Posted inNews

In Oregon, Trumpโ€™s Base Would Suffer Most From Medicaid Cuts

A reduction in federal funds would hammer Oregonians, particularly in rural Oregon

On Jan. 28, officials in Oregon and across the country reacted with alarm after being shut out of the reimbursement system for Medicaid, the federal and state health care program for low-income Americans. (The federal government contributes about 70%; states pay the other 30%.) NEW: My staff has confirmed reports that Medicaid portals are down […]

Posted inNews

New Data Shows Oregon Has the Nationโ€™s Second-Tightest Housing Market

And itโ€™s even tighter outside Portland

This month, the state began acting on the results of a long-awaited Oregon Housing Needs Analysis, hoping the trove of data will help policymakers solve Oregonโ€™s housing shortage. Lawmakers dug right in, inviting economists from the consulting firm ECOnorthwest to brief both the House Committee on Housing and Homelessness and the Senate Housing and Development […]

Posted inNews

Kotek’s Gift to Trade Unions Contradicts ODOT’s Analysis

The Oregon Department of Transportation found that it will be costly and disproportionately hit rural Oregon

Gov. Tina Kotek issued an executive order last month that will make highway projects more expensive, reduce bidding competition and benefit a relatively small number of workers โ€” who happen to be strong supporters of hers โ€” at the expense of many Oregonians. Who says so? Kotekโ€™s own agency, the Oregon Department of Transportation. On […]

Posted inNews

Wyden Decided Against Protecting the Owyhee, and Now Oregonians May Not Get Another Chance Soon

A Republican president and Congress reduce the likelihood of success

Dr. Julie Weikel, a retired large animal veterinarian, has been fighting to protect the Owyhee Canyonlands in Southeastern Oregon for a long time. How long? โ€œMy daughterโ€™s name is Owyhee, and sheโ€™s 43 years old,โ€ she says. Weikel, 78, now lives about 30 miles south of Burns in Harney County but treated animals from all […]

Posted inNews

Empire For Sale

Dr. Robert Pamplin concedes he raided his employees’ pension fund. Properties all over Oregon will now be sold so he can pay back tens of millions of dollars.

Efforts are underway, the Oregon Journalism Project has learned, to unwind one of the great timber fortunes in the state โ€” at the order of the federal government. On Dec. 26, Dr. Robert Pamplin Jr., 83, settled a lawsuit brought by the U.S. Department of Labor to resolve allegations he treated his company’s pension fund […]

Posted inNews

The Damned Deschutes

People who depend on an iconic Oregon river say a public utility is harming it.

MAUPIN, Oregon โ€” Alysia Littleleaf and her husband, Elke, make their living as fishing guides on the lower Deschutes River, near the Warm Springs Reservation. A major tributary of the Columbia River, the Deschutes irrigates farmland, generates electricity and is the lifeblood of Central Oregon’s biggest industry, tourism. The river and its high desert landscape […]

Sign up for newsletters

Get the best of The Source - Bend, Oregon directly in your email inbox.

Sending to:

Gift this article