Murmurs: County Advisory Committee Dwindles to One Member

COUNTY ADVISORY COMMITTEE DWINDLES TO ONE MEMBER: A volunteer committee to advise Multnomah County officials on the budget for the sheriff’s office has dwindled to one member, and evidence suggests the county is in no rush to refill the vacant positions. The county is required by law to support 10 community budget advisory committees, including the sheriff’s, that meet regularly beginning in the fall to provide formal feedback on the budgets of county departments in the spring. But the CBAC for the sheriff’s office is down to one member: Patrick Pangburn, a retired administrator at Oregon Health & Science University. Pangburn sent an email to County Chair Jessica Vega Pederson and the four county commissioners Aug. 15 asking for help. He tells WW he’s never heard back. “The statutory ‘voice of the people’ has been erased from the Multnomah County budget process,” Pangburn says. County spokeswoman Jessica Morkert-Shibley says the Office of Community Involvement is working with sheriff’s office staff “to coordinate an equitable recruitment process to reach communities who have been impacted by [sheriff’s office] services” and will “fill those vacancies before the start of the CBAC process” in November.

STATE SENDS MISTAKEN APPROVAL NOTICES TO OREGON HEALTH PLAN MEMBERS: An administrative error at the Oregon Health Authority resulted in more than 10,000 “approval” notices being sent to Medicaid recipients, when in reality their benefits were being terminated. During the pandemic, the federal government allowed people to remain on Medicaid without verifying their eligibility—an exception that is now being “unwound.” As a result, OHA is requesting documentation to verify eligibility from Oregon Health Plan members, and sending termination notices when it doesn’t get a response. So far, Oregon’s doing a relatively good job keeping people covered, renewing benefits for 85% of them. (Nationwide, the number is more like 65%). Still, the process hasn’t been without hiccups. OHA says it spotted the bug in August and temporarily restored benefits for everyone affected. Deloitte, which operates the system for OHA, is reaching out to all of them with further instructions. “Oregon has updated the ONE system to prevent this from occurring going forward,” OHA spokeswoman Erica Heartquist says.

SHIP ARRIVES TO REMOVE FIRE-PRONE TIRE SHREDS: The cargo ship Global Eternity arrived in Portland on Sunday to haul away the mountain of shredded tires at the old Louis Dreyfus grain elevator site on the Willamette River next door to Moda Center. The pile caught fire repeatedly in May, sending acrid smoke into the air over downtown Portland. The elevator is owned by tire-shredding magnate Chandos Mahon and his business partner Beau Blixseth, son of Oregon timber baron Tim Blixseth. The tire pile may grow again after the Global Eternity leaves, but it will be smaller, at least for a while, because Mahon and Blixseth don’t have a permit to store “tire-derived product” on the site, according to the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. Until they get one, they are allowed to keep no more than 200 cubic yards of tire shreds on the site. That’s a big haircut. In May, DEQ inspected the site and found 3,000 cubic yards. Mahon, owner of Castle Tire Recycling, ships the tire chunks to Asia, where they are burned for fuel. Neither Mahon nor Blixseth returned an email message. DEQ said they are seeking a permit so they can ramp up exports again. They’ve also appealed a $13,600 fine levied after the May fires. “The fine will not be due until the contested case process is complete,” a DEQ spokeswoman said in an email. Blixseth and Mahon don’t use the elevator to store tires. Rather, they are stacked around it. Castle Arden LLC, controlled by Mahon and Blixseth, paid $2.9 million for the property in 2021.

POLICE BUREAU TO BE PAID $185,000 FOR ROUND-THE-CLOCK SCHOOL LIAISON OFFICERS: As school districts debate the role of cops in schools, the Multnomah Education Service District has offered to pay the Portland Police Bureau $185,000 over the next year for dedicated around-the-clock school liaison officers to answer questions and channel information to school officials. The tax-funded MESD runs programs for 100,000 kids in Portland Public Schools and other school districts in Multnomah County. According to the unsigned agreement between PPB and MESD, it “is not a request for physical police presence on school district Campuses.” Instead, SLOs will be “the principal points of contact to receive MESD’s requests for information services and consultation both during and ‘after-hours.’” The Portland City Council is set to approve the agreement at its meeting Oct. 18.