DECEMBER 21, 2016
Seasons Greetings from all of us at
25
CENTS
Portland and Seattle Volume XXXIX No. 12
News ...............................3,9,10 A & E .....................................6-7
Opinion ...................................2 Kwanzaa Events ..............7
Calendars ........................... 4-5 Bids/Classifi eds ....................11
CHALLENGING PEOPLE TO SHAPE A BETTER FUTURE NOW
VANPORT'S FLOOD
Civil rights lawyer to
speak on MLK’s vision,
predictions
By Christen McCurdy
For The Skanner News
O
akland-based
civil rights
attorney
H o w a r d
Moore, whose cli-
ents have included
Angela Davis and
Julian Bond will
speak at The Skan-
ner Foundation’s
Howard Moore
31st annual Martin
Luther King, Jr. Breakfast Jan. 16.
He told The SkanneR he intends to talk
about the aspects of life Martin Luther
AP PHOTO/CARLOS OSORIO
See MOORE on page 3
Flint, Mich., Mayor Karen Weaver listens as
Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette addresses
a news conference, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2016 in
Flint, Mich., where he charged two former State
of Michigan Emergency Managers with multiple
20-year felonies for their failure to protect the
citizens of Flint from health hazards caused by
contaminated drinking water.
Charges
Filed in Flint
page 10
New Movies Opening for
This Holiday Weekend
page 6
Folksinger Woody Guthrie, the one-time Northwest resident known for writing “This Land is Your Land” and other classic American folk songs, wrote a
never-recorded, recently-unearthed song chronicling the Vanport fl ood.
Lost Song Tells Story of ‘Vanport’s Flood’
Woody Guthrie's song was published in 1963, but forgotten until recently
By Thacher Schmid
For The Skanner News
I
n
1948,
America’s
greatest folk musi-
cian, Woody Guthrie –
known for “This Land Is
Your Land” and numerous
other songs about Amer-
ican life and the plight of
working people — penned
a piercing ballad about Or-
egon’s worst disaster, Van-
port.
“Vanport’s Flood,” he
called it.
The song is the only
known Guthrie song about
the Pacifi c Northwest out-
side of the “Roll On” Colum-
bia River songs he wrote
for the Bonneville Power
Administration
(BPA),
Guthrie experts say. It also
may be one of his last im-
portant creative eff orts be-
fore Huntington’s Disease
took its toll on his ability to
write and play music.
Vanport historians say
its lyrics touch on import-
ant,
still-controversial
truths about the Vanport
tragedy.
The song was lost to his-
tory aft er its publication
in a long out-of-print 1963
songbook, even as Van-
port and Guthrie have re-
mained noteworthy.
Portland Mayor Charlie
Hales declared May 30,
2016 a “Vanport Day of
Remembrance,” and there
will be a second in 2017.
There’s been an article in
the Smithsonian Magazine,
The Skanner Foundation's
documentary series called
the “Wake of Vanport” and
events by Vanport Mosa-
ic. Zita Podany authored a
book of photos, and Port-
land Community College
professor James Harrison
is working on a history.
The sheet music was pub-
lished in “The Nearly Com-
plete Collection of Woody
Guthrie Folk Songs,” by
Ludlow Music, copyright-
ed 1963. The Woody Guth-
rie Center shared sheet
music aft er a reporter in-
vestigated a throwaway
reference in a 1969 Orego-
nian story.
“I had never known that
this had ever been pub-
lished in any form,” Seattle
musician and former BMI
Foundation / Guthrie ar-
chives fellow Joe Seamons
said. Seamons shared a
copy of Guthrie’s original
typewritten lyrics, but
didn’t know of the pub-
lished sheet music.
Evocative lyrics stun
survivors
Sitting in a Northeast
Portland cafe and staring
at the sheet music, Vanport
survivor and community
liaison for diversity ini-
tiatives at Portland State
See SONG on page 3
Council Votes for Inclusionary Housing Ordinances
Program would dedicate a percentage of housing to renters making less
than median income
By The Skanner News Staff
T
he Portland City Council passed
two ordinances Wednesday
morning creating a program
that would require developers
to include less expensive housing in
multi-family buildings of 20 units or
more.
Last week the council approved a
series of amendments to the ordi-
nance, clearing the way for a coun-
cil vote this week, though a hearing
on the ordinance scheduled for last
Thursday was cancelled due to in-
clement weather.
“This may need to be tuned. It may
not work perfectly in the market-
place, but the council has the op-
portunity to do that tuning as they
have in the past,” Mayor Hales said at
Wednesday’s meeting.
The ordinances, which would be-
See HOUSING on page 3
PHOTO COURTESY OF DAN SALTZMAN
Moore
to Speak
at MLK
Breakfast
AL AUMULLER/NEW YORK WORLD-TELEGRAM AND THE SUN/PUBLIC DOMAIN
Martin Luther King, Jr. Breakfast 2016
The Portland City Council voted Wednesday
to approve an inclusionary housing program,
spearheaded by housing commissioner Dan
Saltzman, that requires a percentage of new
units to be aff ordable to renters with below-
median incomes.