PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Residents at a pubic housing complex in Northwest Portland say bedbugs are a growing problem and their property managers aren’t doing enough to stop it.
The Williams Plaza apartments are owned by Home Forward, a Multnomah County agency that helps people with barriers to getting housing. It’s a 9-story building with 101 units for residents 55 and older or with a disability and an annual income less than 80% of the local median income.
Longtime resident Dorothy Holland said the problem is worse than ever. She said she had to get rid of her furniture as part of the process of getting rid of the bed bugs.
“I had to get rid of all of my furniture,” she said. “My dressers, my bed, my couches, my chairs, my big chair — everything.”
Some of the people who have lived there for many years believe the issue is caused by people who move in there after being homeless.
“They bring them in off the streets, they don’t vet their stuff, where it’s been. They could be sleeping out on the streets for the last couple years and now they just drag everything in, it’s got cockroaches, it’s go bed bugs, it’s got flies,” resident Alex Arcolio said.
Home Forward said it generally uses its own licensed staff to do pest control but the bugs just keep moving from apartment to apartment and residents want an outside company to do the spraying.
“There are going to be certain units or certain building or certain times of the year where the problem is worse than others,” Home Forward COO Ian Davie said. “Our approach is always to go in and go through our process and our many steps that we do to try and ensure that we can keep our housing as safe and healthy for people as we can.”
Residents suggested that property managers inspect people’s possessions before they area allowed to move in.
Davie said he couldn’t speak about specific locations or residents, but that they do inspect properties for beg bugs and in some properties, they have steps to check belongings before someone moves in but it can be a privacy issue.
“I certainly wouldn’t blame the homelessness crisis in Portland for that problem,” Davie said. “Generally our focus is getting people housed.”