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The government works in mysterious ways. A recent example: The Oregon Department of Transportation has paid a company run by a Vancouver, Wash.-based pastor $2.7 million to extol the virtues of freeway widening in the Rose Quarter (“Highway to Heaven,” WW, Sept. 4). In the years when Dr. Steven Holt has poured oil on troubled waters for ODOT among Black Portlanders who distrust the agency, much of the money earmarked for a Rose Quarter expansion was spent elsewhere, leaving transportation officials with money to construct a cap above the freeway but none to expand the road beneath. Holt tells the members of his committee to have faith. Here’s what our readers had to say:
pdxdweller, via Reddit: “If you have to try this hard to sell your project, then your project isn’t what you claim it is, the community largely sees through the BS and doesn’t find a social benefit…but that doesn’t stop ODOT’s dedicated ‘pave it all’ mindset.”
Odd_Local8434, via Reddit: “The story of how a massive infrastructure project became a fat paycheck for a small group of consultants and nonprofits in the name of equity. Meanwhile the earmarked money was spent on a different infrastructure project.”
SD, on Bike Portland: “Tina Kotek needs to bring some sanity to ODOT. It is poor form for her to let this agency continue to be so deeply mismanaged and self-serving.”
John Donnerberg, via wweek.com: “ODOT also gutted Southwest Portland, downtown Portland, and many other areas when they built I-5. Capitol Hill Grade School and Markham Middle School are both located directly on the freeway, yet we don’t have an outcry to relocate those schools or cap the intersection at Terwilliger and Barbur. The idea that ODOT singled out a predominately minority neighborhood in Albina is fundamentally flawed. There was simply no other way to get a big road through Portland without hitting some disadvantaged areas. The same could be said for I-205 in Lents or Parkrose. This all seems like a politically correct cash grab at this point.”
Nate Dawg, in reply: “Let’s not forget that these days Albina is populated mostly by white gentrifiers and progressives that pride themselves by moving into a ‘diverse’ neighborhood, despite them displacing those making up said diversity…”
Rhonda Ruiz, via Facebook: “Freeways have to be built for people and commerce to move freely. No one desires to be stuck in traffic jams.”
amb, via Twitter: “I’ll just offer that $130 million, the amount of money that ODOT has spent so far just on consultants and planners for the $1.9 BILLION Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion, is almost 10 times what the state spends annually building safe routes to schools.”
TheStJohnsFlasher, via wweek.com: “Jesus H Christ that is an awful lot of money to throw at a guy for what exactly? They either need to build that thing or quit.
“The amount of money they have spent on this project—and the I-5 bridge light rail [for] that matter—is staggering considering nobody has moved an inch.”
CORRECTION
Last week’s cover story on Dr. Steven Holt incorrectly noted that Try Excellence LLC received $832,000 from a city contract. That contract amount is correct, but Try Excellence actually received only $279,190. WW regrets the error.
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