The deadline for filing as a candidate in the May primary is now officially past. In the Portland City Council races, at least, not much happened at the last minute, which was 5:00 yesterday afternoon. Don Smith mentioned on this blog yesterday that he is dropping out of the Saltzman race, and someone named Cisco Holdman joined the field against Sten. Other than that, we're where we were the other day.

I'm not going to dismiss anyone prematurely -- I'll leave that up to The Oregonian (after they get all the candidates' favorite toothpastes compiled) -- but I count two or three serious challengers against Sten, and one or two serious challengers against Saltzman. If you're like me and ready to go with anybody but the incumbents in those seats, you've got several good choices.

I'll ruminate out loud about the candidates in some sort of organized way shortly. Meanwhile, there are 69 days 'til the primary, and 48 days to switch your party affiliation to indepenent if you want to sign a petition to get Ben Westlund on the ballot for governor.