Former Trail Blazer Michael Harper and Matt Wingard, director of the school choice program for Cascade Policy Institute, discuss the institute's report on Jefferson High School during a news conference Tuesday. The report says that, despite numerous reforms at the high school, thousands of students have graduated unprepared.

Jefferson High School is the target of a report by the Cascade Policy Institute, which blasts the Portland Public Schools for establishing numerous academic reforms over the past several years that have failed.

Pictured Jim Hill

The troubled Oregon Health Plan is at the heart of the health care debate among gubernatorial candidates. But they disagree on how or if the plan should be rescued.

The plan was considered a national model when it launched in 1994, expanding insurance coverage for Oregonians. But during a tight state budget in 2004, the Legislature decided to close enrollment in a portion of the plan. Thousands of Oregon-ians have since been dropped from its rolls.

For now, Portland Boulevard will remain just that: Portland Boulevard, not Rosa Parks Way.

Following a Portland City Council meeting at the Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center last week, the council decided to delay a decision about renaming the street and perhaps find another way to honor the woman who sparked the civil rights movement.

Pictured Emilie Boyles

The city ruled last week that council candidate Emilie Boyles is ineligible for public campaign money and demanded that she return $145,000.

Auditor Gary Blackmer ruled that Boyles violated the public financing code by taking out a year's lease on her campaign headquarters — a former restaurant that she planned to use after the campaign for a food bank she runs.

OLYMPIA, WA—Gov. Chris Gregoire, already deep into a two-year overhaul of education, says the next big challenge is health care.

Pictured José "Chencho" Alas

One of Central America's best-known activists, former priest and friend of the late Archbishop Romero, José "Chencho" Alas, will discuss the work that needs to be done in El Salvador during a presentation on Sunday, April 30.

The Rev. Fred Woods of Calvary Christian Church, foreground, shares a laugh with Selena Gutierrez,…

In Oregon, 591,000 people do not have health insurance. That's nearly 17 percent of the state's population.

That's why a group of Oregon Health & Science University students are sponsoring "Cover The Uninsured Week" planned for Monday, May 1, through Saturday, May 6.

VANCOUVER—If you've ever dreamed of climbing into an airplane cockpit and taking the controls, your day has come.
Pearson Air Museum is hosting its first-ever Open Cockpit Day from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday April 29. Several of the museum's vintage aircraft will be open for visitors to actually climb into the cockpit and sit at the controls.

YAKIMA, W.A.— The state pharmacy board says pharmacists' moral objections should not allow them to deprive patients of a legal prescription.

Druggists could still refuse to dispense certain drugs under a proposed draft rule, but only if another pharmacist is on site to fill the prescription.