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The lead (and radon) crisis unfolding at Portland Public Schools keeps getting worse. The O dropped the bomb last night that water filters used by the school district—filters that have been relied on to show administrators had taken steps to minimize health hazards—don't even really work on lead. Whoops!
Meanwhile, the first heads are rolling—or at least being told to stay home. Superintendent Carole Smith placed two schools officials on leave yesterday: Chief Operating Officer Tony Magliano and Environmental Manager Andy Fridley.
And by the way, most schools around here don't test regularly for lead in their water supplies.
Here's a weird thing. Portland cops and citizen police watchdogs disagreed, Wednesday, over whether an officer should be disciplined for grabbing an activist's camera, completely unprovoked. It looked like that would set up an exceedingly rare hearing before Portland City Council about who was right. But then the cops blinked. Acting Police Chief Donna Henderson reversed course yesterday, announcing she suddenly favors disciplining Officer Scott Groshong.
There's more fallout from Chief Larry O'Dea's mistaken shooting of his friend. The heads of both Portland police unions—one representing rank-and-file officers, the other representing commanding officers—are targeting a captain in the Police Bureau's internal affairs division. They say he didn't properly begin investigating the shooting when he learned of it, violating protocol. We pointed out this week that O'Dea's mistake was treated more leniently than any off-duty police shooting in at least 20 years.
Read this very interestingNYT piece about homelessness in Hawaii. The state, and city of Honolulu, responded to its homelessness emergency very differently than Portland has: with laws making it a crime to sit on the sidewalk and stepped up enforcement favored by the business community. And those folks are happy! But the city's also largely just pushing people around, the paper finds. Also: Hawaii flies a lot of homeless people elsewhere.
Not surprising: Prince's autopsy shows he died of an opiate overdose. The painkiller Fentanyl. He'd been planning to seek treatment. RIP.
“This is how authoritarianism starts, with a president who does not respect the judiciary." Political scholars of all stripes agree: A vote for Donald Trump is a vote against the US Constitution.
Protestors in San Jose agree: Trump supporters suck. Probably shouldn't have to come down to physical attacks though.
The nation agrees: GOP House Speaker Paul Ryan has no spine. He's now endorsing Trump.
Probably best to put off work today and begin making yourself a collection of intricate-yet-stout paper fans, Blogtown. This weekend: she's going to be hot.
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