This Week in Photos: Shopping Trip to the Oregon Flea Market

The beer that symbolizes the beginning of the city’s modern craft era continues to prove that it’s still relevant: Widmer Brothers Hefeweizen just snagged a silver at the prestigious World Beer Cup competition. The win came at a perfect time, too—just weeks before the return of an in-person celebration of Hefe Day at the North Portland production facility. The event will kick off an updated brewery tour, introduce the classic beer’s new branding, and allow attendees to sample just-released beers from Widmer’s innovation program. Widmer Brothers Brewing, 929 N Russell St., 503-281-3333, widmerbrothers.com. 11 am-4 pm Sunday, May 22. Free.

Sponsored content presented by Oregon’s Adventure Coast. After the bizzaro hail storms, snow and sleet this spring, I could not be more ready for some warm weather. And there’s no better place to celebrate clear skies and temps above 70 than on our state’s iconic coastline. I’ve already got 2 weekends planned to hit the beach - but this year, I’m venturing to the south coast for some new sights. Also, I’m hoping to avoid running into half of Portland while enjoying my lunchtime beer.

3950 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 707-500-2117, yespleasesmashburger.com. Noon-5 pm Wednesday-Sunday. As the child of a naturopath and a herbalist, Tai Pfeifer grew up eating fresh and healthy, and was determined to bring that to his slow fast food. The Yes Please Smash Burger is grass-finished (as opposed to “grass-fed,” a term that still allows grain consumption), and until recently, Pfeifer ground the meat himself, using a mixture of brisket and heart. He also makes his own American cheese from real cheddar, which doesn’t have the dozen-plus ingredients you’ll find in Kraft Singles. It’s also actually a cheese sauce, which gets poured directly on the burger during cooking, resulting in a fricolike crusty crispy cheese halo.

After a cool, showery spring and the meltdown of last year’s hot vaxx summer, people are itching to get outdoors. Now, one of the city’s top tourist destinations is making it easier for the coming throngs to get around town. Explore Washington Park and TriMet have partnered up...

Mike Bivins had supposedly left the scene of political extremism. As of October, Bivins had an administrative job at Oregon Health & Science University, where he had worked since 2006. He and his wife of nine years lived in a high-end apartment building in the Lloyd District. He had ceased the work two years earlier that had brought him some regional notice and bylines in Willamette Week: filming clashes between dueling protesters in the streets of Portland.

GROCERS BAG BOOZE MEASURE: The Northwest Grocery Association announced May 17 it was withdrawing Initiative Petition 35, which would have allowed Oregon grocery stores to sell hard liquor. Conceding the end of the NGA’s campaign, president and CEO Amanda Dalton still insists consumers want the convenience of one-stop shopping. “Oregonians firmly believe that we should be able to buy liquor along with beer and wine at their local grocery stores as our neighbors in Washington and California are able to do,” Dalton says. The campaign paid $100,000 to a signature-gathering firm earlier this month but never officially launched the initiative. Now, the NGA has determined it couldn’t have gathered 112,000 valid signatures by July 8, the deadline for placing the measure on the November ballot, blaming “the challenges of COVID and court delays in certifying a [ballot] title.”

The Northwest Grocery Association announced today it was withdrawing Initiative Petition 35, which aimed to allow Oregon grocery stores to sell hard liquor. In conceding the end of a quest to reach the November ballot, NGA president and CEO Amanda Dalton maintained her group’s assertion that Oregon voters want the convenience of one-stop shopping. Washington voters approved privatization in 2011 in a hard-fought campaign led by the NGA, which represents grocers in Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

Another COVID outbreak has hit the production group at Portland Center Stage, forcing the scrap the first week of its season-ending show. Today, the company’s director of marketing and communications announced the cancellation of several performances of Rent, the hit 1996 musical by Jonathan Larson. The production was scheduled...

Profile Theatre has canceled its production of Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ play Appropriate due to COVID-19. In an email, artistic director Josh Hecht stated that three members of Profile’s acting company had tested positive. “As with all Profile employees, artists, technicians and volunteers, they are fully vaccinated and experiencing only...

Rumors of Jo Ann Hardesty’s demise have been greatly exaggerated. Hardesty, the first Black woman on the Portland City Council, as well as its most progressive and polarizing member, enjoyed a comfortable lead over her two challengers Tuesday evening and appeared poised to advance to a November runoff. She...

Earlier this month, Multnomah County again led the state in the number of COVID-19 cases per capita. And on May 11, public health officials recommended that people once more don face masks indoors. It’s not a mandate. There will be no battles to get those who remain unconvinced of COVID’s...

Jessica Vega Pederson leads in early returns in the race for Multnomah County chair against fellow County Commissioners Sharon Meieran and Lori Stegmann. The trio of commissioners seek to succeed Deborah Kafoury, who was prevented by term limits from running again. Vega Pederson captured 38.62% of the vote in early...

Sometimes, home isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Kurt Schrader, a large-animal veterinarian, is the proud son of Clackamas County soil, but the place hasn’t been good to him in the current election. First, the county’s Democratic Party endorsed his rival, Jamie McLeod-Skinner, snubbing the homegrown...

The Democratic primary for Oregon’s new congressional district saw unprecedented spending—with more than $13 million spent by national super PACS to try to elect an outsider, Carrick Flynn. As of Tuesday night, Flynn appeared to have lost. Early returns showed him trailing state Rep. Andrea Salinas 41% to...

For most of the past two weeks, the story of the May 17 primary has focused on voter discontent as measured by a variety of polls. But Oregonians turned in a massive number of ballots in the last two days of the election, with more ballots postmarked on Election Day still to arrive.

Earlier this month, Multnomah County’s Joint Office of Homeless Services produced a much-awaited report on the number of people in the county without permanent homes. That report, known as the point-in-time count, is a snapshot that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requires of counties in exchange for federal funding for homeless services. As WW reported May 5, this year’s count showed a 50% increase since 2019 in the number of people who are “unsheltered”—that is, sleeping outside or in vehicles.

Metro Council President Lynn Peterson appeared headed for a comfortable victory tonight over challenger Alisa Pyszka. At 9:05 pm, Peterson held a lead of more than 20 percentage points. The picture is less clear than in many races, however, because Clackamas County hasn’t reported any results yet due to bar code failures on its ballots (the ballots will be duplicated by hand and then counted).

Already facing statewide scrutiny for her handling of ballots with printing irregularities, Clackamas County Clerk Sherry Hall was hit with another problem Thursday: a formal complaint by one of the congressional candidates whose fate rests in those ballots. The misprinted ballots require the Clackamas County Elections Office to re-bubble each...

The Republican primary for governor has been hard fought in a year when the party has its best chance in more than a decade—if not more than a generation—to take the governor’s mansion. In early returns, former state House Minority Leader Christine Drazan leads former state Rep....

Incumbent Portland City Commissioner Dan Ryan took an early and substantial lead in the primary election over his most notable challenger, nonprofit executive director AJ McCreary. The first election results, which rolled in right at 8 pm, show Ryan with 58% and McCreary with 23% of the early vote count....