Good morning, Portland. Here are some links to get your day started.
We broke the news last week that the killer of a 19-year-old black man in Gresham had at least some connections to a white supremacist gang. Yesterday, online and in the print issue, we exposed the prison discipline record of Russell Courtier,, who killed Larnell Bruce, detailing his 12+ year involvement to that group, European Kindred.
Also in print yesterday was Dirk Vanderhart's important story about homeless shelters and zoning codes:
The Portland Bureau of Planning and Sustainability (BPS), at the behest of city council, is pitching a series of zoning tweaks designed to make it easier to create shelters in Portland. Many of the changes—laid out in a technical 66-page draft document—are small edits to the city’s zoning code. But the proposal also would double the number of shelter beds allowed “by right” in more than a dozen zoning categories, meaning expensive, time-consuming land-use reviews won’t always be required in order to establish larger shelters. And crucially, the changes would toss decades-old restrictions dictating that shelters must be 1,300 feet away from one another. The new provisions would shrink that separation requirement to 600 feet, about two or three blocks, according to Phil Nameny, a planner at BPS.
Some more homelessness/zoning news yesterday: "Right 2 Dream Too will push to change the zoning code that's blocking its move."
The big homelessness news of the day, however, is the city's sweep of campers in Portland's Springwater Corridor. Here's the Oregonian's reporting on that.
Some assholes used bolt cutters to break into storage sheds at the Woodstock Farmers Market on Sunday, stealing thousands of dollars of stuff, like heavy handcarts and canopies for farm stands.
In the Portland Tribune, government lobbyists aren't a fan of more transparent public records laws. Better public records laws in Oregon would be a good thing.
Also in the Tribune, is this highly entertaining story about the city's noise control officer trying to prove that the Barrel Room—the Old Town dueling piano bar/nightclub—is violating noise laws so the city can fine them $5,000. The officer is staked out on the roof of nearby Society Hotel:
It takes van Orden nearly an hour on the rooftop before he’s able to find the right placement for his tripod and zero in on the 63 hertz (Hz) reading that represents the bass frequency level from the outdoor loudspeakers at the Barrel Room.
Even up on the fifth floor, the Barrel Room’s noise is clearly dominating the street. The nightclub’s outdoor crowd is shouting along to the music, “I’m going to rock and roll all night, and party every day.”
That doesn’t matter, van Orden says. The only sound he’ll be able to prove in court that came from the Barrel Room is the bass, he says. And right now the red line on his meter that represents the bass is up to 77 decibels, and the line jumps every time the Barrel Room’s bass hits a note.
PSA: You probably won't be able to get away with saying you climbed Mount Everest if you, you know, didn't actually climb Mount Everest. In the New York Times:
KATHMANDU, Nepal — Mountaineers were dubious in June, when Dinesh and Tarakeshwari Rathod announced that they had achieved a lifelong goal, becoming the first Indian couple to climb to the summit of Mount Everest.
Those doubts were confirmed this week when the Nepalese authorities said that the Rathods, both police officers in the Indian state of Maharashtra, had doctored photographs submitted to the government in applying for a certificate of a successful climb. The couple were barred from climbing Nepal’s mountains for 10 years.
Reddit, which can be solid and informative website, is overrun with terrible people. Gizmodo has a breakdown of the ten most hated reddit posts of all time. Most of the "hated" posts are pleas for common decency.