Here's the best tree in Sellwood, in my humble opinion:
It overlooks Oaks Bottom on Sellwood Boulevard. The poet Joyce Kilmer once famously wondered whether he'd ever see "a poem as lovely as a tree." Probably not, if the standard is his poem with the muddled metaphor.
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Steve Novick-- see his commentary piece in today's Big O-- concludes that a state's tax policy makes no difference in per capita income or unemployment. Maybe now anti-tax conservatives will stop the tiresome reference to tax increases as "job killers." Oregon, by the way, ranks 45th of the 50 states for total state and local taxes paid as a percentage of income.
A year ago, Novick wrote an amusing letter to the Tribune about the folly of privatizing government services. Here's what I wrote in my Feb. 24, 2004, Joe's School post:
"Lawyer Steve Novick came up with a clever response in today's Tribune
to those who argue that government should privatize services -outsource
them- in order to save money and to operate more efficiently. Here's
the letter he wrote:
Fine advice: 'Remember the trash cans'
The story on the price of trash cans, showing that TriMet is paying
$645 to $915 per can while the city of Portland pays $238, was very
interesting (Talkin' trash, Feb. 17). Portland, it seems, should be
very proud; city maintenance workers make trash cans themselves, while
TriMet pays a private vendor for its much more expensive cans.
Ironically, Steve Buckstein of the Cascade Policy Institute weighed in
to criticize TriMet's high costs. Cascade is a think tank that
consistently argues that governments could save money by contracting
services out to private vendors. In this case, TriMet took Cascade's advice, the city didn't, and the city is saving hundreds of dollars per garbage can.
The next time Cascade calls for a government service to be privatized,
opponents will have a rallying cry: "Remember the trash cans!"
Steve Novick
Citizens for Oregon's Future
Southeast Portland
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