Chris, your comment about "Obama can't pass anything." Are you aware that per politfifact.com (Pulitzer Prize-winning fact-checking service of the St. Petersburg Times) "that in his first year, Barack Obama has already fulfilled at least 79 campaign promises. This is one of the most accomplished records of any first year in office, and it has come with considerable difficulty in working with and around a Congress fraught with obstructionism and distracted by its own mythology regarding specific points of policy, and in the face of the most uniform and inflexible opposition any president in recent decades has faced." The media continues to focus on what he has NOT been able to get done--leaving out the obstructions-- as opposed to what he has accomplished.

You know little--maybe even nothing like Marion wrote. So your "dying" to know because you think your awareness is correct. In fact, OS Alley operation started out with permits for a wholesale business and then decided without permits to go into the retail business (I assume that you are "aware" of the significant difference between the two) including proper sanitation safeguards such a pubic restrooms, SO the COUNTY closed them down until they complied. Now, do you want a place where you are buying food to comply with the county health requirements that every other business must comply with or a rogue business that does anything it wants to as OS history clearly shows as Marion points out?

Hanneman is a good man and a loyal employee. He is doing what his boss, the city manager, has told him to do. Same for other staff reporting to the manager. These scandals were brought on by the duo from Portland (city manager and Development Services Manager) who were brought here by the big developers to do their bidding. Now their favoritism, mismanagement and bumbling has gotten the city into financial trouble. The buck stops at the manager's office and he's ultimately responsible. The Council should stop dancing around these scandals and fire both; then get on with city business!

This would appear to create another bureaucracy for implemention, which means at least 15% if not more of the funding would go to staff, premises, overhead. etc. These services can and should already be incorporated into existing programs administered by education (where haughty administrators there look upon "work" as being a dirty word), SETA and EDD and County Dept of Human Services. Were the county funds for TANF totally eliminated? DHA’s mission on its website still reads "fostering self-sufficiency among those it serves touches every facet of daily life, from employment . . education . . ." No youth should have to pay to learn vocational skills in a two-year college as they do in California, but not in many other states. An existing major problem with current programs is the failure to include parents for those 18 and under 18 to ensure parental support.

So now the alley belongs to Old Soul? "Old Soul Alley Project . . . " OUTRAGEOUS that this money was taken from a very poor neighborhood like Ben Ali which needs it so badly for council to subsidized Drucker and Old Soul who don't need it at all! There may have been presentations at various meetings but were people told that Ben Ali was being robbed of $100,000 to do this alley? Were Ben Ali residents told and did they approve when they need more sidewalks and street lights? As a condition of receiving this money, Drucker and Old Soul should repay with interest Ben Ali folks.