part two): Desiree Hellegers reflects on the links between immigrant detention, mass incarceration, endless war, and death on the streets. Universal housing, they argue, is no pie in the sky dream, and would go a long way toward ending the cycle of colonial violence in the U.S. Part One aired last week.
Finding Home: Earlier this year, as discussed on a previous episode of the Old Mole, the Welcome Home Coalition, in partnership with Sisters of the Road, released their report, Finding Home: Lasting Solutions Rooted in Community Expertise, which surveyed and consulted those with lived experience of homelessness in the Portland area. That research confirmed that the city needs to pivot to a housing and support service-focused response to homelessness, and away from the current system of sweeps and shelters.
As part of the Finding Home project, Welcome Home produced a short film, directed by Alex Wakefield, featuring the voices of people who know the solutions that will actually reduce homelessness. Welcome Home has graciously granted us permission to share audio from that film here on the Old Mole, but we also recommend watching it, since the visuals include informative text and compelling images. Here are the voices of some who truly understand the problems of homelessness and how best to address it.