Patience and social distancing are two requirements for cashing in bottles and cans at Salem’s BottleDrop centers. Customers cash in at the center on Northeast Commercial Street on Friday, May 1. (Amanda Loman/Salem Reporter) Marion County has the fifth-highest amount of past-due rent of any Oregon county, according to a[Read More…]
Tag: SALEM ECONOMY
SALEM ECONOMIC INDEX: Salem sees housing market reach new highs and signs that hiring is picking up
A home is seen under construction on Vine Maple Drive Southeast above a row of completed homes on Thursday, April 8, 2021. (Amanda Loman/Salem Reporter) The housing market in Salem and Keizer remains hot. Fewer people in the Salem area are receiving unemployment benefits, more employers are posting want ads[Read More…]
Oregon’s economy expected to come roaring back from pandemic-induced recession
A ‘Now Hiring’ sign in front of the Boon’s Treasury McMenamin’s location on Monday, April 26. (Amanda Loman/Salem Reporter) With “no real signs of permanent damage or economic scarring” from the pandemic, Oregonians’ incomes are expected to grow and the labor market is expected to return to full health by[Read More…]
Employment Department will bring back job-seeking requirements for laid-off Oregonians
Oregon Employment Department. (Amanda Loman/Salem Reporter) In another sign the pandemic is waning, the Oregon Employment Department announced a shift in requirements for people receiving unemployment benefits: they’ll have to start actively looking for work. David Gerstenfeld, the department’s acting director, made the announcement on a press call Wednesday. While[Read More…]
City adds grant money to help downtown Salem businesses with security
A security camera outside Salem Center mall in downtown. The camera was paid for with a grant from the city. (Jake Thomas/Salem Reporter) The city of Salem’s Urban Renewal Agency has added more money to a grant program that helps businesses pay for security upgrades at their buildings. On Monday,[Read More…]
Throughout the pandemic, the Latino Business Alliance in Salem kept its focus on connections
A pre-pandemic Café Y Pan Dulce, a monthly networking event hosted by the Latino Business Alliance that will resume in May 2021. (Courtesy/Latino Business Alliance) Jose Gonzalez recalled how during the Great Recession of 2008 he and a handful of other business people in Salem’s Latino community came to a[Read More…]
COLUMN: Do official numbers really reflect the Salem area’s economic recovery?
A graph showing employment changes in the Salem area through the last two recessions. (Source: Oregon Employment Department) The most recent Salem area employment report from the Oregon Employment Department provides a snapshot of a full year of the area’s pandemic economy, from March 2020 to March of 2021. The[Read More…]
Oregon Landlord Compensation Fund opens again for applications
An apartment building in Salem (Rachel Alexander/Salem Reporter) For the second time, a state agency will open the floodgates on a grant program meant to help landlords recoup rent that’s gone unpaid because of the pandemic. This time the agency administering the program said it’s fixed the technical glitches that[Read More…]
Legislation seeks to provide Oregon farmers with an alternative to common pesticide
Oregon State Capitol (Caleb Wolf/Special to Salem Reporter) Kathy Freeborn Hadley doesn’t spray her grass seed fields near Salem with chlorpyrifos every season. But when sod webworms burrow into the plant, she said the pesticide is a valuable aid. “We don’t really have an alternative,” she said. “It’s a tool[Read More…]
TIMELINE: A year of business restrictions and closures in Salem
A sign at Capitol Coffee in March 2020 as Salem businesses saw a first round of pandemic restrictions and closures. (Saphara Harrell/Salem Reporter) Starting Friday, April 30, Marion and Polk counties will again face new Covid restrictions, with indoor dining banned and larger gyms, museums and indoor entertainment venues capped[Read More…]
