Portland, Oregon, purchased 100 tiny home pods, each costing $16,510, to upgrade its villages that provide shelter for the city's homeless population.
The city established several tiny house villages about two years ago, the first being a "safe rest village" in Multnomah Village, which will now receive 100 new pods and will remove 28 old ones and return them to Multnomah County.
Bryan Aptekar, spokesperson for the safe rest villages, told Willamette Week that the move will guarantee that "the village sleeping units are consistent and equitable for all participants" with improved "door locks, heaters [and] insulation."
"The industry that supplies sleeping units for this purpose is relatively young," Aptekar said. "We are working with several companies for which this is a new product. Through experience of use, weather conditions, and so forth, we are providing feedback and improvements are being made to the base model."
According to the city, the cost of running each village is between $1.5 million and $3 million a year, and almost all of that funding has come from COVID-19 relief programs that will end in December.
Savannah Eadens, public information officer for the Temporary Alternative Shelter Sites, told local ABC News affiliate KATU that the concept of a shelter unit is still relatively new.
"The program as a whole wasn't meant to last forever," Eadens said. "It's meant to be a bridge from the streets to stability for this vulnerable population and this homeless crisis that we are seeing."
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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