
Oregon’s public workers can’t find out which private investments in their PERS fund actually made money
The state’s $100 billion public pension fund is under fire for selling $4.5 billion in private equity holdings without disclosing details.

The state’s $100 billion public pension fund is under fire for selling $4.5 billion in private equity holdings without disclosing details.

In what has been described as a “fight for the future” of Southern Oregon University, the Board of Trustees Thursday morning voted 7-2 to approve the final “Resiliency Plan,” authorizing a total of $10 million in cuts over the next four years, including about $5 million this year from SOU’s $71 million budget as of June, according to SOU President Rick Bailey’s presentation to the board.

Southern Oregon University’s Board of Trustees is set to hold a virtual meeting on Thursday, Sept. 18, to vote on proposed cuts to the university budget.

The Ashland Community Food Bank doubled its volume in August, reflecting a troubling trend fueled by inflation, job loss and tightening access to food assistance programs. Executive Director Amy Broeker warns the level of need could soon become the norm as food bank faces shortfalls in funding and more competition for scarce local grants. Broeker and other leaders are calling on the community to step in.

The former president of the consulting firm ECOnorthwest said a survey of the state’s current condition is “sobering.” Five critical issues were most troubling — housing, education, wildfires, taxation, and attitudes toward growth, including land use laws and permitting processes.

Comments from students, faculty and staff poured out Wednesday during a virtual meeting of the Southern Oregon University Board of Trustees in response to an amended provisional plan to cut nearly $10 million over the course of the next few years from the school’s $66 million budget.

The Southern Oregon University Board of Trustees is expected to vote Tuesday, Sept. 2, on an amended provisional plan to cut nearly $10 million from the university’s budget as presented Wednesday by SOU President Rick Bailey during a special virtual session of the board.

A sharply divided Ashland City Council approved pay raises for most city workers Tuesday night, but left Mayor Tonya Graham to cast the tie-breaking vote over management salaries.

Southern Oregon University President Rick Bailey unveiled a provisional plan of action Friday to respond to a structural deficit at the higher education institution, declaring exigency on the campus, with draft plans to cut $10.5 million over the next three to three and half years; reduce staff by 64 positions, approximately half of which are considered layoffs.

The Ashland City Council will review tentative agreements that would give city employees an average raise of about 5% raise this fiscal year and then another 2% each of the following two years at a total cost of under $700,000 this year and about $335,000 each of the next two years, for an aggregate total of a little under $1.4 million total over three years.
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Ask Strider: A worried older brother asks our advice columnist’s advice. And a dog’s guardian wants to know if there is any hope getting their hat-hating dog to calm down. As always, Strider tries to give words that help!
After a successful production of “The Vagina Monologues” and raising more than $2,000 for Planned Parenthood of Southwestern Oregon, Ashland actor and director Lia Dugal intends for “The Climate Monologues” to premiere in Oregon in late 2025 or early 2026 at the Bellview Grange in Ashland.
It’s complicated.
Herbert Rothschild: Whether visualization and intention by themselves can effect broad social change is impossible to determine, but the question merits sustained consideration.
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