This is something that actually makes me laugh greatly. I recall being stalker called by the parks "movement" at the time. The gal on the phone was amazed at my level of understanding and when she went to the "so, we can count on your vote?" I said absolutely...not. I even told her the oldest joke in Portland lore: what is white and sleeps three? Answer: a City of Portland truck.

I am glad to see the $1.1 million spent renovating O'Bongload square downtown.

Awesome.

The O had the same headline buried in the Metro section today.

What a surprise maintenance money used for new parks. As one of the people who voted NO on this, I can't help but gloat over the majority of voters here stupid enough to take our elected officials at their word.

"used for new parks."

Sorry, meant new and unsustainable withour further tax increases PROJECTS.

Why can't there be something done about it? I thought a couple years ago a ballot measure that passed with untrue title and description was reversed by the state elections division, then Oregon courts.

Why do we keep saying "nothing can be done". With the number of attorneys we have in this state, and many with not enough clients, please do something.

"Former Commissioner Jim Francesconi was in charge of the bureau when the levy was placed on the ballot."

There's your problem, right there.

Here is the man who was hired, and failed to recuse himself for conflict of interest, to negotiate the illicit transfer of city parks land from Mt. Tabor Park to the private landholders of Warner Pacific College.

Zari Santner, the Director of the Parks Bureau appointed by Commissioner Francesconi, and Robin Grimwade, an assistant who'd been run out of Sydney, Australia, ahead of an mob angry at him for leasing, long-term, park property to FOX Broadcasting and McDonald's, were the two people at the PPB who dealt with Francesconi and Warner Pacific. They did not even want to inform the public, including those who live immediately next to the affected properties.

Again, Santner and Grimwade, probably along with a lot of other Santner appointees, need to be expunged from the city employee roles before they engage in any more shady deals with civic property. Termination is called for.

(If Grimwade gets the job in the 'Couv, look for a KFC/TacoBell right in the middle of the Ft. Vancouver stockade at the park...with signs that can be seen from the interstate bridge.)

Oh...I'd also like to pass on something else I learned in the recent past....

"Policy" as they discuss it at city hall? It has no meaning whatsoever. City staff are no legally beholden to do anything just because it is a stated "policy" of the city or any city bureau. This has been made clear by an Oregon administrative judge.

So...The next time some city employee throws that phrase, "It's city policy," out there as some kind of tool to mollify angry public meeting attendees...throw it back in their face. Make it clear that their "policy" don't mean s**t.

Policy decisions are a waste of time, the public's, the council's, and the staff's. Terminate public discussions of city bureau "policies" as useless propaganda to obfusticate the real goals of staffers and council members.

I'm just waiting for someone to trot out the old nag, "But it's going to create (fill in the blank) new jobs!"

One word: Wapato.