Amid claims of an economic turn around, Lane County’s unemployment rate hovers at 12.6 percent. This is higher than Oregon’s 11.5 percent jobless rate – the fourth highest in the country – and the national average of 9.8 percent.
While its rates aren’t as high as neighboring Douglas County (15.6 percent), or Crook County (16.9 percent), Lane County is home to more than three times the amount of unemployed people as Douglas despite being similarly sized. This is due to its higher population density and bigger labor force.
Eugene’s Whiteaker neighborhood is no stranger to unemployment. Along with being a famed anarchist hotbed, it is also home to the Eugene Mission. Much of the community is also made up of artists, musicians and students.
In addition to unemployment, the rate of mortgage defaults is also high in Lane County, with an estimated 1 in 682 homes in foreclosure. This manifests in new faces on the streets, and new burdens on local support programs like the mission.
“I see them. I don’t know them by name, but I hear about it on the street,” said Joe Oatman of the Egan Warming Center, near Autzen Stadium.
Oatman estimates there are four times as many people on the streets as last year. The center, named after retired Army veteran Thomas Egan who died of hypothermia last winter, was previously forced to close due to lack of funding. It has since started operating again. This time, however, the center plans to use four churches in Eugene and Springfield as facilities to keep up with the growing need for their services, which include food, heat and shelter.
Oregon is also high in its unemployment exhaustion rate, or those who have used up their unemployment insurance, which is currently at 35.8 percent. This may change due to a congressional extension of benefits for states with an unemployment rate of 8.5 percent.
Unemployment figures do not include those who have worked at all within the past four weeks, such as those partially or seasonally employed who do not make enough money to live on*. It also excludes those who work any more than fifteen hours a week in a family business.
“The economy isn’t as good as a lot of people think it is,” self-employed house painter and 20-year Whiteaker resident Steve Lewis said. “One month you might have a grand in your pocket – the next, you’re broke.”
Lewis says he’s noticed more people using programs such as FOOD For Lane County in the past year. And it’s not just homeless. The biggest change he sees is the number of people driving expensive cars to the food bank, unable to make ends meet.
Similar patterns have appeared in the Eugene Mission, says Myron McMurren, who has stayed at the mission for three years.
“The biggest difference I see now is a lot of people who have never been homeless before and have had good jobs are now homeless,” McMurren said. “It’s not just guys now – it’s families. Women. Children.”
McMurren is part of work programs run by the Mission. Doing so allows him access to better conditions, and a $25-a-week stipend. This comes with disadvantages, though. The program has to be his first priority or else he gets sent to the non-working side of the Mission, he said, which makes looking for additional work difficult.
But when the alternative is living on the street, the choice is obvious for him. McMurren said he is concerned for those living on the street because in the past year three homeless people have been killed in Eugene. A fourth was recently set on fire, but sustained only minor burns. Two of the attacks happened in the Whiteaker.
Edit (11/7/09): *Maybe this is more of a footnote than a true edit, but here’s a link with one estimate of the adjusted national unemployment to include underemployed and discouraged workers: 17.5%.
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