hey all. we're liquidating our wood/metal workshop, located at our home in Hillsboro. we have a lot of tools and they've all gotta go. please take a look at the google spreadsheet and feel free to DM me with any questions!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1zJFZkPv4AB2ZYsvslP2b_0o-Hk-2dusNszpTwSMhIpI/edit

[removed]

I saw this sticker in the Alberta Arts district yesterday and my partner and I removed it, but I wasn’t sure that it meant what I thought it meant. I was in denial. I’m Jewish and believe in peace and Palestinian rights and freedoms fwiw and this kind of thing is straight hate. Please remove these from your neighborhoods if you see them. People telling me that they are elsewhere in north Portland too.

Hey everyone,

Like most of you, I've been watching our electricity rates climb to unlivable levels (up over 50% since 2020). Right now, Pacific Power is back at it again, pushing for another rate revision under Docket UE 470.

If you look into the utility's mandatory Embedded Cost of Service Study (ECOSS), you'll find an incredibly frustrating shell game. While residential energy conservation has kept household demand relatively flat, industrial demand from massive high-compute data centers has exploded by nearly 70%. Yet, the massive infrastructure upgrades required to hook these server farms up to the grid are being socialized across all customer classes.

Based on the utility's own data, residential ratepayers are swallowing an embedded subsidy rate of roughly $0.0155 per kWh. I did the math on a recent household statement: out of a 1,955 kWh bill, $30.30 of that single month's charge went entirely to supporting private tech server infrastructure. That is over $363 a year in a completely hidden corporate surcharge.

I am a local developer, and I decided to stop venting and build an asymmetric tool to let regular people fight back. I just launched and open-sourced the Data Center Rate-Hike Counter-Audit.

What the tool does:

• Parses Your Bill: You drop in a PDF of your Pacific Power or PGE bill. The script safely extracts your raw kWh usage.
• Exposes the Hidden Tax: It calculates the exact dollar amount your specific household paid this cycle to subsidize industrial data center grid capacity.
• Generates Legal Ammo: It bypasses the standard, useless "public suggestion box" and auto-generates a formally structured Formal Customer Objection and Demand for Rate Shielding pre-populated with your specific account metrics.

Why this actually matters:

Under Oregon administrative rules, when you submit a formal objection directly tied to an active docket (like UE 470), the OPUC clerk is legally required to integrate it directly into the official eDockets system. It becomes a permanent, binding part of the case record that the Administrative Law Judge and Commissioners must review before a final rate ruling. It also gives organizations like the Citizens' Utility Board (CUB) massive leverage to point to a record flooded with data-backed community protests.

The tech lobbies and utility monopolies move fast because they rely on administrative inertia and the assumption that regular people won't read a 500-page cost study. This tool evens the playing field.

The app is completely free, runs locally/on streamlite, and doesn't store your data.

• Streamlit Web App: https://oregon-energy-bill-auditor-s6e4hx2itjx4iz7pygkp2f.streamlit.app/

Check it out!

Edit: Not required to upload your actual bill. You can enter dummy data if you'd like and there is even a fake report loaded if you'd like to try it. You can always write the objection yourself as well or copy the dummy data one and change it to your own personal info.

Yes, using AI is intentionality ironic.

If you have kids in the BSD - please read! Action items below:

Last night, the Beaverton School Board officially voted to adopt a new K-5 math curriculum that includes i-Ready, a program currently facing a lawsuit over student data privacy concerns. During the meeting, the curriculum selection committee was unable to answer basic questions including:

• How much screen time are elementary students currently getting during the school day?
• What is considered developmentally appropriate screen time for a Kindergartner?

This is about far more than one program. The adoption of yet another tech-heavy learning platform reflects a much larger problem inside our schools: excessive screen use, lack of transparency for families, and wildly inconsistent technology practices from school to school.

Teachers are being asked to manage constant device use while also trying to teach in overcrowded, underfunded classrooms. Parents are left in the dark about how these programs are actually being used day-to-day. Meanwhile, students are spending more and more of their learning time staring at screens instead of engaging directly with teachers, peers, books, discussion, creativity, and hands-on learning.

We are not anti-technology. Thoughtful, intentional tech instruction absolutely has a place in education. But what is happening in classrooms right now is not balanced, transparent, or developmentally appropriate.

The Beaverton Safe Tech Coalition is made up of parents, teachers, pediatricians, and community members advocating for healthier, more intentional learning environments where human connection, curiosity, creativity, and meaningful instruction come first.

Please consider signing and sharing our petition calling for safer, more balanced technology use in Beaverton schools: Make Beaverton School District Devices Safe for Students

We are approaching 1,000 signatures and plan to formally present this petition along with demands for meaningful change. If you would like to learn more about who we are and what we stand for, please visit our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/838737755865385

Please also reach out to your school board rep and send them an email. They can be easily found here: https://www.beaverton.k12.or.us/school-board/board-members

Our kids deserve better.