Here at Blog Central, the thermometer on the front porch reads a chilly 32.7 degrees Fahrenheit and dropping. Whatever is wet out there right now is going to be frozen in a few hours. Frozen -- and slick! Warning! Hazard! You could die! Just to be safe, you should carry chains, even on the bus.

It's supposed to snow somewhat seriously tomorrow evening, and some of it could stick. Sticking snow! Even more hazardous! Cancel everything for Tuesday. It's important to remain hydrated. And don't forget your pets! Stay tuned to bojack.org StormCenter 9000.2 for the latest team coverage.

The New York Football Giants have dethroned the defending champion Green Bay Packers, despite the best efforts of the officiating crew. This creates an unprecedented logjam at the top of our charity underdog prediction game, with just one week to go. There'll be only two games to pick from next week (both on Sunday, first game at noon), which turns our season-long contest into a real chess game.

Here are our standings going into the last week. If neither of the 'dogs wins next week, these will be our final standings, but if one or both 'dogs win, there could still be a lot of movement. Remember, the top five finishers claim prizes for their favorite charities:

Continue reading "Underdog leader board tightens up for finale" »

The Texans fell in Baltimore, leaving three players points-less in our charity pro football game.

We've some serious big white flakes falling in our part of town at this hour. Let the panic begin!

The Maya Hee guy has long since faded into memory, and the Hide-Your-Kids-Hide-Your-Wife guy has too, but this fellow joins them in the pantheon of internet entertainment. We're always the last to see these things, and it appears he's been doing this thing for years. But hey, we're always on the lookout for new experiences. [Via Cousin Jim.]

Here at Blog Central, we're waiting anxiously for the snow-pocalypse that's due here any minute. Current conditions on the front porch: Cloudy, 38 degrees. If anything happens, we'll meet you at the Sylvan overpass.

UPDATE, 1/15, 2:23 a.m.: For all the up-to-the-minute information one needs regarding current winter storm conditions in Portland, you can always go to isitsnowinginpdx.com.

It's the Elite Eight in the pro football playoff tournament, and our players have made their choices:

13.5 DENVER at New England - Tommy W., NoPoGuy, mna, Rudie, Biggest Cubs Loser, Gary, Annie, genop's gal, John Cr., Eric W., Weavmo, Drewbob

8 NEW YORK GIANTS at Green Bay - john dull, Bob, Bayou Baby, PDXileinOmaha, Usual Kevin, Grizfan, Broadway Joe, AKevin, jmh, Michael K., John Ch.

7 HOUSTON at Baltimore - Paul, Larry Legend, Bad Brad

3.5 SAN FRANCISCO vs. New Orleans - Pete Rozelle, Carol, Ricardo, Gordon, genop

It should be a most interesting couple of days in front of the tube. Good luck and enjoy the games, everyone.

UPDATE, 5:17 p.m.: A super-exciting first game gives 3.5 points to those who picked the Niners. That includes our leader, Pete Rozelle, who ascends to 49 points.

UPDATE, 9:14 p.m.: The second game wasn't much of a game, and Tebowmania has ended, at least for this year. A dozen underdoggers get zilch.

We were ribbing a friend of ours who's a Packer fan the other day. "You must be worried," we said. "You've got a problem. Drew Brees [the New Orleans quarterback] is playing out of his mind." He was quick with the answer: "But we don't have to play him in the Dome."

A good point. The Pack has home field advantage. And their field has a mystique that most visiting teams simply can't crack. Not to mention the wicked cold.

But despite legend, the Green Bay gridiron itself is neither barren nor frozen, even in the harsh middle of a Wisconsin January. All sorts of steps are taken to keep it green and soft, as explained here and here.

Its own little piece of the Pearl District. But a good piece.

Players in our underdog game, don't forget that your choice for this week (our next-to-last) is due in to 'dog central by 1:30 p.m. Pacific Time tomorrow, Saturday.

Now that Williams Avenue in Portland has been handed over lock, stock, and barrel to the apartment weasels, suddenly there's a city transportation "stakeholder committee" apologizing to all the black people who have been displaced by "urban renewal." And the remedy?

• We strongly recommend that the City of Portland critically evaluate its public participation efforts and stakeholder input processes to determine who in a particular community is not being heard in the process and ask why they are not being engaged, and furthermore to question how those with little power can be more actively engaged.

• We strongly recommend that the City start future projects from a place of community need with early input and guidance. The City needs to be responsible to all communities, especially those which are under‐served communities, or culturally disadvantaged communities, when considering project sites, and that the history, land use, and prior planning efforts be considered and questioned while engaging in these projects.

• We strongly recommend that the City right past wrongs by studying the North Williams Transportation Operations Safety Project, its success and failures, utilizing a formal facilitated evaluation process, to guide new policy on engagement processes that ensure that all voices are heard.

• We strongly recommend that the City recognize the opportunities and challenges inherent in planning efforts, and to strive for an outcome that is truly sustainable.

There ya go -- more "evaluation," "input," "studies," and "planning." Problems solved!

When Max Williams recently stepped down after eight years as the director of the Oregon corrections department, friends and colleagues heaped praise on him. He did a wonderful job, they all said. But yesterday it was revealed that another 40-something corrections manager recently left, and the circumstances aren't so rosy:

Prosecutors are considering criminal charges over misuse of public funds at Two Rivers Correctional Institution, tied to a prison manager who has resigned....

The focus of the recent investigation is Mike W. Mathisen, 44, until recently the food services manager at Two Rivers. He managed the prison's central kitchen, overseeing about 100 inmates a day who worked to feed the prison population of 1,580.

Mathisen, with a $59,000 salary, was on paid leave from May until he resigned in late November after the agency finished an initial investigation. While working for the state, Mathisen had catering and food-packing businesses in Hermiston, and established two local farmers markets....

His supervisor, Assistant Superintendent Bob Martinez, was put on paid leave in late November after the Corrections Department finished investigating Mathisen. Martinez returned to work last week, taking a demotion to counselor.

Shades of Farhad "Fred" Monem, the prison system's chief food buyer, who fled the country for his native Iran about four years ago while being investigated for corruption. That fiasco happened under Williams's watch as well, although it was then-state attorney general Hardy Myers's office that let Monem get away.

Every report of corruption in the state's prison hierarchy, of course, reinforces many observers' suspicions that the 1989 murder of one of Williams's predecessors, Michael Francke, was committed by someone other than Frank Gable, the petty criminal who was convicted of that killing. Unlike Williams, Francke told his brother that he had uncovered organized crime in the prisons and was about to put a stop to it. The next thing you knew, people were saying nice things about him -- at his funeral.

An alert reader forwards a breathless e-mail message from Portland mayoral candidate "Camas" Charile Hales, in which he proclaims:

I will jump start the Portland economy, with concrete actions like Community Credit Portland, a loan guarantee program funded by the City of Portland. Through this program, the City of Portland will be the first in the nation to make its money available to support local Portland businesses so they can get back to hiring.

I will create opportunities for our schoolchildren, by bringing together businesses, local community colleges, and organizations such as Portland Youth Builders and Oregon Tradeswomen Inc. to create more opportunities for training and apprenticeships, preparing our youth for the jobs of the coming century.

I know I can do it, because I did it as a Senior VP at an engineering firm, helping to set up an apprenticeship programs at Portland schools so that students had the engineering and planning skills to supply my business' rapidly expanding workforce.

That's it? Man, Charlie, you're going to need to do better than that.

It's illegal for the city to lend its credit to private companies. Doing so violates the spirit, if not the letter, of the state constitution.

And a handful of apprenticeships? Charlie, the teenagers all over the east side are now literally shooting and stabbing each other day and night. Do you ever get real? And how much of your company's "rapidly expanding workforce" came from local government pork spending?

Portlanders who liked Vera Katz as mayor will love Camas Charlie.

Neighborhood associations are there to protect the interests of the neighborhood. No matter how much sentiment there may be in the neighborhood about external matters, it really dilutes the credibility of the association to get involved in them. Apparently, the Irvington neighborhood association does not understand this, as it's about to inject itself into the debate about the new interstate freeway bridge. Bad move.

Hey, busybodies, form a separate group called Irvington Against the Bridge, Irvingtonians for Green Transportation, Yuppies for the Whales, whatever you like. But please, stick to the knitting and keep the neighborhood association out of the bridge morass. It's like the City Council passing infantile resolutions on Supreme Court jurisprudence and the war in Afghanistan -- you just look silly.

For those of you who just can't wait for the 'round-the-clock disaster reporting on local television regarding the forecast snow in Portland, here's a chilly Pacific Northwest story to ponder: ice worms!

 
 

The Portland police have hauled in several young suspects in connection with two recent attacks on innocent passengers on Tri-Met. In both incidents, suspects' mothers have also been arrested -- one on charges of hindering prosecution, and the other for allegedly holding a victim by the hair while the daughter punched her.

Maybe the circuit court judges need to ride the MAX train in the afternoons for a few weeks so that they can better understand what they need to do in these cases. Laughing them off would be a bad moment in Portland history.

On top of today's bad news about Vestas comes this depressing forecast for Portland's other "green economy" pipedream, SoloPower. The city's economic development record slides deeper into the laughable zone. Go by streetcar!

A third candidate for Oregon attorney general has emerged: Katherine Heekin, a Portland attorney. With zero name familiarity, she'll run a distant third to Ellen Rosenblum and Dwight Holton, but the question is, whose votes will she steal? She's connected to the Old Boy Network, but they'll all be behind Rosenblum. She's sends out a crime victim vibe, but she can't hold a candle to Holton in that image category.

Which reminds us: This is another race in which the Democratic Party nominee should be a shoo-in in November. Better re-register as a Democrat if we want to cast a meaningful vote.

Soda tax, library tax, school construction tax... now an arts tax. When they pile on like this, it's easy to say no to all of them.

And once again the Portland police look like a bunch of grifters.

The main reason appears to be that the state crime lab is inadequate, but City Auditor LaVonne Griffin-Valade has a few suggestions for improvement at the Portland police as well.

Maybe we should take some of that $250 million in lottery money that's going to be blown on the Milwaukie MAX train and... nah, never mind.

The head federal transit honcho is scheduled to walk around the SoWhat District in Portland this morning. The mayor's going to be "showcasing the economic development made possible by the stimulus-funded work." Does the future bankruptcy lawyer work count?

One of the supposed "green" saviors of the Portland economy, which has been handed several taxpayer mega-subsidies to move to a Mark Edlen-renovated warehouse in the Pearl District, broke the news this morning that it is shrinking in a major way as an employer:

Vestas A/S, the world's biggest maker of wind turbines in terms of revenues, said Thursday it will lay off around 2,300 employees, mainly in Denmark, because of a market downturn caused by the financial crisis.

The company, headquartered in Aarhus, Denmark, said a potential slowdown in the United States could also result in the layoff of an additional 1,600 employees there.

It said the U.S. layoff plans would mainly depend on whether the Production Tax Credit — which gives a favorable low tax rate to makers of renewable energy — would be extended or not. In 2010, Vestas was awarded about $51 million in tax credits through the U.S. federal stimulus program.

Although its U.S. operations are headquartered in Portland, Ore., Vestas has invested more than $1 billion in four facilities in Colorado.

Will Vestas still be around for a ribbon-cutting in Portland? There's a good chance not. Even if it is, that new headquarters was a bad, bad bet on the part of the city. That company doesn't seem likely to make it in the long run.

So's her gun.

The O's got an interesting headline up this evening: "Portland police, TriMet wonder why no MAX passengers called 9-1-1 about attack on girl."

Maybe it's because there were young males accompanying the attackers, and those young males were carrying backpacks, and there's a good chance at least one of the backpacks had a handgun in it. And if one of those young men saw you ratting their girlfriends out on a 911 call on your cell phone, he might try to earn some major gangsta cred by taking out the gun and blowing your head off.

That might be a good reason to lie low and get off quietly at the next stop. Just a theory.

Yes, they say it might snow in Portland on Sunday. Snow! In Portland! If the snowfall is heavy enough, it may accumulate on the ground. If it accumulates on the ground, travel conditions could be hazardous. If travel conditions are hazardous, anyone traveling could encounter hazards.

For this reason, the city is beginning to shut itself down now. Prepare for the worst! Get with the program immediately, by stocking up on essentials, staying indoors, and remaining glued to bojack.org StormCenter 9000.2. If you do anything else, you could die!

(An important note: If it snows on Monday, Martin Luther King Day, the storm panic will be observed on Tuesday.)

We pity the people who bought into Portland's goofy South Waterfront (SoWhat) District -- among many deficiencies, it's a nasty chore to get in and out of there in a car, which let's face it, is how the vast majority of people get around in this town. There are supposed to be traffic improvements made at the south end of the district to make entry and exit a little easier, but since those projects don't involve bikes, unicycles, streetcars, or skateboards, City Hall could care less about them.

Now comes word that the city is going to take $400,000 from the "south portal" project budget and slide it on over to -- guess what. Yep, bike and pedestrian goodies up at the north end of SoWhat. And some planning hoo-hah concerning the "eco-district" that they're going to try to set up in the neighborhood. They're going to burn your garbage right outside your window, for electricity. It's gonna be great. Really. Think Barcelona or Vancouver, B.C. An epic linchpin.

Some of the neighbors down there are unhappy about the latest diversion of money, but they've been had so many times, they can hardly be surprised. SoWhat doesn't work, and the city and state are going to bankrupt themselves trying to fill it with every goofball toy that the Portland State planning wizards can conjure up. It's a real case study in the convergence of arrogance and poor judgment.

Like magic, it continues to appear, all of a sudden, after nearly a decade of absence. The Admiral and his construction buddies are probably doing a little happy dance right now. And giving residents a special one-finger salute.

In this month's Oregon Bar Bulletin, there's a full page ad for Judge Dave Brewer, who's running for one of the two upcoming vacancies on the Oregon Supreme Court. It's one of those ads that's designed to blow any potential opponents out of the water. There are so many endorsements listed that a reader would need a magnifying glass and half an hour to read them all. You look at it and say, "Win."

Here's a web version of Brewer's supporter list -- in particular, check out this crew. Don't start calling him "Justice" until after the May election -- he's the chief judge of the Court of Appeals through the end of the year -- but barring revelation of compromising photos involving children or animals, that race appears to be over. And no doubt the Old Boys couldn't be happier about it.

The other vacancy on the Supreme Court has three contenders signed up, and there could be more between now and the filing deadline of March 6. That one might be a little more interesting.

To our post of earlier today about the wind energy equipment maker's murky future, add this story, which suggests that it's about to lay off hundreds, if not thousands, of workers.

The Freeway Blogger spent a second day in Portland yesterday, and may do a little more work here after a swing through Seattle that starts today.

Like several of our readers, we keep getting come-ons from Portland's zany Metro government, urging us to take one of their "Opt In" surveys, where the people who agree with them can answer a bunch of loaded questions telling them what they want to hear. Not only do they have high-priced in-house public relations flacks working on this, but there's also a paid outside consultant involved. Phony public involvement doesn't come cheap.

The other day, though, the pitch was unusual. Now Metro is asking about Tri-Met's budget woes:

Metro helping Tri-Met? Sounds natural -- one set of developer slaves pitching in to help another. But there's a subplot to this one, because if we recall correctly, Metro has the power under state law to take over Tri-Met if the Metro board decides to do it. Now, we all know that Tri-Met is doomed from a financial perspective, and when the house of cards starts blowing around in a few years, a lot of questions will be asked about the transit agency's future.

Will Metro take over Tri-Met? The fact that it's now involved in budget planning for the transit system may just push the answer to that question one baby step closer to yes.

Sometimes it seems as though the Portland Business Journal can't handle the truth. Here's an example: The cheery headline says "Vestas posts strong 2011, continues to hire," but then you read on:

[Vestas North America] said it sold 812 wind turbines with a capacity of 1,617 megawatts in 2011 — enough to power 500,000 homes. That’s down from 1,883 megawatts in 2010.

The company installed 30 new wind farms in 2011 and plans to add another 20 this year.

Vestas didn’t release specific North American financial data, such as revenue....

... Vestas’ Danish headquarters has been under a barrage of negative developments.

Last week the company reduced its revenue forecast for the second time in two months. Its shares have fallen almost 90 percent from their high in 2008 after a series of earnings misses including the latest announced on Oct. 30, leading to questions about the status of the company’s management team.

On Thursday, Vestas is expected to announce a corporate restructuring....

[W]ind energy developers [are] rushing to get products completed before a federal production tax credit expires at the end of 2012. If that doesn’t get extended, the forecast beyond this year is murky for the company.

A more apt head might have been "Forecast murky for Vestas," but hey, that wouldn't square with the Portland party line, which is that it's important to subsidize this company on a massive scale so that it can hand money to Mark Edlen to re-do the Meier and Frank warehouse.

Vestas probably won't last too much longer before it's taken over by a competitor -- a competitor who probably won't need a fancy office building in Portland, Oregon for long. But that kind of English is just a little too plain for the PBJ.

The rebels of Clackistan, who are fighting tooth and nail to stop construction of Tri-Met's Mystery Train to Milwaukie (pop. 21,000), have really done it this time. Having foiled the county's ability to use "urban renewal" slush funds to pay for construction, now they're pushing a new ballot measure that would flat-out forbid the county from working on the project unless future voters approve it first.

The proposition now has an official ballot title and everything, and given the anger shown by the Clacka-voters in recent elections, it's got a pretty good chance of passage. So much so that the train pushers on the county commission (they're also apartment bunker pushers, which is what this train is about) are trying to figure out how to fight it.

They'll start with the obvious tactics, of course. Try to discourage people from signing the petitions, look the other way when trolls and fraudsters try to sabotage the signature collection process, and then challenge every signature collected. If that fails, wheel out a parade of horrible, horrible things that will happen if the measure passes. Already they're working on that -- the county won't be able to do maintenance work at existing railroad crossings, the sheriff won't be able to respond to derailed Amtrak trains, one distortion after another, probably written up by a big-bucks Portland real estate law firm.

And in that package, this time there'll be the threat of a lawsuit. "But we've already signed a contract with Tri-Met," the county commissioners will say. "We've already promised to pay $25 million toward the MAX. If we don't pay it, Tri-Met will sue us. It's too late to turn back now."

Now, that would be one of the funniest lawsuits seen in these parts in years, wouldn't it? Maybe after many years in court, Tri-Met could get some money, but it doesn't stand a snowball's chance of getting a judge to order county officials to perform acts prohibited by a voter-approved county ordinance. In any event, there would be years of expensive litigation for Tri-Met. Good luck selling bonds for a boondoggle in that kind of atmosphere.

There will be other arguments made against the ballot measure as well. Some of the commissioners who are pushing MAX are now, comically, wrapping themselves in the constitution. One thing we'd worry about if we were the ballot measure proponents is that there's some state, or even federal, law that somehow pre-empts what the measure sets out to do. But that surely wouldn't stop us from trying.

Last night we learned that the Lake Oswego streetcar may have died a sudden death. If the Clackistanis also stop the Mystery Train at the county line, it will be truly remarkable. And a sign of hope for our region.

We have some advice for the Clackamas County commissioners: Wise up, like the Lake Oswego City Council has. Let this ballot measure pass, and then let the whole thing go. Tell the Goldschmidt people that you did what you could, but the rebels won. After that, your life will get a lot easier. You might even get re-elected.

Portland police made an arrest yesterday in one of the five gangster shoot-em-ups that took place in Portland on Sunday: a 15-year-old who allegedly shot up a house in Southeast Portland using a .22 rifle.

But around 5:00 yesterday morning, another house was hit, around 48th and Killingsworth. Apparently more than a dozen bullets hit the house. And so the gangsters are still ahead by 5.

The mayor says all the shooting is "absolutely unacceptable." The man's pure genius.

A video of a recent attack on a MAX train has already been taken down from YouTube. There's still a clip on KGW, but given the racial overtones of the incident, it may not last long there, either.

We've ridden trains in Newark and the South Bronx, and they were no scarier than MAX on the east side in the afternoon. Actually, probably less scary, because on the East Coast there are at least some unwritten rules among thugs, and fairly competent police. That's not the case here in Portlandia.

One of the four Lake Oswego city council members who have been supporting the insane proposal to run a streetcar from Portland to L.O. tonight announced a change of heart. Apparently he wants a future in elective politics at least slightly more than he wants to make developer and streetcar pusher Homer Williams happy. That puts the council now 4 to 3 against.

It would be sweet indeed to see Homer have to pack up and look elsewhere for more gullible taxpayer geese to pluck. We recommend Fresno.

Check out the street layout in 1955, before the freeways, on this bus route map.

It's the next-to-last weekend of our charity pro football underdog contest, and for this time of year, there are some big point spreads on the table:

13.5 DENVER at New England
8 NEW YORK GIANTS at Green Bay
7 HOUSTON at Baltimore
3.5 SAN FRANCISCO vs. New Orleans

Which of those underdogs (in caps) can win its game outright, without the benefit of the spread? The bigger the spread, the greater your reward if you're right.

As was true last weekend, all picks are due by 1:30 p.m. on Saturday. Nearly half of our pack is still within reach of one of the top five prizes:

First prize - $510 to player's favorite charity
Second prize - $165 to player's favorite charity
Third prize - $105 to player's favorite charity
Fourth prize - $75 to player's favorite charity
Fifth prize - $55 to player's favorite charity

Good luck to everyone with this week's intriguing slate.

The City of Portland and the State of Oregon say the state is likely to give the city a "variance" that will eliminate the need to start construction on a $100 million ultraviolet treatment plant at its Bull Run reservoir. But observers of the city's water bureau, which is way too cozy with the private corporations that are dying to build the plant, are taking nothing for granted. And so they have submitted extensive comments to the state, making the case for eliminating the spendy treatment requirement.

One set of comments is signed by a long list of folks, including two docs from Physicians for Social Responsibility. It's here. Scott Fernandez, a microbiologist and Mount Tabor Reservoir neighbor who's followed the issue closely, adds his points here. Fernandez thinks the feds are using junk science and engaging in scare tactics to strong-arm water systems into unnecessary, and bank-breaking, treatment plans. He makes a strong case.

Here's a story sent us by an alert reader with way too much time on his hands. It's about a downtown Portland lawyer who got herself excluded from Tri-Met for announcing her opinion of a fare inspector's performance a little too loudly while the inspector was in a hassle with another passenger on a MAX platform. The lawyer appealed to a hearings officer and lost, and apparently she's now suing Tri-Met in county court to clear her name.

The summary of the incident makes for some fascinating reading:

We can't say we blame her for suing. The inspector could have, and should have, ignored her. His attitude doesn't trump her right to speak.

"Urban renewal" -- which takes property taxes away from basic public services and hands it over to politicians' pet real estate developers and construction companies -- is supposed to be used only to fix up "blighted " areas. The problem, at least in Oregon, is that there's no clear definition of what "blight" is, and so the politicians take it to mean whatever they want it to mean.

In that free-for-all atmosphere, you wind up with "urban renewal" in places like Lake Oswego, which has got to be the toniest place in the whole state. Lake Oswego is "blighted"? It's "blight" that most of us can't afford to enjoy.

Not only are they going to "renew" the east side of that burg, but now the Oswegans are talking about declaring the Lake Grove part of town "blighted," too. Are they kidding? It would be funny if it weren't so depressing.

One of these days, we'd like to see somebody in Salem -- or even a citizens' petition drive -- propose a tightening of the definition of "blight." The term is now being distorted beyond all recognition. There need to be some objective measures by which "blight" is determined -- based on property values, income levels, environmental contamination, or other clearly demonstrable and verifiable criteria. Things that you can put numbers on. The business of local politicians greasing their friends' palms in ritzy joints like Lake Oswego by declaring "blight" over Dom Perignon and caviar needs to stop, like yesterday.

Yesterday we noted that thousands of taxpayer-subsidized apartment units are about to be slapped up in Portland neighborhoods -- not just wrecking the character of the 'hoods, but at taxpayer expense. Just a few hours later, this story hits the DJC -- about a 155-unit bunker at Interstate and Prescott. And it will get a federal government loan guarantee and at least one 10-year tax abatement from the City of Portland and Multnomah County.

Given that the population of Portland is growing so slowly any more -- and has been for many years -- why does the public need to be building these monstrosities? Apparently the pushers of the project are making their pitches based on unicorns and moonbeams:

"There seems to be enough job growth and population growth in the Portland market to justify all of these projects," Lawrence said. "We are pretty excited about the North Portland neighborhood – there’s quite a bit of opportunity there. We can attract downtown professionals who don’t want to pay the rates for downtown apartments, and will have only a 10-minute commute downtown."

Will somebody please tell these people that the Portland job market is all beat up -- especially downtown? And while you're at it, please give a shout out to the Cogue, who's about to hand over the money to them:

County officials are expected to vote on extensions of the transit-oriented development program and other tax exemption programs in March or April, according to Marissa Madrigal, chief of staff for Multnomah County Chairman Jeff Cogen.

"In these tough budgetary times, all governments are looking at everything they’re doing, and by having these abatements we’re foregoing revenues that could otherwise be used for services," Madrigal said. "But I think with the long-term nature of the (transit-oriented development) program, there’s a good case to be made that we should continue."

"Long term," this city and county are bankrupt. But they hand it over to the real estate sharpies, time after time. What a racket.

No matter how badly these guys screw up, the politicians and bureaucrats just keep shoveling public money to them. They must deliver a lot of votes.

Leaving aside the obvious mismanagement of the organization, it's a little hard to believe that the state gave them a $170,000 grant to sign up poor African-American kids for public health care, and they managed to get a big 22 actual enrollments. That works out to $7,727.27 per signup.

Maybe we ought to be spending that $170,000 to try to get gangster kids to stop shooting at each other.

Down in groovy Marin County, the rules about grocery bags have gotten so convoluted that even the greener-than-thou Whole Foods grocery store chain can't keep them straight.

As promised, the Freeeway Blogger is, indeed, in town.

It's being pushed by one of Opie Sten's old lackeys. Of course, this brings Willamette Week out drooling over it. Just what Portland's economy (if you can call it that) needs right now: another tax. After a while, this place could turn just about any thinking adult into a Republican.

A reader with a keen sense of history writes:

In 1917, the University of Oregon football team of 14 players and two coaches won the Rose Bowl. In 2012, the University of Oregon won the Rose Bowl with nearly 100 players and 14 coaches. I'm trying to attach some significance to that.

It's gotta be the shoes.

Yesterday's Denver-Pittsburgh football game provided all kinds of thrills. And then there were eight teams left in the tournament.

In our poll last week regarding the Super Bowl winner, less than 10% of our voters chose teams that have now been eliminated. Where will their allegiance shift, and has anyone else changed their minds after seeing the wild card action?

Former Wilsonville mayor John Ludlow is running for the chair of the Clackamas County commission. For the foes of the "urban renewal" juggernaut that now threatens all Portland suburbs, that's probably good news, because Ludlow is clearly on their side. If the establishment candidates cancel each other out, the guy's seemingly got a shot.

If you think all the apartment bunkers being slapped up in Portland's neighborhoods are wrecking the place, here's some insult for your injury: You're paying for them.

Our friend Mark Barry, who's the leading expert on the apartment market in the Portland region, has his always-excellent annual report posted here, and we noted an interesting passage (with emphasis added by us):

Apartment Construction: Many developers are champing at the bit to get back in the game, and trying to get their project to make sense in light of low cap rates for investment grade apartments, and the amount of capital chasing after newer stabilized projects. Financing is more readily available, and the word is out that the apartment market is the place to be. We expect to see permits for 2,000 to 2,500 new units in 2012, with half of the construction activity in Multnomah County. While this is below the trend line of the five years ended in 2008, we will see double the apartment construction in 2012 that we saw in 2010. We expect that half of this apartment construction will have public sponsorship or participation.

No money for street maintenance, no money for schools, no money for parks, no money for cops. Pretty soon they'll be turning off the street lights. But hey, we've always got plenty for the construction companies and developers.

Here's a funny one: Portland mayoral candidate Jeffer-Sam Smith is going to have a campaign event in Washington, D.C. this week. His many fans in that city will take a one-hour break from kissing up to Ron Wyden and spend some time telling Smith how beautiful he is. He's about to get his butt kicked in the primary election, but for now he can keep on posing.

There's a come-on for the event on Facebook, here. We don't know if that link will work for everyone, but here are some highlights:

A nationally-relevant progressive leader. Jefferson has been called "a progressive hero" by 50 Simple Things author Jon Javna, "a rock star in the making" by Daily Kos... and was recently named 2011 Small Business Champion by the Oregon Microenterprise Network....

In 2008, Jefferson was elected to the Oregon House. Elected and re-elected to leadership by his colleagues, he successfully championed "Cool Schools" to retrofit schools and create jobs, online voter registration to increase access to voting, the Human Trafficking Notice bill, and “Grow Oregon” to bring market research and best practices to local entrepreneurs.

Jefferson has the right skill set to connect the progressive energy of Portland with what is happening nationally.

The election offers an important choice. Of the major candidates in the race, Jefferson is:
...the only candidate not to urge premature ouster of Occupy camps.
...the only candidate to publicly support the 2010 progressive tax measures in Oregon.
...the only candidate not to criticize the Communities of Color Coalition’s proposal for a City Office of Equity.

And Jefferson would be the only mayor in Portland history to live in East Portland, one of the most challenged, diverse, and under-served areas in Oregon.

Smith has so many problems that it's hard to know where to start. Let's hope he has a productive trip, and meets up in Washington with someone who will give him a good gig there -- a permanent one -- starting this summer.

Here's an interesting hit piece that WW ran late last week, against GOP congressional candidate Rob Cornilles. Do you think the reporter dug that one up on her own? Or was it fed to her by a political operative?

To us it smells an awful lot like a Mark Wiener hit job. In the primary, WW dropped a stinkbomb on Kari Chisholm, political consultant to Suzanne Bonamici's opponent, Brad Avakian. And that one bore the same aroma as the latest.