News

(Portland, Ore.) November 2, 2011 – A new report from the Coalition of Communities of Color and Portland State University (PSU) shows troubling disparities between Multnomah County’s Native American population and whites in terms of health, employment, education, crime and other factors.

The 118-page report is the result of a three-year research partnership between PSU’s School of Social Work and the Coalition of Communities of Color, whose membership includes a diverse alliance of culturally specific organizations in Multnomah County.

The Coalition intends to use the report as the basis for advocating change in public policies that affect Native Americans.

Among the findings in the report:

·       Poverty rates among Native Americans are triple those of whites, and even higher among families. The report showed a poverty rate of 79.1 percent for single mothers raising young children.

·       Income among Native Americans are typically half that of whites.

·       Native American unemployment in 2009 was 70 percent higher than whites.

·       More than half of Native American students do not graduate high school.

·       The rate of incarceration is almost double that of whites.

·       Twenty times more Native American children end up in foster care than white children.

In addition, the report states that these problems are worse in Multnomah County than in the nation as a whole.  “For example, almost one in three local Native families live in poverty, while one in five Native families live in poverty nation-wide,” says Ann Curry-Stevens, the lead author and principal investigator of the project.

The reasons are many, says Nichole Maher, executive director of the Native American Youth and Family Center, including a mass forced relocation of Indians from reservations to Portland in the 1950s, and the federal government’s removal of recognition of numerous tribes in Oregon.

This is the second of seven proposed reports by the Coalition of Communities of Color. The first, which came out in 2010, was a broader portrait of racial disparity in Multnomah County. Lai-Lani Ovalles, coordinator of the Portland Indian Leaders’ Roundtable, said findings from that study have already assisted several Native Organizations to identify key strategies in improving the lives of Native Americans. 

The report will be released Wednesday, Nov. 2 at the Native Professional & Friends Night with invited guests from the Annual Convention of the National Congress of American Indians. Location is the Mezzanine Exhibit area of the World Trade Center, 121 SW Salmon. Enter from the corner of Southwest First and Salmon. Take the elevator to the Mezzanine Level, and enter the glass doors to the left.

The release of the report will occur with a short address by Nichole Maher, co-chair of the Coalition of Communities of Color, at 7 p.m. Signatories of the report will be available for interviews, and copies of the report available. The report is also available at www.coalitioncommunitiescolor.org.