Instead of sugarplums dancing in their heads, my kids have
snowdays dancing in theirs. News that we may get a winter storm has them watching Matt and Dave's weathercasts more intently than ever.
They can recite where the low pressure system is positioned and when it will move into Portland, almost like a meteorologist.

It sure makes it feel like the Christmas season around here.
Another sure sign is our annual KGW Great Toy Drive.

My son, Will, and I have a tradition we look forward to every year.
We love helping out at our Toy Drive.

On as many Saturdays as we can, we get up before the sun.
Will puts on his Santa hat and we bundle up in our long underwear, parkas, gloves and scarves.
First stop, is our neighborhood Starbucks for a big hot chocolate for Will, and a mocha for me.
Then, we head for the Toy Drive location.

Last week, we were out at Bridgeport Village from 7am until 10 am.

This Saturday, Will and I will be at Cedar Hills Crossing at the same time, provided we don't need Santa's sleigh to get there.
Many of our KGW staffers, including our News Director, and his son, and Business Reporter, Joe Smith will also be there until 4pm.

I hope we will see you out there. It's always so heartwarming to meet many of you and experience your generosity, first hand.

Thank you for caring about the less fortunate in our community.
Together we will make this the best Toy Drive ever.

Will and I might not have chestnuts roasting on an open fire for you, but we will have candycanes.
Hope to see you Saturday.

Laural Porter

Posted by at 5:14 PM | Permalink

If you saw "Million Dollar Baby", you know Clint Eastwood probably didn't intend for his Academy Award winning film to increase the popularity of women's boxing.

But it seems it has... at least in part.
Women's Boxing is now one of the fastest growing sports in the world... some say "the" fastest.

On Tuesday night at 11pm (11/29), I'll take you into the boxing ring here in Oregon.

Along with the incredibly talented photojournalist, Kurt Austin, we'll take a close look at a recent fight you might have heard about between two women boxers in Oregon.

50-year old grandma Linda Shampang from Eugene and 35-year old Portland boxer Jennie Houts met for their professional boxing debut last June.

Jennie was 15 years younger and four inches taller than Linda. But Linda was in incredible shape for her age and both agreed to the fight.

The Oregon Boxing Commission approved it.

However, the fight had a near fatal ending, with Linda falling into a coma shortly after the bout.

Our story will track Linda's remarkable comeback, and share Jennie's thoughts on what happened, and how it changed her life and attitude toward boxing.

Linda and her husband,Rocky, now think there may need to be changes in the rules and regulations for professional women's boxing.

Is 50 too old to box?

Neurologists say an older person's brain can't take the same kind of punches a younger person might.

Are women being rushed into the ring too quickly, because there are so few professional women boxers in Oregon, just over a dozen?

Oregon Senator Vicki Walker is now considering asking the Governor's office to conduct an independent review of the fight between Shampang and Houts.

Linda doesn't regret fighting Jennie. It was her dream. Boxing is still in her blood. Surprisingly, Linda tells me she'd fight again given the chance. (The Boxing Commission won't let her.)

There is a great amount of personal choice here, but does more need to be done to ensure the safety of women boxers?

You be the judge after you watch "Risk in the Ring" Tuesday night at 11pm on Newschannel 8.

If you miss the story you can watch it on KGW.com beginning Wednesday morning.

Thanks for watching.
LAURAL PORTER

Posted by at 7:24 PM | Permalink

It's toy drive time! When we ask you to donate a new unwrapped toy for the NewsChannel 8 Great Toy Drive. For those of you wondering how it all works here's the basics. With your help we collect the toys, then a number of agencies that work with families and children in need distribute them in time for Christmas.

For a number of years I had the great joy of delivering a stack of them to a local classroom of little ones in the Head Start program.It always made me cry (happy tears...I'm an equal opportunity crier ) and give a little more. It shouldn't be the children who suffer.

We'll be at the new Bridgeport Village this Saturday(the 26th) right off the Lake Oswego-Durham exit.My shift is from 9am to 11am. I'll bring the kids if they feel better. You parents out there know how it goes...what's a holiday without a sick child ? Anyway, remember us if you are out and about. It's a great way to start the holidays !

Tracy Barry

Posted by at 2:15 PM | Permalink

I knew Oregonians were serious about their trees, but this is getting out of hand.

Workers are busy assembling the HOLIDAY tree in Pioneer Courthouse Square, and it seems there is some confusion - or dare I say - outrage, over what we call it.

After all, 'tis the season of giving - and a number of you have been giving us your opinion on this. Emailers pronounce, "It's not a HOLIDAY tree, it's a #$%&$! CHRISTMAS tree!"

Not to pass the buck, but we don't really have a say in it. The folks at Pioneer Courthouse Square run that show, and they want it to be called a HOLIDAY tree. I'm guessing if they wanted to call it a HANUKKAH BUSH, that's what we'd say.

Or perhaps in honor of Seinfeld, they could call it a FESTIVUS POLE. Ah, yes - that oft forgotten and much maligned celebration on December 23rd, which provides "A festivus - for the rest of us." An aluminum pole is used in lieu of a tree, and celebrants take part in an "Airing of Grievances" to allow participants to vent their hostilities toward each other.

Sure, it's the politically correct thing to do - but so what? People celebrate all sorts of holidays in December, why not make it a party for everyone? We say "Happy Hanukkah" during the Jewish holiday, "Merry Christmas" during the Christian holiday, and "Eat Dirt" on Festivus. It's the HOLIDAY season, so why not call it a HOLIDAY tree? I'm surprised it seems to bother so many people.

Whatever they call it -- they'll light it up Friday night. And we'll cover it live. For those of you who object, you'll have a chance to air your grievances on December 23rd.

Joe Donlon

Posted by at 9:07 PM | Permalink

This fall marks my 20th anniversary at KGW. Wow.

I don't know about you but I never thought that would happen. I can remember being on KXL with my colleagues Shirley Hancock and Julie Emry at least 15 years ago. CBS had just come out with a survey that showed only 1 percent of the women on-air in television news were over the age of 40! I've beat that by a few years. Okay, more than a few.

The big story back then was the Bhagwan and the red clad Rajneeshees. I remember standing on a freezing tarmac at PDX as the Bhagwan boarded a plane and left the United States for the last time headed for India. What a wild tale that was. Back then we were worried about the children of cocaine. That has given way to the children of Meth. What's that saying about the more things change the more they stay the same?

So six News Directors and as many co-anchors later I am still delighted to be here. I know I have you to thank for that. You have been my harshest critics and greatest supporters as I made Portland my home, married, became a mother x2 and grew older with you. I am not convinced that you want to hear even more from me on a blog... but I would love to hear from you. Let's talk. And as always, thanks for watching.

Tracy Barry

Posted by at 4:39 PM | Permalink

Before I moved to Portland, I had a job interview in Milwaukee, Wisconsin that remains to this day, one of my favorites. The news director took me to a Milwaukee Bucks basketball game, and we played "You Make the Call" for the next three hours. We ate a shrimp pizza (it was a Friday during Lent), and drank what looked like a small silo of beer (that is never forbidden in Milwaukee) as he laid out dozens of scenarios. Each was followed by a simple question: "What would you do?"

"A man with a gun walks into a school - and is locked in a classroom. Do you break into programming? What if someone calls from a cell phone inside the school, and tells you who the gunman is, do you go with that information?" And so on..

I had a blast, and I must have passed the test - because they made me an offer. Unfortunately, my agent apparently made a counter offer that put the general manager on a heart-lung machine.

Anyway, I thought about that experience this week, during our coverage of the Nike owned plane with landing gear issues. Do you break into regular programming with that news? Absolutely. The question here becomes, "How long do you go with wall to wall coverage of a plane that could be circling Portland for 6 hours?"

There are a couple of schools of thought with this. If we break AWAY from our coverage to show Regis and Kelly, we risk losing viewers to other stations that ARE covering the ordeal. If we stick with the coverage, we risk losing viewers who don't want to watch a plane dump fuel for 4 hours (this option also costs a television station a lot of money in advertising that gets dumped - along with the fuel).

Make no mistake, we hear from DOZENS of you - on both sides of that debate. Personally, I think we should use common sense. If there's something valuable to add to the coverage, great. If not, get me back to my program. I think our viewers trust us to let them know when something happens - or is about to happen. If it is truly THAT big of a deal, I will watch. If not, give me an update every now and then.

Ultimately, I don't make that decision. It's up to the managers to make that call, while we sustain our coverage on the air. It also brings to mind something an old news director of mine used to say, half jokingly: "Anything worth doing, is worth doing to death." Some of the storm coverage in Portland is proof of that!

Having said all this - it's almost a given that despite all the angry calls we get about our continuing coverage, our ratings the next day usually support the decision to stay with it. Does that make it right?

You make the call.

jdonlon@kgw.com

Posted by at 12:04 AM | Permalink

Welcome to the next generation of television news.

It seems like only yesterday, I was writing my first news stories on a typewriter. Back then, I would roll 5 sheets of paper into an IBM machine the size of a large watermelon - and drop carbon paper in between each sheet to ensure everyone had a copy of the script.

Fast forward 20 years, and I find myself in front of a computer screen - writing an entry for my own blog. Talk about an evolution.

It's hard for some people to make the link between 'television' news, and a blog entry on the Internet. Frankly, I include myself in that group at times. But that's where our business is heading. More accurately, I should say, that's where the business of 'information consumption' is heading.

Somewhere along the line, consumers began to doubt - or at least challenge - some of what they were hearing from print and broadcast outlets. I should point out, however, this is NOT new. I still remember covering the Republican National Convention in 1992, where the hot souvenir was a T-shirt emblazoned with three words: BLAME THE MEDIA.

Still, several recent scandals at journalistic institutions like the New York Times didn't help our cause. The mainstream media was deemed tainted and unreliable, and independent 'blogging' was born. Everyone had an opinion, and they didn't need a middle man (the media) getting in the way of their version of a story. Either way, it got everyone's attention.

And this is our response. Our colleague, Brian Williams, was one of the first to see the value in this additional dialog. In my opinion, it has become an effective way to let people into our thought process as a news organization. As Brian recently said, "If we can show how a bill becomes a law in terms of televison news, we become more approachable, more human in people's eyes, and less of a monolith."

I have absolutely found that to be the case. People often write or call with complaints about a certain story. After allowing them to vent, I explain our version of what happened and why, and they immediately seem to better understand why we do what we do.

Already, though, critics question whether this effort it is nothing more than a promotional ploy. Personally, I don't think that's an issue. Television news is often criticized as shallow and transparent, and if this somehow allows us to reach out to those skeptical viewers - everyone wins. I don't think there is such a thing as "too much information."

Despite what some people might think, we do not make content decisions with reckless disregard. Our newsroom is filled with dedicated journalists who are committed to producing fair, accurate, and compelling newscasts, and we often have very sprited - and even heated debates in our daily meetings. Now, thanks to yet another twist in the ever changing world of information technology, you will be included in that debate - warts and all.

I look forward to it.

Joe Donlon

Posted by at 6:52 PM | Permalink