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Three's
Company
Willamette Week is proud to announce that the City
of Roses Newspaper Co. has added a third paper to its roster.
On Feb. 1 WW's parent company will join Larry Ragan
as an owner of Boise Weekly. Ragan will continue
to serve as publisher of Boise's alternative weekly newspaper,
which has a circulation of 25,000. City of Roses purchased
the Santa Fe Reporter, an alternative weekly in New
Mexico, in 1997.
Sweet
and Low
The "sweetener" the city added to its contract offer to
cops earlier this week left a bitter taste in some folks'
mouths. On Jan. 24 the city offered the Portland Police
Association a maximum 1.7 percent a year pay incentive--but
only to officers who hold a master's degree, have put long
years on the force and pass foreign-language proficiency
and physical-fitness tests.
"You'd have to be a Russian-speaking weight lifter with
a master's degree and 25 years on the job" to get the full
incentive, says union president Greg Pluchos. "It wasn't
even a serious offer."
The impasse is starting to rankle more than just the rank
and file. In interviews with WW, Commissioners Erik
Sten and Jim Francesconi both expressed frustration with
the go-nowhere mediation talks.
Sten was particularly critical. "The city has erred in
taking such a hard line for so long," he said. He's especially
disappointed with the city's "last-minute play" of the $1
million incentive package, which was so complicated the
city didn't even know how many officers would qualify. "It
wasn't really well thought out," he says.
Although Sten isn't fully supportive of the PPA's offer
of 15 percent over three years, he would like to see the
city inject some clarity into the process and make an offer
that affects all union members.
--Philip Dawdy
Murmurs
SCUTTLEBUTT
WITH AN EDGE
How much jewelry do you take when you travel? If you're
the executive editor of The Oregonian, quite a bit.
On Jan. 17 someone snuck into Sandy Rowe's St. Petersburg,
Fla., hotel room and made off with a six-piece set of family
heirlooms and custom-made jewelry valued at $54,000. "Everything
gold and sparkly was gone," Rowe told the St. Petersburg
Times, "and actually some equally valuable things that
were platinum were left." On Friday, St. Petersburg police
arrested a 28-year-old maintenance man at the Renaissance
Vinoy Resort, where Rowe was staying during the business
trip. (Note to Oregonian reporters filling out travel
expenses: Your boss' "Deluxe Bayview" room runs $329 a night.)
That thud coming from Dan Saltzman's office Jan. 24 was
the ax falling. Sources say the city commissioner, armed
with the findings of a city auditor's investigations, called
in Sherrill Whittemore, boss of the city's 911 office,
and asked her to resign. When she balked, he informed her
the city would begin firing proceedings. Whittemore, who's
on administrative leave, has two weeks to fight the decision.
Only 14 months after arriving at the Port of Portland as
a potential successor to executive director Mike Thorne,
Bruce Andrews is history. Although Andrews, longtime
boss of the state Department of Agriculture, recently had
his hands slapped for sloppy management of that agency,
Thorne says the publicity over the negative audit had nothing
to do with Andrews' departure. Still, a press release called
it a "mutual decision," which insiders say reflects Andrews'
unsuccessful attempt to foster a more open, entrepreneurial
atmosphere at the Port.
Mayor Vera Katz is expected drop a couple of big
announcements Friday in her State of the City address. First
(no big surprise here), she's running for a third term.
In addition, Just Out newspaper reported last week
that her honor may unveil the city's plans to allow gay
and lesbian partners to register as couples with the city's
legal blessing, much as they now can in Ashland. Finally,
Katz may spill details of the first installment of her plan
to cap a section of I-405.
Portland Public Schools suffered another loss this week
when Bob Crebo, the district's special-ed guru, announced
his resignation. Crebo, who presided over a $40 million
budget and possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of the Byzantine
rules that govern special education, is heading for sunnier
pastures in California. His announcement follows those of
assistant superintendent Carol Matarazzo, General Counsel
Bruce Samson, acting human-resources chief Gary Tuck (who
will continue to work part-time) and two of the district's
five directors of student achievement. None of the vacancies
has been filled.
The good news in the statistic-rich "Status of Oregon's
Children 1999" released this week is that juvenile arrests
declined for the second year in a row and teen suicide attempts
in Oregon reached their lowest level since 1991. The bad
news is that child abuse reached its highest levels in a
decade; in Multnomah County, 24 of every 1,000 children
under age 8 suffered abuse or neglect last year, a rate
33 percent higher than the state average.
After much bureaucratic droning at last week's City Council
meeting on sewage-rate reform, state Rep. Jeff "Jolt"
Merkley added a theatrical flair to his testimony by
dumping 1,600 postcards on the table from East Portlanders
whose sewage bills are going through the roof. "That's enough,
Jeff," said Mayor Katz, as the audience woke up from their
naps and applauded.
Overheard:
"Pretty soon we'll be going there, but
we'll probably just use it as a parking lot."
--Commentary on the importance of moon-use
planning from a downtown observer during last week's full
lunar eclipse.
The
Plan Man
Gil Kelley, who jumps into the hot seat next
week as the city's new planning director, is no stranger
to controversy. He comes from Berkeley, a factionalized
snakepit of planning politics.
Somehow Kelley survived as director there
for 10 years, though toward the end of his watch things
got dicey, as some critics attacked him as overly sympathetic
toward business interests. In November 1998, after he'd
announced his intent to resign in four months' time, the
city manager placed him on an "administrative leave" for
the final three months.
Portland isn't quite as tumultuous as Berkeley,
but the planning post has become increasingly political.
Consider:
* The bureau was blasted recently by the City
Club for neglecting long-term planning.
* Vera Katz recently took over the bureau
and twice has publicly suggested Commissioner Charlie Hales
is to blame for its decline, most recently in a speech before
X-PAC. Katz's public statements were in contrast to comments
she made during a joint WW interview with Hales,
when she backed the changes he made to the bureau, which
were due to budget cuts and an emphasis on neighborhoods.
* Katz has said the new Planning Bureau director
will be a leader, a visionary. But the last planning director
hailed for those attributes was Bob Stacey, whom Hales fired
in 1993.
In a telephone interview, Kelley, a graduate
of the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., said his
experience leaves him well prepared for the pressure of
Portland's Planning Bureau. Berkeley, for instance, had
run out of new areas to put new development, forcing him
to focus on creative ways to increase density in already
developed areas.
Also, Kelley headed economic development in
Berkeley, which could help him work with the Portland Development
Commission.
--Nick Budnick
Food
Fight
Portland's natural-food wars have moved from
the produce section to federal court.
Depositions in a lawsuit filed by Wild Oats
Markets Inc. began last week. Wild Oats, which bought Nature's
Fresh Northwest last May, brought suit against Rohter late
last year in U.S. District Court in Portland. The suit claims
Rohter poached Nature's employees and took with him Nature's
trade secrets and other proprietary information when he
founded a new natural-foods chain, New Seasons, shortly
after leaving Nature's (see "Fresh Start," WW, Oct.
20, 1999). Wild Oats seeks to stop New Seasons from using
what Nature's considers trade secrets and wants $150,000
in damages from Rohter, as well as unspecified damages from
his company and colleagues.
Rohter says there's nothing in his separation
agreement with Wild Oats that prohibits him from opening
his own stores. "I think they're trying to avoid competing
with us in the market by pushing this into the courts,"
he says.
No court date has been set. Wild Oats and
its attorneys did not return WW's phone calls.
New Seasons will open its first store next
month at 7300 SW Beaverton-Hillsdale Highway.
--Nigel Jaquiss
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Willamette Week | originally
published January 26,
2000
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