Enough Is Enough: Home Forward's Leadership Has to Go

Portland’s housing crisis demands urgency, competence, and integrity from every agency entrusted with public dollars. Recent reporting shows Home Forward failing on all three. The facts now in public view lead to a clear conclusion for many Portlanders: the CEO and Board must step aside so the agency can be rebuilt around transparency, fiscal discipline, and basic operational competence.

Start with the core obligation: house people. Willamette Week found it takes Home Forward 185 days to fill an apartment, while 955 units sit vacant- even as thousands search for stable housing. In a crisis, delay is not a technical failure. It is a betrayal of duty. Every empty unit represents a missed duty to the people this agency exists to serve.

Affordable housing developer Tom Brenneke called the vacancy numbers “egregious.” He added: “Ultimately, all this hurts is the tenant and taxpayer.” He’s right. When performance falls this far below any reasonable standard, it signals a breakdown not just in systems, but in the basic obligations of public service.

A Leadership Culture Detached From Its Mission

While buildings sat empty and tenants reported open-air drug markets in their hallways, CEO Ivory Mathews was on the road, repeatedly. Reporting shows she charged taxpayers over $100,000 in travel across three years, often with unclear public benefit and minimal documentation.

This is not responsible stewardship of public dollars.

Much of this travel was tied not to improving housing outcomes, but to a personal campaign for a leadership role in a national industry group. She attended at least eight NAHRO conferences in 2025, complete with campaign materials and staff. The breach of trust reached its low point when Home Forward sent 10 employees to Orlando in 2024 at a cost of $20,445, with some assisting at her campaign booth. She was running unopposed.

Portland taxpayers should not be funding a campaign entourage for their housing authority CEO.

The Hawaii Insurance Scheme

Nothing illustrates the agency’s drift more clearly than its decision to create a Hawaii‑domiciled insurance subsidiary, a structure that conveniently justified repeated publicly funded travel to the islands.

In October 2024, Mathews spent six days in Hawaii at a cost of $7,269, with no itinerary, notes, or documentation provided when requested. Hundreds of photos posted to her Facebook account during the trip show her and family members horseback riding, touring farms, and visiting canyons. Home Forward paid for all six nights at a posh resort, The Point at Poipu Kauai, at $619 a night, plus airfare and a rental car.

Three other senior leaders also traveled to Hawaii for insurance conferences, costing another $24,000.

When asked whether the agency would move the insurance entity to a state that is actually an industry hub, Home Forward said it needed “more time” to consider the question. The people waiting for housing do not have more time.

A Board That Has Lost Its Bearings

A governing board exists to hold leadership accountable to the public good. A board that signs off on these decisions while tenants go unhoused has abdicated that responsibility. At best, it is disengaged. At worst, it has forgotten whom the agency serves.

Workers Have Already Taken a Stand

The workers closest to this dysfunction have already spoken. The president of AFSCME Local 3135, the union representing 205 Home Forward employees, told Willamette Week that members have “no confidence or trust” in Mathews’ leadership. At the first board meeting after the travel revelations, union members took turns describing how they were barely scraping by while their CEO crisscrossed the country on the public dime.

Home Forward’s workers show up every day to house vulnerable people. They deserve leadership that takes that mission as seriously as they do. Right now, they don’t have it.

What Portland’s Elected Leaders Can Do Now

Mayor Wilson has said he is “disturbed” by the vacancy rate and that he “expects public agencies to use taxpayer and ratepayer dollars responsibly.” City Councilor Eric Zimmerman has called the vacancy data “damning” and said he has “deep concerns about the future of Home Forward.” These statements acknowledge the harm—but acknowledgment is no longer enough.

The Mayor and City Council can act now by publicly joining the union’s vote of no confidence, calling for the resignation of the CEO and Board, and initiating an independent review of governance, spending, and operations.

A unanimous Council call for new leadership would:

· Honor the public’s trust in the stewardship of public dollars

· Stand with workers who have raised the alarm

· Signal that Portland will not tolerate mismanagement during a housing crisis

· Clear the way for competent, accountable leadership

The time for statements of concern has passed. It is time for the Mayor and Council to act.

Sources: Willamette Week reporting by Sophie Peel, December 2025 – April 2026.