I also love it when the newcomers, who are almost exclusively white and middle-class (who else can afford to buy homes here anymore?) talk so much about how they LOVE diversity. I had more than one come up to me, bubbling how they moved here for the diversity.

But do they send their kids to the neighborhood schools? No way! Even bother setting their foot in the door to check one out? Small chance. Shop in a black owned business? Please. Get their nails done in one of the many Mexican owned shops? You’ve got to be kidding. Encourage their kids to make friends with the minority children? Sorry, Junior is attending a magnet school across the city, courtesy of our taxpayer dollars, and while we like the idea of him living in a diverse area we are uncomfortable with THOSE kids. They might be ghetto!

I am amazed at the people moving into our once tolerant, diverse community who manage to preach diversity but fail to practice it in any meaningful way. And then when something like Chavez Avenue comes up they invent a hundred reasons to be opposed.

Protecting history? Let’s talk history of North Portland, then. Like how segregated this city has been. Like how we had to have race riots to get them to put in parks. Like how hard the black community has fought to improve education, often to deaf ears. And how this community originally welcomed Mexican Americans, along with Indians, Russians, and all the other poor immigrant populations the rest of the city was content to ignore. But that was before it was hip and diverse to live here.

I’m ready for things to change for the better. Maybe that’s what we’re heading for? I hope.

I think people are already saying Chavez Blvd. Our former Union (two syllables) Ave., now Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.? Everyone was dithering about that, too. “It’s too long to say!” But of course we just say King (one syllable) or MLK (three syllables) so *whatever*!

It’s raining like mad here — I hope it calms everyone down a little.