Mayor Greenie drives a GMC pickup?

Don't forget that with Sam it's "Do as I say, not as I do." He's a jerk!

AHH..when it rains, it can really pour!

Question:Texting Merritt, or Randy, or Vera?

58 days and counting!

"A source with the Portland Police Bureau told KATU News they believed the mayor mistakenly hit the accelerator instead of the brake."

Unbelievable.

Maybe a cell phone conversation?

I'd like to see the mayor take a drug test.

Maybe he was overdosed on reality, and couldn't handle it.

Fear and Loathing in Portland.

No problem. The council just declares the parking lot a blighted area and we move forward from there.

While the idea of seeing what kind of drugs are flowing through Creepy's system is certainly compelling...I had to pee in a cup to get my lofty job position...what is far, far more hilarious is what "antiplanner" and "Westsideguy" noted.

He's driving a goddamn pickup truck. Like me. I drive, in my off hours, a pickup truck, because I can take the entire engine apart and put it back together, haul things in it, and live in the back if need be.

Mayor Greenie and his coven of like-minded hypocritical elitists, if they could, would do everything in their power to make it more and more prohibitively expensive for regular Joes like me to drive solid, dependable, useful vehicles like pickup trucks through raising taxes and fees on their ownership by unprecedented amounts.

What unmitigated gall.

But does this surprise you in the least, Dear Reader ?

It reminds me of the developers and planners who laugh all the way to the bank as a result of Portland's forced density mandates, while living in large houses set back from the street, with plenty of greenery and room for their gardens.

the mayor mistakenly hit the accelerator instead of the brake

This happens to people in their 70's and 80's. I fear the mayor is starting to lose it. What kinds of medications does he take?

You'd hit the accelerator too if you thought you had only a few weeks left in office to get somewhere.

Sam drives a vehicle that also likes to hit rear ends? Here's a hint, the accelerator is the bigger peddle by ones right foot.

I'm surprised the PPB didn't offer him a ride home.

If I saw my boss climbing into a tow truck, I wouldn't hesitate to offer anyway.

I keep wondering when the people of Portland are going to wake up. Do they know how many honest folks the City government has either corrupted or chewed up and spit out because they were honest enough to stand up and say something was wrong.

Should we be waiting for the spin? Just a regular guy, living a regular guy life,with regular guy problems.

Shouldn't he have been biking to Bike Toys?

Wow....a big 'ol pickup? All that talk about "SUVs" and mass transit...and Creepy drives a gas hog. Im in shock.

How old were the cars he hit? I guess if the cars he hit on were older than 18 years it's OK.
sorry...

If this was the 1970s, Sam would have said the following to the person he rear-ended:

"Sorry. I thought you were Beau!"

At least it wasn't hit and run. That would by Hayden go seek.

Car Toys? That big box electronics store?

I've got money that says within a year he'll be huffing spray paint behind WalMart.

I've never known any generally incompetent person to be able to successfully prevent their own issues from becoming a burden to everybody else. They just can't help it.

Where was the field sobriety test? Adams is an alcoholic (something else he denys). Why didn't the police conduct the test?

Did he rear-end a carload of teenage boys?

Did he

Wouldn't it have been a conflict of interest for PPB to handle the scene? Shouldn't they have called a county sheriff or state trooper to deal with the situation?

While there is certainly a degree of Schadenfreude inherent in this, it is also somewhat painful watching a public figure spiral down the gurgler at such an exponential rate...

The accident apparently took place on private property, so the Portland Police couldn't issue a citation.

DIDN'T WANT TO, you mean. Seems like he disturbed a few people's peace. He could've killed somebody in that parking lot.

I can't think of any reason the Mayor would be distracted. Not a single one.

State and local police have the authority to cite motorists for certain violations that occur on private property that is open to the public, such as store parking lots.
811.135 Careless driving; penalty. (1) A person commits the offense of careless driving if the person drives any vehicle upon a highway or other premises described in this section in a manner that endangers or would be likely to endanger any person or property.

(2) The offense described in this section, careless driving, applies on any premises open to the public and is a Class B traffic violation unless commission of the offense contributes to an accident. If commission of the offense contributes to an accident, the offense is a Class A traffic violation.

ORS 801.400 defines "premises open to the public" to mean "any premises open to the general public for the use of motor vehicles, whether the premises are publicly or privately owned and whether or not a fee is charged for the use of the premises." That's been the law since 1973.
So the Portland police certainly had the authority to cite the Mayor if they thought that he had driven his truck in a manner likely to endanger persons or property, whether or not he actually collided with anyone or anything.

Looks like it's time for the Oregonian to fire up another public records request on Sodomy Sam's phone/text records.

Mayor Greenie drives a GMC pickup?

Adams has *two* autos, in fact--a car and a truck. it's well known (to those not buying the campaign hype) that he rarely rides a bicycle--he often commutes to work by car or truck.

Which made his campaign video of him dressing in a suit and commuting by bicycle especially humorous.

I guess if the police could have cited the mayor for careless driving, they should have particularly if he admitted at the scene that he mistakenly hit the accelerator instead of the brake pedal. I think that's what happens to other drivers who go crashing into stores even when no one is injured.

That wrong peddle excuse is crap.

He was probably on his cell phone or someother more plausible cause and he's just lying, again.

Pretty insulting to peddle the pedal excuse.

After all, it wasn't an Audi 5000.

I'm bettin' he was hammered.

Full-size GM pickup?

Half-assed hypocrite!

Just because his truck wound up in a parking lot doesn't mean that's where the collision, or careless driving, occurred.

You're absolutely right, Jack. And from the sounds of this in the KATU story:

The crash, which involved three vehicles, happened just after 7 p.m. on North Hayden Island Drive.

that's exactly what happened. North Hayden Island Drive is a public street under the jurisdiction of the City of Portland.

...He doesn't have the stones for any other method, so he was trying to end it all by gunning it into traffic. That, or this is just a cry for help...

The O says it happened in the parking lot at 1457 North Hayden Island Drive, however.

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/05/adams_involved_in_minor_car_ac.html

I don't think we've got the full story, though.

Looking at the amount of damage sustained by the vehicles, this was no "fender bender". The side of that Honda is all bashed in.

According to The O story, a witness says the mayor's pickup pushed the two cars across the Car Toys' parking lot after it went "over a curb outside the store."

That was a minor fender bender. Here is a privileged individual from my hometown who had a slightly more serious crash last week.

So when the mayor's off the clock, he drives around in a big GMC truck and shops at big box stores. Niiice. On the bright side (for him), at least he wasn't at WalMart, and he didn't hit any cyclists.

When the other shoe drops, we'll learn his real name isn't "Sam Adams" (like anyone really believed *that*), and he's secretly got a wife and kids back home in Boise.

I wonder how many people he would have to run over before he considered it to be something more than a "personal matter".

It may be instructive if someone from the "O" or WW reviewed the parking lot security tapes at Car Toys, if available for this incident. Too many questions unanswered...

"So the Portland police certainly had the authority to cite the Mayor if they thought that he had driven his truck in a manner likely to endanger persons or property, whether or not he actually collided with anyone or anything."

No, this isn't true because of ORS 153.042. The police have to actually be present when the violation occurs in order to cite a driver. That doesn't necessarily mean that Sam gets away with it. If any person who witnessed the incident is motivated enough, that person may cite Sam and then represent the State of Oregon in court on the violation. The wonderful law is ORS 153.058, "A person other than an enforcement officer may commence a violation proceeding by filing a complaint with a court that has jurisdiction over the alleged violation[...]"

Of course if you are a member of the Bar and try to use this law to prosecute government officials who think they don't have to follow the law, some of the crazies in Portland will ridicule you and tell you how much they hate lawyers, even though the whole point of the law is to open up the courts to non-lawyers. If a witness cited Sam Adams with careless driving and volunteered his or her time to prosecute, that effort would be a meaningful public service.

So why wasn't he riding a bus? If Trimet is good enought for us, especially the poor, it is good enough for him and that is all the time.

I dont care about the crash. Anna Song sure looked good telling me the story

There doesn't appear to be any follow-up on this story. The O online article doesn't even appear to allow comments.

Absolutely nothing on the news this evening.

If he hit the other two cars hard enough to require that they all be towed, he must have blasted over that divider or the other two vehicles were mighty small cars. I wonder if anybody was in them or if they were simply parked. The owners were apparently nearby since the PoPo made sure all involved exchanged information.

E - Have a look at the exception in ORS 153.042, specifically ORS 810.410(4).

Oops, I was wrong about the Oregonian article. It was the Trib article that didn't allow comments.

Further info said observers thought the mayor was doing at least 25-30 mph when he tried to pass the Subaru on the right and T-boned it. Then he continued to push it over a divider and into a Honda before continuing on at speed and peeling into a nearby parking lot.

At least one observer reported smelling beer on the mayor's breath and the Subaru had to be towed and its owner went to the emergency room for observation.

And there was no sobriety test and no citations.

If it were you or I, there would probably have been both.