An Open Letter to Adam Hoesly

August 20, 2021

 

Adam Hoesly

XXXXX

Portland, OR 

 

 

Dear Mr. Hoesly,

 

We are your tenants, the residents of the Kelly Butte Place Manufactured Home Park. We are a

community of friends made up of senior citizens, people of color, families with children. Some

of us are disabled and have severe health conditions. Some are retired, some on fixed

incomes, and some still working at low income jobs. One common characteristic is that we

have well below average incomes and we are limited in what we can pay for housing. Yet for years we have been responsible rent and tax paying residents who take good care of our homes and your park.

 

At present none of us are prepared to be out of the park by October 20th. Even if there were places to move our homes (there are no options in or anywhere near Portland), you are only required to pay us $8000 but the true cost of moving our homes and re-siting them elsewhere is upwards of $45,000. We are low-income Portlanders, and our now worthless-homes were our biggest asset. People of our financial position simply do not have the funds available. We will be broke and homeless due to your actions which are completely out of our direct control. 

 

We have repeatedly tried to reach out to you and explain our predicament regarding our park closure notice and the impact of your actions. We have received no response, not even a courtesy note to let us know that you received our communications. You publicly portray yourself as a man of strong Christian and humanitarian values and if you hold those values, they should require you to meet with us, hear our concerns and consider actions you can take to mitigate this impending displacement crisis. 

 

As a professional real estate investor and builder of moderate cost homes, you are well aware of the Portland housing market.  As a man of your stated moral and religious values, it seems impossible that you would want to add to the City's growing affordable housing and homelessness crisis and destroy the financial future of ten families who are totally blameless. While Mr. Perkins and you had the legal right to file permits prior to the enactment of the RMP zone change, out of all the other operators of Portland's 57 manufactured home parks only you two chose to do so. You did have the legal right, but what is legal and what is morally right are not necessarily the same.

 

We once again ask you to meet with us and city leaders to discuss the available options which could allow us to save our homes. Moreover, we are asking you to immediately rescind our eviction notice so that we can have these conversations outside of the shadow of imminent catastrophe.

 

We ask that you explore with us the possible solutions which could provide you with at least the profit you anticipate from the KBP redevelopment and also consider the outright sale of the park to the City of Portland. Either option would bring your actions back into alignment with your publicly stated values, and either action would allow us to continue to live out our lives as we had hoped and expected to do.

 

Since your continued reluctance to meet with us has now made time to reach a solution to this

problem a major concern, please respond to this letter within ten days of its delivery to you. We

favor a professional solution to this issue, but since your actions could

result in the loss of our homes and our financial security, if necessary we will pursue all legally

appropriate actions to keep our homes.

 

Please respond by contacting our tenant advocate, Margot Black, at xxxx. Thank you. 

 

Awaiting your reply, the residents of Kelly Butte Place