WCS 25: Family time, out in The Numbers

I don’t want your reparations; all accolades will do

“No Donnell, I’m not going to redistribute my house, if that’s what you’re asking,” said the Northeast Portland friend whom I used to call White Girl Wasted.

Yo, I was only wondering how it feels to be an empty nester, only asking, Don’t you want less house?

But I can understand the confusion. My Black History Month-closing series on housing reparations in Portland is bound to hang over all of my shit, for at least a little while. The PDX Housing Solidarity Project stories and podcasts quickly became the most widely-consumed West Coast Sojourn content yet. I tried to lay some heavy ideas on y’all as lightly as possibly. Early feedback says I’ve succeeded.

And yeah, seriously. Your eyeballs are the only ask.

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The bulk of the most recent Portland visit was spent with family. On Saturday my nephew Torry gave me more Ultimate Fighting education than I’d previously been exposed to. Like, I learned that Trump has a huge, captive audience with Dana White’s mob that he services weekly. (More UFC stuff in the Jake Paul-Netflix item below).

Earlier that week, in my sister’s backyard I recorded this video for my Hall of Fame high school cross-country coach, who was about to turn 70:

The plan had been to make the video someplace gorgeous, like Santa Clarita. Nearly recorded my message there. Nearly waited to make the video until after I’d gotten a haircut and bought better clothes. Well, the check didn’t show. But if you watch what I say and consider how I look, the message I am sending grows stronger, no?

No? Well, later for you—but only after we run through these 10 true narratives and their subplots.

10 This just in: Portland cops still duplicitous thugs

On Saturday morning I walked into the Portland Institute of Contemporary Art, looking for a Policing Justice symposium and wildly distracted by fantastic installations.

When I made it into the panel discussion it was made clear that all of my time spent in California hadn’t made local cops less problematic. Like so many, I’d just forgotten. PICA/KOIN

• Former City Councilmember JoAnn Hardesty explained how her driving cop accountability campaigns moved Portland Police to attach her name to a phony hit-and-run report. A high-six figure settlement from the police last fall has allowed Hardesty to comfortably ponder her post-City Hall career.

• Panelists also revisited law enforcement lies attached to 2022’s Normandale racial justice protest murder, in which police and media falsely identified a protester as a shooter.

Lil Hit

• Their names cannot be used because they are minors, but the Hillsboro High students in this high school organizing story are standout villains, because they are organizing Nazis.
  Stumptown Research Collective

• Berkeley’s Boichik Bagels says it’s been targeted with anti-Semitic graffiti. Berkeleyside

This is my version of journalism busking. Do you yearn to tip your reporter? @Donnell-Alexander on Venmo is where you can exercise that option

9 Jake thinks he can beat Mike Tyson

In July, YouTube subscription monster Jake Paul is going to fight Mike Tyson on Netflix. Is this the very bottom of a sport that long ago lost is place of glory?
Yahoo Sports