News For Reasonable People

Washington state experienced one of the largest estimated increases in homelessness between 2019 and 2020 relative to other states in the U.S., according to recently released data from an annual report to Congress. Washington state reported an increase in homelessness of 6.2% between 2019 and 2020, the third largest increase among all states, the Seattle Times reported Saturday. Homelessness grew...

A California couple got more than they bargained for when they discovered a pest in their new home: the former owner, refusing to give up the keys and leave, thanks to a coronavirus eviction loophole. Tracie and Myles Albert experienced a nightmare after they put down money on a beautiful four-bedroom home in Riverside on Jan. 31, 2020. More than a year later, the couple is still fighting to move...

The state of Washington called in the National Guard to assist with a backlog in its unemployment system. According to The Columbian, the state Employment Security Department, with the help of 50 National Guard troops, will start contacting thousands of residents who received overpayment notices. According to the state agency, as many as 55,000 people may have received jobless benefits they were n...

A 22-year-old man who arrived in Portland just over two weeks ago was arrested after an afternoon protest at a downtown bank Thursday, only to be released and face arrest again a few hours later, accused of smashing a glass window of the federal courthouse, jail and court records show. Darby Marshall Howard, according to federal prosecutors, was among about 50 demonstrators who converged on the Ma...

The $2.225 million clapboard house is close enough to a local surf break that Mr. Mazer, a 33-year-old human-resources executive for a videogame company, can run to it with his surfboard tucked under his arm.  Another thing that makes his property emblematic of the neighborhood: He paid $213,000 less than the buyer in 2018, and $450,000 less than the buyer in 2016. The home, for which he paid over...

On Tuesday, Everett, Washington, a city 30 miles north of Seattle passed a controversial local ordinance that will bar people from sitting or lying down in a ten-block swath of the city. The ordinance passed in the Everett City Council 5 to one. It covers a section of the city's industrial area. Violators will either face a $500 fine or 90 days in jail when it goes into effect. Everett's...

Last fall, the City of Seattle’s Finance and Administrative Services (FAS) department sent a letter to the Office of the Washington State Auditor asking them to investigate the $3 million no-bid contract that Seattle City Council awarded to the Black Brilliance Research Project. Now the city’s Finance and Administrative Services (FAS) department has sent a letter to the Office of the Washington St...

Police arrested 13 protesters after detaining a group of more than 100 in the Pearl District for hours Friday night into early Saturday morning. Officers kettled the protesters, employing a controversial police tactic used to contain people within a perimeter. The practice has been at the center of multiple lawsuits and criticized by civil rights advocates and, to an extent, Mayor Ted Wheeler. The...

In almost any other year, a weak economy would cripple housing. But the flash-freeze recession of 2020 corresponded with a real-estate boom, led by high-end purchases in suburbs and small towns.  Even stranger, in America’s big metros, home prices and rents are going in opposite directions. Home values increased in all of the 100 largest metros in the U.S., according to Zillow data.  But in some o...

Housing activity during February remained hot around much of Washington state despite a significant accumulation of lowland snow over the Valentine’s Day weekend, according to the latest statistical report from the Northwest Multiple Listing Service. “It’s amazing how close the February numbers are when compared to February 2020, which was, of course, right before our world changed,” said Mike Gra...

The spring housing market is shaping up to be the leanest and most competitive ever. A sharp drop in new listings partly due to severe weather, combined with already record-low supply, will make it increasingly difficult for buyers to find their dream home at the perfect price. There were nearly half as many homes for sale at the end of February, compared with a year earlier, according to a new ca...

Watch out for a new scam from a fake Washington State Employment Security Department that's being sent by text message. The fraudulent text claims to be from the state's WA eServices and says the recipient's account needs "immidiate" attention. Don't click on it. And be aware that scammers are using every other avenue they can think of to get their bogus lures in fron...

Days after Portland recorded its 20th homicide, Mayor Ted Wheeler said Thursday he’ll seek $2 million in one-time funding to allow more proactive policing on city streets with greater civilian oversight to try to stem a growing wave of gun violence. The mayor made the announcement alongside religious and community leaders, who urged city officials to take immediate action to prevent more people fr...

On Tuesday, Parler dropped a lawsuit it had filed against Amazon in a U.S. District Court. Hours later, it filed a new lawsuit against the company, this time in King County Superior Court. The lawsuit Parler dropped was largely rooted in antitrust claims, asserting three claims: Amazon illegally sought to reduce competition in the social media sphere on behalf of Twitter; AWS breached its contract...

While Alabama, Mississippi and Texas will soon join more than a dozen other U.S. states without statewide mask requirements, many major retailers and employers aren't ready to nix mandatory face-covering amid a pandemic that killed more than 1,900 Americans on Thursday alone. Alabama Governor Kay Ivey is the latest to signal masks will soon be optional in her state. Kay on Thursday extended t...

There's still a lot of clean-up going on in downtown Portland. On Wednesday, crews were scrubbing graffiti off the windows at a vacated jewelry store, getting ready for a CVS pharmacy to move in. There are still plenty of people who work, shop, and live downtown who don't feel very safe about being there. "I tell my friends, don’t come here. I will come there to meet you," said...

Texas is lifting its mask mandate, Gov. Greg Abbott said Tuesday, making it the largest state to no longer require one of the most effective ways to slow the spread of the coronavirus. The announcement in Texas, where the virus has killed more than 43,000 people, rattled doctors and big city leaders who said they are now bracing for another deadly resurgence. One hospital executive in Houston said...

The city of Seattle cleaned up and swept an illegal homeless camp at Denny Park on Wednesday.  Serious crimes have plagued the park, but over the past few months, park residents have been connected with services and resources.  Councilmember Andrew Lewis tweeted he has visited the park at least twice a month since August with REACH, Health One, and JustCare. He has witnessed "dozens of Denny...

Some landlords with a smaller selection of rental properties in Washington state say they feel trapped due to the eviction moratorium.  Roger Telsey was trying to get his frustrations down on paper on Tuesday. The Gig Harbor retiree said all of his angst stems from a property he owns in Seattle. "It absolutely blows my mind," Telsey said. Telsey says a couple who moved into his Seattle h...

Zillow is now so confident in its ability to estimate the value of a home without ever setting foot inside, it will make a cash offer on select houses, including in Portland. The company announced the Zillow Offers initiative this week — 15 years after first posting its Zestimates, the oft-watched home-value estimates that have long been the source of much speculation about their accuracy by homeo...

President Biden appears to have erased Dr. Seuss from "Read Across America Day", the annual celebration of reading in honor of the legendary children's author, whose birthday falls on March 2. While Biden followed presidential tradition in proclaiming Tuesday "Read Across America Day," he bucked his predecessors by leaving out any mention of Dr. Seuss from the proclamation...

A business owner on the Venice Beach Boardwalk is closing his ice cream store after a rise in crime, drugs and encampments during the pandemic. Klaus Moeller, the co-owner of Ben & Jerry's at Venice Beach, said the ice cream shop opened three years ago in the area. "It was doing really well and Venice always had homeless people, but it's never been a problem and we've alway...

In another setback for Seattle’s pandemic-scuttled cruise business, Windstar Cruises is moving its headquarters from Seattle to Miami. The company, known for a small fleet of mid-size luxury vessels that operate worldwide, said Friday that it would relocate its downtown headquarters to Miami in June 2022. Christopher Prelog, Windstar Cruises’ president, said the move was driven by several factors,...

Tired of living in a blue state, some Oregonians want to change the map to join Idaho. And now residents of five Oregon counties will get a chance to vote on the proposed border change. Proponents of the measure say they want to maintain their rural values and join a Republican majority state. If approved, southern and eastern Oregon, as well as the northernmost part of California, would become pa...

An estimated 150 people marched through Portland's Pearl District Saturday night for several hours in a direct action protest in opposition to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Crowds began gathering around 9 p.m. at The Fields Park at 1099 Northwest Overton Street. Once the march began, some individuals in the group spray-painted the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services field...