Nov. 30—After 18 years with the city of Portland, Director of Health and Human Services Kristen Dow will step down on Friday to take a job with a national consulting firm.
Her departure comes as the city continues to grapple with a homelessness crisis, something Dow said she has worked hard to address during her tenure.
The Health and Human Services Department operates a number of crucial services for the city including General Assistance, the needle exchange, the Barron Center, and the distribution of disability and Social Security benefits.
Dow submitted her resignation in late October. She started off as a program manager in the public health department and was appointed director of Health and Human Services by former City Manager Jon Jennings in June 2019 after several months of serving as interim director following Dawn Stiles' resignation.
Since taking the helm, she has played a major role in getting the Homeless Services Center up and running, facilitating an emergency shelter for asylum seekers at the Expo Center, mitigating the spread of COVID-19 in Portland, and spearheading the Encampment Crisis Response Team.
Dow regularly appears at City Council meetings to offer advice on a variety of issues. That advice has largely focused on homelessness and the encampment team in recent months. She encouraged the council to temporarily add capacity at the shelter and fought efforts to temporarily halt encampment sweeps.
She admits there is still a long way to go, but thinks the political polarization around some of the city's major social issues sometimes slows progress down.
"I think the biggest obstacle we face is this narrative of us versus them," said Dow. "I hope we can get rid of that idea that there's some malice in what people are doing, and instead have open and honest conversations because once you break down that, then you can accomplish anything together. At the end of the day we all want the same thing, we want to help our community."
Dow said feels good about the work she's done for the city.
"I'm proud of the work that we've done, especially in bringing together community partners and our government. We can accomplish so much more when we work together like this," said Dow.
Last spring, when the city was grappling with how to address the growing homelessness crisis, Dow spent a long weekend researching what other cities had done to deal with their own homelessness crises, she said. That research is ultimately what led to the ECRT. Although the team has had mixed success, Dow said it is still in its early stages and it has been effective in opening lines of communication between social service organizations and the city.