September 08, 2004

City Club Of Portland Moves To Increase Its Accessibility

Seeks To Become 'Part Of The Day-To-Day Civic Landscape Of The City'

When we first read The Elements of Journalism by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel, we became rather enamored of their description of the lobbies of newspaper buildings in the 1800s, as part of their chapter discussing journalism as a public forum, and following upon a short bit about the forum function of editorial pages.

... Publishers also kept the forum concept alive in more elementary ways. By 1840 the Houston Star was among the first to make its lobby more than an entryway into the newsroom; it became an open salon for the public. Residents were encouraged not only to come by but to help themselves to "a good glass, an interesting paper and a pleasant cigar." In many cases, the tradition of the newspaper lobby as an inviting public reading room and salon continued for more than another hundred years. ...

(Incidentally, we could not recall where in the book this passage was to be found. Thanks to the wonders of the Web, we discovered that Amazon's "search inside this book" feature was enabled on their listing for this particular book, and a quick search for "lobby" yielded us the proper location.)

Everything old at some point in time becomes new again. If the intended schedule holds, this long-lost concept of lobby-as-forum will be resurrected in November when the City Club of Portland moves from its current location isolated on the tenth floor of the Loyalty Building at SW 3rd and Alder, and into its new location at street-level in the Pittock Block at SW 9th and Washington.

Loyalty Building (SW 3rd and Alder)

Pittock Block (SW 9th and Washington)

In its press release late last month announcing its impending move, the City Club's executive director, Wendy Radmacher-Willis, explained that the new space will continue to host the various discussions, receptions, meetings, and committees the Club currently holds in its Loyalty Building offices. But it will also offer space for events they sometimes have had to hold elsewhere, and puts the Club closer to the Governor Hotel, to which they recently moved their Friday Forum series.

But to come back to the matter of accessibility, the August press release also announced that the new location will include Cafe Viola "a new retail coffee and lunch spot." Says Rachmacher-Willis: "We hope that our members and friends will not only come to the Club for scheduled events, but that they will also just drop by for a cup of coffee and good conversation."

Earlier today we received a quick tour of the new location and an overview of the renovation plans. For those unfamiliar with the Pittock Block, it lies directly to the west of O'Bryant Square ("supposedly near the clearing where W.C. Overton and Asa Lovejoy agreed to found a town in 1843"), which opens up the possibiltiy of the City Club offering outdoor programming or events adjacent to their new offices. If a plan to offer free wireless Internet access at Cafe Voila, the move could also be an opportuntiy to expand Portland's community connectivity (shades of accessibility) into the Square.

Some time ago, readers may recall, we attended a pair of what the City Club were terming "citizen salons" -- fundraising dinners intended to generate lively discussion about all things Portland. Asked today if the intent of the presence of a cafe was to open up the possibility of spontaneous mini-salons, Radmacher-Willis agreed.

Via email earlier this week, she described the vision: "I am hopeful that Club members and other citizens will see the Club as more of a drop-in destination," she said. "Because the pressures on people's time are so great, I want members and others who want to think about and discuss public issues to feel free to drop by when they have time, see who's around, and getting into a spirited conversation about our community life."

Back in May, when we first posted about the salon fundraisers, some readers here questioned the City Club allegedly for being an elitist organization. We ourselves didn't quite buy the argument (nor did others of our readers), but in some sense, whether intentionally or not, the City Club's move should directly challenge that image, both in symbol and substance.

While the Club's core mission "to inform its members and the community in public matters, and to arouse in them the realization of the obligations of citizenship" will remain the same, what we've seen so far of the vision behind their move to the Pittock Block suggests a continuing move towards an ethic of accessibility -- a term, perhaps not so coincidentally, we coined as a result of a common theme repeatedly raised at one of the above-mentioned City Club salons.

One final note on the City Club's mission of icnreased accessiblity: It is expected that the Club's website will also undergo a renovation, in order to "provide additional ways for members and other citizens to engage with ideas, issues, and each other." And yes, since some of you might be wondering, that will include the introduction of a City Club of Portland weblog.

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