Brent Adams at Camp Quixote in Washington. Photo by Jeremy Leonard.
When Brent Adams drove north last November to see sanctuary camps in Oregon and Washington, he got a firsthand look at the models he’s been advocating for almost a year. The activist learned a few things, too—for instance, just how much work it is to make a sanctioned encampment with community support.
Adams now realizes he will probably have to create an organization with a board of directors and use that to raise funds for the project going forward.
“I don’t think I knew I was designing a nonprofit to begin with,” Adams says.
A new 27-minute documentary posted to YouTube chronicles Adams’ trip with a friend. Adams went to camps in Eugene, Portland, Olympia and Seattle to see the way they work.
The first stop on the tour was Whoville, a small, unsanctioned camp on a Eugene street corner by a freeway overpass. Adams then went across town to Opportunity Village, where activists rode waves of awareness and support for the homeless after the Occupy movement and eventually built small homes. When the project appeared before the town’s city council, no one spoke against it.
In Portland, Adams went to Dignity Village—a small, established community with make-shift buildings to house about 60 people—and Right to Dream Too, a newer tent city near downtown. Adams also visited Olympia’s Camp Quixote, which is currently moving from a circle of tents to a new location, where volunteers from the local church are building small houses. For its last stop, Adams went to Tent City 3 in Seattle.
Adams, who’s working on a separate video that will break down the nuts and bolts of how a camp could work, is using his trip as a guidebook for what’s next.
“I was a little bit naïve thinking we could just put on a show and get everyone on board. We have to create more of a business plan,” Adams says. “We do have support. A year ago, no one was talking about this thing.”
