WWW . THESkANNEr . COM
S EPTEMBEr 7, 2011
P OrTLAND , O rEgON
V OLuME XXXIII, N O . 45
25
CENTS
I NSIDE
Community News
page 2
Infant Mortality
page 5
Black Power Mixtape
C hallenging P eoPle to S haPe a B etter F uture n ow
Weekend
Shooting
Injures 6
page 7
BumBershoot
Advocates agree
youth need more
services, resources
By helen Silvis
of The Skanner News
photo BY SuSaN FrIED
S
ix teens were shot and wounded on the
porch of a house near the intersection
of N. Albina and N. Jessup late Friday,
and the victims were treated for non-life
threatening injuries.
Police called the mass shooting, with the
largest number of victims this year, “noth-
ing short of an ambush.”
“It’s pretty amazing that nobody was
killed,” said Portland Police spokesman Sgt.
Pete Simpson.
Investigators are seeking two shooters,
both reported to be young Black men, who
fled the scene on foot. The shots were fired
at around 11:20 p.m.
The injured teens are: 13-year-old Earnest
Henderson,
16-year-old
Deontray
Henderson, 17-year-old Damarcus Stuart,
16-year-old Deshawn Crawford, 16-year-
old Deaundre Willis and 16-year-old
Howard Williams.
The boys had recently left where they had
been at the first football game of the season.
Deontray, better known as B.J.
Henderson, a junior, is a starting defensive
end, and linebacker on ’s varsity football
team. He was released from the hospital
Tuesday, but won’t be playing football for
some time, since he was shot in the leg and
foot.
Another shooting victim, D’Aundre
Willis, told The Skanner he was doing well.
“They released me out the hospital Saturday
afternoon with a lot of meds,” he said. “I
have off and on pains, but recovering fast.”
Investigators and outreach workers
believe the shooting is gang-related, part of
an increase in youth violence during the last
two years.
Yet the victims were not involved with
gangs. That’s according to Clayborn
Collins, Ph.D., CEO of Emanuel Temple
Community Services, who leads one of sev-
eral community-driven efforts aimed at pre-
Music Legend Mavis Staples and her band joined hundreds of other musicians, performers, dancers, comedians
and artists over the Labor Day weekend at Bumbershoot, North America’s largest urban arts festival. The beautiful
weather drew thousands of people to the Seattle Center to hear music and see performances by national and local
artists.
Back-to-School Shoppers, Higher Prices
Retailers say rising cotton prices are largely to blame for cost hikes
By chris Levister
Special to the NNpa from
the Blackvoicenews.com
S
chool aged kids have
made their post Labor Day
return to the classroom
and the tell-tale signs of rising
cotton prices and a sluggish
economy are everywhere.
“The prices are sky high, and
the quality stinks,” says Lisbeth
Rose-Scott, a mother of three
school children.
Tis’ the season of the back-to-
school sale, second most impor-
See ShootINg on page 3
INDEX
News .....................2,3,
Opinion ..................4,5
Food..........................6
A & E .........................7
Bids/Classifieds .......6,7
tant time on the retailer’s calen-
dar after Christmas. Early indi-
cations are consumers aren’t
buying this year’s bevy of high-
er priced merchandise from
jeans to pencils.
With costs for consumer
goods and services from apparel
to food and gas on the rise par-
ents like Rose-Scott are back-
to-school shopping at thrift
stores and dusting off hand-me-
downs. “I buy nice clothes for
the kids at the beginning of the
school year and halfway
through they’re already worn
out. Even their corduroy’s have
holes in the knees. I can’t afford
to keep throwing money down
the drain.”
Retail experts say manufactur-
ers are “quietly” making clothes
that are thinner and made with
cheaper quality.
Parents know this season bet-
ter than anyone. Back to school
shopping occurs from July
through Labor Day, around the
start of fall semester. Adver -
tising for this heavy shopping
time started earlier, with some
stores cranking out ads in mid-
June, when some schools were
still in session for the spring
semester.
In August 2010, prime school
shopping season, consumers
spent a combined $7.4 billion at
family clothing stores, accord-
ing to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Apparel, the season’s top-sell-
ing category for school-aged
children, is bracing for cotton
cost inflation of as much as 20
percent, the first in at least a
decade. The recent weeks’ price
declines in the commodity don’t
See prIcES on page 3
Johnell Bell: New Trimet Equity Chief
Advisory boards, attention to minority contracting on agenda
By Lisa Loving
of The Skanner News
T
riMet’s new Director of Equity and
Diversity Johnell Bell has worked his
way up from the grassroots: as a
Benson High School student he served on
the Portland Public Schools Board; from
there he became a coordinator of
Multnomah County’s federally-subsidized
summer food program; then a policy intern
for former Gov. Ted Kulongoski; next, a
community engagement project manager
for former Mayor Tom Potter; a community
liaison for Multnomah County Chair Ted
Wheeler’s office; a policy analyst for the
Multnomah County Health Department
Health Equity Initiative; and most recently,
a field representative for U.S. Sen. Jeff
Merkley. Now at TriMet, Bell takes the
reins from former equity chief Bruce Watts.
Bell is a member of the Black Executives
Network and the Urban League of Portland.
Along with Charles McGee Jr., he co-
founded the Black Parent Initiative. Here
Bell talks about his vision for a transporta-
tion equity advisory group at TriMet, as
well as hot-button issues including public
See trImEt on page 3