The closure of homeless shelter operator Sunstone Way resulted in the layoff of 175 workers June 30. Around 120 were members of AFSCME Local 1790.
Sunstone Way, a private non-profit, received $13.3 million a year from Portland and Multnomah County to run motel shelters, “safe rest” villages, and overnight shelters. But a Feb. 12 whistleblower lawsuit filed by an ex-employee accused Sunstone’s top leaders of serious inappropriate spending and willful financial deception.
A Multnomah County financial audit followed, and revealed that Sunstone Way executives — led by CEO Andy Goebel, COO Alicia Hovanas, and CFO Scott Takemoto — misspent $3.6 million of taxpayer funding. The misspending included expensive meals, lavish business trips, Topgolf outings, and weekly drunken “Thirsty Thursdays” at Paddy’s Bar & Grill. Sunstone Way also let a food vendor, Our Streets PDX, overcharge the organization $210,000. Each day, according to multiple sources, Our Streets PDX delivered more $17 meal plates than the number of people Sunstone Way housed.
And all this was after a 2022 Multnomah County audit had found Sunstone Way overbilled the county by over $525,000.
After this latest audit, Multnomah County stopped payments to the organization. Sunstone Way moved to dissolve itself on May 15.
In June Multnomah County opened a criminal investigation against the former Sunstone Way executives.
Sunstone Way workers represented by AFSCME Local 1790 met with Multnomah County and other local organizations to make sure the clients at their shelters found beds elsewhere. Transition Projects has taken over Sunstone Way’s Delta Park Motel Shelter, Rockwood Bridge Shelter, and SW Naito Village locations.
Clackamas Village will now be run by Do Good, a local nonprofit focused on ending veteran homelessness. Centennial Neighborhood Overnight Shelter operations will pause until the winter. Weidler Village has closed and its residents have been transferred to other shelters.
But Sunstone Way’s 175 workers, many of them previously homeless themselves, were now out of work.
Bargaining over the effects of the layoff, Sunstone Way management agreed to pay all staff $2,500 severance in exchange for the union dropping its unfair labor practice charges against Sunstone Way. But a few days later, management reneged on the deal and said Sunstone Way wouldn’t pay severance unless Multnomah County paid it back. The county declined.
Transition Projects hired around 40 former Sunstone Way workers to staff the three shelters it took over from Sunstone Way. One of them was Misha Litvak, who was AFSCME Local 1790 president.
Other Sunstone Way workers have had trouble finding work. Litvak worries the workers may be associated with the executives’ misdeeds. “The Sunstone stink,” Litvak says former Sunstone Way workers call it.
For former Sunstone Way workers who haven’t found work, AFSCME Local 1790 is setting up a hardship fund that will start dispersing assistance later this month.
HOW TO HELP: Contribute to the Local 1790 hardship fund here.
