www . tHESkaNNER . COm
F EBRUaRy 23, 2011
SEattLE
V OLUmE XXXIII, N O . 18
25
CENtS
I nsIde
25th Infantry History
page 2
Democratic Revolt
page 4
Labour Unions Fight
C hallenging P eoPle to S haPe a B etter F uture n ow
page 5
BroaDBanD
Surprising
Prison
Report
AP finds statewide
prison population is
Whiter, more violent
By nicholas K. Geranios
The Associated Press
President Obama visited the Portland Intel factory last week to promote education, job growth and increased access
to high speed internet as a means to expand the United States economy.
Region Looks to Expand Broadband
Why everyone must have access to high-speed Internet
By Helen silvis
of The Skanner News
I
n his State of the Union
speech, President Obama
stressed the importance of
high-speed Internet access for
all,
pointing
out
that
America’s top engineers give
our current broadband infra-
structure a miserable D grade.
To compete internationally,
Obama said, we need to have
both a strong national network
and a technologically trained
workforce.
“Within the next five years,
we’ll make it possible for
businesses to deploy the next
generation of high-speed wire-
less coverage to 98 percent of
all Americans,” he promised.
“This isn’t just about faster
Internet or fewer dropped
calls. It’s about connecting
every part of America to the
digital age. It’s about a rural
community in Iowa or
Alabama where farmers and
small business owners will be
able to sell their products all
over the world. It’s about a
firefighter who can download
the design of a burning build-
ing onto a handheld device; a
student who can take classes
with a digital textbook; or a
patient who can have face-to-
face video chats with her doc-
tor.”
Being wired for speedy
Internet access is crucial for
the U.S. national economy and
for our state and local econo-
my.
But
100
million
Americans still don’t have
access to broadband connec-
tions at home.
So last year, the FCC laid
out a national broadband strat-
egy that includes major invest-
ments in broadband and urges
government at all levels to
push for robust competition.
portland’s newest effort
That’s why the City of
Portland launched a new
Broadband Strategic Planning
effort Jan. 28, which seeks to
deliver affordable high-speed
Internet to every home and
spoKAne, Wash. (AP) — Washington
state’s prison population has become Whiter
and older in the past decade, and more of
them are violent offenders, an Associated
Press review of Department of Corrections
records has found.
And while running the prison system eats
up 5 percent of the state budget, there
appear to be few places that funding can be
cut without resorting to releasing inmates
early, as some states have done.
“The main way to save money is to close
a facility and lay off staff,” said Tom
McBride, a spokesman for the Association
of Prosecuting Attorneys, whose members
are concerned the state is running out of
prison beds. “When you look at our prison
population, it’s hard to find anybody who
doesn’t deserve to be there.”
Indeed, reforms started in the 1980s have
dramatically changed the prison system’s
population. While Washington has a rela-
tively small prison population — about
17,000 for a state of 6.6 million people —
the percentage of inmates serving time for
violent crimes is greater than the national
average.
The idea of releasing some inmates early
to help reduce the projected $4.6 billion
deficit in the next two year state budget is
being discussed in Olympia, officials say,
although no bill has been introduced.
“We have taken no position on that,” said
John Lane, of Gov. Chris Gregoire’s policy
office.
At a legislative hearing on Wednesday,
Steve Aos of the Washington State Institute
for Public Policy estimated that cutting 60
days off the sentence of low and moderate
risk offenders could save the state $4.6 mil-
lion a year, with just a 15 percent probabili-
ty that crime would rise as a result.
The Corrections Department cannot
release inmates early without authorization
see Internet on page 3
see report on page 3
Index
News .....................2,3,8
Calendar ....................2
Opinion ....................4,5
Bids/Classifieds.........6-7
Start-Up Looks to Compete with Big Shots
Nyxio Technologies stakes claim on smart TVs, tablet computers
By Lisa Loving
of The Skanner News
W
ith big-screen smart TVs, hand-
sized tablet PCs — and space-age
video eyewear straight out of Star
Trek, for watching movies, playing games
or reading e-books — the Nyxio
Technologies showroom in the Lloyd
Center District looks like the annual Las
Vegas Consumer Electronics Show.
Here you can test the company’s flagship
product, the big-screen VioSphere, which
combines an HDTV with a personal com-
puter and Windows Media Center Edition
technology –meaning you can surf the web,
play DVDs, stream music and Skype your
mom in Chicago. And then you just might
decide to watch your favorite TV show.
Engineer Giorgio Johnson, founder and
CEO of Nyxio, is a native Portlander whose
education and work experience has translat-
ed into the perfect mix of design, develop-
ment and production of forward-thinking
media hardware.
“This is a Portland company, it’s an
Oregon company,” he says. “What we do
here could put us on the map in regards to
see nyxIo on page 3