Warren's Blog
Press release on County solar power
Today the Multnomah County Board of Commissioners will consider an agreement to install the largest solar power project in Oregon on three county buildings. The project will produce approximately 1,000,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity per year, marking an important milestone for the Oregon solar energy industry.
Under the agreement, solar energy services provider SunEdison LLC of Maryland will build, own and operate the solar photovoltaic system, selling the power output to Multnomah County under a 20-year power purchase agreement. The county will pay SunEdison for all the power generated by the system at a rate just below what is currently paid to Portland General Electric (PGE). This rate will climb at a fixed annual escalator in line with historical utility price inflation of 2.83 percent.
Read more and discuss: Press release on County solar power
» June 26, 2008 - 0 comments - Front Page News, Sustainability, Warren's Blog
Portland in the New York Times today
District 2 is in the New York Times (again) today. They're writing about gentrification and the "Restorative Listening Project" being led by the City of Portland's Office of Neighborhood Involvement. Have you been to any of these sessions? What do you think of the project? And what do you think of the newspaper's portrayal of Portland?
Discuss: Portland in the New York Times today
» May 29, 2008 - 0 comments - Front Page News, Inner NE, Neighborhoods, Warren's Blog
The Oregon Hope Initiative
Keeping our state competitive in today’s global economy will require an increasingly well educated citizenry. Yet higher education remains out of reach for many Oregonians, limiting their opportunity and that of our entire community. 14 U.S. States have responded to this challenge by creating state funded programs aimed at improving college access for students from low-income families, strengthening state university systems by keeping more top students in state, and strengthening primary and secondary education by giving every student an incentive to do well in school. Oregon can and should follow suit.
Click above to download a PDF of the latest draft of the full report. We welcome your feedback, thoughts and ideas!
Discuss: The Oregon Hope Initiative
» March 18, 2008 - 1 comments - Children and Families, Front Page News, Issues, Warren's Blog
Update on BIT/BLF Business Tax Reform...Next Installment of Reform Rolls-Out This Summer
In 2007, the City of Portland and Multnomah County approved extensive reforms to the city business license fee (BLF) and the county business income tax (BIT). The reform effort sought to ease the tax burden on small businesses and to improve the economic competitiveness of our city and county. With about a month until tax day, we have a quick update on the changes and what's next (click for more).
Read more and discuss: Update on BIT/BLF Business Tax Reform...Next Installment of Reform Rolls-Out This Summer
» March 14, 2008 - 0 comments - Budget, Front Page News, Issues, Warren's Blog
Oregon Health Forum Event on Veterans
This morning I attended a breakfast forum called, "Health on the Home Front: Focusing on Veterans' Needs," sponosored by the Oregon Health Forum. Commissioner Cogen was recognized at the start of the event for his leadership on taking care of our returning Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, and for his help in promoting this event as a follow-up to the "Our Veterans, Our Neighbors" event he helped organize last fall.
Read more and discuss: Oregon Health Forum Event on Veterans
» February 26, 2008 - 0 comments - Community Involvement, Events, Front Page News, Human Services, News, Warren's Blog
PSU Brown Bag Speaker Series, Bringing Cultural Diversity to Environmentalism - 2/27/08
I attended a brown-bag lunch event today titled "Diversifying Environmentalism: The Environmental Movement's Greatest Challenge?" sponsored by the PSU Urban Studies program. Marcelo Bonta, founder of the Young Environmental Professionals of Color and Director for the Center for Diversity & the Environment
www.environmentaldiversity.org, was the keynote speaker. He made a very compelling case for the idea that the Environmental Movement's greatest challenge really is bringing in more diverse voices, stakeholders, participants, and leaders. I think it's true that we will only truly achieve our environmental sustainability goals when we have also achieved the civil rights goals of equality and justice for all.
Read more and discuss: PSU Brown Bag Speaker Series, Bringing Cultural Diversity to Environmentalism - 2/27/08
» February 25, 2008 - 0 comments - Events, Front Page News, Issues, Sustainability, Warren's Blog
Oregon Hope Initiative
Jeff Cogen was featured in the Sunday Oregonian in an Opinion piece by David Sarasohn on Education. The concept is to follow the lead of various U.S. states and foreign countries and make higher education more widely available. This would help our economy, our primary and secondary schools, and above all our people. What do you think?
Read more and discuss: Oregon Hope Initiative
» February 25, 2008 - 2 comments - Children and Families, Community Involvement, Front Page News, Neighborhoods, News, News, Warren's Blog, Warren's Blog
Business Tax Reform Package Signed Into Law
Today the County Board of Commisssioners finalized a set of reforms to Multnomah County's Business Income Tax (BIT) system. This reform package marks the first substantive update to our BIT system since 1994. It will result in tax relief for approximately 20,000 businesses, and it will make our local tax structure both more equitable and more stable.
Read more and discuss: Business Tax Reform Package Signed Into Law
» December 20, 2007 - 0 comments - Budget, Front Page News, Issues, News, Warren's Blog
Klickitat Street...in the LA Times
A nice story about Beverly Cleary and the monuments to her around NE Portland ran this weekend in the Los Angeles Times. See below:
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From the Los Angeles Times
ESSAY
The magic of Klickitat Street
Stumbling on the Portland neighborhood that inspired children's writer Beverly Cleary.
By Denise Hamilton
We were driving through the gracious old suburbs of Portland, Ore., searching for a cafe that had gotten raves for its seafood, when I looked up from my map and saw a sign that resonated to the core of my bookworm soul: "Klickitat Street."
Those two words hurtled me through time and place back to childhood and the ragged paperbacks I reread until they became part of my psychic landscape.
Any reader worth her salt knows that Klickitat Street is where Henry Huggins and Ramona and Beezus (née Beatrice) Quimby lived in the classic children's books by Beverly Cleary. For me, they weren't just characters, they were real children, filled with the desires, dilemmas and annoyances that consumed my own life. I could almost hear them playing a few blocks down the street. And I longed to share their adventures.
Read more and discuss: Klickitat Street...in the LA Times
» December 10, 2007 - 1 comments - Children and Families, Community Involvement, Front Page News, Inner NE, Warren's Blog
Ending the Bias Against Venture Capital Firms: A Step Forward for Local Economic Development
Yesterday Jeff Cogen wrapped up a successful effort to make Multnomah County a viable place for venture capital firms to locate. An oversight in the Business Income Tax (BIT) code had caused all local venture capital funds to move outside of Multnomah County and the City of Portland's taxing jurisdiction. For them to stick around here meant subjecting capital returns on investment that they deliver to their shareholders (limited partners) to the city and county business income taxes.
To subject returns on capital to those taxes would have made local venture funds both uncompetitive and likely targets of shareholder lawsuits, so they moved (at least any with taxable income to report). The solution Commissioner Cogen developed in close collaboration with Commissioner Sam Adam's office, the Revenue Bureau, and a workgroup comprised of members of the venture capital industry, will level the playing field by giving venture capital firms the same tax treatment mutual funds get.
We have removed an inequity, and done so with zero impact to the city or county budget. We have also done so in a manner that preserves fairness and integrity in the tax system and avoids unintended consequences. There may even be some economic development upside to this change. Commissioner Adam's office and the Portland Development Commission (PDC) plan to track the future impacts of this change using an online benchmarking survey. Since venture capital plays a vital role in today's global economy by nurturing emerging businesses and helping their innovative ideas and technologies achieve market success, Commissioners Cogen and Adams felt it was very important to address this problem. Unanimous votes in favor of the change at both the county and city indicated the broad support this solution had. Click below to see three recent media pieces on this.
Read more and discuss: Ending the Bias Against Venture Capital Firms: A Step Forward for Local Economic Development
» November 30, 2007 - 0 comments - Budget, Front Page News, Issues, News, Warren's Blog
Venture capital tax change take effect following meeting
Multnomah County Board of Commissioners approved new administrative rule that addresses the tax treatment of venture capital funds.
After listening carefully to complaints from local venture capital firms during hearings on reform to the Business License Fee in April of 2007, the Revenue Bureau, City Commissioner Sam Adams’ Office and County Commissioner Jeff Cogen’s Office put together a workgroup that included representatives from the venture capital industry, tax professionals and city and county representatives. This workgroup was tasked to review the tax treatment of venture capital funds. If venture capital funds were found to be disadvantaged in Portland and Multnomah County, the group was to jointly design a solution that would overcome this disadvantage without creating unintended consequences for the Revenue Bureau or other businesses.
Read more and discuss: Venture capital tax change take effect following meeting
» November 29, 2007 - 0 comments - Budget, Top Stories, Warren's Blog
Recognizing Veterans
Today the Multnomah County Board of Commissioners passed a proclamation recognizing veterans. The proclamation was submitted by Commissioner Cogen in recognition of the 197 Multnomah County employees who are veterans or who are on active duty. The Board also wanted to acknowledge the contributions of all of our veterans, and to highlight the important duty we have, as a county and as a community, to warmly welcome them back and help them and their families reintegrate after their military service is over.
Below are links to two very alarming articles on homeless veterans and the challenges of reintegration. We still have a chance to get out in front of this problem, but there is no doubt that the challenge of avoiding a repeat of the Vietnam era is a huge one.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/08/us/08vets.html?hp
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/H/HOMELESS_VETERANS?SITE=WWL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
This story from today's Oregonian shares some local perspective on the enormous debt we owe our veterans.
Discuss: Recognizing Veterans
» November 8, 2007 - 0 comments - Homeless, Human Services, Top Stories, Warren's Blog
Our Veterans, Our Neighbors
Yesterday, 10-29-07, Commissioner Cogen co-hosted (and MC'd) a community leaders summit focused on Veterans reintegration called "Our Veterans, Our Neighbors." The event brought together 120 senior leaders from Portland area businesses, healthcare providers, non-profit and advocacy organizations, colleges and universities, and the military. It was hosted by Commissioner Cogen in conjuction with Commissioner Sam Adams from the City of Portland, Commissioner Martha Schrader from Clackamas County, Commissioner Desari Strader from Washington County, Brigadier General Mike Caldwell from the Oregon National Guard, and Sam Brooks from the Portland Business Alliance. The event focused on educating leaders about the problems faced by our Veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, and seeing what solutions our commmunity can develop to address those challenges.
Read more and discuss: Our Veterans, Our Neighbors
» October 30, 2007 - 0 comments - Community Involvement, Front Page News, Issues, News, Warren's Blog
Why All The Engineers on Your Roof?
It's all about SOLAR!!
Yesterday, 10-10-07, Multnomah County hosted a pre-proposal conference and site tour for bidders on our solar project. This project, being built on County-owned rooftops, will produce enough solar power to effectively double the total installed solar base in the state of Oregon.
Commissioner Cogen has led this project from the very beginning. Yesterday he delivered passionate opening remarks to the potential bidders gathered in the County Boardroom for the pre-proposal conference. There was a solid turnout for the event, which I think is a good sign of how much interest there is in Oregon about solar energy right now.
Read more and discuss: Why All The Engineers on Your Roof?
» October 11, 2007 - 0 comments - Front Page News, News, Sustainability, Warren's Blog
Multnomah County Goes Solar
9-21-07
Multnomah County issued a Request For Proposals (RFP) today, soliciting bids for the largest solar electricity project in Oregon. Commissioner Cogen initiated and led this project and he is thrilled to see part of his renewable energy agenda already coming to fruition. The RFP describes five County buildings for solar panel installation; together, the solar panels on our buildings will generate approximately 1,000,000 kWh per year of solar electricity. Once complete, the project will reduce the County's greenhouse gas emissions by about 700 tons per year. Perhaps most importantly, this project is being done at no additional cost to County taxpayers thanks to generous State, Federal and Energy Trust of Oregon support. We anticipate that this project will also help spur economic development and green job creation in our community's fast growing renewable energy sector.
You can read and download the full RFP and all supporting documents on the Multnomah County Central Procurement and Contracts Administration website at: www.multcopurch.org. Any RFP specific questions (or difficulty downloading) should be directed to: 503.988.5111.
The above photo is from Jeff's speech at the 2007 Northwest Solar Expo last Friday, where he talked about the RFP release and how this project will help the citizens of Multnomah County.
Discuss: Multnomah County Goes Solar
» September 21, 2007 - 0 comments - Front Page News, Sustainability, Warren's Blog
Convention Center Hotel
Today's Oregonian included a front page story on Metro's upcoming vote on a Convention Center hotel. It reports on a funding gap and the need for an annual public subsidy, at least for the first 8 years.
While this is not directly a Multnomah County matter, it could affect local property taxes, a portion of which fund Multnomah County. There are several ideas for covering the funding gap including creating a new business improvement district, raising the hotel/motel tax, and getting funding from the Oregon Lottery. What do you think of a Convention Center hotel?
Discuss: Convention Center Hotel
» September 20, 2007 - 1 comments - Budget, Front Page News, Inner NE, Issues, News, Warren's Blog
Rental Housing and No Smoking Policies
The trend of smokefree housing is really picking up around the Portland-Vancouver Metro Area! The most recent development is the news that Guardian Management, the area’s largest property management group, will make 8,000 of its residential units smokefree. Guardian’s no-smoking policy went into effect for new residents on September 1st, 2007, and will be in effect for all residents by Jan. 1st, 2008.
Smokefree housing is a national trend, and locally, things began to heat up about two years ago. That’s when the Portland-Vancouver Metro Area Smokefree Housing Project was created, through a collaboration of the American Lung Association of Oregon, Multnomah County Health Department and Clark County Public Health.
One of the smokefree housing project’s first decisions was to conduct research on what local renters wanted. For years, the three partners had been receiving calls from renters experiencing secondhand smoke drifting into their apartments from neighboring units, and they wanted to find out how widespread the issue really was. In 2006, after completing a random digit-dialed phone survey of 400 renters in the four-county area, the project found that 75% of renters preferred to live in smokefree housing. Just as importantly, the research also showed that only 20% of landlords had a rule prohibiting smoking somewhere on their properties. So, the public demand for smokefree housing greatly outweighed the current supply.
In the spring of 2007, the research findings were compiled into a new tool for landlords—a handbook that essentially walks them through the process of creating a no-smoking policy at their properties. The handbook, A Landlord’s Guide to No-Smoking Policies, is already in its second printing. It provides step-by-step information for landlords on creating, announcing and marketing smokefree properties.
Another important resource for both landlords and renters regarding smokefree policies is a comprehensive web site—SmokefreehousingNW.com. This website was also developed by the Portland-Vancouver Metro Area Smokefree Housing Project. The website offers practical tools for landlords such as a policy checklist, sample lease language and handouts for tenants. The website also offers resources for renters, including tips on how to work with their landlord to reduce secondhand smoke in their buildings. Renters currently suffering from secondhand smoke in their apartments can call the Smokefree Housing Hotline for assistance at: 503-453-0926 or 800-424-0926 outside the Portland metro area.
For more information about smokefree housing policies, please contact the Multnomah County Health Department if you are in Multnomah County at: 503-988-3674 x29356. For other areas of Oregon, call the American Lung Association of Oregon at: 503-718-6145. In Clark County, WA, call Clark County Public Health at 360-397-8000 x7378.
Read more and discuss: Rental Housing and No Smoking Policies
» September 18, 2007 - 2 comments - Children and Families, Front Page News, Human Services, Issues, News, Warren's Blog
Governor Vetoes OMSI Bailout
Good news PGE ratepayers! Governor Kulongoski vetoed the Legislature's attempt to pay off a 1991 OMSI construction debt with PGE ratepayer dollars. Jeff Cogen was part of a broad (and now successful!) effort to convince the Governor to nix this bad idea. Chair Ted Wheeler and Commissioner Lonnie Roberts also weighed in from Multnomah County to encourage a veto. Here are links to KGW's and the Oregonian's story on the news. Straigtening OMSI's books out doesn't seem as important as funding energy conservation and renewable energy, but what do you think? Also, is it appropriate to think of OMSI as a resource only within PGE's service territory, or should any potential bailout be broader based?
Read more and discuss: Governor Vetoes OMSI Bailout
» August 9, 2007 - 3 comments - Budget, Front Page News, Warren's Blog
Child Neglect
Last Monday I attended a one-day summit on Child Neglect. It was a real eye-opener for me. Child neglect is the single most common form of child abuse and it causes such serious harm to children. Neglect is a chronic condition for children in many homes across Multnomah County, and unfortunately, neglected children are often also enduring other forms of abuse.
Read more and discuss: Child Neglect
» July 31, 2007 - 2 comments - Children and Families, Community Involvement, Front Page News, Front Page News, Human Services, Issues, Public Safety, Warren's Blog
8,000 Horsepower Engines...Idling Overnight?
Jubitz Truck Stop
At the huge Jubitz truck stop complex just off the I-5 in North Portland, an exciting new installation will help clear our air, reduce global warming, and waste less fuel. What is it?? It's a set of 34 truck parking spaces that will now be offering electrical hook-ups to power the air-conditioners, heaters, and other creature-comforts used by truckers parked overnight or at rest. Currently, most of our nation’s truckers keep their engines idling for hours at a time to support the in-cab comforts they need to make their trucks livable. But it doesn't have to be that way! This practice is a waste of diesel fuel and money, not to mention a major source of greenhouse gas and particulate emissions. Electrical hookups are a viable and cleaner alternative to acheiving the same end. Jeff Cogen's no-idling policy -- adopted by the County and jointly by a group of private partners early this summer -- is aimed at going for the same low-hanging fruit in energy conservation that this truck stop measure aims at. No-idling policies and electrified truck stop stalls are two simple and cost effective actions we can take today to help face up to global warming, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and clean our air. See this article from the Portland Tribune for more information on the very ground breaking project at Jubitz truck stop, which was sponsored by Governor Ted Kulongoski, Oregon DEQ, Oregon Solutions, the Oregon Department of Energy, EPA, and The Climate Trust. The project was installed and will be managed by a private partner called Shurepower Technologies. Attached is a photo I took at the ribbon cutting and project launch last week!
Discuss: 8,000 Horsepower Engines...Idling Overnight?
» July 27, 2007 - 1 comments - Events, Front Page News, North Portland, Sustainability, Warren's Blog
Tour of Tomorrow Bike Ride
Last Friday, July 20th, I participated in the annual Bi-State “Tour of Tomorrow” bike ride. This terrific 40+ mile ride was organized by Cycle Oregon and the Urban Greenspaces Institute as a way for elected officials, planners, transportation advocates, and other local decision makers to connect and tour our region’s bike path network.
Read more and discuss: Tour of Tomorrow Bike Ride
» July 25, 2007 - 0 comments - Events, Events, Sustainability, Warren's Blog
