Slant

Renter evictions and EW wins awards

• How many renters get evicted in Lane County each year? The numbers are not easy to come by, but local demographics mapper Joe Kosewic has tracked the landlord cases that end up in court in Oregon and broken down the numbers by county. Evictions that are uncontested far outnumber actual court cases, he figures. Lane County had 1,794 court-contested evictions in 2016. Multnomah County had 5,446, Washington County had 2,952 and Marion County had 1,951. Kosewic says the Residential Eviction Complaint form doesn’t track whether children are involved in the evictions. “Student residential mobility is a major problem,” he says, “that disrupts the students’ social network and academic development.” Kosewic’s data and graphic maps are available by emailing him at kosewic1@gmail.com.

• This week in kudos: EW’s Corinne Boyer has been awarded a Journalism and Women Symposium Emerging Journalist Fellowship. The fellowship is given annually to ten women nationwide who are in the beginning stages of their journalism careers. The fellowship sends Boyer to the JAWS Conference and Mentorship Project, where fellows meet leading women in the journalism field to share their skills and learn new ones.

EW’s Rick Levin and Todd Cooper are finalists in the 2017 Association of Alternative Newsmedia Awards. Levin is a finalist in the Arts Criticism category for his review of the documentary “It’s Not Funny Anymore — In Tickled, journalist David Farrier exposes the wealth, power and abuse behind a bizarre Internet fetish.” Cooper is a finalist in the Photography category for his submission 2016 in Music, a series of ten photographs. The awards will be announced on July 29 at the AAN Convention in D.C.

• It’s an exciting time for Eugene and Oregon, three speakers told the City Club of Eugene June 16. Because of the University of Oregon, basic scientific research is leading to thriving businesses right here, and the coming of the billion-dollar Knight campus will accelerate this movement. Speakers were Don Tucker, CEO and chief scientist of Electrical Geodesics; Matt Beaudet, CEO of NemaMetrix; and Richard Geiger, CEO of Dune Sciences. Dr. David Conover, vice president for Research and Innovation at the UO, asked the speakers for their advice to the school. Their answers: foster connections, offer internships for UO students, encourage these outstanding students to stay in Eugene.

• On July 1, the minimum wage in Lane County goes up to $10.25, in Portland metro area to $11.25 and in “nonurban” counties to $10. By July 1, 2022, our county will be up to $13.50. Oregon’s Legislature is doing better than the federal government, but where’s that $15 an hour, the least we should have in progressive Oregon? Sooner, please.

• Portland-based dance band The Slants won at the U.S. Supreme Court June 19 when the justices ruled unanimously that The Slants can trademark their name, offensive or not. The federal Patent and Trademark Office had refused to register the name, ruling it was a racial slur. That was the point, argued Slants founder and bassist Simon Tam. “We were bringing more awareness to issues of oppression by using our art as a platform,” he told EW in March. Said the court: “Speech may not be banned on the ground that it expresses ideas that offend.” The 39-page opinion adds that Trump-appointee Neil Gorsuch “took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.”