Good Morning, News: Expand Sunday Parkways, Oregon Honors (Ugh!) Charlie Kirk, and Blazers Stay Alive Thanks to… Panda Express?

• Portland’s Sunday Parkways program—in which neighborhoods shut down streets so they can solely be used by cyclists, skaters, and pedestrians—is AWESOME, and follows in the footsteps of other countries with similar programs. The big difference? Rather than closing a few streets for a few weekend days during the summer, our Latin American neighbors continue the program for weeks. Our Taylor Griggs knows this from experience, and in her latest and always excellent Street View column, she breaks down why creating a more balanced car-to-pedestrian ecosystem will benefit everyone.

Comic book conventions have come a long way since their start in dark basements, and are now exploding in popularity. So what’s different? Photojournalist @corbinsmith.bsky.social attended the Rose City Comic Con, and came back with a great story and pics! 📸
www.portlandmercury.com/photo-essay/…

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— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) September 12, 2025 at 5:08 PM

• Thanks to the state legislature—who in turn are blaming Trump’s federal cuts—Oregon homeless services providers and tenant advocacy groups are being forced to lay off sizable portions of their staffs, after state officials reduced their funding to the tune of roughly $1 billion over the next two years. So while the housing plan does include a substantial amount of money for houseless shelters, the money to prevent evictions—which goes to groups like the Community Alliance of Tenants, who had to let go almost their entire staff—has been decimated. And unless the community steps in to save these organizations, don’t expect things to improve soon: Thanks to the effects from Trump’s tariffs, forecasters predict the state will have “hundreds of millions of dollars less to spend than anticipated for the state’s next budget.” Check out the eye-opening report from OPB. 

• Just a reminder that the reason that American flags across Oregon were flying at half-staff yesterday is due to an order from Governor Tina Kotek, in order to pay tribute to the recently assassinated Charlie Kirk, a hateful individual who spent much of his young life spreading and encouraging transphobia, racism, homophobia, and antisemitism, while helping Trump dismantle democracy. Wonder which horrible person Gov. Kotek will choose to honor next?

After marching through Eugene and holding a candlelight vigil in honor of slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk, the crowd lifted an enormous American flag into the air. Organizers said it was the same one that hung off the side of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

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— OPB (@opb.org) September 15, 2025 at 8:30 AM

• The sale of the Portland Trail Blazers to Tom Dundon—owner of the NHL’s Carolina Hurricanes and pickleball fanatic—reportedly became official on Friday, when Dundon also announced he would be purchasing the team with help from the owners of a couple of venture capitalist firms, as well as the Cherng Family Trust, which famously owns… [*checks notes*] Panda Express? Panda Express! (Look, if it will keep the Blazers in Portland, I don’t care if they’re owned by Arby’s!)

• If you noticed that gas prices took a big leap lately—surpassing $4.50 per gallon, or an average of 16 cents more than you’ve been paying—you are not crazy. The culprit? Not Trump (this time), but a major pipeline outage which stopped the flow of gas to the state for 10 days. While the outage was reportedly repaired and gas is flowing again, prices are expected to stay high through this week, and potentially longer.

 • The final album from Portland’s beloved and late musician, Michael Hurley (who died in April), came out on No Quarter Records this past Friday. Ben Salmon reviewed Broken Homes and Gardens for the Mercury, to celebrate the “conclusion of one of the great recording careers of the past century.”

Yippee! It’s time for another super fun edition of POP QUIZ PDX. In this week’s brainy trivia quiz: a Powell’s Books controversy, the spider that’s watching you as you sleep, and what chores should we give the invading National Guard? 🤔 See how well YOU score!

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— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) September 11, 2025 at 9:32 AM

• After months of threats to “shut ‘er down” by the Trump administration, there is reportedly a “framework of a deal” to keep TikTok alive in the United States. In the past year, Trump has set multiple deadlines (which he has consistently backpedaled on) to ban TikTok due to national security concerns, and this newest deal with the Chinese government would allow the app to continue operating in the US. The deal reportedly hinges on two undisclosed “private parties” who agreed to take control of the site’s algorithm, which dictates what users see on TikTok—which is not, like, suspicious and creepy at all, is it?

• Tyler Robinson—a 22-year-old white Utah resident—has been arrested on suspicion of murdering transphobe/racist/antisemite Charlie Kirk while he was speaking on a college campus last week. According to Republican Utah Governor Spencer Cox—SO PLEASE TAKE THIS WITH THE APPROPRIATE GRAIN OF SALT—the suspected murderer was “left-leaning” and spent a lot of time in “the dark places of the internet” where he may have been radicalized. FBI Director Kash Patel also had some theories about the incident, but since he is well regarded as a lying buffoon who has already impeded the investigation once before, I cannot with good conscience repeat anything he says.

• Meanwhile, Donald Trump’s revenge tour continues: King Fool is once again threatening Washington, DC, after the city’s mayor, Muriel Bowser, said that local police would cease assisting ICE now that Trump’s 30-day “emergency” declaration has expired. This naturally infuriated the always deeply insecure Trump, who squealed on Truth Social, “I’ll call a National Emergency, and Federalize, if necessary!!!” (Okay, Susan… calm down.) Trump is also itching to get his tiny, bruised hands on Memphis, Tennessee (another blue city), threatening to send in the “National Guard and anybody else we need. And by the way, we’ll bring in the military too, if we need it.” (Can someone please tell this dipshit that the National Guard IS the military?)

• At last night’s Primetime Emmy Awards, the big winners were HBO’s The Pitt (a more gruesome carbon copy of ER with cuss words), and Apple TV’s The Studio (a fitfully funny and often cringey satire of the Hollywood studio system). However, it was Stephen Colbert who won the longest standing ovation of the night after he was unfairly fired by the Trump butt-licking CBS network, while several award recipients had plenty to say at the mic, including Hacks‘ star Hannah Einbinder who correctly shouted out “go Birds [the Philadelphia Eagles], fuck ICE, and free Palestine.”