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About The skanner. (Portland, Or.) 1975-2014 | View Entire Issue (May 21, 2025)
MAY 21, 2025 Portland and Seattle Volume XLVIII No. 10 25 CENTS News ................................ 3,6-7 A & E ........................................5 Opinion ...................................2 Ballet the Black Way ......5 Briefs ......................................4 Bids/Classifieds .....................7 CHALLENGING PEOPLE TO SHAPE A BETTER FUTURE NOW A CONVERSATION Prosper Portland Fights For Continued City Funding Two city councilors suggest ending city’s funding to wide- reaching economic development agency. By Saundra Sorenson Of The Skanner News A s the city council met Wednes- day in a marathon session to ap- prove the city’s annual budget, the future of Prosper Portland appeared to hang in the balance. It is the first such budget process un- der the city’s new form of government, and the now 12-member council had more than 120 proposed amendments to consider before the midnight dead- line. One of the most contentious of those amendments was put forward by councilors Jamie Dunphy and Mitch Green: to defund what was formerly known as the Portland Development Commission, and which now serves as the city’s economic development and small business support branch. “We’re just in a very tight and frank- ly temporary budget deficit created by the mayor’s shelter plan,” Coun- cilor Mitch Green told The Skanner. “This is a one-time affair. Frankly, the mayor’s pitch was also supposed to be temporary. He sold it to council on the presumption that this is a surge strate- gy, we’re going to get folks shelter and See PROSPER on page 3 Trump Demands Probe of Celebs Who Backed Harris page 5 PHOTO BY COURTESY NABCJ Chabre Vickers, director of equity, policy and communications for Prosper Portland Actor & Author Hill Harper and Councilor Loretta Smith NABCJ President Sherman Lea, Jr., Health Department Director Charlene Addy McGee, Actor & Author Hill Harper, Councilor Loretta Smith, Senator James Manning, Jr., Word is Bond student representative, NY State Police Sr. Investigator Elliot Boyce, Drug Policy Reform Advocate Art Way, and Word is Bond student representative. Actor & Author Hill Harper, and National Law Enforcement Leaders Join Oregon Legislators for Community Townhall The Skanner News “G aslighting: Chal- lenging the Dis- connect Between Public Policy and the Reality in Communi- ty” was recently hosted in Portland by the National Association of Blacks in Criminal Justice (NABCJ), a group of Black law en- forcement executives and experts. “African Americans are often used in narratives stating what we like and don’t like, but they rare- ly come and talk to us. As we’re creating policies around tobacco, criminal justice reform, fentanyl, and homelessness, we need to be part of those conver- sations. Today is a conver- sation with us,” said Coun- cilor Loretta Smith. Panelists, led by moder- ator Actor & Author Hill Harper, spoke with dozens of community attendees. The panel included Sen- ator James Manning, Jr., Councilor Loretta Smith, NABCJ President Sherman Lea, Jr., NY State Police Sr. Investigator Elliot Boyce, Health Department Di- rector Charlene Addy Mc- Gee, Drug Policy Reform Advocate Art Way, along with student leaders from Word is Bond, a Portland nonprofit leadership incu- bator for young Black men. Drug Policy Reform Ad- vocate Art Way stated, “Youth at this event told us that online is the access point for these already il- licit products, and a ban will only make the online illicit space more preva- lent. Oregon must tightly regulate these products for adults while continuing to diminish the illegal online and elsewhere market.” The dangers and history of political gaslighting, a form of psychological ma- nipulation where policy- makers make their constit- uents doubt their reality, use misinformation, and deny the research and facts of what’s happening on the ground to push their legis- lative agendas, was a pri- mary point of the discus- sion. The panel discussed See TOWNHALL on page 3 Reparations Democrats reintroduced the idea of reparations with a resolution that oers trillions of federal dollars in reparations to Black Americans to repair the damage of the enslavement of Africans in America for 250 years By April Ryan “T he President doesn’t have a public position on the issue,” said a senior White House O cial, regarding the most recent debate on reparations or a reparations study. The question arises as Maryland’s latest contro- versy over reparations versus a rep- arations study continues. Governor Wes Moore has vetoed any bill that proposes studying reparations in the state. Maryland’s Legislative Black Caucus wants a two-year commis- sion to study reparations. Maryland State Senator Ron Watson supports Governor Moore, saying, “The ves- tiges of slavery are well known and See REPARATIONS on page 3
