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Oregon Gov. Kotek calls for halt to Portland interstate tolling plan

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Oregon Gov. Kotek calls for halt to Portland interstate tolling plan
  • Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek has halted the Regional Mobility Pricing Project for Interstate 5 and Interstate 205 toll implementation in Portland.
  • Kotek voiced uncertainties about tolling’s feasibility and said growing challenges outweigh expected benefits.
  • Kotek’s letter came a few weeks after a survey found a majority of Oregon voters opposed the Regional Mobility Pricing Project tolls.

Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek wants to scrap a plan to implement tolls on large sections of two Portland-area interstates, she said Monday.

Kotek sent a letter to the Oregon Transportation Commission on Monday saying the Regional Mobility Pricing Project for Interstate 5 and Interstate 205 should be halted, KGW-TV reported.

Kotek said in the letter that the “state’s path toward implementing tolling in the Portland metro area is uncertain, at best,” and that the challenges associated with the plan “have grown larger than the anticipated benefits.”

OREGON GOV. TINA KOTEK DIRECTS STATE POLICE TO CRACK DOWN ON FENTANYL DISTRIBUTION, HOLD SELLERS ACCOUNTABLE

“Therefore, I believe it is time to bring the agency’s work on RMPP to an end,” she wrote.

Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek speaks during a signing ceremony on Feb. 23, 2024, in Washington. Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek is scrapping a plan to implement tolls on large sections of two Portland-area interstates, she said on Monday. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

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In 2017, the state Legislature directed the Oregon Department of Transportation to start exploring tolling as a traffic congestion management tool that could be part of a major transportation funding package, but the plans have drawn increasing criticism as they’ve become clearer.

Kotek’s letter came a few weeks after a survey found a majority of Oregon voters opposed the Regional Mobility Pricing Project tolls, KOIN-TV reported.

The move also came after the Oregon Department of Transportation produced a report on the equity impacts of tolling and the agency’s plan to mitigate the impacts on low-income Portlanders. Kotek wrote in her letter that the report showed “a toll program which keeps toll rates low enough for working families and raises enough funding for major projects would fail to meet expectations for local project funding and revenue sharing.”

The state transportation agency is facing funding challenges because of a projected decline in revenue from the state’s gas tax, and Kotek said she expects the Legislature to tackle that issue in the 2025 session.

The governor said in the letter she is “confident that a more robust conversation on funding options will yield greater understanding and direction for our future moving forward.”

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Oregon Transportation Commission Chair Julie Brown and Vice Chair Lee Beyer, as well as Oregon Department of Transportation Director Kris Strickler, all released statements later Monday suggesting they agree with Kotek.

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Beyer said “metro leadership views on tolling have changed” and “local and regional opposition to tolling makes clear that Oregon is not ready for regional tolling.” Strickler said “it is clear the toll program cannot be designed in a way that meets the needs expressed by our local partners while also meeting the needs of Oregonians statewide.”

Brown said she looked forward to conversations about other funding sources but added that while she didn’t believe tolling should be the only tool to solve challenges, “as a steward of our state’s transportation system, I believe it should be one of our tools.”

Kotek said this move should not impact the planned collection of toll revenue on the interstate highway bridge between Oregon and Washington that’s set to be replaced as part of a multibillion-dollar project supported by federal funding.

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San Francisco, CA

Supervisors urge California to expand S.F. speed-camera program

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Supervisors urge California to expand S.F. speed-camera program


San Francisco supervisors authorized a resolution Tuesday urging California lawmakers to expand the city’s automated speed camera program, which currently has 33 cameras operating in the city under a state pilot.

The board’s 10-to-1 vote on Tuesday, with District 10 Supervisor Shamann Walton voting against it, will not add cameras immediately, but formally asks the state to explore changes to the program. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency has identified at least 80 additional high-need locations that could benefit from automated enforcement, according to a report filed with the Public Safety and Neighborhood Services Committee.

Richard Zieman, whose son Andrew, a paraeducator, was killed in November 2021 by a speeding driver outside Sherman Elementary School on Franklin Street, told Mission Local that city officials should do more. “They waited for a tragedy,” Zieman said. Parents and school leaders had repeatedly asked the city to slow traffic on Franklin Street, where drivers barreled downhill toward the Marina, said Zieman.

Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who introduced the resolution, has said the city’s first year of automated speed enforcement shows that the technology works. The SFMTA reported nearly an 80 percent reduction in drivers traveling at least 10 miles per hour over the speed limit at camera locations after the program launched in March 2025. San Francisco was the first city to implement the pilot authorized under Assembly Bill 645.

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The pilot, however, is capped by state law at 33 camera locations. Tuesday’s resolution asks California lawmakers to consider allowing more, prioritizing corridors on San Francisco’s High Injury Network, including Franklin Street.

Walk San Francisco, a pedestrian advocacy group which spent roughly eight years advocating for the state legislation that created the pilot, called the resolution an important first step toward broader expansion.

“Thirty-three cameras is nowhere near the number of cameras we need for people to realize that San Francisco is a safe-speed city,” said executive director Jodie Medeiros. “This tool is working. People are lowering their speeds.”

District 6, represented by Dorsey, currently has seven of the city’s 33 cameras, most of them in SoMa. The district also records the highest number of crashes involving injuries or fatalities in San Francisco, making it a focal point in the debate over expanding automated enforcement.

The resolution advanced unanimously from the Board of Supervisors’ Public Safety and Neighborhood Services Committee last week, where Dorsey said the cameras have made streets “feel safer” and argued the early results show “why we should have even more of this life-saving technology.”

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Zieman, whose son’s death prompted traffic-calming improvements and eventually a speed camera near Sherman Elementary, said the issue is urgent. 

“There are probably other Franklin streets out there,” he said. “I just hope they don’t wait for someone else before they expand the program. It’s too late for Andrew.”





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Denver, CO

Five Points affordable housing building honors Dr. Justina Ford | Rocky Mountain PBS

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Five Points affordable housing building honors Dr. Justina Ford | Rocky Mountain PBS


DENVER — Dr. Justina Ford’s name adorns plaques and statues across Denver, where she delivered more than 7,000 babies as the city’s first licensed Black woman physician. Now, an affordable housing building in Five Points, the neighborhood where she lived and worked for 50 years, bears her name.

The newly christened Justina at Five Points, formerly Brunetti Lofts, offers a rare commodity in Denver’s housing market: family-sized affordable housing units.The 23-unit building, built in 2005, has 19 three-bedroom units. Rents range from $840 to $1,893 per month. Residents must make between 30% and 60% of Denver’s area median income, and specific income requirements vary depending on the unit.

“I do believe that in the last, five, ten years, maybe a little longer, housing here in Colorado has just gone crazy. I mean, I have a little two-bedroom townhouse, and I can’t afford to move back in the neighborhood I grew up in because of the pricing. And it’s just crazy,” said Daphne Rice-Allen, chair of the board at the Black American West Museum and Heritage Center, which is housed in Ford’s historic home in Five Points.

Rice-Allen grew up in Clayton, which is northeast of Five Points. This cluster of neighborhoods in north Denver — Five Points, Cole, Whittier and Clayton — were among the areas deemed “hazardous” and “definitely declining” on the city’s 1938 “Residential Security Map,” which redlined neighborhoods with Black, Mexican and lower-income residents.

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At that time, Five Points flourished as a cultural and entertainment hub, known as “the Harlem of the West” and serving as “the seat of Denver’s African American community.” Black social clubs, such as the Owl Club, emerged. And Ford, who arrived in Denver in 1902 and was not allowed to work in a hospital, continued to provide medical care out of her house and deliver babies at her patients’ homes. 

“This was a family neighborhood, Rice-Allen said about Five Points during that period.

“There were a lot of families that lived in the area and lived in the neighborhood.”

But Five Points’ demographics have changed a lot since Ford died in 1952. About 30% of households in the neighborhood were families in 2020. By 2024, that percentage dropped to about 20%. 

The neighborhood experienced a drastic shift in racial demographics as well. In 2000, about 27% of the residents were white, 26% Black and 43% Hispanic. The 2020 census told a different story: 64% white, 10% Black and 17% Hispanic.

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What was once a Black cultural hub is now a majority-white neighborhood, which raises concerns about gentrification and displacement of long-time residents. Despite the large supply of affordable housing units in the area — 2,796 in 2024 — about half of renters in Five Points are cost-burdened, meaning they spent more than 30% of their income on housing.



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Seattle, WA

Seattle weather: Hot and sunny day Wednesday, highs in the 80s

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Seattle weather: Hot and sunny day Wednesday, highs in the 80s


Wednesday will be another warm day with highs in the mid to upper 80s for parts of western Washington. Eastern and central Washington will reach near 100F with high fire danger. The coast and north interior will be cooler, only in the 60s to 70s.

Today's Highs

Wednesday will be another warm day with highs in the mid to upper 80s for parts of western Washington. 

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Fire Weather Watch

A Fire Weather Watch goes into effect Wednesday evening through Thursday evening for thunderstorms and gusty winds. Lightning strikes could create new fire starts and, with very dry conditions in place, any new fire could spread quickly.

Fire Danger

A Fire Weather Watch goes into effect Wednesday evening through Thursday evening for thunderstorms and gusty winds. 

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What’s next:

An upper level low will move into the Pacific Northwest, bringing scattered showers and a chance of thunderstorms. The heaviest showers will be in the morning hours and will turn more scattered into the evening hours.

Thursday Showers

An upper level low will move into the Pacific Northwest, bringing scattered showers and chance of thunderstorms. 

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Looking Ahead:

High pressure will build again Friday and into the weekend, increasing temperatures and sunshine. We will start to see highs reach the upper 80s to low 90s by early next week.

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Seattle Extended

High pressure will build again Friday and into the weekend, increasing temperatures and sunshine. 

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Download the free FOX LOCAL app for mobile in the Apple App Store or Google Play Store for live Seattle news, top stories, weather updates and more local and national news.

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The Source: Information in this story came from the FOX 13 Seattle Weather Team and the National Weather Service.

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