🌱 Portland Needs More Trees + Young People Are Leaving Multnomah

How was your weekend, Portland? Was it restful? Fun? Everything you hoped it would be? I hope it was all of the above for you. We're in a whole new week now. Here's what's going on today.

First, today's weather:

Not quite as hot as yesterday, but we're still in for a sunny, sunny day with a high of 91.

Here are the top five stories today in Portland:

1. Why has Portland's relationship with non-profit Friends of Trees soured? Particularly at a time when the city is losing tree canopy AND has experienced unprecedented heat waves. Investigations have revealed a years-long power struggle between city bureaus that appears to have cut the number of annual tree plantings that are key to the city achieving its tree canopy goals — and, in the process, protect the people most vulnerable in extreme weather. (Oregon Public Broadcasting)
2. In the wake of massive sweeps of encampments in Portland’s Old Town neighborhood in May, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler deemed the city’s new approach to addressing the homelessness crisis an early success and announced he would take it citywide. But the evidence to support that claim of success is all but non-existent, an analysis by The Oregonian/OregonLive shows. That is largely because city officials have failed to collect meaningful data or coordinate with outside groups or agencies it works with, the analysis found. The city has no evidence any individuals it rousted from sleeping on the streets got permanent housing or other needed services. (The Oregonian)
3. According to the Portland police crime statistics report, we're on track to see a dramatic rise in crime this year, and we're only halfway through 2022. The crime statistics only go up to May of this year so far, but we can already tell from these numbers, that the number of violent offenses is trending higher than the year before. According to Portland Police's report, as of May, there have been at least 37 homicides this year, and at least 35 of those are from shootings. (KATU)
4. The latest figures from the Regional Multiple Listing Service demonstrate a marked cooling in Portland’s market for single-family homes. In its July 9 report for the month of June for Metro Portland, RMLS noted big drops in activity compared to a year ago and to May 2022. A chart of the interest rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage from Freddie Mac and the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank shows a reason buyers have gotten cold feet. The median sales price for homes in Metro Portland ticked down from $575,000 in May to $570,000 in June—still 9.4% higher than the median price in June 2021. (Willamette Week)
5. Young people are leaving Multnomah County. No, really. Millennials in their late 20s accounted for nearly a third of Multnomah County’s unprecedented population decline during the height of the pandemic, new Census data show. That large of a decline in people 25 to 29 years old is particularly striking when taking into account that only 8% of Multnomah County residents were in that age cohort last year. (The Oregonian)

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Today in Portland:

• Powell's Books presents Tiana Clark, Vanessa Friedman and Shayla Lawson in a virtual conversation with Katherine Morgan. In May 1962, Helen Gurley Brown's "Sex and the Single Girl" sent shockwaves through the United States, selling more than two million copies in three weeks. In their exceptional anthology, "Sex and the Single Woman" (Harper Perennial), editors Eliza Smith and Haley Swanson bring together insights from many of today’s leading feminist thinkers and writers to pay homage to Brown’s original work and reinterpret it for a new generation. Register online for this free discussion. 5 p.m.
• Join stand-up comedians Joyce Nance and Todd Basil at an incredible place to hang out: Conquer Bar in SE Portland. Enjoy some food and drink and a great comedy show. Featuring local Portland comics, POC, Queer, and Women comics. 7 - 9 p.m.
• It's time for another OMSI Science Pub and the topic tonight is RNA Viruses and DNA Viruses Can’t Recombine with Each Other, or Can They? In this talk, extreme virologist Ken Stedman will describe research in the eXtreme Virus Group at Portland State University on virus discovery in extreme environments and virus evolution. Don't really want to be around people? There is a Zoom option. 7 - 9 p.m.
• Looking for some dark entertainment? Check out Burlynomicon at the Coffin Club in SE Portland. Produced and hosted by Natasha Riot, Burlynomicon is a darkly decadent monthly showcase of performance featuring a rotating cast of cabaret and performance art talent from Portland and beyond, performers present art with a dark but humorous twist in the mythos inspired space of the world famous Coffin Club. Showtime is 7 p.m.
• Join Chief DannyBoy and Casey Freedom for their joint Debut at the LaurelThirst Public House in NE Portland. DannyBoy brings roots, rock, and folk from his hometown of Horizon Texas to Portland for the first time. He will be joined by Seattle area singer/songwriter Casey Freedom, who will be sharing some laid-back country and americana sounds. No Cover! Showtime is 9 p.m.

From my notebook:

• Portland Audubon: "Birds are an excellent source of inspiration and a joy to paint in watercolor. Join our live, online class on July 21 at 6 p.m. to paint Oregon's state bird, the Western Meadowlark, alongside Ronna Fujisawa, an experienced art educator." (Portland Audubon via Instagram)
• Summer is festival season here in Portland and we've got a big one coming up this weekend. Paseo, put on by the Portland Parks Foundation, will take place Friday through Sunday, July 15-17, in the South Park Blocks and Director Park. The festival is free. Paseo coincides with the opening of “Perspectives,” at the nearby Portland Art Museum. The exhibition, which is billed as “a collection of photographs by BIPOC photographers in Portland, Oregon, during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests,” opens Saturday, July 16, with a day of free admission. (The Oregonian)
• I was talking with someone just the other day about all the crazy, fun things that are happening Portland. I brought up Trek in the Park. Far from being a hiking group, Trek in the Park was a theater nerd's fever dream. Episodes on Star Trek TOS acted out live in parks around Portland. For those of you who missed out, here's a video of the spectacle. (YouTube)
• SINE (Survival Is Not Enough) is a mentorship and networking program for recent college graduates from communities of color. Established by Portland nonprofit The Contingent, the mentorship program helps young adults build wealth, navigate big financial decisions and become civically active leaders in their communities. In its first year, the program reported that more than half of its participants started paying down their debts, built savings funds, enrolled in retirement plans and earned raises at work. (The Oregonian)
• When Aubrey Gordon — the Portland-raised host of the podcast Maintenance Phase — talks about food publicly, it’s not often about food she actually enjoys. She and her co-host, journalist Michael Hobbes, dissect the myths surrounding fad diets, weight-loss products, fat-phobic medical bias, and phenomena in the sticky world of “wellness,” ranging from Jordan Peterson’s all-meat diet to Halo Top ice cream, Snackwell’s to celery juice. “Listen, I spent my morning yelling at Mike about a TV chef who later outed himself as a Nazi, so I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’ll talk about HK Café, sounds great,’” Gordon says, with a laugh. (PDX Eater)
• The Oregon Humane Society says it's struggling with staffing shortages and too many animals. OHS said shelters across the nation are also seeing similar issues and there's been an increase in requests to surrender pets, but they often don't have room. Officials say foster families that were available during the pandemic are now traveling for the summer or back in the office. Another issue they're dealing with is inflation. (KATU)

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That sounds like a fine Tuesday. A bit warm for me, but this is summer after all. Stay frosty, my friends, and join me back here tom0orrow for more stories about Portland.

— Dominic Anaya

About me: Doctor, educator and now a writer/artist, I'm just chillin' in Portland, OR with my wife, our ferrets, our chickens and our goats.

Have a news tip or suggestion for an upcoming Portland Daily? Contact me at portland@patch.com