Story by Pete Shaw After several months of deliberation and community input, the Socially Responsible Investments Committee (SRIC) voted unanimously to recommend that the City of Portland divest its holdings in Wells Fargo & Company due to the company’s financing of for-profit prisons and “morally bankrupt” lending practices. The City currently holds $40 million in…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Many part-time recreation employees are cheering the unanimous Portland City Council decision on February 17 to ratify an agreement between the Parks and Recreation bureau and Laborers Local 483. Under the arrangement, Portland Parks and Recreation will create 130 new living wage union protected jobs by the Fall, and…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw As a debilitating housing crisis continues to plague Portland, those people most affected are organizing against landlords and the laws that work to benefit them at the expense of tenants. On Wednesday December 16, Know Your City (KYC) and Portland Tenants United (PTU) hosted a community dialogue titled “The…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Over 300 supporters of Don’t Shoot Portland and the Black Lives Matter movement gathered in Holladay Park on Friday November 27, making demands ranging from police reform to the abolition of capitalism that has created a system where Black lives do not matter. The rally also included a boisterous…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Exactly one year after 12 year old Tamir Rice was fatally shot by Cleveland police officer Timothy Loehmann in a public playground on November 22, 2014, 50 people gathered in Portland near the corner of SE Madison and 11th for a vigil in Rice’s memory and to demand justice…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw The late, great Townes Van Zandt once said, “Aloneness is a state of being whereas loneliness is a feeling. It’s like being broke and being poor.” Thanksgiving is a day that begins a six or so week stretch that reminds many of their aloneness more painfully than usual. So…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Voz and the Portland Immigrant Rights Coalition (PIRC) held a candlelight vigil on the night of November 19, calling for an end to the detentions and deportations that have torn apart many immigrant families and communities. The action was part of a national week of action promoted by immigrant…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw New York is big. New York is loud. It is bombastic, boasting, and even overwhelming. New York is not Portland. Last week I was in The City, part of a trip to visit my family. A few days before departing, I realized I would be missing the rally in Portland…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw A resolution opposing projects in Portland, Vancouver, and the Columbia River Gorge that would increase the number of oil trains passing through the region was approved by Portland City Council on November 4 by a vote of 4-0. A second resolution which would declare the City’s opposition to the…
Story by Pete Shaw Francisco Aguirre, the immigrant and labor organizer who is being persecuted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Department of Justice (DoJ), will have a trial this Wednesday, October 21, at 11 AM that will determine if he is guilty of illegal re-entry into the United States. The case has…
