your local rag is full of shoot first, ask questions later bleeding-heart psychopaths. If Portland's hippies can lose their shit over a tortilla truck they can sure as hell work up a lather over a swimming pool closure.
Shitting on two white ladies with a burrito cart is "fun" and hip. Getting the city to shift their budget to save the pool in a part of town many people don't even know exists (ask how the city is laid out and people will tell it's divided into four quadrants, I live in the "5th quadrant",) involves taking hours out of your evening to bitch at city council. People in this part of town love their community. We have our own parade and after parade debauch that people get as excited about as your average Midwest town would get about the second coming of Christ (I mean this, people build floats and polish their classic cars for weeks in preparation, adults jump up and down with Glee a week ahead of time). Old timers on the deep end if the peninsula still pretend it's not incoperated. I heard one if them boast that they hadn't been to "the city" in twenty years. We are going to bitch and bitch and bitch and then bitch some more. There are some very fine, savvy and dogged individuals whom I know from neighborhood association meetings and what not, who's names are spoken like a curse in city hall in the fight. I always donate, bring coffee to events and show up here and there but I'm in this one, shit has me pissed. My kid loves the pool, I love the buildings architecture and it touches the health and well-being of a lot of people I know.
I've met people who've lived here for a decade and not known we are up here. Before Google maps people would call business that I worked at for the address and I'd tell the "number street North Portland." They would say I'm sorry is that NE or NW? I'd say, no, it's in North Portland. They would ask "do you mean NE or NW", I'd repeat. They'd be in a huff "ok (dumb fuck) are you on the east or west side of the river"? I'd say that I guess we are on the East side of the river but we are really North of the river. People would show up and say they lived here for ages and didn't know this part of town existed and they were sorry for being an ass on the phone. The best was when I was told that North Portland didn't exist and I was an idiot or an asshole.
New Mexico's experience is relevant here. And now I really wanna explore North Portland!