CA/News/News Clips

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News Clips

Local
We are facing a budget crisis in the city of Portland for the same reason virtually every other city and state in this country is facing a budget crisis: In 2008, investment bankers and hedge fund CEOs drove this country into the biggest, most prolonged, most severe economic crisis we've seen since the Great Depression.
  • PROPOSED EDUCATION URBAN RENEWAL AREA - These are challenging economic times. Teacher layoffs, school closures, cuts to public safety, parks and infrastructure maintenance are in the news on a regular basis. When considering using urban renewal as a financing tool, it is important to:
• Appreciate the impact urban renewal has on basic city, county and school services; and
• Evaluate whether the proposed urban renewal projects truly are a higher priority than the city, county and school services that will be adversely affected by the diversion of property tax dollars over the life of the district.
Portland Public Schools is a land of many chiefs.
“I look around here and all I see are broken hearts.”
“For every dollar we save now,” said Labors’ Local 483’s Kevin Stampflee, “we lose ten dollars down the road when things are worse. So do we wait for it to crumple, or do we fix it now?”
Proposed urban-renewal area could boost university development by $100 million
How are government budgets created, and in whose interests?
National
Since the 2010 elections, when Republicans took control of many states, there has been an explosion of legislation advancing privatization of public schools and stripping teachers of job protections and collective bargaining rights.
Republicans are in talks about pushing a bill to extend the Bush-era tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 before the November election, and ahead of their expiration in January.
The Buffett Rule bill would "restore the confidence of middle-class Americans in our tax system by assuring that those at the very top of the income spectrum aren't paying lower rates than regular families do."
Mass Action Gets Results
There are no donor names, no clues as to whether they are individuals, companies or trade groups, and no hint as to whether there are repeated donors from year to year.