Date: 09/06/2013 09:20 AM
AP-OR–2nd NewsMinute/307
Here is the latest Oregon news from The Associated Press
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) – Disabled placards are a coveted item in many cities, allowing drivers to park for free at a meter with no time limit. But parking officials in cities like Portland are alarmed by the number of vehicles with blue placards dangling from rear-view mirrors. The use of placards to park free at metered spaces all day long costs the city meter revenue while reducing the turnover that shop owners like to see. Portland officials are now looking to charge disabled people who are not in wheelchairs for parking.
MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) – A man has been charged with murder for the stabbing death of a Medford woman. The Mail Tribune reports Jose Valencia-Gaona appeared in Jackson County Circuit Court yesterday for the death of Maria Guadalupe Rodriguez, who was killed outside her apartment. Police say Valencia-Gaona jumped from bushes outside Rodriguez’s apartment Sunday night and stabbed her.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) – Firefighters were unable to save the life of a 62-year-old woman who was struck by a light-rail train yester near Portland’s Lloyd Center Mall. Police say it appears the woman did not hear the MAX train entering the station and stepped in front of it. Crews used hydraulic jacks to free the woman, but she died later at a hospital. She’s identified as Yvonne Osredkar of Ridgefield, Wash.
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) – Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden is touring the western North Dakota oil patch in his role as chairman of the U.S. Senate’s Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Wyden will meet with community leaders and energy workers today and tomorrow in what has become the second-largest oil and gas producing state in the nation. Wyden calls the boom in the Bakken oil fields “historic” and says it’s “rewriting the playbook for American energy.”
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.
