Heat pumps, electrical work and insulation projects are very expensive – and many families in Oregon can’t afford them, despite their potential for reducing carbon emissions, saving energy and slashing utility bills.

The federal government has promised financial help: generous rebates and tax credits to defray the costs of home energy efficiency upgrade projects for low- and moderate-income families. The tax credits are already available, while the rebates will be rolled out in Oregon by mid-2024.

But, according to the state’s Department of Energy, only about 13,000 Oregon households will qualify for those rebates. That’s less than 1 percent of Oregon’s 1.7 million households. Will your family be one of them?

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In 2019, Portland’s lone drop-off center for people experiencing severe intoxication from drugs or alcohol abruptly shuttered.

The closure left a massive gap in how Oregon’s largest city could respond to those in the throes of visible — and often dangerous — bouts of crisis, just as drug use and overdose deaths began to soar.

Dozens of local leaders began immediately working on a plan to replace Portland’s decades-old Sobering Station.

After four years, the effort largely collapsed this fall. The fate of a new — and desperately needed — sobering center in Portland remains uncertain, even as other communities throughout the state successfully create their own.

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Five years ago, The Oregonian/OregonLive published the award-winning five-part series, “Ghosts of Highway 20,” accompanied by a full video series along with the articles that chronicled the victims of an Oregon serial killer.

Lead reporter Noelle Crombie, a senior criminal justice reporter for The Oregonian/OregonLive, joined Editor Therese Bottomly for a conversation about the original series, which is seeing renewed interest because of the debut this month of a new docuseries available on Max.

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A bunch of well-known Northwest brands – like Bamboo Sushi, Sizzle Pie, Water Avenue Coffee and Rudy’s Barbershops – were bought up during the pandemic by Sortis Holdings, a company that positioned itself as a savior for businesses that were struggling.

But now, Sortis Holdings has had to call off a big transaction, disputes over unpaid bills have spilled into courts, and it’s laying off staff.

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"Life on the planet is imperiled," "we’re on the brink of collapse" and there’s "little progress on combating climate change."

That’s according to a new climate study published at the end of October by a group of renowned U.S. and global scientists, including several researchers from Oregon.

On this episode of Beat Check, The Oregonian's environmental reporter Gosia Wozniacka interviews Dr. Jillian Gregg, an ecologist and principal investigator of Corvallis-based Terrestrial Ecosystems Research Associates. Dr. Gregg is also the author of the climate change study.

Dr. Greggs talks about the alarming data, the transition to an economy that puts a pause on over-consumption and fossil-fuel emissions and solutions we all can participate in that will help slow climate change.

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While true crime tales have become mainstays of media and pop culture, the disturbing stories told in The Oregonian/OregonLive’s 2018 prize-winning project, “Ghosts of Highway 20″ had a particular impact on Octavia Spencer, the Oscar-winning actor, who help produce the new “Lost Women of Highway 20” documentary series for Investigation Discovery.

You can watch “Lost Women of Highway 20″ on Investigation Discovery (ID), MAX and via the Philo streaming service, which offers a free trial.

Watch The Oregonian's five-part video series "Ghosts of Highway 20" on our YouTube channel.

Read the original story on OregonLive.

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The murder of George Floyd at the hands of police set off social justice protests across the nation and in Portland. For some members of the city’s small Black community, Floyd’s death was a reminder of Portland’s painful history.

In this podcast episode, reporter Fedor Zarkhin joins Editor Therese Bottomly to talk about his recent four-part series, “The Forgotten Four,” which told of the unprecedented string of deaths of Black Portlanders at the hands of police in the 1970s.

The four deaths galvanized the Black community in a way that had never occurred before and has repercussions yet today. While the larger community of Portlanders may have forgotten the stories of the three young men and one teenager who were shot and killed in a short span of 1974 and ‘75, the memories remain fresh for family members and friends.

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We'll be back with another episode of Beat Check next week. In the meantime, don't miss the episode we published Thursday, answering your questions about the potential Portland Public Schools teachers' strike. Given the dynamic nature of that story, we wanted to bring it to you as soon as possible.

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On a special edition of The Oregonian’s Beat Check podcast, education reporter Julia Silverman and City Hall reporter Shane Dixon Kavanaugh answer your questions about the potential Portland Public Schools teacher strike.

Read our previous strike coverage here:

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Jayati Ramakrishnan and Nicole Hayden, both staff reporters for The Oregonian/OregonLive, produced the first two parts of the newsroom’s in-depth examination of Oregon’s mental health system and its failures. Editor Therese Bottomly leads a discussion of what their findings have been so far.

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