The article recounts Evan B Harris's descent into homelessness and the transformation of Portland from an artist-friendly city to one of increasing corporate influence and affordability issues.
When I first met Evan B Harris he was fizzing with talent and kindness. So I was shocked to hear he had become homeless and out of control. What happened to him is a story playing out in cities across America
Evan was an artist. Not long before we met, he had completed a mural in the stairwell of the city’s newly opened Ace hotel – the second in what would later become an international hipster chain. His work was beautiful: old-fashioned and intricate folk art, filled with sea creatures, jays and foxes, with moths and mermaids, sailors and sweethearts.
I noticed when he stopped posting in the spring of 2021 and was curious, but not particularly worried. He’d told me once he’d be happy living quietly, making art by the sea, so when he disappeared from view I imagined that was where he was, and felt happy for him. To understand what happened to my friend is also, I think, to understand what happened to Portland, and to many cities across the US and beyond; a story of opiate addiction, mental health crisis and a homelessness epidemic; a lesson in how we care for our most vulnerable.t is strange, after so many years, to see Evan through a screen. He is sitting in Jordan and Kristin’s house in Pennsylvania, next to one of their dogs.
When he first began to hear voices, Evan was unsettled. It was different from an internal dialogue. Instead the voice appeared to be standing outside of him, talking over his shoulder and whispering in his ear. “In my brain it was my dad’s ghost talking to me,” he says. “I thought his soul was trying to enter my body.”
He had no money. His ID and mobile phone were stolen. The pandemic was at its height and people walked around wearing masks. He recognised no one. Meanwhile, Portland was recovering from the recent riots. “So the city was destroyed,” Evan recalls. An influx of homeless people also brought change: “There were homeless camps on every corner, fentanyl and crystal meth had flooded the streets. It looked like someone had dropped a bomb in Portland.
It is not that people didn’t try to help Evan. His wife, his brother, his friends all did what they could. A mutual friend tells me of meeting for coffee one day and finding Evan “out there. His personality had totally changed. He had painted his face and was drinking large amounts of THC” – tinctures infused with cannabis. “He was fucked up. I said, ‘Let’s go and get you some help.’”
It was scary to see his friend in such bad shape. “He had makeup smeared on his face, he was super dirty, he was so thin already, so thin.” Over the days that followed, Jordan got Evan food, a shower, a bed. They walked and talked., documenting his strange transformation. “He was bouncing between these three personalities and telling these wild, deep stories that he was making up essentially on the spot,” Jordan recalls. “It was like a Tolkien novel.
He bought Evan camping supplies, a torch and a mobile phone. He wrote his telephone number on “700 things” in the hope of keeping in touch, then flew back to Pennsylvania. The phone was stolen within 48 hours.t was July when Jordan returned, and this time he had brought a cheque for $5,000 to admit Evan to a private facility out of town. He knew his friend needed not only shelter, but antipsychotic medication, a diagnosis and treatment plan.
Evan had been living on the streets for a year when somebody offered him drugs. “Other than smoking pot, I never used anything before being on the streets – especially with my mom’s use of drugs, I really steered clear,” he says. “But you can’t sleep, it’s freezing outside, and someone’s like, ‘Here, smoke this, you’ll feel better, you’ll have energy, you can get up and move.
I ask Evan to describe what freebasing fentanyl feels like. “You feel euphoria, just complete relaxation,” he says. “It takes away all thoughts, you’re just in the moment, present, relaxed. You get put into a trance and you’re just out. You’re bent over, drooling on yourself.” “Portland was a very scary place. I saw dead bodies on the street. Just lying there. If someone ODed, they’d roll them up in a sleeping bag and roll them over to the curb and just leave them there.” There was a lot of crime and a lot of violence. A woman he knew was murdered and one time, a man who had been going through the camp robbing people showed up and attacked him. “I hate even talking about this, but I stabbed him with a knife because he tried to kill me,” he says.
This time it was different. “They finally had someone who could work with me and get me into a programme where I could detox and stabilise,” he says. Kristin Jordan teaches at a school not far from the home she shares with Jordan, three dogs, 12 chickens and their daughter, Evie. Although for a long time his artwork had hung all over the family’s house, Kristin had met Evan only once, seven years earlier, for a couple of hours over dinner.
Meanwhile, Evan began weaning himself off Suboxone, the drug administered for opiate addiction. “It was horrendous,” Kristin says. “He would be shaking and throwing up, and his legs were seizing up. We had him in the emergency room a couple of times because of the side-effects. It was so hard to watch.”
Evan B Harris Homelessness Portland Artists Affordable Housing Corporate Influence
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