Plans are underway for the Kenton Street Fair, gracing North Denver Avenue in May. Jessie Burke, the owner of Posies Cafe, is helping to spearhead the fair's organization, and is giving Kenton businesses first dibs on booths. We've got the info below, and Kenton business owners can download the vendor form as an attachment at the bottom of this post.

We've completed our vendor forms and they are being prepared for distribution and to be posted on our KBA website.  I wanted to send them around to the Kenton area businesses first, however, because we wanted to give Kenton businesses first priority for booth space, and also a discounted rate for all KBA members.  At next week's KBA meeting we will be discussing KBA membership, dues, etc if you want more information on how to qualify for the discounted rate.

The rate for Kenton businesses is $25 per booth (10x10).  You must provide your own tent, table and chairs.  The remainder of details are listed on the application.

It will be a subject of conversation as well as today's city council meeting. Email from Gary Marschke

Help Strategize Urban Renewal Recommendations to the People in Power

• Voice your concerns
• Hear draft community recommendations
• Strategize action steps
• Speak directly to Mayor Adams

  Thursday, March 11th, 6:30pm to 8:30pm
  Billy Webb Elks Lodge
  6 North Tillamook St.
  Snacks and Drinks will be provided
  20 Community Savings Cards as door prizes!

  For more information, please see attached flyer, visit www.necoalition.org or contact Shoshana Cohen at 503-823-4575 ext. 5 orforums@necoalition.org

  
  

Wanna eat corned beef 'n cabbage while jigging to Great Highland pipe music in Linnton?(?!?!?) Of course you do...especially b/c this St. Paddy's Day celebration is also a fundraiser for the Linnton Community Center, which hosts everything from children's enrichment programs to quinceaneras and is where the lively locals of Linnton come together. Here's all the info, courtesy of Linnton mover-and-shaker Pat Wagner:

St. Paddy's Day Celebration and Dinner! $15 gets you corned beef and cabbage, potatoes and dessert. No-host beer and wine, silent auction, "Luck of the Irish" 50/50 drawing (winner keeps half, LCC keeps half), plus music and dancing with Irish quartet!

Sunday, March 14; doors open at 6 p.m.

Linnton Community Center, 10614 NW St. Helens Rd.

Sarah Stevenson, Executive Director of Innovative Housing addressed the Friends of Cathedral Park Neighborhood Association Tuesday night. She was responding to neighborhood complaints about Innovative Housing's 14-unit facility, with part-time service and care providers by Cascadia Behavioral Healthcare.  The building, located near North Trumbull and Edison streets, was purchased by Innovative in 2005 and renovated and rented the following year.

Tenants are formerly homeless residents who must be single when they apply and go through a screening process.

We love it when we can present positive updates to past coverage. Case in point: the Emerson Street Garden proposal, which we reported on last April and which is coming ever closer to fruition. The site at Northeast 8th and Emerson streets has been sitting vacant for decades, its soil contaminated by lead and other toxins. But as Sentinel reporter Cassandra Koslen discovered nearly a year ago, Groundwork Portland and the Oregon Sustainable Agriculture Land Trust (OSALT) are working with the state Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) on a unique experiment to determine if the lead can be removed or more thinly distributed with plants. The desired result is soil safe enough to support a community garden.

We just saw an announcement today (via King Neighborhood Association) from Groundwork Portland inviting citizens to a meeting next week to "help come up with a community outreach and engagement strategy for Emerson Street Garden." Looks like the soil-saving idea is alive and well. We'll check back in with Groundwork Portland and bring you updates as they arise. Date and time: March 16 from 4-6 p.m. at the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods, 4815 NE 7th Ave.

Exciting event tomorrow in Piedmont! From the Piedmont Neighborhood Association website:

Piedmont Neighborhood Association invites you to come meet your neighbors on March 11th at 7 P.M. at Rosemont Court, 597 N Dekum St. This is a new meeting place for Piedmont Neighbors. Come see this beautifully restored building. The front doors are located at the corner of Dekum and Kerby.

Piedmont Neighborhood will be having a “SHOW AND TELL” Event at this gathering. You will have a chance to talk to your neighbors and see all the good work Piedmont Neighborhood does for our community.

At long last, the Kenton branch of the Multnomah Library System opened on Monday March 7th. A grand opening ceremony and party is scheduled for this Saturday March 13th.

Last week, we reported on the unease of Memorial Coliseum redesign finalist Douglas Obletz regarding the city's current Coliseum operating agreement with Portland Arena Management.

Obletz, a principal with the firm Sheils Obletz Johnsen, which proposed the Memorial Athletic & Recreation Center (MARC), took issue with Section 2.2.3 of the operating agreement, which allows the city to reclaim the Coliseum with 18 months notice. However, the agreement also says the city would then only be able to use the site as a “Non-Spectator Facility."

“Our project would be dead in the water,” Oblitz told Sentinel reporter William Crawford. The agreement, in Obletz's opinion, would also put the Blazers' JumpTown proposal at a distiinct advantage.

The Daily Journal of Commerce reported yesterday that Obletz has sent a letter to City Council requesting a delay in the Coliseum Request for Proposals process until the onerous operating agreement can be re-negotiatied between PAM and city officials.  The issue will be discussed further by the Rose Quarter Stakeholders Advisory Committee tonight from 5-7:30 p.m. at the Portland Development Commission offices.

Has one of the key players in a series of commerical and residential break-ins along North Mississippi Avenue and Northeast Alberta Street finally been caught?  Has the recent crime along these streets been the cause of a select few or many small groups?  The Oregonian reports a man arrested whose MO fits the more sophisticated styles of commerical break-ins that have been seen along NE Alberta and N Mississippi.  Unlike other 'smash and grab' style break-ins, this suspect appears to be associated with break-ins where alarm systems had been cut pre-buglary.  In one case along Alberta, a safe was stolen. That's not your troubled teen or thrill-seeker crowd there.  We will see if this arrest has an impact on crime reports.
FROM THE OREGONIAN

Early Christmas Eve morning, Kurt Huffman was dismayed to find a mess when he arrived at the Whiskey Soda Lounge on Portland's Southeast Division Street. It was the second break-in at his business within 10 days. 

"You put your heart and soul into something, and then somebody physically destroys it," Huffman recalls. "It's really disturbing and makes you feel very exposed."

Huffman wasn't alone. As many as 30 other restaurant and taverns had been broken into much the same way since July -- many along Northeast Alberta Street, North Mississippi Avenue and Southeast Division Street.

 

READ THE ARTICLE

UPDATE 5:30 p.m.: OK, the dust is finally settling, and here's what we know, courtesy of WWeek, OPB reporter April Baer and Blue Oregon, among others:

-Newest candidates for Jeff Cogen's District 2 MultCo Commissioner seat: Roberta Philip, a new hire at County Chair-turned-Interim State Treasurer Ted Wheeler's office; and Paul van Orden, the former pro skateboarder and City of Portland Noise Control officer. They join Cogen aide Karol Collymore, Rev. Chuck Currie and former MultCo commish Gary Hansen in the race to fill the District 2 seat. (That's our district, yo!)

-Full slate of candidates for Wheeler's now-vacant MultCo County Chair seat: Cogen, former state Sentator Margaret Carter, and Mike Darger.

-And for State Treasurer: Jim Hill-D, Rick Metzger-D, Chris Telfer-R, and Wheeler-D.

UPDATE 3:13 p.m.: OPB's April Baer breaks the news that Steve Novick has withdrawn from the Multnomah County Chair race. On her Facebook fan page (I know, I know), April says, "Novick just told me he had been on the phones all day. Ultimately, a conversation with former MultCo chair Bev Stein led him to step back."

UPDATE 12:32 p.m.: OPB reporter April Baer resets the MultCo chair race: Margaret Carter, Jeff Cogen, Mike Darger, Steve Novick. And for State Treasurer: Jim Hill-D, Rick Metzger-D, Chris Telfer-R, Ted Wheeler-D. In her words, "Still 4.5 hours to go, folks!"

Meanwhile, WWeek reports the candidates (as of 12:30ish p.m.) for Cogen's District 2 seat are: Karol Collymore, Rev. Chuck Currie, and former MultCo Commish Gary Hansen. Check back here for more updates, including (gasp!) some original reporting.

UPDATE 10:33 a.m.: WWeek reports that former state Senator Margaret Carter will run for Multnomah County Chair. The position was vacated this morning by Ted Wheeler (pictured in slide show) when Gov. Ted Kulongoski appointed him as Interim State Treasurer to replace the late Ben Westlund, who died of cancer over the weekend. More details on the political shuffle below. 

Last fall's Senate shuffle's got nothing on this morning's political developments. Here's the scoop, courtesy of WWeek and BlueOregon:

-Gov. Ted Kulongoski announced this morning that he was appointing Multnomah County Chair Ted Wheeler as Interim State Treasurer, replacing the late Ben Westlund, who succumbed to cancer over the weekend.

-Then came word that former U.S. Senate candidate Steve Novick and United Church of Christ minister Rev. Chuck Currie planned to file for Wheeler's now-vacated County Chair seat.

-Then we learned, via WWeek, that Karol Collymore, a mover-and-shaker in MultCo Commissioner Jeff Cogen's office, was filing for her boss's seat, leading to rampant speculation that Cogen will be filing for County Chair. (Cogen has just confirmed that he will indeed run for County Chair.)

Why the sudden flurry of activity? Well, the deadline to file for the state's May primary is today. The clock is ticking. Let the games begin.

Photo in slideshow by Leah Nash, from Street Roots. Photo embeded in article of Wheeler at a past event with Portland City Councilor Nick Fish from Portlandonline

In addition to a spat about the St. Johns Farmers Market, there's plenty goin' on in the John this month. Thanks to St. Johns Neighborhood Association President Babs Adamski, we've got a quick 'n dirty wrap-up of events, meetings and must-know news for March. Here goes:

Monday, March 8 (that's today!): St. Johns Neighborhood Association General Meeting, 7:00pm - 8:30 pm, St. Johns Community Center Auditorium, 8427 N Central St. (at Leavitt). Agenda includes the introduction of Angela Wagnon as our new Crime Prevention Coordinator, planning for the Community Clean-up and Trash to Treasure in April.

Wednesday, March 10th 6-8 p.m.: St. Johns + Art Organizing Potluck. Interested in helping form the SJ+A group for 2010? We're having a family friendly organizing meeting & dinner. Send an e-mail to babsia@gmail.com for the address.

Friday, March 12th and Saturday, March 13th -- 7 p.m., Saturday, March 13th -- 2 p.m: MATINEE! Wizard of Oz  - Roosevelt High School
Tickets for the performances are now on sale online at www.roosevelttheatre.org or you can contact the box office at 503-916-5260 ext. 71424

Try to picture Brandon Roy never getting the chance to wear a Blazers’ jersey.
 
Go ahead and imagine him playing for another NBA team.
 
Painful, isn’t it?
 
Believe it or not, there was a time when Portland wanted to pass on selecting the three-time All-Star guard.  It was back in 2006 before the NBA Draft.  Roy was fresh out of the University of Washington and was in town for pre-draft workouts with a trio that included Adam Morrison (Gonzaga), Rudy Gay (Connecticut) and Hassan Adams (Arizona).
 

Last month, Sentinel reporter William Crawford covered a N/NE Urban Renewal Area Town Hall hosted by the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods. This Thursday, March 11 is your last opportunity to take part in a community education/Q&A session about proposed changes to Urban Renewal Area boundaries and investment. Here's all the info you need, courtesy of NECN:

The final Urban Renewal Community Forum for the Interstate Corridor Urban
Renewal Area is next Thursday, March 11, 2010 from 6:30 - 8:30pm at the Billy
Webb Elks Lodge, 6 North Tillamook St.
This is the final meeting in a series which has focused on educating and
engaging community members about upcoming Urban Renewal Area investment
changes and decisions that will change the built environment of inner
North/Northeast Portland.
Notes from the first three meetings are available at the NECN site:
http://portland.necoalition.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&i...

If you are a resident, business owner, or other type of stakeholder in this
area your presence is sincerely requested and we ask that you also take a
moment to give us your valuable opinion in this survey:
www.surveymonkey.com/s/PXD6V35