OCTOBER 2007, EDITOR'S LETTER
The road to somewhere
I WASN’T SURE IT COULD GET ANY BETTER than the sparkling
day that greeted us in Astoria, the first stop of our
rollicking 1,800-mile ride through Oregon.
With our RV loaded with business and civic leaders from around
the state, the Business is Good tour was on the hunt in
September for innovation, reinvention and inspiration, and
Astoria delivered in buckets. With grit, creativity and
passion, the leaders in this tiny historic town at the mouth of
the Columbia gave us an eye- and earful about how a depressed
fishing village became a community with a future that now seems
boundless.
But on each leg of the trip, it did get better. Not that
Astoria was bested by Salem or Medford had it over The Dalles,
but that we found the same passion and pride in every stop
along the way. And as my boss, publisher Gillian Floren,
imagined, this business rave was also a chance for connections
and conversation among old friends and newly minted ones.
I imagine that it will be the beer (locally brewed and
sustainably produced, of course) shared by the urban government
official and the rural businesswoman that will create the
collaboration needed to solve the state’s many
challenges.
If you couldn’t come along for the ride, check out the
daily diary the Oregon
Business editors have been writing at oregonbusiness.com/tourblog. Our live coverage
gives you a flavor of the tremendous people we met in every
community on our 20-town tour and also of the fun we had. Not
to be missed is the video of the ever-game Betsy Johnson,
Democratic state senator from Scappoose, hitching a ride on the
side of the road, sign in hand, as the tour bus headed through
her hometown.
We’ll also be devoting our next issue to the news that
we found in our travels. Oregon is re-imagining itself —
east to west, urban to rural — and what we discovered is
much bigger than can fit into one issue of the magazine.
But like the tour itself, it’s a great place to start.
In November, we’ll examine the downtowns and industries
that are changing and how communities and businesses are
focusing on sustainable practices.
Our journey around the state had an end (because really, you
can’t party forever, and we had to return the RV at some
point). But it is only the beginning of the story of
Oregon’s reinvention.
