Think Out Loud

OPB’s sister station KMHD has organized a month of events and programming this September celebrating the centennial birthday of of legendary jazz saxophonist John Coltrane. The community events include a concert performance next Wednesday of Coltrane’s seminal album “Blue Train” at the Aladdin Theater in Portland. 

Hailey Niswanger, who grew up in West Linn and performs as the jazz-expansive saxophonist and flutist MAE.SUN, will lead the sextet of musicians. They include Charlie Brown III on piano and Garrett Baxter on upright bass.  

MAE.SUN, Baxter and Brown III join us for a preview of next week’s concert. We’ll also talk with MAE.SUN about the influence Coltrane’s spiritual, boundary-breaking music has had on her, and her return to Portland after her home in Altadena near LA burned in January 2025. 

The Higher Education Coordinating Commission distributes funding and sets policies for Oregon’s community colleges and public universities. As OPB reported, HECC’s  Board approved last month a $4.7 billion budget request for the 2027-2029 biennium. Gov. Tina Kotek will consider the proposal as part of the overall state budget recommendations given to the state Legislature when it reconvenes next year. 

Oregon public colleges and universities are facing multiple financial headwinds that have grown worse in recent years. That includes stagnant state funding for higher education that has left Oregon near the bottom compared to other states.  

HECC board members have warned that greater investment in higher education is necessary amid rising administration and labor costs, canceled federal grants, inflation and other challenges. Year-over-year tuition increases amid declining student enrollment adds to the uncertainty facing Oregon’s public universities. 

Greg Hamann is the chair of HECC. He joins us for a discussion of the state of higher education funding for Oregon’s public colleges and universities.

Large and super-hot wildfires have been increasing as global temperatures rise. So too have the phenomenon they create: “pyrocumulonimbus clouds," better known by their informal,

easier-to-pronounce name, “fire clouds.” The large fires push air and particulates into the higher atmosphere where they can form thunderclouds that can produce electrical storms and tornadoes. The wind and lightning expand the large fires they were generated from. But this summer, NASA launched a new project collecting data on fire clouds using a modified U2 spy plane, including fires in Central Oregon. We learn more from Dr. David Peterson, an atmospheric scientist at the US Naval Research Laboratory in Monterey, CA and the principal investigator.

Alex Tatarsky has always loved performing. From singing operas at the age of 3 to now blending clowning, physical performance and comedy for their latest project, “Sad Boys in Harpy Land,” a narrative exploration of anguish and humor. The New York Times describes it as “a thrilling and frenetic mental breakdown.” Tatarasky will be performing their piece at the Portland Institute For Contemporary Art’s Timed Based Art Festival. They join us to share more about this work, and the different performance genres they draw on.

The number of high schools in the U.S. with school newspapers dropped nearly 20% from 2011- 2021. But students in some districts are launching or reinventing newspapers and magazines, mostly online. Battle Ground Public Schools in Washington is one such district. Students at Prairie High School run the Falcon Flyer; Battle Ground High School has the Tiger Times; and at Tukes Valley Middle School, a student with a small team launched a districtwide newsmagazine called Your Battle Ground Public Schools (Your BGPS). We talk with the editor of the Falcon Flyer, Kennedy Tandrow, a junior at Prairie High, and Rye Geilenfeldt, the managing editor and founder of Your BGPs.

The nonprofit Dream Big City aims to create safe, drug- and alcohol-free community events across Portland. Over the last six years, the organization has put on more than 170 events featuring live music, art, free meals and mentorship opportunities for youth. Its latest project is to turn a blighted street in Portland’s Central Eastside into a community plaza with skateboard ramps, basketball hoops and more.

Alex Murrell is the founder and executive director of Dream Big City. He joins us to talk more about the nonprofit’s work.

The 160th annual Oregon State Fair in Salem wraps up on Labor Day. The 10-day event features live music, monster trucks, carnival rides and competitions that showcase excellence in Oregon art, livestock, agriculture and more. From the tallest sunflower grown to blue ribbons awarded for beef and dairy cattle, the fair is also an opportunity to honor the hard work of future farmers, ranchers or hobbyists who’ve waited months to compete and show off their skills.

We visited the fair on opening day to talk with folks about what brought them there, whether it was livestock to judge, veggies to show off, deep-fried Oreos to sell or childhood memories to rekindle.

In September, that includes the annual Montavilla Jazz Festival. The three-day festival kicks off today and features performances by local artists, with a lineup this year that includes Jessie Marquez. The Portland vocalist joined “Think Out Loud” last month for an interview and studio performance of Cuban filin music.  

In honor of the centennial birthday of jazz legend John Coltrane, KMHD presents “A Month Supreme,” a series of events held across Portland celebrating Coltrane’s music, influence, and legacy. Fans of Coltrane’s seminal album “Blue Train” will want to check out a live performance of the entire album on Sep. 16 at the Aladdin Theater featuring Portland saxophonist MAE.SUN and other jazz artists. 

KMHD General Manager Meg Samples joins us for more details and music.

Tyson Alger, a sports writer who covers UO athletics for Lookout Eugene-Springfield, joins  us for a preview. Alger also writes about the Portland Timbers on his substack, The I-5 Corridor.

The weather pattern known as El Niño is still gathering strength, and climatologists say it could be one of the biggest on record. The phenomenon is caused by rising surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean. The weather pattern is expected to bring big impacts to Oregon come winter. State Climatologist Larry O’Neill says that’s likely to mean warmer and wetter weather. He joins us to tell us more.

The Trump administration is trying to loosen regulations around development projects on historic and culturally significant land. Proposed changes to the National Historic Preservation Act would make it optional for federal agencies to consult with Native American nations about these projects, as reported locally in Underscore Native News. The proposal would also change the definition of a historic property to exclude mountains, rivers and other landscape features that tribes consider sacred or culturally significant.

Crystal Miller is the cultural sovereignty director for the Association on American Indian Affairs. She joins us to talk about what the changes could mean for tribal sovereignty.

Oregon lawmakers passed the Plastic Pollution and Recycling Modernization Act (RMA) in 2021. It was the first law of its kind, putting much of the responsibility to reduce waste on producers and manufacturers. California, Washington, Colorado and a handful of other states have now passed similar laws. The Oregon law took effect July 1, 2025 and the state began collecting fees from producers to expand recycling infrastructure. A recent report highlighted Oregon’s progress in the first year, including dozens of new producer-funded collection sites, 36,000 new recycling carts and $30 million dollars to improve and modernize recycling facilities. 

The National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors sued the state to block the law shortly after it went into effect, but a federal judge has now rejected those arguments and upheld the constitutionality of Oregon’s law. We talk about what’s next with Dan Leif, policy implementation director at The Recycling Partnership, a nonprofit helping municipalities all over the country create and implement these kinds of laws. 

 In 2021, the city of Portland officially legalized living in mobile dwelling units on private property. MDUs include recreational vehicles and tiny homes on wheels, which are different from accessory dwelling units, or ADUs. According to a recent survey reported in Sightline Institute, MDUs have been seeing an increase in popularity since 2020.

Kol Peterson conducted the survey, owns Accessory Dwelling Strategies and is an ADU and MDU expert. He joins us to explain more on MDUs and why they are growing in popularity.

 Kimberly Lining remembers calling the information number on a flyer for a missing Indigenous woman and learning that the photo on the flyer didn’t even belong to the missing woman. The frustration born in that moment led Lining to launch the MMIW Search and Hope Alliance, a group of volunteers she mobilizes to help look for missing Indigenous women and girls. Lining partners with the Oregon State Police, families, tribes and others to help get the word out on social media and in-person searches. We talk to Lining about her work.

After more than a decade, a new facility that aims to spur the development of wave energy technology opened last week off the Oregon Coast. AP first reported the opening of PacWave, which features two sites in the open ocean near Newport where companies can test devices they’re building to convert energy from waves into electricity.  

Oregon State University developed PacWave with $140 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Energy. It’s the first such testing facility connected to the continental U.S. energy grid and is pre-permitted. Director Dan Hellin says that can save companies time and money since they don’t need to secure additional state and federal approval for testing, which he expects to start next summer. The Bonneville Power Administration has an exclusive agreement with OSU to buy all the electricity generated by PacWave.    

But hurdles remain. As OPB’s “All Science, No Fiction” previously reported, companies trying to develop this technology have hit federal funding delays. The Trump administration has also cancelled offshore and solar wind projects, raising concerns about the future of renewables in the U.S.  

Hellin joins us for a discussion. 

Sutter spent a week hearing from dozens of residents in places like Cave Junction and Grants Pass, from frontline healthcare workers to medically vulnerable seniors and business owners. Sutter joins us to share some of those perspectives and the toll worsening wildfire smoke is taking on the tight-knit communities he visited and wrote about in his recently published story. 

Since 2015, almost every year a child in the faith-healing sect Followers of Christ in Idaho have died from a treatable condition. That’s according to new reporting from ProPublica.

In Oregon, where Followers of Christ are also present, lawmakers have previously removed faith-healing protections that Idaho has. Authorities in the state say this has led to a reduction of these kinds of incidents as parents are more likely to seek medical care for their children when needed. Audrey Dutton is a reporter for ProPublica. She joins us to share more on her reporting.

How do climate-driven events like wildfires affect tourism in communities like Bend? That’s one of the questions the Oregon State University Sustainable Tourism Lab is trying to answer. A recent analysis examined how wildfire smoke impacted visitor demand. It found that while one or two smoky days may not affect travel plans, people are more likely to reschedule or cancel their trips during prolonged smoke events. 

Todd Montgomery is a hospitality professor at OSU and director of the Sustainable Tourism Lab. Nate Wyeth is the chief of staff for Visit Bend. They both join us to talk more about how climate change is affecting communities that depend on tourism dollars.

This weekend, Portlanders can enjoy food, music, dancing and more with ties to Jewish culture. The Jewish Federation of Greater Portland is putting on its first Jewish cultural festival at Zidell Yards on Sunday. Marc Blattner is the president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland. He joins us to share more on what attendees can expect and why this event is important to have.

Oregon State University will play its first game of the new college football season next Saturday. The Beavers will also be competing this year in an expanded Pac-12 Conference that features six other football teams joining OSU and Washington State University. Gonzaga is also now a member of Pac-12, competing in basketball and other sports.  

The Pac-12’s new roster brings some relief for the future of the 110-year-old athletic conference. OSU and WSU were the only teams left in the Pac-12 after the 2023 football season following the departure of the Oregon Ducks, Washington Huskies and eight other teams for other conferences.  

Fans will be able to see all of the Pac-12 football games this season on broadcast TV or via streaming under media distribution deals the conference secured with CBS, The CW, CBS Sports and USA Network. 

Kevin Griffin is vice president and director of athletics at OSU. He joins us to talk about the new Pac-12 and the team’s prospects this season under new head football coach JaMarcus Shephard.