Grossly unfair!!!

For more than 20 years, I have rented a small studio in the Fine Arts Bldg, which is diagonally across the Peterson store. His store is opposite the Galleria. That area has always been a haven for vagrants from skinheads to the usual homeless people, some mentally ill.

I know Mr Peterson and he has always tried to run a clean location. A few years ago, he put himself at risk when he challenged a suspicious character in the smartpark garage and the guy fired a weapon at him.

The vagrancy occures on both sides of the street but I don't see anyone calling for the closing of the Galleria.

The city is wrong!

By the way, Sho Dozono's restaurant is in the same block and building. I guess you don't get evicted for not paying your rent to the city.

This is really a sad sad state of affairs. When we live in a society where a minimum wage job cannot cover all your necessities, where one hour's work will buy less than 2 gallons of gas, where any sort of criminal record will ensure you never get a livable wage job, or a decent home again....we are bound to see an increase in the 'criminal class' and the generally disinfranchised. No one wants to take responsibility for them, no one wants to look at them, for sure no one wants to help them, and even the cops have the legal means to move them on down the road or arrest them if they so much stop to rest by sitting on the sidewalk, or gather together. This situation has been decades in the making, and we have all had a part in it. How many very well compensated corporate types who work downtown could imagine living on the wages they pay to their service people...secretaries, cleaning crews, the wait people who serve them their two martini lunches and designer coffees? How many times have we approved new laws and regulations that further strain the financial resources of the poor, making it harder for them to make their way through a hard life?

I believe this merchant, Mr. Peterson, should be left alone and allowed to keep his lease and his business. I believe the authorities should deal with those who cause harm to others. But to run a hard working man out of town on a rail because you don't like the look of his 'clients' is wrong wrong wrong. "If thine eye offends thee...." Do unto others, Portland....save your soul.

Once again I suspect those who would like to run the 'unsavory riff raff' off the street along with the merchants who sell to them....are the same people who worship at the 'right' temples and will write fat checks to charity and be thankful they never have to lay eyes on the recipients of their largesse.

Peterson has been ordered to close his store in the city-owned SmartPark garage at Southwest 10th Avenue and Yamhill Street by Aug. 15 after complaints about the clientele.</i?

I guess the city never received my 15 complaints about the clientele that the Galleria was attracting? I told them that those no good pretentious new-money yuppies would create havoc and destroy affordable housing but they didn't listen.

Speaking as someone who is often in the area around 3-4am, I can tell you that it's the building design more than the business. Both the Yamhill and Morrison sides of the building offer significant shelter from rain, and at the corners and the Yamhill side, wind.

If Peterson's business is such a problem, how come people aren't demanding his eviction from 1st & Yamhill, or 4th & Alder?

If Peterson's business is such a problem, how come people aren't demanding his eviction from 1st & Yamhill, or 4th & Alder?

Because Brooks Brothers isn't going in across from either of those locations.

This seriously pisses me off. Talk about sticking it to the little guy.

Peterson's: a great place for shoplifting. Wonderful for a meth-head...come in, buy a package of crackers, steal a couple bottles of wine. Great deal!

The City has that huge parking structure with street level retail space to either side of the convenience store, but can't keep it leased. Besides Peterson's smelly, convenience store/shoplifting center, what other reason might there be for this?

I'm pretty sure the police log has some interesting reports from over the years related to incidents the police have had to respond to due to fights and disputes between people hanging around Peterson's doors.

Peterson might be a fine person and businessman, but that type of store is probably just not compatible with the best use for that area. The city should make Peterson a fair deal and have him move on.

This is appalling and disgusting. Peterson runs a perfectly fine store.

On what do you base this? Peterson's media blitz over the last few weeks?

This store has been a problem spot for years. And no, Doug Peterson is not the victim here. He has been asked, repeatedly, to help solve some of the problems. He has either ignored those requests or flat-out refused. Other merchants in the area have begged him to help clean up the area so they can survive. He has refused. They've pleaded with him to ask his staff to call police to report crimes. He shrugs.

If you spent much time outside his store, you would see public intoxication, fights, public urination, and vomiting on the sidewalk -- all from customers that go in and out of his store. After years of frustration from Peterson's total lack of interest in helping to solve the problem, other merchants (not just Brooks Brothers) asked the City to throw him out. This was not done lightly, but Peterson brought it on himself. He's playing the martyr now, and you've all bought into it.

Is Doug Peterson the cause of homelessness in Portland? Of course not. But there is a socially responsible way to run your business, and an irresponsible way that focuses solely on the bottom line. Peterson doens't give a shit about anyone else in that area, only his own sales. It's long past time for the city to close down that store. If he's such an upstanding businessman, I'm sure a private landlord will step forward with space to lease. (And if they don't, maybe that says something about Doug Peterson.)

I've shopped in the store from time to time, but not regularly enough to pass judgment on the owner or his practices. Having said that I will state that putting another business in the this one's place, whether another convenience store or some other business, will not cause the problems to go away. As others here have pointed out, its the end of the free MAX line downtown, the building itself provides shelter from the wind/rain and people are naturally going to congregate there.

This smells a lot like NIMBY to me. Closing Peterson's won't fix the problems. Keep Peterson's open and deal with the problems.

My sister's company (from Boston)is going to hold thier annual meeting in Portland sometime next year. However, Portland almost lost this little shindig because of my sister's company concerns of areas on the Max lines like Petersen's store. I think they petitioned the city to do something sbout those areas or say bye-bye to the meeting and the lots of money the event will bring to Portland.

My fiance is visiting Portland right now. She lives in Canada. She has been repeatedly acosted at the stop in question during some of her first visits here and does not ride the Max past Pioneer Courthouse Square now. To go to the zoo, we take a bus or drive to there - it scares her that much. So much, she has warned other potemtil visitors to Portland not to take Max past Pioneer Square.

The store has been a magnet for the parasitic bums and street creeps for years. About time they did something with it. It will hopefully make Max safer to ride as well.

"As others here have pointed out, its the end of the free MAX line downtown, the building itself provides shelter from the wind/rain and people are naturally going to congregate there."

Just because it is there does not entitle one to use it as their personal toilet or bathroom or anything else. Those parasitic bums abuse the access to that building. Removing the store will remove any abusive excuse the bums have to loiter there in the first place.

Well, it depends on what they put in its place, but even if it lessens the problem, it won't eliminate it. The location and type of building in and of themselves will invite vagrancy and problems. And no, I don't think people have a right to abuse others or use the building premises as a toilet. It just feels like a lot of people are indicating that if you close Peterson's---voila!---the homeless and indigent that spend time hanging around there are going to disappear...not gonna happen. Peterson's may exacerbate the problem, but it doesn't create it, that's all I'm trying to say.

The creeps and bums tend to hang out and congregate at places where there is a lot of foot traffic (Petersens, Starbucks, McDonalds, ect). When you eliminate that heavy traffic, they will move on like the parasites they are to another local they can abuse. They are everywhere and you can't get rid of them - and we eventually end up just moving them to another high traffic area where they can puke on each other in blissful, ignorant harmony.

Enough already with the 'parasites' name calling. Some of the people hanging around Peterson's doors may be trouble makers, shoplifters and drug addicts, but they're still people, and we're not improving conditions to think of them as less than that.

Ms Mel Harmon...main reasons why people are hanging out around Petersons: alcohol, cigarettes, crack snacks, shoplifting potential, convenient hours. They may still hang around the building for the shelter its overhangs offer if Peterson's is gone, but are far less likely to if all the aforementioned essentials of street life go missing from that location.

I do feel sorry for the person whose fiancee is nervous about downtown and the Galleria stop on the MAX line. May I suggest that she never go to Europe, much less Amsterdam on a Friday or Saturday? She'd be paralyzed with fear. Even more so for the person whose sister's company is afraid to come here.

Seriously, I encountered rougher situations this last week in Amsterdam. I might also point out that Amsterdam has public urinals set out in the Leidseplein to accommodate the hordes of what some here are calling the undesirable (in some of these cases drunken tourists, not just street people).

I do know that I've never had a pickpocketing attempt made here when riding public transit--and I foiled one last week in Amsterdam. If a person is that frightened and nervous about iffy urban situations, well, then, they probably won't like to go to places like Amsterdam.

To Local Merchant~

Give me a break!!! You say "They've pleaded with him to ask his staff to call police to report crimes. He shrugs." That is down right BS and you know it!!! Everyone of those employee's call the police or downtown clean and safe when something is going on outside the store, on PUBLIC streets....So, should we close down Starbucks in Pioneer Square? What about Nordstroms? City Hall? The Library? This is not a Doug Peterson problem this is a City problem that has carried to the homeless and have done nothing about it!!! You also state... "But there is a socially responsible way to run your business, and an irresponsible way that focuses solely on the bottom line." Really??? The stores DO NOT carry products that would "attract" the homeless....You are just jealous that he makes more then you!!!! :) Seriously, you might be next to get evicted!!!!

To Eric Parker~

OK...seriously!?!? Your statement "The store has been a magnet for the parasitic bums and street creeps for years. About time they did something with it. It will hopefully make Max safer to ride as well." So, closing down Peterson's will make Max safer to ride!!!! I don't care who you are but that is funny!!!! Wow, you probably should advise your sister and her company and your fiance not to go to LA or NY either!!! I have heard those places are pretty dangerous too!!!! Get a life dude!!!!!!