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INSIDE:
City Council authorizes
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Southwest Portland’s Independent Neighborhood Newspaper
Volume No. 19, Issue No. 8
www.swportlandpost.com
Portland, Oregon
Complimentary
– Page 2
June 2011
Citizenship ceremony draws 47 new Americans from 26 Countries
By Polina Olsen
The Southwest Portland Post
When Carmel Breathnach took her
oath of citizenship, children from the
kindergarten class she teaches cheered.
Part of the 27 th Annual Cinco de Mayo
Fiesta in Waterfront Park, the May 6
United States Citizenship and Immigra-
tion Service ceremony brought together
family, friends and 47 new Americans
from 26 countries.
Each year, the Portland Guadalajara
Sister City Association sponsors a natu-
ralization ceremony as part of the fiesta.
Established in 1984, the non-profit
PGSCA promotes Latin culture, arts,
education, economic and intercultural
programs between Portland, Oregon
and Guadalajara, Mexico. The orga-
nization’s primary source of funding
comes from the annual Cinco de Mayo
celebration.
The naturalization ceremony took
place in the fiesta’s main tent. Onlook-
ers grabbed treats from the vendors
lining the large enclosed area and
crowded into tables and chairs set out
for the occasion.
The new citizens held their natu-
ralization packets and listened with
attention. Qureish
Ahmed Adde came
from Mogadishu, So-
malia, and has been
in the United States
for six years.
Bindya Narayan
came to the United
States from Mumbai
(Bombay), India nine
years ago. She and
her husband are high
technology workers
at Intel Corporation
in Hillsboro. “It feels
good to be a citizen,”
she said.
Breathnach, who
teaches at the Joyful
Noise Child Devel-
opment Center, im-
migrated to the Unit-
ed States from Gal-
way, Ireland, more Children from the kindergarten class and their parents joined Carmel Breathnach at the citizenship
than 10 years ago. ceremony, May 6. Shown from left to right are Steve Mooney, Rys Kleier, Zachary Slater, Carmel
She and the others Breathnach, Delaney McFarland, and Kelea Lachman. (Post photo by Polina Olsen)
stood as they called
out each country of origin … Albania,
Mexico, Moldova, Peru, Romania,
legiance and offering congratulations,
Australia, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Canada,
Somalia, South Africa, Syria, Taiwan,
the Immigration and Naturalization
China, Cuba, the Czech Republic, Fiji,
the United Kingdom, Uzbekistan and
Service director introduced the keynote
India, Iraq, Ireland, the Democratic
Vietnam.
speaker, Nawzad Othman, the chief ex-
(Continued on Page 7)
Republic of Georgia, Greece, Kenya,
After administering the Oath of Al-
Multnomah residents consider
Safeway traffic impacts
By Lee Perlman
The Southwest Portland Post
Ryan Hashagen, owner of PortlandPedals.com, gives a pedicab ride to Kelly and
Dash Hartman of Linnton at the Hillsdale Farmers Market, May 1. (Post photo
by Don Snedecor)
Don’t forget to renew your subscription. Form on Page 2.
The Southwest Portland Post
4207 SE Woodstock Blvd #509
Portland, OR 97206
Representatives of the Safeway
Corporation presented their plans for
a new store at Southwest Barbur Bou-
levard and Capitol Highway, replacing
an existing store on the site, at a public
meeting organized by the Multnomah
Neighborhood Association last month.
The 30 people who came expressed
pleasure at seeing the new store come
in, but their questions were directed
almost entirely at its potential trans-
portation impacts, and they expressed
concerns.
“We’ve had the store since 1968, and
for the last 15 years we’ve tried to figure
out how to upgrade it,” Safeway Real
Estate Manager Diana Phillips said.
“The site is an odd configuration that’s
hard to deal with. Then last year we
purchased two adjacent parcels, one
vacant, the other with a small rental
house on it.”
Safeway is currently seeking a Com-
prehensive Plan Amendment to change
the lot’s R1 multi-family zoning to a
commercial designation. The process
requires Safeway to replace the po-
tential housing that could legally be
built on the residential site by rezoning
another property somewhere in the city
for residential use or greater density.
According to spokesperson Dan
Floyd, the company will attempt to
do this with a property in southeast
Portland. They have already submit-
ted a formal application for the project,
Floyd told The Post.
Assuming they can do so, they intend
to put in a “podium” store, architect
Wendell Mueller said, with parking at
grade and a store built over it. Once
parked, customers will proceed by
“various modes of transportation” to
the sales floor, which will be open on all
four sides, he said. The entrances will
be off Southwest Capitol Hill Road and
Multnomah Boulevard.
Chris Brehmer of Kittelson and As-
sociates said that the store will have an
11-foot-wide sidewalk on Multnomah
and a 12-foot-wide sidewalk on Capitol
Hill Road and Barbur Boulevard.
To accommodate left turns from
northbound traffic, he said the inter-
section will have a dedicated left turn
lane and a signal with a yellow left turn
arrow, allowing traffic to turn without
unduly impeding through traffic flow.
To accommodate pedestrians, there will
be an exclusive “walk” phase, he said.
Those present were not completely
reassured. “That crossing is really
dangerous,” Hillsdale activist Don
Baack said. “There’s a lot of traffic com-
ing at high speeds. There are a lot of
near-misses.” Others said that Capitol
Hill Road contains a blind curve that
obscures views of crossing traffic.
Asked about the traffic the new
store is expected to generate, Brehmer
said, “It will nearly double in size, so
we’re expecting a substantial increase.”
Asked about future development of
Barbur as a “transit corridor,” he said,
“We don’t have any parameters to de-
sign around.”