A11
B USINESS
THE BULLETIN • WEDNESDAY, JUNE 9, 2021
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34,599.82 -30.42
BRIEFING
Washington offers
‘joints for jabs’
Licensed marijuana
stores in Washington
state can offer free joints
to promote on-site
COVID-19 vaccine clinics,
officials said Monday.
The state Liquor and
Cannabis Board is calling
the effort the “Joints for
Jabs” program. The board
says licensed adult-use
marijuana retail shops
can give away a single
pre-rolled joint to anyone
over 21 who gets a shot
at an on-site vaccine clinic
held by July 12.
The board has already
allowed breweries, win-
eries and restaurants
to offer free drinks in
exchange for proof of
vaccination — though
alcohol-serving estab-
lishments have not had
to host a clinic on-site to
give out product.
The board said the
marijuana stores must
buy any joints they in-
tend to give away from
licensed producers or
processors and they must
keep records of any prod-
uct given away.
Websites go down
after outage
Dozens of websites
went down briefly around
the globe Tuesday, in-
cluding CNN, The New
York Times and Britain’s
government home page,
after an outage at the
cloud computing service
Fastly, illustrating how
vital a small number of
behind-the-scenes com-
panies have become to
running the internet.
San Francisco-based
Fastly acknowledged
a problem just before
6 a.m. Eastern. About an
hour later, the company
said: “The issue has been
identified and a fix has
been applied.” Most of the
sites soon appeared to be
back online.
The company said in
an emailed statement
that it was a “technical is-
sue” and “not related to a
cyber attack.”
Fastly is a content-de-
livery network. It provides
vital but behind-the-
scenes cloud computing
“edge servers” to many of
the web’s popular sites.
These servers store, or
“cache,” content such
as images and video in
places around the world
so that it is closer to us-
ers, allowing them to
fetch it more quickly and
smoothly.
Job openings up to
record 9.3 million
U.S. employers posted
a record 9.3 million job
openings in April with the
U.S. economy reopening
at break-neck speed.
The number of job
openings soared 12%
from the 8.3 million
counted in March.
But employers hired
just 6.1 million, up 1%
from March, according to
a Labor Department re-
port Tuesday, suggesting
that positions are open-
ing faster than companies
can fill them.
“More than a year af-
ter horrific job losses and
wage cuts, job seekers
have a strong hand in
the labor market again.
Demand for workers is
surging as the broader
economy starts to
emerge from the pan-
demic,” said Nick Bunker,
director of the Hiring
Lab. “At the same time,
supply is restrained as
workers are slow to find
their post-pandemic nor-
mal. The result is a labor
market that has snapped
back quicker than many
expected.”
— Bulletin wire reports
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COVID-19 | Oregon regulations
Four businesses fined for ‘willful’ violations
The Associated Press
PORTLAND — The state
of Oregon has fined four
more businesses a combined
$44,600 for what the state con-
siders “willful” violations of
regulations meant to protect
workers from COVID-19.
The Oregon Occupational
Safety and Health administra-
tion has issued 159 citations
to employers for violating
COVID-19 safety require-
ments since the pandemic be-
gan, The Oregonian reported.
Cork Cellars Wine and Bis-
tro in Sisters was fined $17,800
for willfully allowing indoor
dining at a time when it was
banned. The restaurant has
appealed the fine. Owners
Tom and Jeannie Buck told the
newspaper they look forward
to their day in court.
Officials hope to have about
600 units by end of 2022
SCOTT GREENSTONE
The Seattle Times
I
n an 8,000-square-foot Seattle warehouse,
about a dozen volunteers plan to work six
days a week to build at least 10 shed-sized
homes a month for homeless people.
Sound Foundations NW and other build-
ers are producing 100 tiny houses, expected
to hold up to 130 people, this summer. The
houses will sit on two sites in North Seattle
and potentially double the size of another vil-
lage.
Seattle included these villages as part of
its record $167 million 2021 homelessness
budget. The materials for each house nor-
mally cost around $2,500, although they’re
$4,500 right now because of a national lum-
ber shortage, according to Josh Castle, advo-
cacy and community engagement director for
the Low-Income Housing Institute, the city’s
main contractor for village operations. It costs
an average of $600,000 a year to run each vil-
lage, with case management and food, Castle
said.
The city is capitalizing on an infusion of
federal money to relieve the growing frustra-
tion among community members and busi-
ness owners around visible homelessness.
While shelters that hold many people to-
gether in one space were considered the most
cost-effective option, data from nonprofit
outreach providers has found that people liv-
ing outdoors would usually rather go to a tiny
house than an emergency shelter.
The villages being assembled this summer
are just the beginning of a broader shelter
push. There are 298 houses in eight villages
across the city. Barb Oliver, director of oper-
ations and volunteer coordinator at Sound
Foundations NW, and other boosters hope to
double that number by the end of 2022, using
philanthropy and state and federal funding
from the American Rescue Plan Act.
Said city Councilor Andrew Lewis, “I’d like
to do more than that, but that’s as fast as the
overstretched [Human Services Department]
team can do.” Lewis, runs the council’s com-
mittee on homelessness and launched a cam-
paign earlier this year to get businesses to do-
nate startup costs for villages. He dubbed the
campaign “It Takes a Village.”
Seattle is leaning more on the tiny house vil-
lage model than perhaps any other city, though
Los Angeles County hopes by the end of the
year to have 425 portable, prefabricated com-
posite plastic pods, which are made in Everett,
Washington, that can be set up in minutes.
Last Stop Saloon in The
Dalles was issued an $8,900
fine for willfully allowing
indoor dining when it was
banned. The bar didn’t imme-
diately respond to a request for
comment but has appealed.
Country Bakery in Halsey
was issued an $8,900 penalty
for failing to ensure that face
coverings were worn and not
posting a “COVID-19 Hazards
Poster.” Country Bakery has
not yet appealed and declined
to comment.
Portland’s Creative Wood-
working Northwest Inc. was
issued an $8,900 fine for will-
fully failing to ensure that face
coverings were worn, accord-
ing to the state. It has hired a
lawyer and appealed the fine.
Hope Redmond, executive
administrator for Creative
Woodworking Northwest, said
some employees cited health
concerns related to masks and
the business opted to respect
those concerns.
Oregon OSHA said Monday
that it will lift face covering
and distancing rules for busi-
nesses and other institutions
when 70% of Oregon adults
are at least partially vacci-
nated.
Seattle is
building tiny
house villages
for homeless
A portrait of Barb Oliver, director
of operations with Sound Founda-
tions NW, is taken in one of their
tiny homes in Seattle Thursday.
Erika Schultz/The Seattle Times
Oregon requires COVID-19
vaccines for farmed mink
BY GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
SALEM — Oregon’s cam-
paign to vaccinate the public
against COVID-19 is extend-
ing to the animal kingdom.
The state Department of
Agriculture has filed an emer-
gency temporary rule requir-
ing coronavirus vaccines for as
many as 212,700 farmed mink
to reduce the risk of new in-
fections, virus mutations and
possible animal-to-human
transmission, the agency an-
nounced recently.
Mink farmers have until
Aug. 31 to vaccinate their cur-
rent animals. Any mink born
or imported after that date
must be vaccinated within 120
days of birth, or within 60 days
of being brought into Oregon.
Farms must also agree to
participate in additional sur-
veillance testing per ODA and
U.S. Department of Agricul-
ture guidelines.
“ODA is taking the nec-
essary precautions to reduce
the risk of infection in captive
mink, as well as reduce the risk
of potential mutation of the vi-
rus and the potential for virus
transmission back to humans,”
said Ryan Scholz, state veteri-
narian for ODA. “It is critical
that owner-operators vaccinate
their mink against the virus.”
The rule comes after one
mink farm in Oregon was
placed under quarantine for
more than two months be-
tween late November and early
February after multiple ani-
mals tested positive for the vi-
rus. Scholz said the mink had
likely contracted the virus from
workers at the farm.
ODA did not identify the
farm for security reasons. The
positive tests prompted concern
about the possibility of a “viral
reservoir” among captive mink
spilling into the wild and infect-
ing related species like river ot-
ters, fishers and martens.
After two consecutive
rounds of follow-up testing
at the farm revealed no new
cases, the quarantine was lifted
on Feb. 11.
Michael Whelan, executive
director of Fur Commission
USA, said mink farmers were
already working toward vac-
cinating their animals even
before the Oregon rule was an-
nounced.
“Oregon was quicker to
make an emergency rule be-
cause of the outbreak, but all
mink in the country will be
vaccinated before the end of
July,” Whelan said.
Lake Oswego biotech
executive sentenced
for insider trading
BY MIKE ROGOWAY
The Oregonian
Former Oregon biotech
executive Mark Ahn faces six
months in prison and an addi-
tional six months of home de-
tention after pleading guilty to
two counts of securities fraud.
In 2017, Ahn had been
working as a biotech consul-
tant for a company in New
York, advising it in its efforts
to buy a Massachusetts firm
called Dimension Thera-
peutics. Prosecutors say Ahn
learned that Dimension
would be acquired by a dif-
ferent company and bought
Dimension stock based on in-
sider information.
When Dimension an-
nounced its sale, its stock
jumped 262% in one day.
Ahn, 58, continues to live
in Lake Oswego. He pleaded
guilty in March to two charges
connected to the stock pur-
chase.
In addition to Ahn’s prison
sentence, U.S. District Court
Judge Richard Stearns on
Monday ordered Ahn to for-
feit $49,421 — the approxi-
mate value of his profits from
the stock — pay a $5,500 fine
and make additional restitu-
tion to be determined later.
He also faces two years of su-
pervised release.
Under a separate deal with
federal securities regulators
reached in April, Ahn is pro-
hibited from serving as a
board member or executive
with publicly traded compa-
nies. Ahn was previously CEO
of Galena Biopharma, a Lake
Oswego company.