Murmurs: We Swear—It's Only The Truth Out Of Salem.

1. When Uber returns to Portland in April, it could face new competition (“Drive,” WW, Dec. 31, 2014). Commissioner Steve Novick has told the city’s taxi board to tackle its backlog of 377 permit applications from 10 cab companies. (Portland now has just 460 licensed cabs.) The Private-for-Hire Transportation Board of Review is often accused of protecting the interests of existing taxi companies. Potential newcomers: Rainbow Cab, serving LGBTQ passengers, and EcoCab, which uses Tesla electric cars.

1. Andrew Davidson, a first-year student at Portland State University, is running for a seat on the board of the Portland Public Schools in the upcoming May election. A 2014 Grant High School graduate, Davidson served as the board’s student rep when teachers nearly went on strike last year. Davidson didn’t have a vote then but argued that the School Board wasn’t taking students into account. “This board will sit up there and talk about budget cuts, but they just talk about them. They don’t really know,” Davidson says. “I’m a recent graduate of this system. I know how well-equipped we are, or aren’t, for the real world.” His opponent, two-term incumbent Ruth Adkins, declined to comment or say whether she would seek re-election.

1. It’s not clear who knew what as the $300 million disaster known as Cover Oregon melted down, but one lawmaker wants to raise the stakes for misleading the Oregon Legislature. Currently, there’s no prohibition against lying to state lawmakers. State Rep. Julie Parrish (R-West Linn) plans to introduce bills in the 2015 session that would require witnesses before legislative committees to testify under oath (as they do in court or before Congress) and would impose criminal sanctions for lying. “We are our own branch of government,” Parrish says. “We should be able to hold people accountable for what they say to us.”

1. The city’s sewer department has cleaned up two lingering messes previously reported by WW. Longtime Bureau of Environmental Services director Dean Marriott agreed to resign Jan.  7 after a city audit showed construction costs for a BES office building had spiraled out of control (“Space of Waste,” WW, April 30, 2014). In his settlement with the city, Marriott gets a year’s salary—$199,160—plus $49,000 for legal costs. And Portland Bottling—a major backer of the failed May 2014 measure to wrest control of the water and sewer utilities away from City Hall—agreed Dec. 29 to pay $290,234 in back bills and fines for allegedly evading higher sewer fees by secretly dumping millions of gallons of wastewater (“Busted Bottles,” WW, July 2, 2014). The company blamed a mechanical failure.

1. Thanks to the 10,000-plus donors who helped WW’s Give!Guide smash records by bringing in $3.14 million. Visit giveguide.org for more details, and look for a full recap in next week’s paper.

WWeek 2015