Reclaiming Home: How Housing is Reviving Black History in North Portland

Although there's beauty in our city's Black history, it is also mired by harmful redlining policies and urban renewal projects that forced Black residents out of north and northeast Portland.

Today, those neighborhoods are the site of a growing movement to help every Black community member thrive in this area again.

“I think that this building, one day, by the time my grandchildren get grown, this will be historical,” said Leor Beverly.

Named after the prominent Oregon suffragist, the Hattie Redmond Apartments sit along North Interstate Avenue in the historically Black Kenton Neighborhood.

From 1990 to 2010, African Americans were pushed out by the thousands as the area was redeveloped and prices rose.

The building is part of a broader effort to help Black Portlanders find a place in this neighborhood again, by starting with the most vulnerable members of the community.

“So when I first started, this building was just sticks,” Beverly said.

As Associate Director of Housing for the Urban League of Portland (Portland, OR), Beverly has been on the forefront of this movement. She oversees three multi-family properties and over 200 scattered sites, but she says the most important part of her role is relationship-building.

The building has over 60 units, designed for people with disabilities who are chronically homeless and who request services within the Black or African American community.

The Urban League offers on-site support to connect with residents and help them better their futures.

“We do a lot of things as far as sip and paints. We do therapeutic paint sessions. We have a barber that comes to give haircuts to the people that are ready to get back into the workforce. We have workforce cohorts where other parts of our like other departments will come here and help people get connected to jobs and stabilization financially,” Beverly said.

This year, the Urban League of Portland will open M Carter Commons -- a 62-unit affordable senior housing development. It is named after Sen. Margaret Louise Carter.

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