OPB’s First Look: Paying for potholes

Subscribe to OPB’s First Look to receive Northwest news in your inbox six days a week.

Good morning, Northwest.

Portland City Council is considering a policy to charge residents and business owners a monthly fee to pay for maintenance on streets, sidewalks, signs and more.

OPB’s Alex Zielinski reports this morning on how the fees, which mimic those used by 31 other Oregon cities, would work in Portland.

In other news, the controversial dismissal of a Battle Ground High School teacher is affecting what her colleagues put in their lessons.

Here’s your First Look at Friday’s news.

— Bradley W. Parks

Portland looks to charge residents, businesses a monthly street fee

Portland city councilors are taking a drive down transportation funding memory lane with plans to advance a new fee to pay for street maintenance and safety projects.

The proposal would create a monthly fee of $12 per home, $8.40 per apartment complex, and $61 for commercial properties.

The policy mirrors one that failed to get traction in City Hall a decade ago. But, as Portland’s streets deteriorate and transportation revenue shrinks, councilors appear determined to not let this policy meet the same demise. (Alex Zielinski)

Learn More

3 things to know

• Battle Ground social studies teacher Amanda Gonzales was put on leave following comments made in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s killing. An arbitrator said Gonzales should get her job back, but the district still hasn’t let her return to class. (Erik Neumann)
• Pacific Seafood faces $3.2 million in fines levied by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality yesterday for water pollution violations. The company described DEQ’s fines and permit requirements as unreaonable. (Alejandro Figueroa)
• Linfield University is considering cuts to degree programs within the school’s College of Arts and Sciences in order to address a deficit of nearly $5 million, while Lane Community College is moving ahead with a budget plan that would cut its associate degree programs. (Tiffany Camhi and Natalie Pate)

Northwest headlines

• Portland Public Schools wants to know: What should be considered when closing schools? (Elizabeth Miller)
• Portland police chief cautions that budget cuts will cause ‘detrimental impacts’ (Troy Brynelson)
• A new Oregon law regulates police use of license plate readers. Here’s how it works (Shaanth Nanguneri)
• Splitter led the Blazers to the playoffs as a 1st-time NBA head coach but his future is uncertain (Anne M. Peterson)
• Victor Wembanyama listed as questionable for Friday game against Portland (Raul Dominguez)
• Washington Department of Natural Resources to close 4 campgrounds after lawmakers cut funding (Aspen Ford)

Listen in on OPB’s daily conversation

“Think Out Loud” airs at noon and 8 p.m. weekdays on OPB Radio, opb.org and the OPB News app. Today’s planned topics (subject to change):

• Scientist looks to microbe found in extreme environments to help protect Washington apples
• Washington researchers are concerned about gray whale populations after uptick in early-season deaths

Superabundant recipe: This eggplant lahme b’ajeen is more than a meatless Syrian ‘pizza’

Former Oregon Gov. Vic Atiyeh probably ate dishes like lahme b’ajeen when he visited his father’s home village west of the old city of Homs in northern Syria.

The dish comes from a Middle Eastern family of quickly baked, well-seasoned, meat-smeared flatbreads, all of which are invariably called “(insert nationality here) pizza” by culinary lumpers.

But it’s so much more than Syrian pizza.

In her take on this traditional flatbread dish, Superabundant newsletter writer Heather Arndt Anderson also digs into Homs-area variations on classic Levantine fare and communal ovens in Syrian communities. (Heather Arndt Anderson)

Learn More

Subscribe to OPB’s First Look to receive Northwest news in your inbox six days a week.