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I'm an Alaskan who was there when the Alaska Legislature crafted the Permanent Fund legislation. I think Oregon has gone about this all wrong. The idea with the Alaska Permanent Fund was that you don't give away the surplus directly (in this case it was oil revenue), instead you invest the surplus and give a portion of the dividends to the people and designate another portion for an emergency fund. Each year that there are surpluses, the principle increases and the amount of the dividends depends on how successful the investments are. The state hangs on to the principle no matter what. In Alaska, this has resulted in a fund that now yields dividends that rival the value of oil revenue.

posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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Here is a great thing the union that represents the workers at Powell's Books is doing to help members who recently were laid off:

LWU Local 5, the union that represents Powell’s workers, is asking you to show your support.

On Tuesday, March 8th, we invite everyone to join us for a shop-in at Powell’s online store.

When you shop through our link, 7.5% of your sale will go directly to assist workers displaced by recent layoffs.

posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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Am I disappointed? You bet! ...But not with Obama. Believe it or not, I still get a little inward glow when I say the words: "President Obama".

First, I am disappointed with all the Republican legislators who are obviously more interested in seeing this intelligent, rational, charismatic, hopeful president fail rather than even attempting to address the needs of the American people.

Second, I am disappointed with the media who--in the best case scenario--zoom in on every negative aspect of the president's uphill battle and give little coverage to positive accomplishments. In the worst case, the right wing press misleads the public and spreads utter lies in their crusade against Obama.

Third, I am really disappointed in all the American people who (egged-on by the media and social networking) think the problems created in the previous decade can all be solved by just waving a magic wand over the heads of lawmakers who refuse to vote for anything that smacks of the "audacity of hope".  I guess our citizens think this is a TV sitcom where every problem is solved in less than an hour. It looks like the folks paying for the commercials get to decide who the bad guys are...and we believe them!    

posted 2 years, 5 months ago
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I live in McMinnville, where the Riverbend Landfill sits beside the Yamhill River floodplain. Beautiful Yamhill County attracts tourists who come to visit the heart of wine country, and are treated to the sight and smell of a giant mountain of garbage as they drive down Hwy 18.  Waste Management wants to expand this noxious eyesore, endangering the watershed with trash from places outside our county. Even though all environmental experts say this is a very bad idea, the local government keeps overriding the permit denials. Watching concerned citizens valiantly fighing "big business" sometimes makes me feel like I'm in the middle of a Carl Hiaasen novel! 

posted 2 years, 9 months ago
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I have been a writer all my life, writing poems and journals as a child. I sailed through English classes using big words and complicated sentences until I met Miss Rhodes, a high school creative writing teacher, who marked up my first paper in her class with so much red ink that it looked like she had bled on it. Her big comment, next to the horrifying "D", gave me my first good piece of advice as a serious writer. "Cut out the deadwood! Less is more."

Forty years later, after a career as a copywriter, editor and graphic designer, I started writing comical mysteries with my sister. I took us a few years to get a working style that plays on each of our strengths, but now we have two published books, "A Corpse in the Soup", and "Seven Deadly Samovars". We have just finished the first draft of "Vanishing Act in Vegas" and expect it to be published next year.  

Our first book won a US Book News award. I am 65 and my sister, Morgan St James, is 70. She speaks at writers panels, book signings, workshops, and has started a chapter of Sisters In Crime in Las Vegas. So my advice is you are never too old...or young...to become a successful author!

Phyllice Bradner, McMinnville OR

posted 2 years, 10 months ago
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If you are like me, you have your cloth bags in the car and forget to take them into the store, so at the checkout, you reluctantly take the bag offered. One day it dawned on me, duh! just leave the groceries in the cart, wheel it out to the car and put them in the forgotten bag yourself. Try it! You will feel so much less guilty. 

posted 3 years, 3 months ago
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Everytime I hear the discussion about healthcare reform, the topic is always dominated by employer provided insurance. No one even talks about the large percentage of the American public who are self-employed or unemployed. If they do, it's barely a passing mention. It makes me want to scream!!

A large segment of society makes their living without having any employer. They are artists, authors, handymen, dog breeders, food cart owners, gardeners, tiny shop owners, musicians, B&B operators, e-bay sellers, house cleaners, and hundreds of other little entrepreneurs. And there are so many people who are just plain un-employed.

What is being done to help these folks get affordable health insurance? They are no group plans for them. The rates for these people who don't even have a steady income are astronomical. I know. For many years as an artist I paid outrageous prices for $2500-deductable insurance for myself and my son,and there were times when I couldn't even afford that. Self employed people are not welfare cases that qualify for Medicare, how are we going to cover them?

posted 3 years, 9 months ago
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I moved here from Alaska a few years ago, so I have never recieved an Oregon Kicker. I want to talk about how Alaska deals with excess revenue. When we began to recieve lots of tax revenue from our new oil fields back in the late 70's and early 80's, Alaska legislators created the Alaska Permanent Fund. All the oil renenues were funneled into this fund which was in turn invested. The dividends from those investments have been distribted to Alaskans for over 25 years. The Permanent Fund Dividend varies from year to year, but they have never missed one yet. The principle of the fund is never touched, that's being saved for a really rainy day. Oregon could do the same thing in a small scale way, using that revenue overage, which would allow us to have our cake and eat it too. 

posted 4 years, 2 months ago
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Art purchased with public money must be appealing to the broader spectrum of residents. In Juneau Alaska, about 25 years ago the city fathers and mothers decided that the public needed more exposure to contemporary art. They commissioned a famous east coast sculptor to make the 1% art for the new court building. The project cost over $65,000. When "Nimbus" arrived and was installed,it looked like a huge exploded dumpster painted bright green. The quality of the work was not good, bad welds, etc. The outcry and vilification in the press and public discourse was overwhelming and within a few years the sculpture was removed and stored in a surplus storage yard. Nimbus was resurredted some years later and placed near the state museum. BUT the golden lining in this cloud was that Skip Wallen, a local sculptor (who is also famous but was ignored by the selection committee)offered to donate a sculpture to fill the space vacated in front of the court house if the city would just pay for the bronze casting. The result is a breathtakingly beautiful bear fishing in a stream. It has become one of Alaska's most popular piece of public art, rubbed shiny on it's back by the many children who have climbed on this beloved bear's back to have their picture taken! The artist recieved not a penny for this great work.

As an artist myself, I support the concept of paying for art in public places, but feel it is not the role of those selecting the art to bring controversial art into the 1% program, that should should be funded by private money.

posted 4 years, 12 months ago
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I am 63, an active artist and author. My husband passed away recently after cancelling his insurance and running up large debts that I didn't know about. Instead of rolling over and giving up, I assessed the situation, took money out of my IRA and bought a big house in the midst of downtown that was zoned commercial. I put my art studio in the dining room, opened up a boutique in the living room, and took in three roommates. Now I have workspace, a job to do every day and three friends for company. If the boutique doesn't make money I can write off the loss on my taxes! My sister is 67 and the two of us started writing books together a few years ago and the audio version of our first published "cozy" mystery, "A Corpse in the Soup", won the US Book News award for "Best Audio Mystery of 2007". I have the feeling that neither me or my sister will ever stop working, it's the way to stay alive!

posted 5 years, 1 month ago
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