Murmurs: State Payroll Woes Continue

STATE PAYROLL WOES CONTINUE: Although the Oregon Department of Administrative Services insists it is rapidly solving problems with the new Workday payroll and HR management system it implemented Jan. 3, many state employees—and their dependents—remain ballistic. They’re frustrated because child support and alimony have gone unpaid as a result of erroneous paychecks. “It’s a total, unmitigated disaster,” says Marc Abrams, a vice president at the Oregon chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents 300 attorneys at the state Department of Justice. “I’ve got 30 members who got paid too little and 15 who got paid too much, and everybody hates it because it’s not getting fixed.” Five public employee unions have filed grievances, and AFSCME sued in Multnomah County Circuit Court on Jan. 31, “seeking a court order requiring the state of Oregon to fix its payroll system.”

NIKE’S NORTHEAST STORE BOARDS UP: The Nike community retail store along Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. is now boarded up with plywood. Nike closed the 13,000-square-foot retail building in October. News outlets traced the closure to a string of thefts. The Nike Store remained well lit and somewhat staffed for months, and still contained all of its retail shelves and racks. But with plywood blocking the view inside the store, it doesn’t appear it will reopen anytime soon. Nike built the store in 1984 in hopes it would become a flagship community hub in a predominantly Black neighborhood struggling with rising crime. The Oregon sportswear giant is amid a shift in its retail strategy: It closed a Nike Store in downtown Seattle last month, and the Portland Business Journal reports it’s opening a new location in the upscale outdoor shopping plaza Bridgeport Village. A request for comment to Nike went unanswered.

WATER BUREAU DELAYS PIPELINE: The Portland Water Bureau on Jan. 31 abruptly halted the Willamette River Crossing Project, which it has been pursuing for more than a decade. The Water Bureau planned to lay a new pipeline under the Willamette River to ensure the westside’s drinking water supply in the event the bureau’s current, seismically vulnerable pipelines should rupture in a major earthquake (“The Big Muddy,” WW, Dec. 7, 2022). “In the last 45 days alone, new information on construction inflation projections, supply chain challenges, and overlap with other Water Bureau, city of Portland and regional projects of a similar nature intensified the potential risks with moving forward now,” the bureau said in a statement. Ron Doctor, leader of a group of South Waterfront residents who questioned the cost and effectiveness of the city’s design, applauded the decision. “I’m pleased that PWB has realized that their current WRX Pipeline plan is not feasible,” Doctor says. “And I’m pleased that they are closing down their construction sites and will rebid the project.” The bureau says it now hopes to start construction on the pipeline in 2027-28.

MIKE SCHRUNK DIES AT 80: Revered former Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schrunk died Monday. He was 80. His passing was widely mourned. Schrunk won the respect of judges, prosecutors and defense lawyers during his 32-year tenure as Portland’s top prosecutor. All camps sang his praises when his death was announced Jan. 30 (family members told The Oregonian Schrunk died of complications from Alzheimer’s disease). County leaders declared a day in his honor following his retirement in 2012. “Mike has always been known for doing the right thing,” then-Chief Criminal Judge Julie Frantz of the Multnomah County Circuit Court said at the time. Schrunk’s influence on Portland’s criminal justice system has extended long after his reign as DA. His handpicked successor, Rod Underhill, served until 2020. Underhill’s successor, Mike Schmidt, credits Schrunk with giving him his “first chance” to practice criminal law, and has adopted some aspects of his former boss’s mentality. Schrunk opposed the death penalty, started one of the first drug offense diversion courts in the country, and avoided partisanship. “Political winds change,” Schrunk told an interviewer in 2007. “What we need is to get the data, and we need to ask the questions of the bright young men and women that can analyze this data.”