Serving up success EDITION EDITION St. Johns tennis program helps at-risk youth — SEE B1 GREATER PORTLAND PortlandTribunePTUESDAY, JULYo 1, 2014r • TWICEt CHOSENl THEa NATION’S BESTn NONDAILYd PAPER •T PORTLANDTRIBUNE.COMri •b PUBLISHEDu TUESDAY ANDn THURSDAYe City taps a dozen ‘It was a different world’ for water oversight Commission meets July 15 to look at water bureau, BES By JIM REDDEN The Tribune Representatives of three organizations that have crit- icized the City Council’s management of the water and sewer bureaus have been appointed to a commis- sion that could recommend changes in their oversight. Mayor Charlie Hales and Water Commissioner on Nick Fish announced the appoint- ment of a 12-member Utility Oversight Blue Ribbon Com- mission last Thursday. The The ap- pointment appoint- keeps a prom- ment keeps ise Hales and Fish made a promise during the (Charlie) fight over the Hales and proposed Port- land Public (Nick) Fish Water District TRIBUNE PHOTO: JONATHAN HOUSE made on the May 20 Above: Jacob Tanzer, retired Associate Justice of the Oregon Supreme Court, goes through old photos in his home offi ce. Top: Tanzer as a young lawyer visiting the Ole primary elec- Miss campus in 1967. during the tion ballot. fi ght over They prom- the ised to appoint a commission ■ Portland lawyer recalls Mississippi killings 50 years ago proposed to review the Portland management of the Water he murders are half a cen- defi ne it then.” Public Bureau and tury old now. The chain of events was set in mo- Water Bureau of En- But for Jacob “Jake” Tan- tion on June 21, 1964, when James District on vironmental Tzer of Portland, the memo- Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Mi- Services and ries generated by the federal investi- chael Schwerner went missing. They the May 20 recommend gation of the deaths of three young were there as part of the Mississippi primary needed chang- civil rights workers in Mississippi Summer Project, which enlisted stu- es if voters de- are everlasting. dent volunteers to help blacks regis- election feated the And the murders also changed a ter to vote, teach them about their ballot. measure. It nation. rights, and prepare for white resis- lost over- Tanzer, tance. The Student Nonviolent Coor- whelmingly. then a dinating Committee took the lead. The fi rst meeting of the com- STORY BY 29-year-old The project was described in that mission will be from 4 to 6 p.m. lawyer for the day’s New York Times, whose story on July 15 in the Lovejoy Room PETER WONG U.S. Depart- concluded: “No one can predict the at Portland City Hall. ment of Jus- outcome.” One member who ques- tice, said neither he nor the other At that time, an estimated 5 per- tioned the council’s manage- members of the investigative team cent of blacks were registered to vote ment of the bureaus in the past knew what would emerge from their in Mississippi, which had the largest is Chris Liddle, a Portland Gen- work. percentage of blacks among the eral Electric manager who “I knew it was the right thing to states. chaired a Portland City Club do,” Tanzer says, recalling those The strategy behind the project study committee on the mea- events. was outlined by Allard Lowenstein, sure. The committee issued a “I had these feelings — and I know who a few years later organized the report adopted by the civic or- my colleagues did — that we were in anti-Vietnam War movement for the ganization that recommended the midst of something historic that presidential candidacy of Minnesota a “no” vote on the measure. was bigger than this case, and the Sen. Eugene McCarthy. But the report also criticized case was an important part of what- “He said black people getting the council’s handling of both ever that was. Losing it would set killed (in the South) had no effect,” COURTESY OF JACOB TANZER bureaus. It said the Portland things back. Winning it would add to Gov. Tom McCall, right, appointed Tanzer, center, to the Oregon Court of Appeals ratepayers had lost confi dence it, whatever it was. But we could not See TANZER / Page A2 in October 1973, launching his judicial career that lasted a decade. in the ability of the council to manage the bureaus, in large part because of controversies over spending water funds on projects not directly related to the core missions of the water bureau. The projects included the remodeling of the new Rose Festival headquarters, Novick ballot measure stand not new the experimental Water House that was later sold at a loss, between residential and non- and the public toilets known as Commissioner residential properties. the Portland Loos. Although Hales has repeat- hasn’t changed his edly said the council should See WATER / Page A8 make the “tough decision” it- mind on public self, Novick, who is charge of street plan vote the Portland Bureau of Trans- portation, has even said voters could throw the two of them By JIM REDDEN out of offi ce in 2015 if they don’t The Tribune like that decision. In fact, this is not the fi rst Throughout the debate on time Novick has said voters Commissioner the proposed Portland street don’t need to vote on tax mea- Steve Novick fee, some of the loudest voic- sures. In 2000, he worked explained the es have insisted that the City against a statewide ballot mea- need for more Council should refer it to the sure by conservative activist street voters for approval. Bill Sizemore that would have maintenance Mayor Charlie Hales and required public votes on virtu- money Monday, Commissioner Steve Novick ally every fee and tax increase but doesn’t think are crafting a fee to raise proposed by local and state it needs to go on around $50 million a year — governments. Measure 93 was the ballot. primarily for street mainte- defeated at that fall’s general TRIBUNE PHOTO: nance and transportation proj- JAIME VALDEZ ects. It would be evenly split See NOVICK / Page A6 “Pamplin Media Group’s pledge is to Portland Tribune TRYON FARM’S deliver balanced news that re ects the THORNS BRING HOME THEIR FIRSTLAMB NWSL LOVES TROPHY GOATS stories of our communities. Thank you — SEE SPORTS, PAGE B8 forfor readingreading ourour newspapers.newspapers.” Inside — SEE LIFE, PAGE B8 — DR. ROBERT B. PAMPLIN JR. OWNER & NEIGHBOR ______CAPTION ______FOLIO ________JUMP WORD ________JUMP PAGE NO. ________STORY ENDS A2 NEWS The Portland Tribune Tuesday, July 1, 2014 Tanzer: Voting Rights Act changed South Section, whose lawyers met reg- about that. We knew we should ■ From page A1 ularly with then-Attorney Gen- be cautious — and we were. eral Robert F. Kennedy, who “But when you talk about Tanzer said. “But if one of took a special interest in their courage, think of those rural these white kids is killed, the work. Kennedy had been chief black residents being asked to nation would not tolerate it. counsel to the Senate committee come to a federal grand jury Freedom Summer did help a investigating labor racketeering and testify about white people generational change in the at- before his brother, President doing wrong. That’s where the titudes of young people; I do John F. Kennedy, named him at- courage was.” not want to take away from torney general. that. But it did not change Tanzer became an expert in Indictments much in reality in the South.” grand juries and what he de- About 125 witnesses ended Chaney was black, and from scribed as “stirring the pot.” up testifying to a grand jury of Mississippi; Goodman and Schw- “One of our techniques in a 21 white men, one white woman erner were white. Their deaths major case, when we found we and one black woman convened would change a lot. could not do much, was to call a in Biloxi. When they were reported grand jury to set a buzz about The grand jury returned two missing, the FBI initially resisted what we were doing,” he said. indictments. One involved a getting involved. It would set off speculation black prisoner who had been Director J. Edgar Hoover was about how much federal investi- whipped by a belt until he made unsympathetic to civil rights gators knew — and might get a false confession. The other groups, the matter appeared to witnesses to cooperate with was for the arrest of a black be local — the FBI did not want their investigation, because man without probable cause to clash with state and local grand jury proceedings were that he had committed a crime, agencies — and the legal basis secret. and who had been released for federal intervention was So Tanzer was transferred to from jail at night only to be pun- weak. But Hoover’s bosses — the Civil Rights Division, and he ished by a mob. President Lyndon B. Johnson, and the other members of the Both indictments named as who was running for a full term, investigative team headed for defendants Sheriff Lawrence and then-Deputy Attorney Gen- Meridian, Miss., in late summer Rainey, Deputy Sheriff Cecil eral Nicholas Katzenbach — of 1964. Among them were his Jacob Tanzer is Price, a police officer and other prevailed upon him to do so. team leader, Bob Owen, and sworn in as the suspects in the civil rights “When the FBI went in, it John Doar, the No. 2 lawyer in first director of murders. They were charged went in full force,” Tanzer said. the Civil Rights Division, who the Oregon under an obscure post-Civil FBI agents discovered the would eventually prosecute the Department of War law that made it a federal burned station wagon in which case.