Portland has changed a LOT since I was last there. Jonathan and I have gone to the Portland area at least once a year since we started working on houses, but we mostly go to Costco or IKEA near the airport, or Clackamas, never Portland proper.
We stayed at a hotel that may be familiar to some of you: the Pony Soldier Inn! I got so excited when we pulled in that I had to take a picture. It's not great, but it's something.
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| Yes, that's still Elmer's in the parking lot! |
Since I had my own rooms that weekend, I ended up in this giant king room.
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| I should have spent way more time in this room. |
We went out in Portland and bar/club/restaurant hopped for quite some time, although I'm pretty sure we all got back to the hotel before closing time.
Our first meeting was a working breakfast; we sat in the banquet room at Elmer's! Unfortunately since we were in there, we were only able to order off the 3-option banquet menu, but my omelet was delicious. While we ate breakfast, we heard from Kari Chisholm, a political consultant and writer of a progressive Oregon blog. He talked about the use of email in political campaigns, especially for development purposes, and how to retain constituent engagement after the main campaign.
Next, we met at the courthouse and took the Max to the Tri-Met offices. Tri-Met is the regional transit authority in Portland, and at their offices, we learned about the history of Portland transportation and why parts of it were built where/the way they were. Because it was very hectic trying to find parking near the courthouse, people were kind of trickling in during the presentation; some of us had gotten on the Max and others ended up parking at the Tri-Met offices, which made things crazy later on in the day.
Anyway, the Tri-Met office is pretty cool - it's kind of industrial and open with high ceilings, and they have a sort of obstacle course set up in the lobby. People who want to get certified to ride Portland's version of the Access Bus go on the obstacle course to prove they need the service, and also learn how to use the service.
My fellow Jessica took this great picture of the course:
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| This awesome picture is featured in Jessica's blog, FeelingElephants, at jessicadickinsongoodman.com |
John Carroll, one of the men who presented to us at Tri-Met, is a developer in Portland. He is a big proponent of transit use, and has developed his buildings to reflect that. He has been lauded for both preserving the feel of historic buildings and successfully working in modern new construction that fits the neighborhood. After the presentation, he took us on a walking tour of the Pearl district, where many of his buildings are.
This google map view is of the site of his new proposed building. We walked past this auto body shop and he hinted at an interest in it. Below is a sketch of the proposed building.
It is a very attractive area, with lovely low brick buildings and small boutique shops. Our tour ended at a food truck corral so we all got a quick bite and headed back to our cars.
My car was kind of far away, and I took a wrong turn, and I was on the wrong side of the garage... I'm pretty sure it took me a good half hour to find my car from the time we left the food trucks. That was some of the most nerve-wracking time ever - knowing I had a bunch of delicious food I couldn't eat while walking or driving, not knowing where my car was (I ALWAYS know where my car is.), misplacing my ticket to get out of the garage somewhere in my purse right after I paid for it... I haven't been that discombobulated in a long time. Oh, and I was starving. I ended up getting to eat about 5 bites of my food, but because it was so fragrant, I couldn't take it in to any of the places we went after that.
I ended up arriving at a neighborhood talk at the very tail end; I would have been better off going straight to the next location and eating my food in my car, but I didn't really know how late I was or how long we would be there, especially since it wasn't on the agenda at all. Oh well. That Thai food sat in my car taunting me all the way home to Seattle, too; I couldn't bear to throw it away, but it had been sitting in a hot car for far too long to still be safe to eat. *Sigh*.
Anyway, I ran in there just in time for the last of the Q&A session, then ran back to my car to go to Morel Ink.
Morel Ink is a full-service union printing shop owned by a wonderful man named Bill Dickey. They print things mostly for campaigns (they will work for both sides of the aisle, but they are very sensitive to conflict of interest and do their best to only print one side of competing campaigns). Their work is beautiful, and because they are union printers (and work in other areas with a network of other union printers) you know that everyone working there is being paid fair wages and receiving good treatment. They print and ship and mail all up and down the west coast and can get your materials out to other parts of the country as well. It was really neat to see their giant old printers; they print giant posters and little postcards on those machines, and they have some super cool new printer technology as well.
Bill talked to us about the role of small business in progressive politics, which was a very welcome viewpoint. There was a lot of focus on their pro bono work for NARAL, Planned Parenthood, etc.; doing pro bono work helps to build their business by positioning them as staunch supporters of progressive values. When consultants and people who worked on those campaigns that used Morel Ink's pro bono services need paid campaigns done, they know where they can go to get the best product at good pricing. The paid campaigns, in turn, make them enough money that they can continue doing pro bono work. A big cycle of giving back.
Morel Ink (and Bill as an individual) also donates large sums to progressive causes in addition to the work that they do pro bono. While we were there, he wrote us a check for $2500 toward our DC travel costs. We were flabbergasted by his generosity, and so thankful for it. He reminded us that Institute for a Democratic Future is a pretty unique program, and that it bears supporting; the number of progressive champions that come out of the program to run nonprofits and run for office and change things for the better is staggering. So he donates to IDF every year at some point, sometimes more than once. I think the world needs more Bill Dickeys.
Bill and the Morel Ink crew were nice enough to let us use their space to invite two other speakers, Tom Powers (Oregon House Majority Leader Chief of Staff and Director of the Oregon State Democratic Leadership Fund) and Nathan Howard, Interim Executive Director of the Oregon Bus. These two guys were both my age and had done SO MANY THINGS.
It made us all very jealous to hear how they were able to get so much done in their Democrat-majority legislature. They talked about passing their New-Motor-Voter law, which enters residents into the voter registration logs when they get their license. If they are 18, they can vote, otherwise when they turn 18 they are automatically registered. Awesome! Why can't we get that going?! Next up they are focusing on gun safety, sick leave, and minimum wage issues. They were really impressed by our Seattle Minimum Wage initiative and would like to see the same sort of grassroots campaign take place in Portland.
They also told us about Our Oregon, an organizing table around which many Oregon progressive groups meet. I haven't heard about anything like this in Washington, and if we don't have it, we need it! They all get together and decide where their energy is best focused, and WORK TOGETHER FOR PROGRESSIVE CHANGE! Whoa. That's part of the reason they are able to get so many democrats elected each cycle and in turn are able to pass progressive legislation. Seems so simple.
And that, my friends, is where Portland ended. We were all exhausted and did a short debrief, then went our separate ways from Morel Ink. Kind of a fizzle out end to an amazing weekend, but seriously, once we ran out of questions for the speakers at Morel Ink, we were all just kind of like hmm, it's time to go home. I did stop at BurgerVille on the way home to get a mocha milkshake (so delicious that I went 10 minutes off the freeway for it), but that's about the extent of the excitement.
Next up: waiting through 8 other weekend blogs before I tell you about DC. Haha! Just kidding. I'll start DC next.
