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Matt Davis was news editor of the Mercury from 2009 to May 2010.
The good news started rolling in shortly before 3 pm. Exit polls from 10 key states showed that Democrats were leading the Senate races in eight—even in places like Ohio and Missouri—while Republicans were only pulling through in Tennessee and Arizona. The trend held all night. Thanks to the Republicans’ bungling of the Iraq War, […]
It happens every election cycle: Your mailbox gets stuffed to the gills with all manner of colorful, oddly sized postcards, all attempting to convince you to vote in a specific way. Add to that campaigns’ increasing use of the internet—email, websites, and, oddly, YouTube videos—and the tide of information becomes overwhelming. Face it, you simply […]
In spite of his reputation for process over action, for assembling committees rather than solving problems, Mayor Tom Potter may have scored a major victory this week: Advocates for Portland’s business and homeless communities have worked together to craft a revolutionary set of recommendations that would replace Portland’s current, controversial Sit-Lie Ordinance with a more […]
At last Friday’s memorial service for James Chasse Jr., attended by more than 400 people, Beckie Child of the Mental Health Association of Portland gave Chasse’s father a petition addressed to Mayor Tom Potter. The petition, signed by delegates of the Alternatives 2006 mental health care conference in Portland last week, asked that Potter commit […]
Instead of apologizing and forming another hand-wringing commission in the wake of James Chasse Jr.’s death on September 17, Mayor Tom Potter could take the lead in making Portland safer for folks like Chasse, who suffered from schizophrenia—by writing the cops a check made out to the training department. When the Mercury asked the mayor […]
The head of Portland’s police union accused the mayor of calling him and his rank-and-file officers racists, at a hearing on racial profiling Thursday, October 19. Portland Police Association (PPA) President Robert King didn’t participate in the mayor’s commissioned series of racial profiling sessions between May and July earlier this year. At the hearing, where […]
A grand juror serving in Portland between September 10 and October 11—at the same time the James Chasse Jr. in-police-custody death case was presented to the Multnomah County Grand Jury—has told the Mercury, “the process is biased.” “The official story from the district attorney is, ‘we want you to question things,’” says the grand juror, […]
There’s a too-oft rewound scene on my VHS copy of Helen Mirren’s 1989 performance in The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover that features a young Ms. M with her clothes off. But from now on, it will be rewound no more—because she’s far sexier as Britain’s 71-year-old monarch, and I’m still trying […]
There’s a nice “cheffiosi” feeling to driving around the Pearl District with a dismembered pig’s head stowed in your trunk. I was brimming with this mixture of culinary and criminal glee when I returned, pig’s head under my arm, to the Pearl Cash & Carry. I needed to return the 20-quart pot I’d bought there […]
On Tuesday afternoon, October 17, the seven-member Multnomah County Grand Jury “voted unanimously not to return criminal charges against any individual in connection with the death of James Chasse [Jr.],” Multnomah County District Attorney Michael Schrunk wrote in a statement. Chasse died in police custody on September 17, after police arrested him in the Pearl […]
The mayor’s “Street Access for Everyone” (SAFE) committee wants to make it illegal to obstruct Portland’s sidewalks in “high-pedestrian areas,” according to their draft recommendations—due to be voted on by city council on December 13. “We’re not targeting homeless people, but opening the sidewalks,” says Central Precinct Commander Mike Reese. Reese has sat on the […]
Victims of racial profiling will probably not be happy with Mayor Tom Potter this week. On Thursday, October 19, the mayor will most likely delay the formation of a commission that would tackle the problem, thereby ignoring a crucial recommendation of a report on racial profiling he commissioned earlier this year. The report—prepared by Oregon […]
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