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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (March 7, 2007)
37 years 50j¿ Spring Forward! of ~com munity service íSnrtíanh (Observer P ’ ‘City of Roses ‘P it\z n t Clocks move ahead one hour for daylight savings time Sunday at 2 a.m. Established i o in 7 n 1970 acpc Obama Makes Selma March M o re th a n a th o u s a n d people, includ ing presidential c a n d id a te s Barack O bam a and H illa ry C lin to n g a th ered in Selma, Ala. Sunday to com m em orate the 1965 “ Bloody S un day” voting rights march. Partici pants retraced the steps to the bridge where marchers were beaten back by state troopers. See sto ry , pageA 2 White House Aide Guilty The form er chief o f staff to Vice P re s id e n t D ick C h e n e y L e w is “Scooter” Libby w a s c o n v ic te d T uesday o f o b struction, perjury and lying to the FBI in an investigation into the leak o f C IA operative V alerie Plam e’sidentity to reporters. Libby faces up to 30 years in prison. See sto ry , page A2. Arrest in Teen Murder A 16-year-old w as arrested M on day for the January m urder o f an other teenager w ho died after be ing shot in the head on North K illingsw orth Street. See sto ry , p age A 2. » i „ „ www.portlandobserver.com Committed to Cultural Diversity Volume XXXVII. Number 10 .Week ¡n The Review ......... Wednesday • March 7. 2007 A Record Retailer’s Last Stand Music Millennium adapts to downloading S arah B lount T he P ortland O bserver by W hen M usic M illennium ow ner Terry C urrier received a cal 1 from a friend and co m petitor w ho had ju st lost his lease at his southeast Portland record shop, he did not take the new s as one m ight expect. “ Y ou'd think I’d be happy when com peti tors go aw ay, but it’s a very sad situation,” he said. T h a t’s because For W hat It’s W orth Records and Tapes, w hich at one tim e had several Portland stores, iso n e o f many retail ers to disappear after a fatal drop in business. Portland has alw ays been a bastion for independent-m inded music fans, but a shift in technology has led people out o f the stores and onto their hom e com puters, w here they can dow nload entire album s illegally or legitim ately purchase songs from online music stores like iTunes. It’s been a dism al decade for m usic retail ers, causing national chain T ow er Records to shut dow n com pletely late last year, as well as another local shop Reverb Records. Music M illennium has been able to stay photo by S ean O ’C onnor /T he P ortland O bserver Music Millennium owner Terry Currier adapts to changing tastes and the loss of sales because of music downloading. afloat, but C urrier said they’ve lost money three out o f the past six years, and have only turned a minimal profit during the other three. It’s the oldest music store in the Pacific N orthw est, opened in 1969 at its current Fast Burnside location originally as a place to find underground music. A sec ond store was soon added, now on N orth west 23rd A venue, plus a w ebsite and a classical music store. Currier, w ho took over the business in 1984 and describes him self as a passionate music freak, acknow ledges that a “sm arter business m an" w ould have called it quits by now. “Everything I’ve w orked for is in this building," he said. "M y philosophy is that I ju st want to be a recording music store. But after losing m oney for two years I had to find another w ay.” M usic M illennium and its fellow small retailers suffered their first blow around a continued on page A6 Suspect Sketch Released D e te c tiv e s re- leased a sketch o f a suspect in the * murder of23-year- o ld J e rm a in e N y ro n D a v is . D av is w as sh o t dow ntow n around 2 a.m. after par tying on New Y ear’s Eve near Southw est Fourth and Stark. See sto ry , page A2. Ci Belmont Store Clerk Shot Police are looking for a suspect w ho shot a store clerk Sunday afternoon after a failed robbery attem pt. The attack took place at the Belm ont G rocery in southeast Portland. See sto ry , page A2. NAACP President Resigns B ruceS . G ordon resig n ed his p o sitio n as p re s i d e n t o f th e NAACP Sun day, c itin g c la s h e s w ith b o ard m em bers o v er m a n ag e m ent style and the civil rig h ts o rg a n iz a tio n ’s m ission. Shaq Shoots for Reality TV S h aq u ille O ’N eal is ready to re turn to the screen to star in a six- ep iso d e reality series for A B C in w hich he w ill help a bunch o f o v erw eig h t e lem en tary and ju n io r high school stu d en ts shed p o u n d s w hile ed u c atin g the kids an d T V view ers about the perils o f c h ild h o o d obesity. photo by R aymond R endi eman /T iif . P ortland O bserver A Fred Meyer billboard hangs over Paulo Escobar and Juan Escultor as they wait for day labor on Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. The demographic makeup of the neighborhood was used as criteria for the advertising, according to a company spokesperson. Advertising ‘ Blackand White Using race to sell products by R aymond R endi . eman T he P ortland O bserver W ho w ould have thought that a local baby-food com pany and a superm arket chain's billboard cam paign em erging in the sam e month could start a m eaningful discus sion about race? O nly in Portland, as they say. A Fred M eyer billboard featur ing a black boy eating an orange ap p e ared on N o rth ea st M artin Luther King Jr. Boulevard next to a pickup site for immigrant day labor ers, w hile sim ilar billboards adver tising the superm arket's fruit fea tured white people in other areas. At the same tim e, Nice Cubes frozen organic baby food debuted in local New Seasons stores with five flavors, each with its own baby m odel. The sole non-white model is a black girl representing "Sassy S quash,” as other models repre sent "Gentle Lentils" and "Perfect Pear" flavors. D o th e s e e x a m p le s re v e a l Portland’s latent and injurious rac ism ? O r arc these com panies just p ro m o tin g b e n ig n fa ilu re s in m ulticulturalism ? Some maintain that such cam paigns sim ply mirror our diverse society, but no one says an ad is ju st an ad. Fred M eyer Regional Public A f fairs D irector M elinda Merrill ar gues that the com pany's unwritten billboard-placement policy follows long-accepted standards based on dem ographics. "W e've tried to make the diver sity in our advertising reflect our client base." Merrill says. "We place our ads in the vehicles through which we can reach the largest num ber of our custom ers for the least amount o f money." T he retail giant points to its com m itm ent to the advancem ent of African American and other m inor ity populations by the charitable donations received from its em ployees and change boxes at cash registers Fred M eyer can cite 63 organizations in northeast Portland alone that it has given $ I (M)to$2,5( Ml t t in the past three years. But som e com m unity mem bers see a lack o f responsibility in Fred M eyer's ads. Hannah Bea's head ch ef Saan Patterson says, "I think it's messed up. It's not that much about caring about the com m unity because there are definitely things they could put on the billboards that would help the com m unity rather than just sell ing their products." Standing under the billboard in question, recent im m igrants point out an even more insidious p o ssi bility. "There's a lot of ads that make it seem like everyone has a go<xl life here, but here we are, no w ork," says Paulo Escobar. Can the same ad reflects diver sity, eschew resp o n sib ility and m isrepresent A m erican society? Part o f the trouble with any critique o f advertising is that everyone has a different point o f view. A nother recent im m igrant by the name o f Zach Asfaw drivesa Broad way C ab for a living. "I've seen so many ads taking advantage o f black people, but what really bothers me are the w om en that are practically naked," he says. A dvertising w atchdog org an i zations tend to ignore com plaints of racial stereotypes because other abuses are more clear-cut. M am ie G lickm an o f Portland- continued on page A 6