[April 23rd, 2008]

WINNERS

1. Teeny-boppers scored this week when the OLCC decided, after much ado, to allow minors into music venues that serve booze. Under the liquor control agency’s new rules, which take effect June 1, minors can see their favorite bands (or, you know, whoever’s playing that night) at venues that create a “minor control plan.” In other OLCC news, “April is Alcohol Awareness Month!” Trust us, we know...and do you have to shout?

2. Moving on uptown: The Sauvie Island Bridge got a new lease on life this week when City Commissioner Dan Saltzman changed his mind about Sam Adams’ plan to move the old bridge to I-405, at Northwest Flanders Street, and make it bikes-only. Saltzman gave the thumbs-down to Adams’ earlier plan—a $5.5 million no-bid contract with Max J. Kuney Construction. Now the city plans to go with the lowest bidder. What a concept.

3. Truth be told, David Lee Patterson came out a huge winner last week. A Multnomah County grand jury decided against indicting Patterson, who’d confessed to killing a man in 1991. Patterson, a 60-year-old black man, said he killed Eric Denis Lamon, a white man, in self-defense after Lamon kicked him and shouted racial epithets when Patterson was lying on the street homeless.

LOSERS

1. Tough week for City Council candidate John Branam. First, Branam got his hands slapped by auditor Gary Blackmer, who administers the city’s publicly-financed elections system. Blackmer said Branam’s compensation of campaign manager Phil Busse was excessive and forbade him from giving Busse any more than the $20,000 already paid. Then blogger Jack Bogdanski produced a lawsuit in which the plaintiff, a former Port of Portland employee, noted that Branam, who also briefly worked at the port, got his job because of a recommendation from disgraced former Gov. Neil Goldschmidt. Ouch.

2. Two top Portland Development Commission execs, development manager Cheryl Tweete and housing manager Andy Wilch, got the boot as the agency executed a sweeping reorganization that made newcomer Erin Flynn the big winner and likely favorite to replace current PDC director Bruce Warner.

3. Kristy Lee Cook, the American Idol crooner from Oregon—whose ego, in one episode, eclipsed the immensity of Dolly Parton’s chest—was booted off the best-ever television show last week. No worries, KLC fans: We hear Big Brother Season 437 has put out a casting call.