Beat Check with The Oregonian

A new investigation published in The Oregonian/OregonLive focuses on the life of an Oregon girl who was repeatedly trafficked for sex and on how the foster care system had failed to protect her. On the latest Beat Check, investigative reporter Hillary Borrud talked about the story, including how sex trafficking of children can happen in a city like Portland and why our state is failing those most at risk. Read more: Oregon teen repeatedly sex trafficked. How the foster system failed her 5 things to know about how Oregon’s foster system failed to protect teen from sex trafficking Video: How Oregon’s foster system failed to save a teenager from sex trafficking Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re a few days out from Election Day 2024, and reporters at The Oregonian/OregonLive have been hard at work trying to decode all the results and what they mean for our region. Portland’s got a new mayor, and the new City Council is coming into focus too. Voters chose two new progressive Multnomah County Commissioner candidates over their more moderate opponents, while the Clackamas County Commission is on the verge of a big power shift. Democrats remain in the driver’s seat in Salem, and are poised to win nationally watched Congressional races in the Pacific Northwest too. This week’s podcast breaks it all down, plus we’ll get into the Election Day moments we’ll still be thinking about six months from now. Related coverage: Mayor-elect Keith Wilson says he’ll once again make Portland ‘the city that works’ Progressives Meghan Moyer, Shannon Singleton capture seats on Multnomah County board of commissioners Janelle Bynum wins race for Congress, flipping U.S. House seat from GOP to Democratic control Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In one of the most contentious and consequential elections in recent memory, Oregon has become ground zero for one of the most intriguing and potentially important races in the United States. District 5, a wide swath of Oregon that stretches from SE Portland to Albany to Bend, is home to a heated and hotly-contested political showdown between Republican incumbent Lori Chavez-DeRemer and Democratic challenger Janelle Bynum, who are vying for a spot in the U.S. House of Representatives. The winner of the race, which is one of only a handful of battleground matchups this election cycle, could shift the balance of power in congress. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Oregonian/OregonLive's Maxine Bernstein reported on the two-week trial in federal court that brought to light a pattern of crimes by defendant Negasi Zuberi. A final twist as the case was headed to the jury threatened to hold up the final verdict. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The senior vice president at DHM Research decodes his firm's recent polling on the Portland mayor's race, voter attitudes about downtown and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At the end of September, when the federal government canceled Oregon’s first-ever offshore wind lease sale, many people were left with questions about why and what’s next. The announcement from the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management came after Gov. Tina Kotek sent a letter to the agency asking it to stop the Oct. 15 auction. Kotek cited tribal opposition and a tribal lawsuit among the reasons for halting the lease sale. That lawsuit was filed by the Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians, which has emerged over the past two years as one of the most vocal opponents of offshore wind, demanding the bureau conduct in-depth reviews of the impacts of floating turbines on marine life and fishing areas. Despite the lawsuit and the canceled auction, the tribal confederation has continued talks with the federal agency. Because the reality is that the turbines are badly needed to generate clean electricity and help achieve state and federal climate goals. The questions remain: how and where should these projects be built? Brad Kneaper, Tribal Council chair with the Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians and Rick Eichstaedt, the tribes’ attorney, talked on Beat Check about why his tribes decided to sue to halt the auction and what the path forward for Oregon’s offshore wind is. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the latest Beat Check, Oregonian/OregonLive reporters Shane Dixon Kavanaugh and Julia Silverman discuss the prospects of Portland mayoral hopefuls Rene Gonzalez, Carmen Rubio and Keith Wilson. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The general election is fast approaching and Oregon journalists are working hard to inform voters. The Oregonian/OregonLive’s politics team is tackling everything from congressional races to local measures. A particular focus this fall is Portland’s new ranked-choice voting system. Jamie Goldberg, who with Betsy Hammond leads the newsroom’s politics team, joined Editor Therese Bottomly for a conversation about all of the information we’re providing prospective voters as we approach the date when ballots go out. --We cover key dates to watch for --We talk about recent concerns regarding ineligible voters --We highlight various tools on OregonLive for readers to find out more Find all of our general election 2024 coverage at oregonlive.com/election-preview All of our coverage on Portland’s new system is at oregonlive.com/topic/portland-government The Oregonian/OregonLive’s interactive map for Portland voters is here. Our video explainer is at here, using donuts to explain the new system. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Connie Chung is an icon. It’s been almost 20 years since she was regularly on air, but she’s still a household name and a namesake for a generation of Asian American women. Americans remember her as one of the faces of the news, from the 1970s through the early 2000s. She interviewed Nixon and Oregon’s one-time Olympic darling-turned-national villain, Tonya Harding and covered the events that rocked the country from the O.J. Simpson trial to the Oklahoma City bombing. In “Connie: A Memoir” released Tuesday from Grand Central Publishing, Chung, now 78, tells her own story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

School is back in session, but September has been warmer than usual. Thousands of students in the Portland area were let out of school early or had classes canceled earlier this month as temperatures reached triple digits and dirty air from wildfires in the region triggered air quality alerts. With extreme weather events on the rise both during summers and winters, schools are being forced to adjust to the impacts of a warming climate, including by upgrading their buildings, swapping gas-gurgling buses for electric ones and writing new climate-focused curriculums, among others. Julia Silverman, The Oregonian’s education reporter, talked on Beat Check about how schools are hoping to fund new HVAC systems and other climate-related changes, what approaches rural schools are taking and why climate-related learning disruptions can significantly hamper student success. Read more about schools’ response to climate change on The Oregonian/OregonLive.com: Portland-area schools hope city will fund more AC and climate upgrades, via clean energy tax proceeds How shabby or shiny are your local schools? In Oregon, it depends where you live 6 down, 3 to go as another renovated high school opens in Portland With extreme heat in the forecast, Portland-area school districts weigh their options Students, legislators push for school districts to tackle climate change A Portland high school student has Oregon governor’s ear on environmental justice Young Somali American brings green Islam movement to Portland Students nationwide have rebounded after pandemic. But not in Oregon. Consequences could be severe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Portland City Hall is on the verge of some truly monumental changes, ranging from the radical transformation of how the city’s government operates to an historic election in November that will usher in a new mayor and expanded 12-member City Council. The work to get here has now been years in the making. Few have followed the twists and turns of this civic saga as closely as Maja Viklands Harris. A longtime journalist and local government watcher, Harris is the founder of Rose City Reform, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news and research site that’s become a must-read for reporters, political insiders and many of the people seeking local elected office this fall. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

new wave energy test site is nearly complete off the Oregon coast. The site, overseen by Oregon State University, will allow private developers to test devices that can harness the power of ocean waves, a technology that’s still in its infancy. The hope is that wave energy can become another major source of clean, renewable electricity akin to solar or wind power and can help power the world’s clean energy transition. Burke Hales, a professor at Oregon State University and the chief scientist at the test site, talked on Beat Check about why Oregon is at the forefront of this new technology and what the challenges are going forward. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last month, watchdog reporter Ted Sickinger published an in-depth article examining a loophole in the Oregon Lottery’s rules. In Oregon, it is perfectly legal to re-sell your winning lottery ticket at a discount, allowing the buyer to claim the prize. Why would anyone do this? Well, if they wanted to avoid having the state seize part of their winnings for taxes or back child support, for example. And why would the state allow this? Lottery officials told Sickinger they were aware of the practice of “discounting” and despite the fact other states have moved to close down similar schemes elsewhere nothing had been done in Oregon to prohibit the workaround. Sickinger joined Editor Therese Bottomly on “Beat Check with The Oregonian” to talk about how he got onto the story and how he tracked down participants willing to talk with him. He also talked about reaction to his piece. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 2024 fire season so far hasn’t encroached on as many highly populated areas or forced as many mass evacuations as some recent years. But it’s been historic nonetheless. More acres have burned across the state than in any year since at least 1992, when officials started keeping a reliable tally. Sujena Soumyanath and Fedor Zarkin, public safety reporters for The Oregonian/OregonLive, discussed fire damage to date, dispatches from the front lines and the outlook for the rest of the season on Beat Check with The Oregonian. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Portland, like much of Oregon, is still in the throes of a housing crisis. Rents and home prices continue to squeeze some residents and move further out of reach for many more. Developers who could help reverse these troubling tends are skittish. Meanwhile, the dream of converting swaths of empty offices in Portland’s beleaguered downtown to apartments remains elusive and unlikely to materialize in the near future — if ever. On the latest Beat Check, reporters Shane Dixon Kavanaugh and Jonathan Bach discuss Portland’s housing crunch and how it could be solved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This summer marked the debut of The Oregonian/OregonLive’s first long-form serial narrative podcast with Wondery. “Happily Never After” rapidly climbed the charts and left listeners wanting more about the case of Nancy Crampton Brophy, convicted of murdering her husband, a Portland chef. Reporter Zane Sparling, who covers Multnomah County Courts for The Oregonian/OregonLive, held an “Ask Me Anything” on Reddit to answer burning questions. For “Beat Check with The Oregonian,” Editor Therese Bottomly welcomed Sparling back to revisit the successful podcast (an excellent diversion for a summer vacation). “Since the 2022 trial, I’ve spent the past two years interviewing dozens of people about Dan and Nancy, reviewed thousands of pages of police reports, listened in on Nancy’s jail calls — and, yes, read through all her novels.,” Sparling said. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new state-wide coalition wants to add an environmental rights amendment to the Oregon Constitution. It would enshrine the right to a healthy environment in the Bill of Rights. Proponents say making the right to a healthy environment a fundamental right is key in the era of human-made climate change. Right now, such a right is not explicitly spelled out in Oregon and only a few states – Montana, Pennsylvania and New York – do include it in their Constitutions. Nationwide, advocates are pushing to pass similar so-called ‘green amendments’ in all 50 states, with several states working actively on the effort. In Oregon, the amendment could be added through a legislative referral or a ballot initiative. Linda Perrine, an organizer with the Oregon Coalition for an Environmental Rights Amendment, talked on Beat Check about what a green amendment means, why it’s needed in Oregon and whether it will harm the state’s economic development. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Few helped define the Portland food scene that would fuel the city’s glowing reputation for innovation and creativity the last two decades than Naomi Pomeroy, the celebrated chef, cookbook author and James Beard Award winner. Pomeroy died July 13 in a tragic accident while floating on the Willamette River near her hometown of Corvallis. She was just 49. On the latest Beat Check, Oregonian/OregonLive food critic Michael Russell and I talk about Pomery’s indelible impact on Portland and beyond. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Many consumers want to do their part to slow down global warming and they’re flocking to companies that try to do less harm to the planet. Companies, in turn, love to claim they’re environmentally friendly, sustainable or carbon neutral. Because in a world battered by climate change, it’s not just morally right to fight climate change, it also pays off. Nike, the world’s largest sports apparel brand, has been at the forefront of environmentally friendly commitments. The company has promised to significantly slash its emissions by 2030. It has touted innovations that would not only lessen its impact on global warming but also become a “powerful engine for growth” and an industry model. But in December, Nike started slashing its sustainability workforce, leading to doubts about how the company can fulfill its carbon reduction pledges. Nike executives told The Oregonian the company remained committed to its sustainability goals and has made them everyone’s job. On Beat Check, Matthew Kish, a business reporter who covers the apparel industry for The Oregonian, talked about why apparel companies like Nike are interested in sustainability, how they’re planning to fulfill their promises and why they may have trouble doing so. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Forecasts for this past weekend called for another lengthy heatwave, with temperatures exceeding 100 degrees for four days in a row — maybe longer. This won’t be the Portland area’s hottest stretch. That was a 2021 heat wave when temperatures hit 116 degrees. About 100 people died in Oregon. But this 2024 heat wave might end up among the longest, which weather officials say could be similarly dangerous. Environment reporter Gosia Wozniacka joined host Elliot Njus to discuss this dangerous effect of climate change and how the Portland region is preparing for more frequent, more severe heat events. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices