Benton
Let’s have an honest discussion about the Rose Quarter freeway widening project
By Joe Cortright Good decisions result only if state officials are transparent and honest City Observatory has been closely following the proposal to spend $500 million widening the I-5 freeway at the Rose Quarter in Portland. In the process, we and others have repeatedly uncovered instances of state agency officials…
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Could Your Plant Benefit from a FREE Energy Assessment?
By: Energy Trust Looking for new ways to trim energy operating costs and increase the bottom line in your facility? Whether you’ve already made energy improvements or are just getting started, an energy assessment can help you determine the largest savings and decide where to focus. Available at no cost…
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Your Zoning Code Is Inherently Exclusionary (But It Doesn’t Have To Be)
by Nolan Gray Since bursting onto the scene in the 1970s, the concept of “exclusion” now figures heavily in the way urban planners do their work. Now more than ever, urban planners are aware of how certain land-use regulations and forms of public process can systematically exclude certain groups of…
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Sale Prices Surge in Neighborhoods with New Tax Break
By Alexander Casey Sale prices ticked up sharply in some of the nation’s lowest-income and highest – poverty communities near the end of last year-but mostly in the neighborhoods now eligible for newly created tax breaks. Tucked within the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA) is a somewhat…
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Flying Lessons: How stories from Aviation can make us better Managers
In this, the second installment of our six part series, we look at the role of communication in business and examine, through the lens of lessons learned, an example of communication from the field of aviation and how it can improved enterprise performance. The picture of Boeing’s iconic 737 airliners…
Read MoreThe Emerging Digital Town Square
By: Matt Sayre reprinted by permission Picture the small villages and towns of early America. The farmers are selling produce and smoked meat in the market square, while the cobbler and sheriff barter four deerskins for a pound of wheat. The local physician atop his soapbox announces the latest ailments…
Read MoreOccupations that Pay More in Southwestern Oregon
by Sarah Cunningham When looking for a job in your field, determining which region pays the most could be a sound strategy. In 2018, there were 27 occupations where workers in Southwestern Oregon earned higher median wages than in any other region in the state. In 2017, 6 percent of…
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How to Update Your Employee Handbook
By Jenna Reed, Vice President General Counsel and Compliance Services Cascade Employers Association jreed@cascadeemployers.com If it’s been more than a year since you’ve given your employee handbook a thorough read, chances are it’s already out of date. I don’t know too many people that jump up and down about the…
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Does Your City Have Shiny New Toy Syndrome?
by Daniel Herriges Everybody, at some point, has known (or maybe even been) that kid who just has too many toys. The one who gets showered with new stuff on every special occasion from birthday to Christmas to 100-on-the-spelling-test. And everybody knows the sad, lonely fate of all the older-but-still-fairly-new…
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Which Countries Have the Most Pavement Per Person?
by Daniel Herriges (Photos: Wikimedia Commons) One number can’t begin to capture the complexity of the differences between urban places—what we build, how we build it, what it looks like, and what it’s going to take to maintain it. But sometimes, one number can cut through all the details and…
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Hemp Production Program
The Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 (2018 Farm Bill, Section 10113) directs the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to issue regulations and guidance to implement a program for the commercial production of industrial hemp in the United States. USDA has begun the process to gather information for rulemaking. Once complete,…
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HB 2020 Oregon Cap and Trade FactSheet
The proposed HB 2020 legislation would have significant and lasting impacts on natural gas rate payers. Customers from all rate classes would experience rapid and increasing costs for simply heating their homes and businesses. The chart below shows the weighted average rate impact for all residential and commercial customers in…
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