MEDIA AND RESEARCH | Ground Score

Ground Score

in the Media

2025

3/28/2025 - The Southeast Examiner - From Bottles to Building Futures: Inside The People’s Depot - by Rachel Peterson
3/11/2025 - The City of Portland -City launches laundry program serving people experiencing homelessness
1/28/2025 - The Oregonian - Picking up Portland’s litter isn’t glamorous, but for some it’s a path to dignity and healing by Lillian Mongeau Hughes [has a paywall]

2024

12/13/2024 - US Senator Jeff Merkley visited Ground Score, met with our workers, and toured our facilities. His office shared our post about the visit on Facebook.
12/12/2024 - Portland Street Art Alliance - Streets of Hope by Sara Sjol
11/26/2024 - A small City partnership yields big returns for people experiencing homelessness by the City of Portland
10/2024 - Willamette Week - Ground Score Association [our 2024 Give!Guide profile] by Ground Score Association
10/23/2024 - KPTV - Portland organization creates art using tents discarded on city streets by Anna Katayama [Note: Rickey Linden, who is featured in this story, uses they/them pronouns.]
9/19/2024 - Eugene's Homeless Heartbeat - Homelessness and the environment: a dual crisis by Sarah A. Koski
7/30/2024 - Grist - Does the plastics industry support waste pickers? It’s complicated. by Joseph Winters
7/2024 - Multnomah County Joint Office of Homeless Services - Low barrier employment programs produced by Outside the Frame [Videos on Vimeo featuring Ground Score, Cultivate Initiatives, and Stone Soup PDX]
7/26/2024 - BikePortland - Cargo trikes help Old Town nonprofit create good out of garbage by Jonathan Maus
7/15/2024 - Oregon Public Broadcasting - The Willamette River has a trash problem. Homeless camp removals could be making it worse by April Ehrlich
5/29/2024 - City of Portland's partnership with Ground Score Association highlighted at International Alliance of Waste Pickers Congress by the City of Portland, Oregon
5/22/2024 - KOIN 6 News - Barbra Weber’s vision: ‘Give people meaningful work’ by Elise Haas
5/16/2024 - Portland Mercury - County Commissioner candidate saw more than $40K funneled to her husband by a board she oversees by Courtney Vaughn
5/16/2024 - Redemption [podcast on RSS] - INC-4: Voices from the Global Plastics Treaty Negotiations by Reloop North America
5/15/2024 - Street Roots - Former employees, homeless Portlanders cite various violations, lack of training in Rapid Response Bio Clean's practices by Terah Bennett
Partnerships and job opportunities by the City of Portland, Oregon
4/2024 - Enabling Just Transition speech at INC-4 by Barbra "Barbie " Weber [video posted on Facebook by Ground Score Association]. Panel moderated by Halshka Graczyk
4/2024 - Ground Score by OKAPI Reusables [page about our 2024 Earth Day partnership and fundraiser with OKAPI]

3/28/2024 - OPB's Think Out Loud - Four perspectives on Oregon’s landmark Bottle Bill by Gemma DiCarlo
3/20/2024 - Waste Dive - CMI calls for bottle bill policies that prioritize EJ, informal recycling communities by Megan Quinn
2/21/2024 - Street Roots - City adopts Enhanced Service District recommendations amidst criticism by Jeremiah Hayden
2/12/2024 - High Country News - A proposed bottle-deposit bill in Washington would help the environment — and low-income communities by Erin X Wong
1/25/2024 - Portland Tribune - Viaduct murals ready to see under Hawthorne Bridge by Jason Vondersmith

Photo of front page of The Sunday Oregonian showing that the main story is about Ground Score. The title is 'Trash pickup program gives homeless sense of "purpose."' Underneath the headline is a large photo of a Ground Score worker wearing a neon yellow reflective jacket and pants standing next to an adult trike with a rectangular bin mounted in the front for hauling waste. The bin is lined with a gray tarp and filled with pieces of cardboard strapped together. The worker is walking on a paved area in front of a gray building exterior. At the very top of the newspaper's front page, it also says "50 years of SNL" and includes three images inside TV graphics from the show.

Image of a frame and title of a video about Ground Score. The frame shows a worker wearing a gray hoodie and black Ground Score beanie talking while sitting in Ground Score's warehouse. The frame includes captions of what the worker is saying: "We're helping. We're actually helping." The warehouse interior is shown out of focus behind them. Below the frame is a video description that says "Ground Score Association" and below that "Outside the Frame."

2023

11/14/2023 - The International Alliance of Waste Pickers addresses the plenary at INC-3 on Just Transition by the International Alliance of Waste Pickers
11/1/2023 - Street Roots - Portland has a waste problem — where is it coming from? by Jeremiah Hayden
10/27/2023 - NPR & OPB's Next Generation Radio - She used to stand in line for services when she was unhoused; Now, she provides them by Terah Bennett
9/28/2023 - Sisters of the Road - Community Spotlight: Ground Score Association by Kelcie Grega
9/6/2023 - Street Roots - Gov. Tina Kotek’s downtown economic task force is missing key players, critics say by Jeremiah Haye
7/30/2023 - The Oregonian - Why aren’t dumpsters and toilets a standard to help people living outdoors in Portland? by Gosia Wozniacka
7/12/2023 - Street Roots - A fight for the soul of the city? by Kaia Sand
6/27/2023 - Oregon Metro - Trash for Peace warehouse and reuse hub fosters community by Arashi Young [Note: The artist mentioned in this article now goes by the name Rickey Linden, and Ground Score is now fiscally sponsored by Trash for Peace.]

2022

11/2/2022 - Portland Mercury - Homeless Portlanders urge city officials to reconsider mass encampment plan by Alex Zielinski
11/1/2022 - Oregon Public Broadcasting - Portlanders experiencing homelessness voice opposition to mayor’s proposed camping ban by Kristian Foden-Vencil
11/1/2022 - KOIN 6 News - Homeless to Wheeler: Worried camping will be crime by Brandon Thompson
10/27/2022- Portland Mercury - City Council hears public feedback on proposal to criminalize unsheltered homelessness - by Alex Zielinski
10/26/2022 - Street Roots - Wheeler, Ryan, you are cordially invited to a town hall. Please RSVP. by Kaia Sand
10/9/2022 - The Oregonian - Readers respond: Bottle Bill isn’t the problem by Christa McDermott
9/27/2022 - KGW 8 News - Program that pays people experiencing homelessness to pick up trash in Portland proves successful by Christelle Koumoué
8/31/2022 - Street Roots - Bringing housed and unhoused communities together is vital by Kaia Sand
6/15/2022 - Concordia Neighborhood Association Portland, Oregon - Houseless campsites crisis comes to a head by Shawn Mihalik [Featuring Ground Score worker Becky L.]
5/5/2022 - Institute for Local Self-Reliance - In New York and Oregon, canning reduces waste and changes lives — Episode 150 of Building Local Power by Jess Del Fiacco

2021

12/27/2021 - Ground Score provides waste collection services for the unhoused community by the International Association of Waste Pickers
9/2/2021 - Street Roots - Portland needs a better plan for trash by Kat Wasula
7/28/2021 - Portland Mercury - City hears opposition to continuation of Downtown Clean & Safe's contract by Alex Zielinski
6/16/2021 - Street Roots - There’s plenty of trash talk. Ground Score puts people at the fore. by Kaia Sand
4/27/2021 - KOIN 6 News 'From the ground up': Trash clean up program provides opportunities by Danny Peterson
4/15/2021 - The Oregonian - Portland launches easy-entry jobs program that cleans up trash by Nicole Hayden [has a paywall]
4/15/2021 - KGW 8 News - Amid record cleanup requests, 3 Portland-area agencies aim to expand trash pickup by Maggie Vespa
2/10/2021 - Street Roots - Hazelnut Grove is a model to emulate, not evacuate by Laura Kutner Tokarski [opinion]
1/27/2021 - Street Roots - We should embrace ingenuity, not erase it by Kaia Sand
1/22/2021 - Portland Mercury - With Hazelnut Grove set to close, City looks to expand village-style shelter options by Alex Zielinski

2019-2020

2/29/2020 - Ground Score, a new waste picker organization in the USA by the International Alliance of Waste Pickers
8/2/2019 - Street Roots - Ground Score puts homeless Portlanders to work for a fair wage by Helen Hill

Photo of Ground Score's Kris Brown smiling and standing in front of The People's Depot, which he manages, on a sunny day under the Morrison Bridge in Portland, Oregon. Kris is wearing a dark blue hoodie with a design featuring mushrooms of various colors--light green, blue, red, pink, yellow, and orange. He has dark hair that goes down close to his shoulders and a short beard. The background is blurry and includes a few unidentified people walking, waste bins, and trees on the other side of the bridge in the distance. The caption under the photo reads "Kristopher Brown, manager of the People's Depot, oversees the redemption center for two hours every weekday" and "Erin X. Wong," the article's author and photographer.

Video frame showing Barbra “Barbie” Weber seated at a long table indoors and speaking into a microphone with a laptop in front of her. She is wearing glasses and a black suit jacket. Behind her is a plain gray wall. The caption from this part of her INC-4 speech showing up in the frame reads, "waste pickers and the most affected by plastic pollution"

Above left: Photo by Erin X. Wong of The People's Depot Manager Kris Brown at the depot, February 2024. This photo was featured in the High Country News article by Wong titled "A proposed bottle-deposit bill in Washington would help the environment — and low-income communities."

Above right: Ground Score Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director Barbra "Barbie" Weber speaks at INC-4 at Enabling Just Transition with the International Alliance of Waste Pickers, April 2024. The panel was moderated by Halshka Graczyk and aimed at answering the question “How can the Global Plastics Treaty operationalize key concepts of just transition for all, and what are the necessary elements to be included to realize these expectations?"

Learn more about INC-4 and our international advocacy

Research about Waste Pickers

Photo of three trash bags filled with used aluminum cans at Ground Score's The People's Depot, which is located under a road bridge, in Portland, Oregon on a cloudy day. In the background out of focus are a person sitting on a rail, a bicycle leaning against that rail, and another part of the bridge with yellow road signs next to it.

Photo of 20 open, used aluminum beverage cans arranged in a 5 by 4 rectangle on pavement. The photo was taken from above so that the tops of the cans are showing.

Cass Talbott, T., Chandran, P., Allen, C., Narayan, L., and Boampong, O. (2022, June). Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) and Waste Pickers. Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO) Technical Brief No. 15. Manchester, UK: WIEGO.

https://www.wiego.org/sites/default/files/publications/file/technical-brief-no15-ENG.pdf

Esparza, D.M., Kazemi, K., Brown, K., Zuñiga, M.E., Vedachalam, S., and Shahyd, K. (2024, March). Environmental Justice Assessment of Aluminum Recycling Programs + Community Engagement: A Report for Can Manufacturers Institute. Intersectional Environmentalist.

https://www.recyclingrefundswork.org/resource18.pdf

Greene, J., Ferry, T., Hawash, L., Zapata, M., and Puczkowskyj, N. (2022, February 15). Hygiene, Storage, and Waste Management for the Unsheltered Community: Gaps & Opportunities Analysis: A report prepared for the City of Portland and Multnomah County Joint Office of Homeless Services: A report prepared for the City of Portland and
Multnomah County Joint Office of Homeless Services. Portland State University.

https://www.pdx.edu/homelessness/sites/homelessness.web.wdt.pdx.edu/files/2023-02/Hygiene%20Waste%20and%20Storage%20Analysis%20Report_0.pdf

Ground Score Association (2021). The People's Depot 2021 Canner Survey.

https://www.groundscoreassociation.org/_files/ugd/5fdef8_2d66d9cf9ed34fa5b803688595a8c395.pdf

Harvey, J., Hegel, C., and Hartmann, C. (2023). Independent Recyclers in New York City: Sector profile and pathways to inclusion. Sure We Can, Alliance of Independent Recyclers, Western Connecticut State University, and Suny Old Westbury.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5647b691e4b0524134ec6b8c/t/65e1f1c13bbe880ffe2d9be9/1709306311996/REPORT_WEB+%281%29.pdf

International Alliance of Waste Pickers (2023, November). IAWP’s Vision for a Just Transition for Waste Pickers under the UN Plastics Treaty.

https://globalrec.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/english_position-paper_IAWP-vision-just-transition_resolution150ppi.pdf

Intersectional Environmentalist report released that month featuring The People's Depot and TPD manager Kris Brown. The report '"highlights the importance of including diverse stakeholders in the recycling industry, particularly those involved in the informal economy,” said Diandra Esparza, co-founder and executive director [of Intersectional Environmentalist].

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5530230ae4b0dac9d1968694/t/5f74fdfbd2dcd905d2ebb5f1/1601502752243/Groundscorepresentation.pdf Informal Recyclers ♻ Environmental Workers PDF put together by GSA