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Now they're bringing Joel Przybilla back. Can Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje be far behind?
The Blazers have flailed around so aimlessly these last few years, with seemingly no one with any basketball sense in charge. It's hard to get behind them, not knowing where they think they're going.
After an unfavorable audit finding numerous accounting irregularities and conflicts of interest, the Portland Development Commission has pronounced everything fine, and of course, the local mainstream media just repeats the line back. And hey, of the nine major things that were found to be wrong, they're working on fixing five of them!
Great!
It's hard to believe that they can shrug off an audit that contains this passage. It's one of the most damning we've read in a while:
PDC issues checks to itself on a regular basis but for different reasons. It is unclear whether this practice is appropriate, especially for all the reasons described. Fraud schemes use a similar practice to steal funds. PDC’s practice presents the opportunity for the misappropriation of funds, especially when more secure methods – such as wire transfers or journal entries – are available alternatives....
Everything's peachy. Go by streetcar.
By far the funniest show on Portland television last night was Channel 8 News. Reporter Reggie Aqui covered the hilarious Lake Oswego City Council meeting at which public access to the lake was being discussed. The lame duck mayor and the members of the council said "preserve the status quo" about a dozen times. Must-see TV.
Eventually, the enviros will likely have their way on this issue, although not without a lengthy court fight and probably some action in the state legislature. Then life in L.O. will never be the same. Just ask Portlanders who faint when they open their sewer bills and pay through the nose for the Big Pipe project: Sometimes you've got to follow the law like everyone else, whether you like it or not.
If we were given the assignment to find ways to get Portland's outrageous water bills under control, we'd start by selling this vehicle and cutting out all the joy rides to Bull Run. Spend a couple of hundred bucks to shoot a video, post it on the internet, call it good, and lay off whoever works on the tours.
In addition to wasting money, this program no doubt allows the water bureau to advance its public relations campaigns to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on unnecessary, if not counterproductive, construction projects. The sales pitch that gets laid on the passengers on the bus is probably breathtaking.
They'll fight blight a few years longer down in that dark den of inner-city decay, Sherwood, Oregon.
After being insulted, attacked, and otherwise baited for years by an anonymous blogger calling himself various names including "Urban Planning Overlord," we have finally figured out who he is, and we will be revealing his true identity here on Friday. Between now and then, he can decide what to do about the charade of concealing who he is.
He may try to pull some or all of his blog down, but some of its content is available on the Wayback Machine, and of course we have many of his comments, several of which were posted from government computers, preserved on our site. Posting from Mountain Park on Sunday was a dumb move on his part, and as a result, his anonymous blogging career will be ending in just a couple of days.
Should the next mayor of Portland commit to spending 25% of all Portland transportation funds on bikes and pedestrians? Really -- 25%?
Says Camas Charlie: Absolutely.
Says Jeffer-Sam Smith: At least that much, maybe more.
Says Founder Eileen: Let's be grown up about this.
So of course, the bikeys endorse Jeffer-Sam. Which is rich indeed, given the fact that the guy is such a jackass behind the wheel of a car that any biker or pedestrian should mightily fear being anywhere near him on a street.
The Multnomah County commission is forcing the public library to close on Mondays and lay off staff -- this after the county's voters have told the commissioners, time after time, that they want the current level of service maintained. The voters even passed, overwhelmingly, a ballot measure that was supposed to "get the politicians out of" library funding.
That was obviously a lie.
In any event, go ahead and cut away, commissioners -- it's your political funeral.
Its transit system is completely in the tank, but it's got money and time for this. Day after day, stupider and stupider.
Wonder where all those tax dollars that you pay to the City of Portland are going? Not to pave streets, obviously. Here's a bag of them flying out the window:
Last April 19, Adams' chief of staff Warren Jimenez and Steven Shain, a manager with the Portland Development Commission, sent Iberdrola's Madrid-based director a "menu of state and local incentives" to peruse.Options included low interest loans for property redevelopment; state dependent-care tax credits; state forgivable loans based on new job creation; wage reimbursement for on-the-job training; cash incentives for energy efficiency; state low-interest loans for public infrastructure improvements; and state research tax credits.
"The earlier that we can start to work together the greater our ability to optimize the incentives prior to the transaction being completed," Jimenez and Shain wrote.
More tilting at windmills while the livability of Portland drains away -- reminiscent of Opie Sten in its detachment from reality. It is going to take a major disaster to get this city to stop the insanity. Electing Eileen Brady certainly is not going to change it.
An interesting day at Blog Central -- no power. It's a vulnerable feeling, but by our cell phones shall we function.
UPDATE, 11:20 a.m.: Juice has been restored. But the day will be a half step off for a while.
According to the IRS, that little enclave near Bellevue was one of the 30 richest zip codes in the country, with 1,425 tax returns averaging $506,000 of income for the year 2008.
This is pretty funny. Mr. Brave Anonymous Troll tries to cover up the fact that he obviously dwells in Mountain Park.
Let's see... lives in Mountain Park, works in government "planning," used to work in the planning bureau at the City of Simi Valley, California, has had some connection with the Clackamas ESD, wife is a USC alumna -- and he thinks he can stay anonymous? In Portland?
They keep talking about him as if he's still a professional basketball player. Come on, guys, that was over long ago -- and you certainly should have realized that, at the latest, two years ago. His last game was in December of 2009. It's history now, and it never was. Please give it a rest.
"He’s recovered from a couple of these before—his last two microfracture lesions have healed fine," Buchanan said.
That's the Blazers' "acting general manager." Can he possibly believe what's coming out of his mouth?
We wish her nothing but the best with it.
It's "Presidents Day," whatever that is supposed to mean. Lincoln's birthday was eight days ago; Washington's is the day after tomorrow. Today is... well, something. The banks are closed, and there's no mail.
We feel sorry for Lincoln and Washington, great men who led the nation in violent, revolutionary times. Their names have been blotted off the calendar. Now it's "Presidents Day," which for all the kids know might be in honor of Nixon or Fillmore or the Bush family. Martin Luther King gets better billing these days -- much better. Nobody had better dare make people work on his day.
At least Abe and George are still on the money.
The phrase "out of touch" is too mild.
Our condolences to the loved ones of the bouncer at the Grand Central Bowl in close-in southeast Portland. He was shot dead at closing time Saturday night.
It's the second such killing in 14 months. On New Year's 2011, a bouncer downtown was shot and killed at closing time by a disgruntled patron.
It's also the second Saturday night shooting outside a close-in southeast bar in three weeks. At closing time on the night of Jan, 28, it was the Grand Cafe, four blocks away.
We feel bad for the young people of Portland who are at the age that they need to go out to bars and party. It used to be safe to do that in central Portland. Not any more.
When the last bouncer was snuffed out, the city's "unique" mayor called one of his "bar summits," at which pub owners and cops convened to talk. Apparently that will have to become an even more frequent event.
Between the bouncer murder and the latest craziness on the crime trains -- would you rather be menaced by a machete, or have your neck broken? -- one has to wonder when, if ever, an adult will take the reins of the city's public safety apparatus.
We saw a lot of geese over the weekend. On Saturday, we were running on the East Bank Esplanade and a pair came swooping down, making long landing splashes into the Willamette, parallel to the walkway. Then yesterday we found ourself motoring up and down the valley on I-5, and there were hundreds of them overhead, in various formations. Guess spring is right around the corner.
"Urban Planning Overlord" is on our case again. Not only is he or she trash-talking us on his or her blog, but he or she is also leaving snarky comments on ours.
It's a funny thing, though: When you go to check "Urban Planning Overlord's" IP address, 209.210.19.130, it traces back to the Mountain Park Homeowners Association in Lake Oswego.
We find it amusing, in a pitiful sort of way, that the people who want so badly to tell Portlanders how to live don't even live here themselves.
Apparently there's a debate going on in Salem about whether the politicians in the legislature should have hands-on involvement in the running of state agencies. We have an opinion about that. Up here in Portland, the politicians run the city bureaus, and it's a disaster. Separation of powers has served our nation well, and we could use a dose of it. If only the foot-draggers on the charter revision commission would serve it up to the electorate one of these days. It would probably get shot down by the many with vested interests in the current system, but it would be worth a spirited discussion.
When an aging rocker starts recording standards, be prepared to cover your ears and run. Rod Stewart, whose poor voice has been beyond salvage for several decades, has been murdering the American songbook, and damaging his place in rock history, in recent years. And so we approached Paul McCartney's new recording, Kisses on the Bottom, with enormous caution.
But despite the title (an oh-so-cute quote from "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter"), it's pretty darn good. He has Diana Krall on piano, and John Pizzarelli on guitar. John's father, the legendary Bucky Pizzarelli, also shows up on several songs. With that lineup, it's hard to go wrong. And the material, which avoids a lot of the obvious from the genre, suits McCartney's sweet croonings perfectly. Including three songs written by Frank Loesser, who could knock great ones out, one after another.
Resist it if you will -- we won't blame you -- but when you're ready to suspend disbelief, we think you'll find it's a fine recording. It certainly brings a smile to our face.
A concerned reader sends along this story, and an apt comment:
No word yet on what happens if your kid has a food allergy or his/her parents don't want their kid eating GM foods. You'll take your USDA-approved, chicken nugget lunch and like it, kid!
Portland City Hall has a great suggestion: Move your garbage can further from your house. And be sure it's in the shade.
Those two-week-old Depends are going to be mighty funky come late July.
Soon they'll be swimming in the Willamette.
One of Portland's old-time bunker peddlers has taken the plans for his failed 31-story condo tower in the Lloyd District and redrawn them as a hotel. There'd be three floors of condos, and 25 of hotel. No word yet on how much subsidy he'll be demanding from the public, but being that the property's on the east side streetcar line, he'll doubtlessly get plenty.
As for the design, the architects are selling the same line of bullpuckey that they pushed in building the failed SoWhat District:
With a tall, skinny facade, the Cosmopolitan is designed to allow more light and usable space between buildings. He said the team took inspiration from Vancouver, B.C., where point towers are commonplace.
But if course, since the powers that be have already cut a backroom deal with somebody else to build a hotel in the neighborhood, the Weston building is inadequate:
Metro’s general manager of visitor venues, Teri Dresler, disagrees."The Weston development, while it’s great – we love development in the neighborhood and it's fairly close to the convention center – doesn’t quite meet the criteria for a convention center headquarter hotel," she said.
Dresler said that in order for the center to gain the business it’s presently unable to capture, a block of at least 500 rooms is needed. To that end, she said Metro officials have resumed conversations with city and county political leaders to revisit the idea of a headquarters hotel.
Maybe we'll have two new hotels. Let's hope the taxpayers pay zero for the both of them. Portland is a weak attraction for a national convention, and that isn't going to change no matter how many hotels get built.
The Trib reports here what we noted 11 days ago.
Maybe it's karma for all the trouble they've been causing with their neighborhood cell towers.
Wind energy companies like Vestas and Iberdrola, which have their headquarters in Portland, keep telling Congress that they need an immediate extension of the federal tax credits for wind energy or else they'll have to lay off more hundreds of people. What the Euro-suits are finding out, however, is that Congress is nowhere near having its act together, on tax credits or anything else. The latest action on Capitol Hill, jerking around with the Social Security tax cut, is not going to include a tax credit extension. And nobody knows when, if ever, the congressional toupees might get around to a vote on the issue.
The "green" lobbyists are heading back out into the hall to plot their next maneuver. But if they don't get a tax deal pretty soon, the greenies will likely be furloughing workers, at least temporarily, in the second half of the year. That is, if they don't go under completely.
That immigration jail that Fireman Randy and his developer buds are forcing on Portland's South Waterfront District -- next door to a grammar school -- looks like even more of an abomination in light of this story. It turns out the immigration enforcers are as dangerous as the inmates.
Portland's version is going in next to a grammar school, over the objection of a hearing officer who ruled that it was too dangerous. That hearing officer is a whole lot smarter and more honest than the people sitting in the City Council chairs.
In last night's mow-down of a pedestrian by a Tri-Met bus in Tigard, the bus was reportedly making a left turn. That simple maneuver seems to be quite problematic.
There's something happening at the Fukushima meltdown site. Unit 2, which from external appearances seems like it's less trashed than the other three melted-down reactors, is throwing off strange temperature readings. Meanwhile, radiation levels in Tokyo are higher than they've been in months.
Heaven help the Japanese and their nuclear disaster. They can act like life goes on, but many innocent people are being poisoned.
My goodness -- can it get any uglier? The screwiness of Portland government is reaching new depths every day.
One of the joys of having a blog is being able to use it to support worthy causes. Last summer we launched this charitable initiative, and we're happy to see that it's now bearing fruit.
What in the world (or from out of this world) are these things?
Rah rah, siss boom bah, here's how Portland's newspaper "covers" its dying transit system. The headline writers over there must start drinking at breakfast. "With WES leading the way" -- yes, one of the biggest transit flops in history is certainly a fitting image for Tri-Met these days. The subsidy per boarding ride on that thing is $15. But hey, they make it up in volume.
You just know the City of Portland isn't going to let us go on living without these.
Here's a pretty decent summary of where the protests against the Mystery Train to Milwaukie (and other boondoggles) stand. Jim Redden of the Trib manages to report without slanting, unlike his rivals at Portland's monopoly daily newspaper.
The Trib warms over the press release that the PBJ already warmed over on Tuesday, here. We stand on our question of yesterday: What more are we going to export, Jim? Solar panels? Windmills? More silicon chips? Surely a phone call or two would have turned up an economist who's skeptical about the prospect of doubling exports of Oregon-made anything. Portland will be lucky to hold on to what it's got.
The City of Portland's official watchdog over public funds issued an extensive report late yesterday that lambasted the Portland Development Commission for all sorts of sloppiness -- or worse -- in handling public money. The report is here. The whole thing is worth study, but there are a few highlights (or are they lowlights?) that jump out at first reading: doing business with unregistered companies, keeping inadequate records about vendors, lax conflict-of-interest rules, falsely showing overtime pay as regular pay, illegal "awards" to employees, writing checks to itself, issuing duplicate checks and skipping transaction numbers in the payment registry, the list goes on and on.
PDC officials did not consistently make businesses follow its own requirements for doing business with PDC. Ultimately, by not verifying business registry, PDC is providing City funds to businesses that may not be operating in the City legally and paying applicable City business taxes....PDC has several weaknesses in its conflicts of interest and related party practices. PDC existing policies are not inclusive enough to meet the Oregon Ethics Law definition for “public officials,” and are silent about relationships between employees. In addition, there is compelling evidence that employee relationships warrant additional work in identifying and monitoring potential conflicts of interest and related parties. Lastly, PDC has not consistently followed its own requirements related to purchasing from businesses where employees may have a personal interest or hiring former employees....
PDC is not adhering to its own accounting system due to the combined reporting of regular and overtime wages in the regular wages account. Combining these significant expenditures makes the specific wage types less transparent for the public and PDC decisionmakers....
After consulting with the Oregon Government Ethics Commission, we do not believe the [Employee] Service Awards are consistent with the Oregon Ethics Law. PDC discontinued the practice of distributing Service Awards to its employees after hearing our concerns about these awards....
PDC’s current practice of data management does not consistently produce complete records in the vendor master as required by policy. By using incomplete records, PDC has also missed an opportunity to verify, update and scrutinize information in its vendor master to add reasonable assurances against errors and fraud....
PDC issues checks to itself on a regular basis but for different reasons. It is unclear whether this practice is appropriate, especially for all the reasons described. Fraud schemes use a similar practice to steal funds. PDC’s practice presents the opportunity for the misappropriation of funds, especially when more secure methods – such as wire transfers or journal entries – are available alternatives....
A number of payment sequence gaps and [check] duplicates went undetected by PDC. In addition, the log used to monitor and explain any gaps and duplicates was not always accurate or complete, which impacted its effectiveness as a tracking tool. While PDC officials were able to explain most of the sequence issues, regular and timely reviews of gaps and duplicates can prevent errors or potential misuse of funds....
What a mess. In any other business, people would be fired over a report like this. Even the Urban League chopped off a guy's head over far lesser accounting problems. But hey, this is Portland, and the PDC slush fund is accountable to no one.
That whole operation needs to be disbanded. It's bankrupting Portland, even if you take its word for what it's doing. And heaven only knows how much money is being flat-out stolen out of there. Yoo hoo! Amanda Marshall!
Suddenly there's serious talk of a new basketball and hockey arena to be built in downtown Seattle. It seems like an obvious ploy to get the Sacramento Kings pro hoops team to move up there. Boy, wouldn't Paul Allen love to swing a deal to move the Blazers to Seattle and let Portland and some new owners have the Kings. Allen's under personal contract with the City of Portland to keep his team here for many more years, but you can bet he'll have the lawyers wracking their brains for a way out of that one.
Maybe the whole Seattle deal is just a head fake to get the taxpayers of Sacramento to build a new arena for the team down there. Stranger things have happened. But if Seattle gets an NBA team and it isn't his, DOS Boy is going to be just a wee bit frustrated.
The naked, bound, and gagged girlfriend in the back seat was one way to celebrate Valentine's Day, but the cow heart on the front porch was quite another.
