Lemons and Laurels

Lemon to the Oregon Board of Forestry. The board is planning to up the cut by about 100-thousand acres on state-owned Tillamook and Clatsop state forests, tipping its priority towards logging and away from recreation, wildlife, fishing and global warming prevention and other environmental issues.

Laurel to those who helped bring about a best-in-the-nation 10-percent drop in crime for 2008. Among those who helped: TriMet, which increased policing of MAX lines, Portland police who helped bring car thefts down 30-percent by targetting volume stealers, and state legislators who regulated meth precursor drugs.

Lemon to the Portland school district for dismantling its only remaining year round school program--Peninsula--despite its popularity with students, parents and teachers and despite test scores above average for the school's demographic. The district sometimes tends to do what's institutionally easiest, instead of treating students and parents as customers.

Laurel to Oregon City High School. Even though a third of students come from low income homes it placed in the top ten high schools in Oregon in reading and math even edging Lake Oswego in math.

Lemon to Toyota for closing its Calfornia manufacturing plant three days after the taxpayer-funded cash for clunkers program ended. The biggest beneficiary of cash for clunkers? Toyota.

Laurel to the Portland Department of Transportation for the city's first cycle track. Located on Southwest Broadway near PSU, it provides a wide bike lane that runs between the curb and rows of parked cars and so should reduce the conflict between motorists and bicyclists and improve safety for both. It won't work in all parts of the City, but we'd like to see that principal of conflict reduction continued.