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TREE REGULATION TEAM STRIPPED FROM URBAN FORESTRY: The Portland City Council voted last week to move the city’s team of tree regulators from the Urban Forestry division to the centralized permitting office. The council also voted to move $2.1 million from tree enforcement to backfill parks maintenance cuts. The proposal was the brainchild of Councilor Eric Zimmerman, who for weeks has called into question Urban Forestry and how it polices and fines Portlanders seeking to trim or remove trees near or on their property. WW wrote about the division in a March 5 cover story (“The Taking Tree,” March 5). The move means enforcement of the city’s Tree Code will no longer be under the oversight of city forester Jenn Cairo, whose management has come under scrutiny. “In a place where I think we’ve got a city program that’s being administered in an either unfair manner or is not treating Portlanders well, we do have a duty to act,” Zimmerman told his colleagues before the vote. The tree regulation team must move by Oct. 1.
KOTEK SIGNS ILLICIT MASSAGE CRACKDOWN: Gov. Tina Kotek signed a bill June 12 to crack down on illicit massage parlors. House Bill 3819-A was spurred by WW’s reporting last fall, which used data from a watchdog nonprofit to reveal that the number of such businesses, which sexually exploit undocumented women, had tripled in five years to 114 in Portland (“Nightmare in Plain Sight,” Sept. 25, 2024). Among other things, it increases the maximum charge for repeat offenders operating such a business from a misdemeanor to a Class C felony, punishable by up to five years in prison and a $125,000 fine. The bill, sponsored by state Rep. Thuy Tran (D-Portland) and Sen. Kathleen Taylor (D-Portland), passed the Senate last week on a 28–1 vote. (Democratic state Sen. Khanh Pham of East Portland was the only senator to vote no. Pham told The Oregonian she was concerned about taking a punitive approach with immigrant-owned businesses.) Tran’s office credited the legislation to the work of WW contributor Eliza Aronson, who started her reporting as an intern placed by the Charles Snowden Program for Excellence in Journalism. “It was Willamette Week’s reporting that led to [Tran’s] work on HB 3819,” her aide, Collin Ledford, said in an email.
COUNTY SEVERS TIES WITH HOUSING CONTRACTOR: Multnomah County’s Homeless Services Department halted funding for a Gresham-based shelter provider after a dispute over billing practices. For three years, the county paid Rockwood Community Development Corporation to house homeless families in 50 of the 65 units at an apartment complex called Rockwood Tower. Recently, officials at the department discovered Rockwood CDC had sought reimbursement for unapproved expenses, double-counted some costs, and charged the county for rooms that were closed for repairs, the county alleges in a memo describing the matter. The move is significant because Multnomah County delivers more than $1 billion in services through nonprofits like Rockwood CDC. Rockwood says a policy change at the county led to the rift. “Initially, funding was understood to support not only the designated rooms, but also the broader operational infrastructure necessary to maintain them,” Rockwood CDC spokeswoman Savannah Carreno said in a statement. “The county has since retroactively narrowed that interpretation, limiting funding to expenses tied directly and exclusively to the individual 50 rooms.” Rockwood CDC is run by president Brad Ketch, a former tech executive, who was paid $228,000 in 2023, according to the nonprofit’s tax filings. His wife, Lynn, serves as executive director, a position that pays her $143,000.
OHSU CONSOLIDATES RESEARCH: Faced with likely cuts to federal funding, Oregon Health & Science University is centralizing its research functions under a single executive, down from three, OHSU interim president Steve Stadum said in a memo to research staff. Dr. Nate Selden, dean of the medical school, will take “primary executive responsibility” for OHSU’s research mission July 1, Stadum wrote. Selden made news in October when the university announced it would forgo a national search and immediately name him president, replacing Dr. Danny Jacobs, who resigned under pressure. The board scrapped that plan after Gov. Tina Kotek publicly opposed the rushed appointment. Selden’s new appointment comes as the current chief research officer, Peter Barr-Gillespie, retires from the position, which he has held since 2019. Until now, research at OHSU has been supervised by the dean of the medical school, the provost, and the chief research officer. Interim chief research officer Bonnie Nagel will report to Selden. She will oversee the independent research centers that Barr-Gillespie runs and all research done in the school of medicine.