Hip-Hop Radio Show Debuts
500
General Election Nov. 4
Last Day to Register:
Oct. 14
www.oregonvotes.org
1-866-ORE- VOTES
Cool Nutz teams up to bring
hot Northwest artists to
Portlands airwaves
y è û iï S o/
•'com m unity service
See story, page A9
‘City of Roses’
Established in 1970
.Week in
The Review
© bsettier
www.portlandobserver.com
Committed to Cultural Diversity
Volume XXXVIII. Number 37
VOTE
Wednesday • September 17. 2008
FOOTPRINT JITTERS
Grim scenes greeted rescuers as
they penetrated the areas hard­
est-hit by Hurricane Ike, tw oday s
after it thrashed the Texas G ulf
C oast over the w eekend and left
thousands homeless. See sto ry ,
page A2
82nd Avenue Prostitution
People who live near N ortheast
82nd Avenue packed a public
meeting M onday to say they're
fed up with the prostitution in
th eir neighborhood and they
shared ideas with the city on
how to com bat the problem.
photo
Economy Fixes Eyed
Barack O bam a took dead aim at
John M cCain's econom ic phi­
losophy Tuesday, charging that
the Republican presidential can­
didate would extend Bush ad­
ministration policies that helped
fosterW allStreet'sturm oil, while
M cC ain proposed creating a
blue-ribbon com mission to study
the nation's deepening financial
crisis. See sto ry , page A2
Oregon Jobless Jumps
O re g o n ’s unem ploym ent rate
ju m p e d to 6.5 p ercent in A u­
gust, up from 5.9 p ercent in
July. T he state E m ploym ent
D epartm ent reported M onday
th at O regon lost 7,400 jo b s in
A u g u st.
Portland House Prices Fall
House prices in the Portland area
are starting to becom e a little
more affordable. The Regional
M ultiple Listing Service reports
that the m edian home price in
A ugust was $280,000 — a 7.3
percent decline from the more
than $300,000 m edian price in
A ugust 2007.
Oregon Gas Prices Fail
O regon has dodged the gas price
bullet from H urricane Ike, with a
slight drop in prices against a
nationw ide average increase of
about 20 cents a gallon.
in M ark W ashington /T he P ortland O bserver
Portland Community College wants to build more facilities on its Cascade campus in north Portland to serve a growing student population and demands
for workforce training. A desire for more greenways and parking could also push the campus further into the adjacent Humboldt neighborhood.
PCC Levy Hints at Expansion
Cascade would
get money for
land, parking
by M ichael L eighton
T he P ortland O bserver
More homes and businesses will likely
give way to an ever expanding Portland
C om m unity College cam pus in north
Portland no m atter what voters decide in
a proposed property tax levy for PCC
facilities in November.
Extending the reach o f the Cascade
cam pus in the H um boldt neighborhood
is the current, past and future history of
the school which took over a tiny private
college in the 1970s in a landlocked
urbanized residential and business dis­
trict.
A Portland O bserver investigation
has revealed how the college district has
continued to purchase neighborhood
properties on an annual basis since the
last big build-out, mostly for additional
parking, but also for speculation, leav­
ing som e businesses and residences
vacant or dem olished.
A bond levy in 2000 provided fi­
nances for PCC Cascade to almost double
its size, but the PCC district board has
spent an additional $3.89 million in prop­
erty acquisitions in Humboldt since 2002,
mostly along North Killingsworth Street
and som ew hat into residential neigh­
borhoods.
The new bond levy w ould provide
PCC additional funds for real estate in
the neighborhood and pay for the devel­
opm ent of more cam pus parking, possi­
bly a parking garage.
College officials argue that a growing
student population continues to cause
parking shortages on cam pus that spills
cars into the adjacent neighborhood.
But the district has not analyzed how
approximately 130,(XX)square feet of new
college parking lots in the past six years
has relieved those transportation woes.
The college district also w o n 't specu­
late on w here future buildings will be
sited, even though acollege impact miti­
gation plan approved by the city of
Portland makes the promise that the
existing surface parking lots would be
used for future cam pus buildings. The
lots were created by dem olishing mostly
low income housing.
PCC D istric t P re sid e n t P resto n
Pulliams said there "is no secret plan" on
where the college cam pus will expand
next. He said both the Cascade campus
and the PCC Southeast C enter are lo­
cated on sites that are landlocked by
continued
on page AS
Proposal to serve more students, train workforce
M ichael L eighton
T he P ortland O bserver
Portland C om m unity College hopes
to position itself for the future with a
proposed bond levy that will add new
facilities and m odernize cam pus pro­
grams.
The $375 million property tax m ea­
sure before voters in the Nov. 4 G eneral
Election would give PCC the facilities it
says it needs to serve an expected surge
in population over the next few years
and help meet the dem ands o f em ploy­
ers for more skilled workers.
“The key em phasis is work force.
by
A d o w n tu rn in th e
work force, work force,” said
economy
is also making com ­
P C C D is tric t P re sid e n t
m
u
n
ity
c
o lle g e s p o p u la r
Preston Pulliams. “W e need
choices
for
people looking
to grow to fill a larger pipe­
to
get
a
leg
up.
to retrain and
line o f skilled w orkers.”
seek
a
new
career,
Pulliams
T h e c o lle g e e x p e c ts
said.
th o se c h a lle n g e s to in ­
“O ur student population
crease because o f the esti­
is e x p lo d in g ," he sa id .
m ated 370,000 people pro­
“W e’re expecting a 12 per­
je c te d to m ove into the
cent increase in enrollm ent
greater Portland m etropoli­
this fall.
tan area, including W ash­
Preston Pulliams
Pulliam s said m any o f
ington, Yamhill and Colum ­
bia counties, the region served by PCC P C C 'seducational facilities are already
outdated with not enough laboratory
through the year 2020.
space to serve stu d en ts’ needs and
pointed to a lack o f m odem , up-to-date
technology in many classrooms.
He said some o f the most pressing
needs are in nursing, engineering and
diesel mechanics programs.
At the PCC Cascade cam pus in north
Portland, the bond levy w ould pay for a
new building to expand instruction for
careers in pre-kindergarten though high
school education, add classroom s, add
achild-care facility for students, increase
parking and add a sim ulation lab for first
continued
on page A5
Meals on
Los Angeles- Rail
Service Resumes
after Deadly Wreck
Rail service resum ed Tuesday
a lo n g th e tra c k s w h e re a
M etrolink train from Los A nge­
les co llid e d h ead-on w ith a
freight train and left 25 people
dead. Federal investigators were
continuing to look into whether
the engineer o f the com m uter
trai n was text messagi ng on a cel I
phone before Friday's deadly
wreck.
Alaska Cuts Local Service
A laska A irlines and Horizon Air
say they will reduce fights from
Portland International Airport as
a part o f larger cutbacks. H ori­
zon will trimdaily departures from
94 to68 while Alaska will reduce
departures from 35 a day to 29.
See story, page A2
A
Bicycle
Wheels
Deliveries to
Seniors go green
by L aura M eehan
T he P ortland O bserver
Kyle Lyles, 65, has reinvented the co n ­
cept o f m eals on wheels.
Three tim es a week, he loads a bicycle
trailer w ithcoolerscontaining up to 15 meals,
and brings them to local recipients o f the
Loaves & Fishes meal site at the Martin
Luther King Jr. Multicultural SeniorCentcr.
Lyles originally bought the trailer to trans-
continued
on page A11
photo by
M ark W ashington /T he P ortland O bserv er
Kyle Lyles loads his bicycle with meals for seniors and the disabled through the Loaves & Fishes meal site at the
Martin Luther King Jr. Multicultural Senior Center.