|
Sudden
Impact
After 18 months of meetings, mediation and protests,
the flap over a Southeast Portland homeless shelter took
a sudden and unexpected turn last week.
On Jan. 14 the city planning office yanked conditional
use permits that allowed Sunnyside United Methodist Church
to run Wednesday and Friday evening programs for homeless
and low-income Portlanders. The programs, which offer free
meals and coffee, will be forced to close Jan. 29.
The ruling followed a contentious neighborhood meeting
the previous evening, where the hardened positions of both
sides were aired. Advocates for the shelter at Southeast
35th Avenue and Yamhill Street said questioning the program
was "immoral" and smacked of "class prejudice."
Other neighbors said they had no philosophical problems
with feeding the needy, but that they were fed up with the
homeless men who used their front yards as toilets, fought
in Sunnyside Park and shot heroin in front of children.
Such talk "has divided the neighborhood," said Tom Badrick,
president of the Sunnyside Neighborhood Association. Consistently
prodded by neighbors, the association asked the city to
review the permits. Badrick said the association expected
that Elizabeth Normand, a city hearings officer, would follow
the lead of Mike Hayakawa, a city case planner, who recommended
that the program be allowed to continue for six months with
an oversight committee that included area residents.
But Normand took a much harder line. In a 26-page ruling,
she found that "the neighborhood cannot be asked to continue
to bear the impacts of the current program" and that a causal
relationship existed between the program and livability
in the neighborhood.
Church leaders, who said they felt sideswiped by Normand's
ruling, have until Jan. 28 to appeal. Such a move would
require the church to fork over $1,700 to the city.
--Philip Dawdy
Head
of the Class
In the old days, if you wanted marijuana gardening
tips, you had to ask your local stoner. Now you can ask
your college instructor.
The passage of the Oregon Medical Marijuana Act may have
brought Mary Jane into the mainstream, but to many patients,
reefer remains as mysterious as a jungle orchid. They have
no idea how to grow pot, get the cuttings or follow the
law.
To help, Portland Community College is offering a non-credit
class on the Oregon Medical Marijuana Act, teaching budding
self-medicators how to meet the law and grow the ganj.
The classes are run by a group called Medi-juana, which
is headed by long-time hemp activists Barry Joe Stull and
Hannah Westphal.
Westphal set up the PCC class because she says the state
isn't being proactive enough in reaching out to patients.
Under the law, the state medical-marijuana program is self-supporting,
but the $150 registration fee covers administrative costs,
not outreach.
"We're just trying to fill the gap between the people in
need and the people who know," says Westphal. Participants
in the seminars will get information from the experts: Kelly
Paige, director of the state's medical marijuana program,
will be speaking at the first session, and Stuhl will describe
how to successfully grow marijuana.
Classes start Feb. 3. A one-day session in Beaverton is
also available. Call PCC at 244-6111 for more information.
--Patty Wentz
Murmurs
SCUTTLEBUTT
WITH AN EDGE
Quote of the week:
"Rhesus monkeys.... Aren't those
the ones that are chocolate on the outside and peanut butter
on the inside?"
--Dwight Slade, KXL radio, Jan. 12
It's still a deep dark secret, but Murmurs hears that Wilsonville
officials are working to ink a deal to construct an outdoor
amphitheater in Wilsonville. House of Blues, which promotes
concerts and operates venues across the country, has tied
up acreage along the east side of the freeway and plans
to deliver the Portland metro area its long-awaited amphitheater.
The news should tighten throats in Vancouver, which has
been trying to build its own facility on the Clark County
Fairgrounds.
So what was Tommy Lasorda doing in Portland the
weekend of Jan. 8? The GM of the LA Dodgers dined with members
of the Portland Family Entertainment investor group--and
we've got a hunch they weren't talking about the pasta.
Details of the meeting are unclear, but Lasorda's visit
supports the rumor that PFE boss Marshall Glickman
is close to buying the Dodgers AAA affiliate, the Albuquerque
Dukes. Neither Glickman nor Dukes brass will comment.
The governor's Willamette River Initiative task
force is holding a retreat at Silver Falls this week, but
some members are grumbling that WRI can't retreat any further
than it already has. Formed to develop a state response
to the federal fish listings, critics both inside and out
of the group say it's been a big waste of time, and they're
starting to wonder when the "initiative" is going to surface.
More proof that folk music fans are genetically
superior: During the intermission of last weekend's Peter
Ostroushko/ Claudia Schmidt gig at St. Johns pub, the ticket
collector made a startling admission. One patron had inadvertently
been given a $100 bill, instead of a $1 bill, as change.
Within minutes, the wayward Ben Franklin was back in the
till.
Word is Gov. John Kitzhaber is going to throw down
the glove at Friday's State of the State speech and challenge
Bill Sizemore to a debate about the anti-tax man's
state tax-deduction initiative. Kitzhaber is also expected
to announce his support for Bill Bradley's presidential
bid, thanks in part to the ballplayer's simpatico views
on universal health care.
It may be in with the old, out with the new at Metro this
year. Longtime bike activist Rex Burkholder is running
a serious campaign for Metro Councilor Ed Washington's
seat. Burkholder says he has raised almost half the money
he needs for the May election, he recently got office space
donated by Nature's cofounder Stan Amy, and he's
hired a campaign manager--Ben Sturgill, a North Portlander
and former guitarist for the band Kerosene Dream.
"We're going to rock 'em," says Burkholder.
Circus
of the
Stars
Even in the elevator, you could tell these weren't amateurs.
Bright cloth swatches were draped along the side of the
car, and colored gels covering the lights gave the lift
an unworldly glow. When the door opened, two street clowns
ushered you in to an even more dolled-up space inside the
Governor Hotel.
And this was just the warm-up.
Last week, Cirque du Soleil announced it would be bringing
its highly stylized acrobatics in May to a movable performance
village plunked down on unused Schnitzerland under the Marquam
Bridge.
It wasn't your typical press conference: Champagne flowed,
half-dressed twins balanced each other and a wide assortment
of follicle-shaped food was a part of the spread. When the
Montreal-based circus troupe decided to announce plans for
its five-week Rose City debut, it took no chances. B. Sinclair,
a local public-relations agency, handled the details of
the press conference at the Governor while Seattle-based
ad agency DDB saturated the market with proposals for local
businesses to get in the ring. (Even Willamette Week's
ad department fell victim to the seduction and signed on
as a media sponsor.)
So why all the fuss? Cirque's brand of irreverent gymnastics
is unusual and risky enough to engage the most hardened
cynic while still enthralling hoi polloi, a rare find in
the world of entertainment. The group is so popular that
in Seattle, where the show will head on July 6, a certain
large software company was so psyched that it hoped to buy
all the tickets for the entire engagement. Cirque said no.
"We're open to the public," says Joyce Tay, marketing director
for the troupe.
--Caryn B. Brooks
I'll
See You an Initiative and Raise You a Ballot Measure
The latest game to hit Oregon is initiative poker, and
the biggest players are Bill Sizemore, Bev Stein and Ken
Lewis.
The game started when Sizemore filed a measure that would
increase the state tax deduction for federal taxes paid.
When critics called it a tax break for the rich, County
Chairwoman Stein and businessman Lewis responded with a
measure that limits tax breaks for the wealthiest 1 percent
of the state.
In response, Sizemore filed two initiatives to protect
his original measure. This week Stein and Lewis raised the
stakes, filing another initiative designed to trump all
of those Sizemore has filed so far.
Secretary of State Bill Bradbury says the initiative bidding
is just one way that his office has become ground zero in
the initiative wars. Although more than 140 ballot initiatives
have been filed, few of them will ultimately circulate for
signatures.
Instead, activists are following the lead of Sizemore,
who for years has filed several slightly different versions
of the same initiative and then pursued only the ones he
believed would pass. This year, Bradbury says, the unions
filed at least seven measures dealing with everything from
workers-compensation insurance to a patients' bill of rights.
--Patty Wentz
Ship
Shape
Cascade General, one of the city's biggest blue-collar
employers, started the New Year off with a bang--or more
precisely a kick in the pants.
At a closed hearing with the federal Occupational Health
and Safety Administration on Jan. 5, the company, which
operates the Portland Ship Yard and employs about 800 workers
there, agreed to pay OSHA $30,000 in fines and spend another
$25,000 on safety improvements.
The fine was the largest levied by the local OSHA office
in the past 12 months, says OSHA area director Carl Halgren.
In inspections completed last fall, Halgren's staff originally
itemized 45 safety violations, ranging from faulty wiring
to insufficient protections against falls on stairs and
platforms. (OSHA earlier fined Cascade General $7,000 for
having insufficient fall protection, the maximum allowable,
after a worker fell to his death in 1997.)
Company president Frank Foti says that despite the large
OSHA fine, Cascade is a much less dangerous place to work
than it used to be. "We've done a huge amount to improve
safety," he says. "It's much more integral to our operation
now."
Halgren and union sources concede that Cascade has shaped
up, but not everybody is applauding. In the 22 months ending
October 1998, Cascade workers suffered nearly 700 injuries
serious enough to require medical attention.
"If conditions are safer, that's great," says Doug Swanson,
a lawyer who represents injured Cascade employees. "But
it took Cascade a long time to get the message, and the
residual effects of some of these injuries last for years."
Cascade, which leases the ship yard from the Port of Portland,
is in the process of purchasing the yard.
--Nigel Jaquiss
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Willamette Week | originally
published January 26,
2000
|
