News Portland City Council will be talking about the "fall bump" -- budget monitoring process -- at its meeting tomorrow morning. Here's the one-sentence summary of what to expect: Revenue has not kept up exactly with financial expectations (to the tune of about $1.5 million), so bureaus that depend on general fund dollars are taking small hits. The list of cuts is below. And the whole document ...   More

News The City Council agenda for Wednesday morning will include a discussion led by Commissioner Randy Leonard on the process for awarding city contracts. A resolution (PDF) that Leonard will introduce calls for city bureaus to "include at least one minority evaluator provided by the Alliance of Minority Chambers on all contractor evaluation and selection panels awarding City contracts." The ...   More

News With the Jan. 29 public financing deadline looming in the race for Portland City Commissioner Dan Saltzman's seat, his challengers met last Sunday to brainstorm strategies to secure public financing. And what did they come up with? A series of Candidates' Collective events in which candidates will each speak for five minutes and spend the rest of the evening collecting 1,000 signatures and the ...   More

News Just days before she is expected to unveil Portland Public Schools' controversial high school redesign, Superintendent Carole Smith penned an angry four-page missive [PDF] to Mayor Sam Adams and the rest of City Council forcefully asserting the school district's independence. The reason for her letter has little on the surface to do with the impending changes to the district's high schools. Instead, ...   More

News As promised, Sisters of the Road led a "sidewalk parade" through downtown Portland this afternoon to protest the sidewalk management plan proposed by Mayor Sam Adams. The 30-person march began in Old Town at Sisters of the Road Cafe, the source of several vocal opponents of the mayor's plan. It ended at City Hall, where City Council held a public meeting to review the emergency ordinance behind the ...   More

News Sisters of the Road organizers are gearing up to give the City Council another earful this week on the proposed sidewalk management plan [PDF]. The plan comes up again this Thursday at 3 pm at City Council, which last week delayed a vote on the plan to review whether it would limit free speech. Here's what Sisters wants its supporters to do between now and Thursday: 1) Contact Commissioners ...   More